After a somewhat disappointing last 70.3 in Boise the plan was to execute the same strategy again. Target 250 watts on the bike and start the run with a 6:15min/mile. Before the race I talked to my coach and asked him when the race starts. (meaning, when should I start focus on competition). His answer was the race “is on” at mile two of the half marathon. Normally, in longer races I only focus on competition during the last few miles. Based on my good durability this is changing now.
Swim:
I lined up on the far right on the swim opposite side than the buoy line. I was hopping that there would be a few fast people around me but less of a struggle for space. Once the race started I noticed that I was leading the right side and all the fast swimmers were on the left. It felt great for once to be aware of my surroundings ahead of the average swimmers, rather than being overwelmed and fighting for space. But still I had to merge over to the fast swimmers as soon as possible to find some fast feet. I found some quick feet to draft overtook many people from the previous waves and finished the swim in 30:51 which is a new PR!
T1:
I struggled a little to get the wetsuit off but all in all was pretty quick.
Bike:
Right out of transition I was with lots of other riders and as it turns out I didn’t tighten my aerobottle with the Velcro strap. After trying to fix it while riding the first few miles I had to stop and tie it up. This didn’t take more than 30 seconds but was still annoying. Once that was done I started to focus on my target watts.
At the start of the bike
But there were too many people around, which often meant people rode into each others drafting zones and were forced to overtake the person in front and once they did that they would slow down which would than again force someone behind that to overtake. It was fairly annoying especially every single time when I went ahead in front I could be sure that some other guy would overtake me. My guess was that most if not all of them were riding outside of their zones since I didn’t see a single one of them later in the ride again. Eventually, I broke loose of them and had like 10-15miles almost riding alone. I thought it was going to be a race like Boise were I rode mostly alone. Oh was I wrong. Somewhere around mile 20 mile a big packs of rider overtook me and that pack kept growing while we caught up with other riders. Many people were riding clean in that group but there were also many who were constantly riding to close more like 2-3 bike length rather than 4 and than obviously a few who were just blatantly drafting. I wished a referee would come by, but I had to wait till mile 40 for that. For a while I was caught in that group which meant I was riding close to 300 watts when I was forced to overtake people than to ride below 200 watts when someone overtook me and I had to fall back. So definitely not the ideal situation. I decided to fall back and ride behind the group. At around 40 miles a referee came by and started riding with me since I was slightly behind the group. That cause the group to split up somewhat since they must have heard the noise. Than the referee rode ahead, I’m not sure if penalty were handed out or not, but the motorcycle was riding next to the group for a long time until the group was well spaced out. Than the referee went ahead to pull aside and fall back to do it all over again. So we pretty much had a referee with us for like 15 miles of the ride and I loved it!
Interestingly enought on the last few climbs around mile 50. People were already starting to slow, I started to overtake more and more people from that group. My stomach was holding up well and based on my time (I was slightly ahead) I decided to skip one gel.
I finished the bike in 2:37:08 averaging 239 watts. Interesting fact is my maximum speed, on one of the downhills 83km/h (51miles/h).
T2:
The weather was fairly cold since the sun hadn’t burned through the clouds yet. I noticed I had cold feet but didn’t know how bad it was until I jumped of the bike barefoot. It was a long transition run on bad surface and my feet were hurting. Mental not for next time, run this part with shoes on 🙂
Run:
I started off feeling strong but I tried to hold back to not go faster than a 6:15 pace for the first mile. I noticed one guy right out of transition just running slightly faster than me. At mile 1 he had a 50 yard lead on me. I closed that gap over the next couple hundred yards and than run with him for the first loop. We had a quick chat where I told him that I wasn’t in the same age group (his calf said 42) and we also agreed on pace. We were running just slightly below a 6:15 pace. It was hard but I was in controll and I felt great. I finished the first loop in about 42min. Due to the lack of blood in my brain I had a hard time to estimate my run split. I eventually realized that I was on course for a sub 1:25 half marathon. This was really exciting to me since my previous best 1:27 was from Texas 70.3 on a flat course. At the start of the second loop I decided to push the pace a little just slightly, so I overtook that runner and signed him to stay with me, hoping that he would help to push the pace but he quickly lost me. Only a mile later around mile 8 a guy from my age group which I overtook started following me. I figured he must have noticed that we are in the same age group. He helped me to maintain the fast for the next 2 miles. For a while I started to doubt myself if I could keep that pace and that this guy could beat me. But I forced myself to focus on execution and kept pushing. Shortly after that he fell back and I overtook a couple more from my age group which clearly could not keep up with my pace. Around mile 10 I started to push even harder, I was running a 6min/mile on the flat parts. The pace was getting really hard to maintain since I was getting tired. Especially, uphill required a lot of mental effort to not slow down. Eventually, I pushed myself over the last hill and finished the last mile in a 5:47min/mile. It just felt great! I finished with a new half marathon PR (in an 70.3) with 1:22:01. I am so proud of that time. It is my the 3rd fastest half marathon to date and only a little over 3 min slower than my current open PR.
Thanks to the whole TN Multisport crew who was out there cheering me on!
Result:
I finished 45th overall and 7th in my age group. Best place so far. As in Boise I once again would have gotten a roll down slot for the 70.3 World championship, but decided to leave early. Apparently it rolled down way past the 20th place.
This race was also special since Amy was racing too. She also had a great day and did an amazing performance. I’ll put another guest post up soon…
Thats awesome!! Great job!