We can thank Hurricane Ike for the lousy weather for the weekend in Muskoka. (Muskoka is about 2 hours north of Toronto). Saturday was overcast, but dry. As part of the local festivities, Lori ran in the Terry Fox 5K charity run. Her highlight was when Craig Alexander, IM Champion pulled off the course, (due to his 3 year old daughter) and she was able to pass him. So, now she can say she beat him, due to his DNF.
This was a first year event as an IM 70.3 event. They had over 1600 entries, but it really didn't feel like the normal insanity of an IM event. It was very well organized and the registration was pretty quick. They had a welcome dinner and they asked if this was anyones first ever triathlon. One guy stood up and the group let out a collective giggle.... I can only wonder what this guy thought. The logistics were a bit tough for anyone not staying at the resort. You had to park offsight for everything and take a shuttle to the complex. Kind of a pain, considering it is almost a one lane road into the area. The area is a lot like Lake Placid.
The funny thing was I had no anxiety due to no expectations for the event, my time or place. It's amazing the different feeling of a HIM vs. IM. As I've been saying recently, you can recover from a HIM and not worry, because if you do poorly, you can come back and race one within a couple of weeks. That was my approach on race day, when I realized I brought the wrong bike/wheels for the conditions (AKA, knife to a gun fight). The rain was coming down at 5:30 in the am and this is where you think, I've been here before, it will pass....(WRONG!)
My bike tech at work.Swim/Race Start: The water was 68F. Felt more like 62. It was chilly. Not cold enough to suck away your breath, but your digits felt it. I wore a long sleeve wetsuit and that was the right call. They had wave starts and we were the 4th to go off. We were the 2nd largest wave(40-44). The course was a down, back and right turn. Kind of a backwards "P." It was pretty smooth sailing. I was out around 38 minutes (2:00/100' avg.) Not bad for a 300 person wave and the fact I was catching guys in the wave in front of us. No-not the pros.
The worst part was the almost km run to the tranisition, that was straight up hill. Kind of like the helix at IMWI. Does wonders for your T1 time. I saw Lori and PJ on the hill and it is always great to see loved ones to remind me of why I do it. Considering the conditions, I'm lucky they showed up. But, PJ didn't look any worse for the wear. He s eems to love all the commotion and excitement. Not sure he liked his body mark though.
Bike: Due to roads, the course was actually 58 miles, not the normal 56 for a HIM. (Not that it mattered). About 5 miles into it, my brain switched to long training day. I was scared to death on the bike. I don't normally like riding in the rain. But to do it in a Tri bike, which is inheritantly front heavy and twitchy and a deep dish rim on the front (with strong cross winds in the valleys) all I wanted to do was get home safely. There were some downhills where I was riding the brakes doing 35 mph and the bike started to get squirrelly, it is hard to get comfortable. So, I stuck to my power/pacing goal and just free spun up the hills while others ground it out. This paid off some, but I was getting quickly surpassed on the downhills. This is clearly a course where a road bike geometry would be better suited with strap on airbars and a shallow rim. Live and learn. But, this is why my time approached 3:15 on a course that normally I should ride around 3 hours. Part of the ride was horrible for about 5 miles where they just threw down gravel on top of ashpalt. It would have been better for a cyclocross bike. I'm surprised there were no flats during this portion. However, I did hear one guy blow out behind me at one spot. It never ceases to amaze me the number of flats in a major race. Why don't these people put new rubber on their wheels? My nutrition: One bottle of Perpetuem and 3/4 of a Powerbar. (In hindsight, not enough)
T2: Nothing eventful. Quick in, but had to change socks. The others were soaking wet. Along with all else I owned. One interesting note was the RD had us set up like a normal tri, not your normal IM bagged transition. So, we got to put our stuff in plastic trash bags in our tranisition, so my run stuff was "partially" dry to start.
Run: OMG...where did these hills come from? It wasn't the uphills, but the downs that made me hurt on Monday. By sticking with my power/pace, I was able to gain a handful of AG spots back on the run. I wanted to run 8's for the run, but in hindsight, I was still alittle undernourished, in spite of all my planning. In the final 5k, I think some of the lake water I had taken in was starting to affect me and I was pushed to a brisk walk up the hills and jog on the flats and downs. Run time was just over 2 hours. I saw my fan club near the end of the run and was very happily surprised. PJ was again soaking it all in. Lori is pretty good about picking me out of a crowd. Even though she says I need to wear something more brighter colored. She saw me on the drive to the shuttle bus and thankfully I was running at that point!
It rained non stop for the entire run. I had thoughts of Jeff E at IMLP this year and the exact thought I had was I'm glad this wasn't a full distance and that I've decided to focus on HIM's for the next few years. For having my maximum training week of approximately 8 hours during my summer a finish of 6 hours total is just fine with me!
Overall finish was 558, AG was 88th out of 166. (There must have been a bunch of DNS/DNF's- because 240 were registered in the AG) A top third or half finish is always respectable considering other "life" issues. If I was a pro, this would be work, not FUN! (And I'd be broke!)
The main takeaways from this event:
1. Thank your crew and loved ones and volunteers. They put up with this grumpy guy before, during and after. There was good crowd support for a small town event. This was a big deal for Muskoka.
Coach and his "Fan Club"
3. You can be somewhat competitive on a reasonable training schedule of less than 10 hours per week. This was my goal, considering we have a young one in the family and I still have to work every day.
4. On hilly courses, I'm now going with a road bike modified for tri. Every hilly course has had rain and I couldn't get comfortable. This event had probably half the bikes set up in this configuration. Very few discs and deep dish rims.
