So, we had beautiful weather on Saturday on Belle Isle for the 3 Disciplines Great Pumpkin Duathlon. For those who have never done an event on the river, you will always have a headwind and always have a tailwind at some point. I was looking for a test to see how I will do in the upcoming final season event in Wilmington. That is a flat course half Ironman. Saturday's event was an Olympic distance duathon with 5k run/40k bike/10k run. My last bike on the island was at the Motor City Tri relay where I completed the bike portion and averaged about 20+ mph. I was hoping my training would show some progress on that result. I'm happy to report it did!
Cadence is green, power is yellow, speed is blue.....
Here is the ideal bike set up for a flat course. I finally broke down and bought the aero helmet. Not sure how much it helped, but I gained 2 mph somewhere. I'm sure it's part of the equation. It was actually pretty comfortable. Note the disc cover over my Powertap hub. This is the cat's meow! You can race with a training rim and put a $80 cover for races. Best bang for the buck. (This was compliments of my swim/bike buddy Jeff Howard. Thanks man!)
I'd attribute it to a couple of items. I've been working on my power based training and following the protocol layed out by the experts. My functional threshold power at the last test was 245. So, for Saturday, I aimed to hold 220 watts for the bike leg. It was 4 loops of the island, each about 5+ miles. You'll notice on the power chart here were we had the head wind and tail winds by the increase in speed(tailwind) and decrease in power. Then when we made the turn, the power went up and speed went down (headwind). The Powertap (and disc cover) forces you to not go too hard or too easy depending on the weather conditions. It's a great tool for pacing, especially on the first lap. If I were to have raced by Perceived effort, I'd have blown up at the end, similar to what I did at Motor City. Here I was fresh enough to get off and run a 10k with an average of under 8 minute miles(7:50's). The bike leg time was 1:01 which equates to 22.9 mph average. I was very happy with this improvement over the July event. Which means this should translate well to the half in 3 weeks. The more I work with and study Power training on the bike, the more clear it is that it is a necessity on anything over a sprint distance triathlon. (I only had 1 guy pass me on the bike.) I won't race without it now and I'm recommending it for all of my athletes I'm coaching.
Here is the ideal bike set up for a flat course. I finally broke down and bought the aero helmet. Not sure how much it helped, but I gained 2 mph somewhere. I'm sure it's part of the equation. It was actually pretty comfortable. Note the disc cover over my Powertap hub. This is the cat's meow! You can race with a training rim and put a $80 cover for races. Best bang for the buck. (This was compliments of my swim/bike buddy Jeff Howard. Thanks man!)
End of the day...3rd in age group, 12th overall. Good day for racing. Fall Duathlons are always very competitive and make you feel good with the small, but competitive fields.
PJ demonstrating proper aero technique.....
