Hagg Lake Sprint 7/2004

July , 2004
Hagg Lake, OR
.5m swim/12.5m bike/5k run

Okay, grab your coffee cause this could be a long one. So I did 3 races last summer at 285lbs: the swim and bike of a triathlon relay; the Danskin Sprint in Seattle and the Danskin in NYC which had the swim cancelled due to weather so it was a turned into a duathlon. I've got several sprints and an Olympic planned for this summer but as I'm sitting in my WW meeting it occurs to me:

#1 For all my excitement about triathlon and my plans for longer distance racing, to this point I've only actually finished 1 full sprint.

#2 All of my races last year were Women Only so this would be my first co=ed race

#3 It's been 9 months since I've been on the starting line for anything resembling a tri, eeekkkkkkk

Being the master of recon (a skill I learned from ER) I went to the course on Monday since I was off work. My friend Karie (this would be her 1st race) and I got in the water only to discover there was lots of mud and it was pretty cold without a wetsuit. Then we asked some other "racer" types about the bike course and they said it's clockwise so we rode the course clockwise. What do you know it turns out that it's counter clockwise. This would normally be no big deal except this course is refered to as "challenging" which is an understatement since it's more hilly than anything I've ridden before. Double Yikes!

So every hill we'd gone down on the recon we'd now have to go up etc. All week I was secretly stressed about this race because I hate hills, I suck at them and I have questionable balance so if I can't make it up a hill dismounting 1/2 way up usually leads to tipping over :( Anyway, went to packet pickup yesterday, packed my race bag, got my bottles filled etc and went out to dinner with DH. I had mashed potatoes and 2 chicken strips, yummy :) Watched the TDF and tried to go to bed early - 10pm

Drat, can't sleep. Tri dreams flying through my head, I'm thinking about the course and this HUGE 1 mile long hill that is steep and seems to never end. Ugh, what if I tip over, what if I tip over and someone is behind me etc. Finally get to sleep at 11:30pm. Alarm goes off at 5:30am and I'm thinking, cr%p I have to do a triathlon on 6hrs of sleep.

Get dressed in my sweet red tri-suit (TK tri-suit is having zipper replaced), double check gear, have 1/2 banana and 1/2 PB&J, get Preston up and we're out the door. ER - I totally hear you on the 1 pc tri-suit thing as I had to go 2x before we left. Get to the garage and finally need to "go" whew, run back upstairs and then we're really on our way.

The race is 45min away from our house so despite being stuck in road construction we get to the race site at about 6:45am, get body marked, rack my bike, set up transition area and wait for Karie to arrive, she does, we chat for awhile, then it's back to the bathroom again. Can you tell I hydrated well yesterday? :) Mill around transition area and run into several people I rode with on the Century as well as a few people who recognize me from the Tri Clinic where I spoke in February, cool :)

Since this is an Olympic and a Sprint, it's time for the Oly people to get underway so we head to the beach and watch as mass confusion ensues because the announcer doesn't know which buoys everyone is supposed to swim too. Race Delay and finally the Oly waves are off. I'm in the 3rd wave of the Sprint and before I know it it's 8:40 and my wave is in the box, then we're in the water and (insert airhorn here) We're Off!

Woo Hoo! I've been doing really well on my swimming especially in the OW so I felt really good and despite going slightly off course (D'oh, note to self: work on sighting) I rounded the final buoy and headed toward shore. The finish of the swim was extremely slippery and muddy so I swam til my hand touched the mud and then I carefully stood up and mde my way through the sludge to the mat. Felt good, walked the 500yds to T1 to ensure my HR was in check.

Swim (800yds) - 21.50 (201/226) Not too bad

Found my bike and tried to wipe my feet off which was difficult to do since some guy had racked his bike very close to mine and I couldn't really get to my towel. Grrrrr. Helmet on, sunglasses on, 2 pkts GU in my pocket, now for the bike shoes. Oh boy, talk about tough to put on with wet and muddy feet. Just switched 1 month ago to new cycling shoes with velcro and carbon soles. Nice but tough to put on. Finally ready to go, jog with my bike to the mount area.

T1: 4:08 must work on this

Now for the sucky part of the day. The bike. I love biking, I just did 100m ride, I've biked up Mt Hood but dangit this bike course freaked me out. 1/8m into the course and you have to go up a super steep driveway to get out of the parking area. I knew this ahead of time and downshifted in time, climbed it okay, now we're on our way. Suprisingly the first part of the course is flat/molehills so I gathered as much speed as I could and at times was sustaining 23MPH on the flats. Drank some Gatorade, water and took a GU at mile 4. The course wasn't closed to traffic so there was the occasional car to look out for but really I was just seeing lots of Oly distance people fly past me in their Aerobars (they had to do 2 loops). Worked on some of the more moderate hills, downshifted at the right times and just kept the mantra that slow and steady is the best way to go. Okay, here comes "The Hill", Karie has finally caught up to me (I beat her in the swim and out of T1) so I tell her "you're a better climber than me, so make sure to pass me", she said okay and I started up the hill and the funny thing is she never passed me :) This is funny because I rule on the flats and descents but she kicks my butt on the hills so I was pretty happy that I was going strong. Now mind you strong on the hill is 5-6MPH but shoot, there were people walking and I was still pedaling so I'll take it.

Lots of fast people passed me on this hill and as I noted this was my first co-ed course so I was nervous about guys flying past me or coming up on me without the "On your left" warning. In fact nearly every guy I rode past shouted encouragement which made me feel tough and helped me feel like it was no big deal to do a co-ed race. Many more hills including 3 more at 6MPH but 1 super fast descent where I got up to 38MPH - WOO HOO!

The roads were really cr*ppy so I felt like I was riding on a rumble strip half the time but no mechanical issues so that was good. Passed the first Oly man at the turn around of the 10k (I was still on the bike), dang those guys are fast! One final killer short hill til you plummet down that first hill out of the parking area to the dismount.

Bike (12.95m) - 54:56 Average Speed 13.9 (206/226) Awesome, considering the difficulty of the course.

Jogged my bike to the rack, gloves were already off, helmet and glasses off, rack bike, cycling shoes off, socks and running shoes on, swig some Gatorade from bottle as I grab additional pkt of GU, race belt and IronGirl visor :) Karie came in behind me off the bike but for a 1st timer she smoked me on the transitions and was out of T2 ahead by about 1000yds.

T2 - 2:57

Of course the run course starts up that huge hill out of the parking lot but I ran Karie down, again odd since she's a faster runner than me and we ran together awhile. Made it to the first mile marker and she's starting to walk, feeling tired, sore legs etc so I give her 1 of my GU pkts, we get some water at the aid stations and I try to get her running again. I like having someone to talk to so I stayed with her and we walked the hills and more of the flats than I would have liked but it's her first race and I wanted her to feel good at the end.

We get to the turnaround, I have 1/2 my remaining GU pkt chased with some water and we're jogging again. Lots of encouragement from other racers which is awesome and once we turned around I was cheering on those that were behind us. Remembered to thank the Volunteers for being out there and we kept going. At this point I know I'm 1 mile from the finish and I suddenly realize I have the potential to beat my time from my first triathlon on a course that is 10x harder so I'm like sweet. Start jogging again. Still walking the uphills as that's just an energy saver per my doctor who's an IM.

Karie's about 200yds ahead of me as we go up the final hill and then run towards the finish line. I always sprint the finish, in fact I train to have a tiny bit of energy for the final sprint. I turn it on and sprint down the last stretch and through the finish line just 8 seconds behind Karie.

WOO HOO! Finished. I look at my watch and know I'm within 5 seconds of my Danskin time. Sweet! Get my medal, take off my chip and head to my bike to pack my stuff up.

Run (5k) - 42:52 (222/225) Yikes! Run time has greatly improved as I'm under a 14 min mile but geesh I lost like 20 spots during the run.

Final Time - 2:06.43 (207/212) 5 seconds slower than my time at Danskin which is negligable and on a course 10x harder PLUS I felt totally fine.

Last year I felt like I was going to die at the end of the triathlon, this year I felt like I'd just done a good training day. Legs felt fine, HR stayed pretty good other than during the climbs and all in all I felt strong and happy to have finished my first triathlon of the summer on a tough co-ed course. Waited to see the results because you just never know how many Athenas there are and if by some miracle you might get an award you want to be there. Top 3 place and Karie beat me by 8 seconds taking the #3 spot. Oh well, I wasn't racing for an award today.

My next sprint is in 2 weeks on a completely flat and fast course (assuming the wind is light) so I am looking to smoke my time there and hopefully break into the awards :) Biking on the flats is my best thing so I am going to go for broke and hope for the best.

Thanks for reading, this was a great race and I exceeded my expectations in many ways. Went out to breakfast after but only ate 1/2 my meal which was strange then took a 2 hour nap and had chinese food (I never eat this because of the pts and again could eat less than 1/2 so that was good)

Since I've been up since 5:30am I'll end this with the side note than it's all mental and if we want to do something no matter how much it freaks you out if you focus, plan and execute you can do anything :)