What a Summer!

Well I just finished my 4th Olympic distance triathlon of this season! I got a little aggressive in my season planning and scheduled 15 events from March to November of this year:

Shamrock Half Marathon
Monument Ave 10k
Susan G. Komen 5k
Power Sprint Triathlon
Xterra Sport
I Love the Tavern Triathlon
Muddy Buddy - Richmond
NYC Triathlon
Waterboy Duathlon
Chicago Triathlon
Rock n Roll Half Marathon
The Nation's Triathlon
Naylors Beach Triathlon
Richmond Sprint Triathlon
NYC Marathon

It has been a lot of fun, but almost a little stressful with trying to fit the kid's schedules and work and training in. I really enjoy the Olympic distance, 1500m swim, 40k bike, 10k run, it is long enough that you really have to train for it to even finish, but a distance that you can really push yourself during.

It has been an amazing sophomore year of my running/triathlon new found passion. I will give a quick recap of the races this year:
Shamrock Half Marathon - Cool and rainy weather, set a new PR of 1:52!
Monument Ave 10k - Set a new 10k PR of 48:11!
Susan G. Komen 5k - Set a new 5k PR of 22:53! 6th in my AG.
PowerSprint Triathlon - Improved my race time from last year by 6 mins and place 4th in my AG.
Xterra Sport - Improved my time from last year by 20 mins and place 32nd overall.
I Love the Tavern - Was my WORST race last year, thought I was going to DNF on the swim. This year I improved my time by 19 mins and placed 61st overall!
NYC Triathlon - Great Swim, Great Bike, Terrible Run, heat index was over 100, both legs cramped up in Central Park, finished in 2:43, not my goal but a couple of times during the run I doubted if I would finish at all!
Waterboy Duathlon - Run Swim Run a fun event, that is a lot tougher than you would think! I improved my time by 4 mins over last year and place 10th overall.
Chicago Triathlon - A great race in a great city! The swim was all out war, with about 250 in my wave all starting in a swim lane that was not much wider than a regular lap pool. The bike was up and back on Lake Shore Drive, incredible scenerey, too bad the road was in such bad shape. The run was down the lakefront, past the museums, Soldier Field and McCormak Place, back to a finish in Grant Park. I had a very solid race, 2:33:37, missed my goal by 3:37! Placed 626th overall out of about 9,000.
Rock and Roll Half Marathon - Not fully recovered from Chicago, I stupidly tried for a new PR on my half marathon time. I went out in blistering heat and humidty with the 1:45 pace group, who started out too fast. By the 5k mark I new I had to slow down some, by 10k I wasnt sure I was going to be able to finish. Miles 6-10 were hell. By mile 10 I knew I only had 3.1 to go, so I sucked it up and ran hard. Instead of a new PR, I survived with a lousy time of 1:58:14 six minutes slower than my half this spring! Oh well live an learn, you have to adjust your goals for the conditions and your body.
The Nation's Triathlon - 1.5k swim in the potomac, 40k bike through DC and Maryland, 10k run finish on Pennsylvania Ave with the Capital bldg behind you. After a rough start (flat tire in trasistion, left wetsuit in hotel and had to go back) The race went really well. 2:36:22 put me in the top 12% overall.

That brings me to today's race Naylor's Beach. A 1.5k swim in the Rappohanock river, 26 mile bike through the Northern Neck, and a 10k run. I had heard how challenging this swim can be and stories of the tough bike course. I had a great swim, probably the best I have felt during an Oly distance swim this year, came out in good position and hit the bike course. At mile 7.5 there is a monster hill. I climbed that, passing a number of people as I did, and was hammering the flats at 22-24 mph. Had a great race going until about mile 12, when I realized that my front tire was going flat! Damn, I pulled over hopped off and like a NASCAR pit crew got the front tire off an opened my saddle bag. I pulled out my new tube, CO2 cartridge and then realized that I had no tire levers in my bag. I tried everything to get the tire off the rim so I could change the tube, but it wasn't budging. Finally I grabbed it and with sheer frustration peeled it off the rim! I got the new tube in, now I have to get the tire back on. I didn't even mess with any other options I just muscled it (my hands are still sore tonight) hooked up the CO2 cartridge and prayed that it would work. Luckily it did, I checked the tire and rim, put it back on the bike and jumped on clipped in my pedals took two cranks and the chain popped off! Un-clip, pull over, fix chain, remount, re-clip and take off. The whole flat tire/chain pit stops cost me over 10 mins in lost time. From that point on it was tough to get back into the race mentally. I knew i could never make up those 10 mins, so I kept asking myself why are you pushing yourself, why would you want to hurt if you have no chance of placing? I realized then that racing is not about placing and I am not doing this for anybody but myself, and I knew that if I quit or coasted the rest of the race that I would only have myself to blame and be disappointed in. There wasn't anything i could have don about the flat tire, but I could control the rest of my race. So i started hammering on the bike and caught a lot of people that passed me when I was broken down. The run was tough but I pushed hard and finished with about a 50min 10k. I ended up 12th in my AG, if I got those 10 mins back I would have been around 5th. Oh well at least I finished and endured the hardship. Isn't that what competition is all about?

Now I have to get back to long runs getting ready for the NYC marathon.

I will let you know how that goes!