Wednesday, June 1, 2011

COMBAT Triathlon Report

I have now done my second triathlon! At Tri Swim last Tuesday night we did the 300 yard pool 'snake' swim that would be in the COMBAT Triathlon on Saturday. I made it through pretty well so I signed up for the race!

SWIM (300 yards in 9:59)
The swim start took forever since I was number 322, we were seeded in order of our 300 yard swim time, and everyone started 10 seconds apart. I had timed my swim at the pool in 24 Hour Fitness at 10:55. I ended up doing it in 9:59! And even that was with catching my breath at the walls and letting people go past me. Much room for improvement but still a win for me. Coach Chris (Tri Swim coach and now one of my new tri coaches) was doing the swim start, so it was nice to hear a familiar "Ready... GO!" to get started!





T1 (2:38)
I had quite the n00b mistake in T1... I put my running shoes on! I grabbed my bike and started toward the line, then noticed... aww crap! And of course there were lots of fellow BAM! club member volunteers around to share (and laugh) with my misery. The really funny (or not) part of this picture is that the guy coming in with the LJFAT uniform is Donnie Artley... who won our age group. He was coming back from the bike before I even left! Note the long delay to swim start though. :)

BIKE (15 Miles in 48:56, 18.4 Mph, Avg HR 163)
I had a great bike! Tailwind to begin with, so I took max advantage there. I kept my heart rate around 160 and my cadence around 85 all the way and just shifted to whatever gear let me keep close to that. Since I was slow on the swim, I got to pass a lot of people! I don't think I was passed at all. I like that part at least! Garmin data here.

T2 (2:33)
More trouble in T2... this time some woman was trying to rack her bike in my spot! Right on my number. Then she tried to put the rear wheel on the bar and things got tangled up with my handlebars. It turned out she was supposed to be on the OTHER side of the bar... where she finally went, only to shove her bike back over to the wrong side. (Even with another volunteer helping) Argh!

RUN (3 Mi in 33:11, 11:03 pace, Avg HR 170)
My tentative run plan was to just run the whole thing with no walk breaks. I had not done that for 3 miles before, but came pretty close in training once. But not after a swim and bike. That idea fell apart after 15 minutes. I have been running 10 minute intervals, so I should have kept that going but I didn't quite manage that either. I ran 15 minutes at 10:33 pace, then took a break for a minute. I realize that was way past what I have been training to, the next couple of intervals were only 3 minutes each. I rounded it out with 7:44 of run at the end. I could have done better if I had stuck to my 10 minute intervals! I sprinted at the finish and found a new max HR of 189.  Garmin data here.


RESULTS
I was a little sad to be last in my age group of 12, but then I realized I was 171 out of 244 overall. Not too bad for my second triathlon! Particularly when I have only been swimming 6 months and decided to do the race in the last few days. I have only been running a couple of years now too. So I have lots of room for improvement.

NEXT
So the plan is to continue Tri Swim, going twice a week now. The Thursday night class has less beginners so it is much more aggressive, but that kind of pushing would be great for me. I am signing up with MC Tri Training in preparation for the Galveston 5150 this October. I will probably be doing a few more sprints before then, and lots of open water swim training. It's going to be quite an adventure!

Darren