2007 Seafair Triathlon
July 15, 2007
This really was a great race! I’m so glad I decided to do it. I hadn’t done a sprint distance race in 2 years, so I really didn’t know what to expect.
I really wasn’t that nervous considering I had no expectations for myself. I knew it was going to be about 1-1/2 hours at threshold and it was. I didn’t get too much sleep the night before. I was trying to get my stuff ready plus both boys who were also racing the next day.
I got up at 4:30am and got my nutrition ready and had breakfast: eggs, toast and ½ banana. I rode with Eric P. to the race. We set up our transition and stood in line for the restroom multiple times. I went for a quick 5 minute run to warm up. No time to warm up in the water.
There were a lot of people at this event, over 2200. The swim was a counterclockwise ½ mile (800 yd) swim. There were a few obstacles to swim around during the swim. So I placed myself to the far left in hopes of minimizing the zigzag swim. Fortunately, that worked and the swim was very good, not to many people around until the last 1/3 where I encountered multiple people doing the crawl stroke from previous waves. Felt I could have swum a bit faster. Swim time: 15:22.
I remembered to take my wetsuit down and ran into T1. It seemed to take a bit to get the wetsuit down, but took off and raced out to the bike. T1: 1:50.
The bike was fantastic! I cruised by so many people along the flat of Lk. Washington Blvd. The I-90 bridge was very windy, so I held on tight. I pushed it hard at the turnaround, like Jill said. At the end of the bridge, Shannon C. (my age-group friend) caught me. We talked for a bit and exchanged words of encouragement. We pushed each other back through the blvd. She raced ahead and I continued strong until the end. At the end, right before transition, Shannon went down. Someone had cut her off! I yelled out to her hoping she was ok and continued on. Bike time: 34:56. Average HR about 157-162.
I raced into T2, racked my bike & shoes, grabbed my running shoes & had and took off. No stop for water and the entrance, T2 time: 1:13.
The run always feels slow the first mile. I hit the 1 mile mark at 8 minutes. I knew there was a large hill just before mile 2, so I continued on at that pace. My HR was high, but tolerable for 3 miles. I raced to the hill. It was larger and longer than I anticipated: ¼ mile up and then back down and a ½ mile race to the finish. I tried to stay consistent on the hill while still pushing it hard. As I was going up, I couldn’t tell which girls might be ahead of me in my age group. I hadn’t seen any all day except Shannon who I knew was behind me. I just continued to run hard up and down the hill. At the bottom, I pushed it hard to the end. What a fun time and a quick workout! There was no talking during the run! Average HR about 160-168 (on the hill). Run time: 23:50.
Overall time: 1:17:11 (5th in AG, Overall 166/1288)
Overall average HR: 158
