Friday January 11th finally came and after months of quality work with Coach Kameel from Coach4Tris.com I was ready. I left around 10 am for the four hour car ride with the family and was absolutely terrified of my bike on the back of the car. It was the farthest race I've ever gone for a race and my first 70.3 (half ironman) distance event. I probably checked the rear view mirror every 10 seconds the whole way to make sure my bike was stable and the wheels hadn't fallen off. We arrived and I went to the bike check in and athlete meeting and I learned that Dirk Bockel would be racing the half as well, (10th in kona this year and a 2008 Olympian). Standard 4 hours of sleep and 4 hours of trying to sleep then it was race morning. 15 minute drive to the race and I spent some time in transition ,got everything set to go, and went to the beach.
The calm before the storm, I knew that I really wanted to show off what I had done the last few months and I knew this was the day to it as Dirk casually toed the start line on the beach right next to me. The swim course made for heavy dolphin diving the first 200 meters and then more after a few strokes of swimming. And I found myself right next to the leaders til this point, with
around 3-4 other guys til the first turn. At this point I tried to get into a groove and be aware of how long the race was, unfortunately the groove was not as fast as I was hoping for. Overall it was a fairly calm swim, I was happy with the time just not the placing came out of the water in just over 33 minutes. A fairly long run to transition and wetsuit off, I passed by the wetsuit strippers but had alot of trouble getting mine over my timing chip. Helmet on and I was out on the bike. My heart rate was sky high as soon as I got my feet strapped in and I knew I needed to fix it. I soft pedaled for a few minutes and it was still sky high so I gave up and just started riding. Ten minutes later it finally went to the green zone as I made up alot of time. After maybe 20minutes of passing people someone on a cervelo surged by me. I'm not sure if I had just passed him or what but he was hammering. I decided to ride with him and see where it went. We rotated taking the lead for maybe 20 minutes before we picked up two more fellas and really started doing some damage. At mile 22 an aid station bottle was received and I slowed down a bit to much pouring it into my shiv and lost the pack. I was on my own the rest of the ride. At the turn around I placed myself in 28th spot and had avg like 21.5 or so. On the way back the wind was appreciated. Averaged almost 27 on the way back and had no major issues took in all the calories as planned the whole ride. 260 p/h race weight 136. Thanks to Hammer Nutrition for helping me out with all things nutrition related by the way.
I came of the bike and was astounded, my reach goal for the bike was to ride a 2:25 and I had rode a 2:19 (24.1MPH). I Came off the bike in 24th and passed a handful of people with a 0:36 T2 (no one else went under one minute all day) and went out on the run. I felt myself paying for the 2:19 right away. I was shooting for a 1:25 run split but with 85 degrees and what was basically no shade on the run I knew imminently that wasn't going to happen. 6:33 through the first mile and I was already digging deep so I backed off. 6:50, 7:01, 7:07 I saw the trend each mile slower and harder then the last as everything in my legs fought back. Then at mile 5 ish it got bad . There was basically an aid station every 1.5mi but there was one at 4.5, 6.5 for the turn and then 8.5 and for what it's worth mentally I wasn't prepared. The heat really got to me at that point and I saw my pace climb to 7:50s and I think one split was over 8 at one point which is not what I wanted. I basically ignored the last 1.5 miles when thinking about how long was left and when I finally got to that last aid station I slowed down for a few seconds really cooled off and then brought it home at like 7:15 pace from that point on. I ran a 1:38 and I had passed alot of people on the run. And it was nice seeing the 3 people who went sub 4 (well two guys at 4:00:xx) fly by me looking so strong. I came across the line in 12th overall 2nd for the 20-24 age group in a time of 4:34. I'd like to thank Blueseventy for provided me with what turned out to be a beautiful custom trisuit. In my mind I traded 6 minutes on the bike for 13 minutes on the run who knows what could've happen, but I'm very happy with my performance and can't wait for the rest of the season! I have a few smaller races in the next few months and then I will be bringing my best to St. Anthony's in April.
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