What a great race! I felt great, the race course was fun, and I enjoyed the less than three hours of racing!
Day Before Race
We drove out to the Hamptons mid-day on Saturday. I had to pick up my race packet in Southampton and I was looking forward to going there as this Jersey girl has never been to the Hamptons! yeah, I think I’ll be vacationing back in Jersey from now on ‘cause everyone, and I mean everyone, was dressed to the nines on Main Street in Southampton. We rolled up in our Mazda Zipcar and parked next to this beautiful (and really, really expensive) Bentley convertible! hah - seriously, every car was a Bentley, Porsche, Ferrari or Lamborghini... it was ridiculous!
Anyway, after our lunch break in the fancy pants part of town we continued on to Montauk where we’d be staying for the night. The hotel was nice and we had an oceanfront room with a little grill and full kitchen. We grilled up chicken, corn on the cob, asparagus and made some pasta for dinner. It was delish!
Day Before Race
We drove out to the Hamptons mid-day on Saturday. I had to pick up my race packet in Southampton and I was looking forward to going there as this Jersey girl has never been to the Hamptons! yeah, I think I’ll be vacationing back in Jersey from now on ‘cause everyone, and I mean everyone, was dressed to the nines on Main Street in Southampton. We rolled up in our Mazda Zipcar and parked next to this beautiful (and really, really expensive) Bentley convertible! hah - seriously, every car was a Bentley, Porsche, Ferrari or Lamborghini... it was ridiculous!
Anyway, after our lunch break in the fancy pants part of town we continued on to Montauk where we’d be staying for the night. The hotel was nice and we had an oceanfront room with a little grill and full kitchen. We grilled up chicken, corn on the cob, asparagus and made some pasta for dinner. It was delish!
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| our superfans and BLT |
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| It was really chilly out in Montauk! |
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| Top Grillers |
Pre-Race
The alarm went off at 430 am on Sunday morning - ouch! But I slept well, I was super tired so I was out like a light around 10pm the night before. BLT and I packed up our stuff and drove over to the Sag Harbor race site while the boys slept in a little more and would meet us there later. We got to the race at 530am as planned and sat in traffic for a half hour!! I was freaking out! You guys all know I’m pretty anal about being on time and never want to be late etc... well this was just plain nuts and it was driving me crazy! Finally we parked, pumped our tires, then booked it to transition. yeah, we had about 10 minutes to set up our gear. The saving grace was that we were the last wave to go, so after we quickly set up our gear, we went to the mandatory porta potty line and took our time there as the earlier waves went off.
Swim - 37:09
This swim was a bit interesting. You had to swim about 100 yards out, then it was a deep water start. As we were getting in the water I overheard the race organizers say tha the bouys were moving!! So that meant i would most likely have a longer swim. I didn’t think much of it at the time and when the gun went off I started swimming.
I am happy to say that I didn’t panic or have to stop or get hammered by other people. Finally, after 5 years of doing triathlons, I think I’m finally getting used to open water swimming! So I swam, sighted, and swam some more. I think I held a pretty straight line but it was hard to site as there were only 2 buoys to sight off of. I finally reached the swim exit and looked down at my watch.... 37 minutes?!?! wtf?? there’s no way that was only a .9 mile swim! I really do think the buoys moved further out. I stalked the swim times in my age group, compared them to the beginning wave swim times and there’s a significant difference between the two. Anyway, I felt great the entire swim and felt like I could have gone on longer.
T1 - 3:13
Nothing major to talk about here. Ran barefoot on a really grainy asphalt surface and took an extra few seconds to wipe the sand from my feet and legs
The alarm went off at 430 am on Sunday morning - ouch! But I slept well, I was super tired so I was out like a light around 10pm the night before. BLT and I packed up our stuff and drove over to the Sag Harbor race site while the boys slept in a little more and would meet us there later. We got to the race at 530am as planned and sat in traffic for a half hour!! I was freaking out! You guys all know I’m pretty anal about being on time and never want to be late etc... well this was just plain nuts and it was driving me crazy! Finally we parked, pumped our tires, then booked it to transition. yeah, we had about 10 minutes to set up our gear. The saving grace was that we were the last wave to go, so after we quickly set up our gear, we went to the mandatory porta potty line and took our time there as the earlier waves went off.
Swim - 37:09
This swim was a bit interesting. You had to swim about 100 yards out, then it was a deep water start. As we were getting in the water I overheard the race organizers say tha the bouys were moving!! So that meant i would most likely have a longer swim. I didn’t think much of it at the time and when the gun went off I started swimming.
I am happy to say that I didn’t panic or have to stop or get hammered by other people. Finally, after 5 years of doing triathlons, I think I’m finally getting used to open water swimming! So I swam, sighted, and swam some more. I think I held a pretty straight line but it was hard to site as there were only 2 buoys to sight off of. I finally reached the swim exit and looked down at my watch.... 37 minutes?!?! wtf?? there’s no way that was only a .9 mile swim! I really do think the buoys moved further out. I stalked the swim times in my age group, compared them to the beginning wave swim times and there’s a significant difference between the two. Anyway, I felt great the entire swim and felt like I could have gone on longer.
T1 - 3:13
Nothing major to talk about here. Ran barefoot on a really grainy asphalt surface and took an extra few seconds to wipe the sand from my feet and legs
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| Me, in the pink, in the far left leaving transition with my bike |
Bike - 1:19:11
This was the fun part of the race! The course was rolling hills, nothing too steep, and had some really fun descents. I wanted to see how fast I could go so I started to hammer right from the get go. My feet were cold with the wind so they eventually went numb through the ride. This little fact would come back to haunt me on the run. For most of the ride I was passing lots of people and doing a little leap frogging with some dudes on tri bikes. I felt really great until my stomach started to bother me. I think it was from swallowing too much salt water during the swim and mixing that with a gu and my powerade drink. There was one low point on the bike where there was a bad head wind and my stomach was revolting and all I could think about was how I was gonna throw up as soon as I got off the bike! Luckily, that didn’t happen. When I headed back into transition I saw our supporters and they were surprised to see me so soon! As I got to my rack I saw there was only one bike back on the rack - sweet! I’m really proud of how far my biking has come. I used to hate biking and only did it to get through a tri and now I’m completely in love with my Jamis! I just know there’s so much more room for improvement and I’m excited to see that in the coming year.
T2 - 2:20
This took a little bit longer than normal because my hands were really cold so it was hard to get my shoes off and on.
Run - 54:55
As I set out on my run I realized how cold my feet really were. They went numb on the bike so when I started running and putting all my body weight on them they started to tingle... and then hurt because they were getting the feeling back in them. Yuck. My plan was to run the first 2 miles conservatively at a 9 min/mile pace. I did that almost to a T. First 2 miles were 858 & 859. From the third mile on I was gonna pick up the pace to an 845 or faster, Well, mile 3 was slower because I decided to walk through a water station to ease my aching feet. It worked and the rest of the run felt really good! I finished strong and was trying to count how many girls in my age group I was passing or if they were passing me. My last mile was 8:33 and I ran in strong!
This was the fun part of the race! The course was rolling hills, nothing too steep, and had some really fun descents. I wanted to see how fast I could go so I started to hammer right from the get go. My feet were cold with the wind so they eventually went numb through the ride. This little fact would come back to haunt me on the run. For most of the ride I was passing lots of people and doing a little leap frogging with some dudes on tri bikes. I felt really great until my stomach started to bother me. I think it was from swallowing too much salt water during the swim and mixing that with a gu and my powerade drink. There was one low point on the bike where there was a bad head wind and my stomach was revolting and all I could think about was how I was gonna throw up as soon as I got off the bike! Luckily, that didn’t happen. When I headed back into transition I saw our supporters and they were surprised to see me so soon! As I got to my rack I saw there was only one bike back on the rack - sweet! I’m really proud of how far my biking has come. I used to hate biking and only did it to get through a tri and now I’m completely in love with my Jamis! I just know there’s so much more room for improvement and I’m excited to see that in the coming year.
T2 - 2:20
This took a little bit longer than normal because my hands were really cold so it was hard to get my shoes off and on.
Run - 54:55
As I set out on my run I realized how cold my feet really were. They went numb on the bike so when I started running and putting all my body weight on them they started to tingle... and then hurt because they were getting the feeling back in them. Yuck. My plan was to run the first 2 miles conservatively at a 9 min/mile pace. I did that almost to a T. First 2 miles were 858 & 859. From the third mile on I was gonna pick up the pace to an 845 or faster, Well, mile 3 was slower because I decided to walk through a water station to ease my aching feet. It worked and the rest of the run felt really good! I finished strong and was trying to count how many girls in my age group I was passing or if they were passing me. My last mile was 8:33 and I ran in strong!
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| Home stretch |
Total - 2:56:47 ** 9th place in my age group!!!
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| Happt Finishers |
Say what?!?! When we got back to the city I practically ran to my laptop to check out the results. I got my official overall time and was happy but thought it was kinda slow compared to how I raced. Then when I looked at the times in my age group and saw I got 9th place - holy cow!! I’ve never even gotten close to finishing in the top ten of my age group, like ever! This was a smaller sized race but I am still proud of it. My tri buddy also placed very well, coming in 12th place in our age group! So overall it was a great late season race and I am very happy with how I raced. All this training is working and I can’t wait to see what’s in store for the in the next year!
So what’s next? Well, this is an “easy” week for me so my body can recover from racing then I’m back on my Chicago marathon plan starting with a nice 20 mile run on Saturday. I’ll be heading down to the Jersey Shore to see my parents and there’s a sprint tri out on LBI. A 1/4 miles swim, 10 mile bike and 5k run... hmmmmmmm.... I had so much fun racing on Sunday that I might just be entering this race very last minute!
So what’s next? Well, this is an “easy” week for me so my body can recover from racing then I’m back on my Chicago marathon plan starting with a nice 20 mile run on Saturday. I’ll be heading down to the Jersey Shore to see my parents and there’s a sprint tri out on LBI. A 1/4 miles swim, 10 mile bike and 5k run... hmmmmmmm.... I had so much fun racing on Sunday that I might just be entering this race very last minute!
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