Mightyman Olympic Triathlon Race Report

2nd in age group baby!

What a great end to a pretty spectacular season!  I came in 2nd in my age group and set a new Olympic PR in Montauk!

Montauk Beach

Thank goodness we didn't have to do an ocean swim

I'm gonna let you in on a little secret.... while I did 'train' for this race... I didn't really train.  **you know what the use of the italicized word really means, right?

I probably completed 85% of my workouts.  I slacked on my biking and swimming, which are normally the ones I enjoy most.  I did complete every single run workout, even with terrible shin pain.

So while I wanted and willed myself to break my PR and place in my age group... I wasn't sure until the last .2 miles I was actually gonna do it.

What was my race strategy??  Survive the swim (ahem, lack of swim training), attack the bike and run as hard as I can without looking at my Garmin and getting freaked out by what I saw.

I think I nailed those simple goals.

BLT & JPow threatening the course pre-race

SWIM: 31:46 **yikes...

Event Power LI puts on a half distance every year but this was the inaugural race for the Mightyman Olympic.  The Half & Olympic actually started at the very same time but on different swim courses.  The hardcore half people swam a nice out an back.  Us olympians?  We had a 6 turn .9 mile course.

It wasn't too confusing to navigate but when you're used to swimming an easy out and back, potentially with a buoy line **Placid it kind of threw me off.  I started swimming with the lead girls but my lack of open water technique & practice left me eating their dust, or waves.  So I told myself to swim on my merry way and not worry about it.  I've swam ** swum? thousands and thousands of yards this year, how hard will .9 miles be?  Now, I wouldn't call my swim hard, but it just wasn't fun.  I felt sooooooo slowwwwwww and my time showed it.  Note to self - do not slack on swim training.  I actually finished the swim in about 30:46 but there was a long transition run the event included in our times.

T1: 3:02

Nothing really to report here except my super fans were right by my transition area taking photos.  I may or may not have threatened them about photographing me while taking off my sausage suit.

Darn those super fans!!

Time to ride the Roooooooo!

BIKE: 1:19:22 19.0 mph

Ahhhh... the bike... my lovely Roo where I feel the most comfortable.  I wanted to attack this course and just ride fast without worrying about my running legs.  I pretty much nailed this leg.  The course was really scenic... riding by the Montauk lighthouse... the ocean.... and it had rolling hills.  Nothing too steep but they kept you honest.  I passed a few chicks right off the bat and some dudes.  I wound up playing leap frog with this really annoying woman in the 50-55 age group.  What is it with 50 year old ladies wanting to race me??  Anyway, every darn time she passed me she would stay on the left hand side hugging the double yellow line!  So if I wanted to pass her, or anyone else for that matter, I would have to either scream on your left, illegally cross the double yellow line or illegally pass on the right hand side.  She also did the annoying thing of passing me then slowing down.  Really lady?  She did make a course error at one turnaround.  Instead of going around the cones like we were supposed to she went further out around a small house.  Sucka.  I sprinted away after she did that. **and I beat her overall by a good 10 minutes  Besides the biking lady drama the ride was pretty fun.  I felt ok, not great, and I willed my way to finishing strong.

T2: 1:53
Nothing new here... helmet off, sneakers on... yada yada

RUN: 51:19

Now this is where my race got interesting. Or at least in my head it did.  My goal was to run a sub 50 but with my recent training runs ending in pain I wasn't sure how I would do.  Well, I came pretty darn close and busted out my fastest 10K ever.  Yes, the italicized ever, people.  I am not the speediest runner but I'm getting better!  The first mile was pretty flat and I clocked in at 7:53.  Whoa!  Can I keep this up?  Then the hills hit... nope!  Easy Agresta, easy.  Second mile had a slight incline but again, nothing major and I clocked that one at 8:19.  Perfect pace for me!  I've done a ton a tempo runs at this pace so I felt good.  Mile 3 is where the hills really started to hit.  This run is famous for "Murder Hill."  You have to run up a super duper steep hill, go down the other side, turn around and run up it again! In the half you have to do that sucker twice!  If that wasn't bad enough, they throw in a few more rollers in the middle section here just to make you hurt that much more. Mile 3 = 8:36 Mile 4 = 8:58 **carnage from Murder Hill repeats

I completed my race with a total time of 2:47:21 which earned me 2nd place in my age group!!

Picking up my award AFTER the ceremony - DOH

Overall I was really happy with my race.

Please ignore the floofy hair

BLT smashed her Half Iron PR & placed 3rd in her age group.
Pls ignore the floofy haired Odwalla monster  to the left!

I accomplished what I wanted, but I couldn't help but ask... how much faster could I have gone if I trained 100% to my ability?? But I also think that every athlete needs a break, physically and mentally.  After training SO hard for SO long for the Ironman, I forgot what it felt like to do a race and not have it consume 100% of my life.  On one hand I felt some sort of relief.  I didn't HAVE to think about it all day, every day, for a year.  I could sign up, train when I wanted and still have a fun race.  On the other hand... I still quite can't decide if this was refreshing or not.

I'm hoping to write a 2011 Tri Season Recap soon.  I recently realized that every single race I entered, I either PR'd or completed a new long distance.  It was a VERY successful season for me!

If you've been living under a shell and haven't heard... the Kona Ironman World Championships is this Saturday.  I plan on hooking the live feed to the big screen, having some tri and non-tri friends over and basically partying for 9 hours!!  Woooooooo!

Me and surrogate Montauk Ollie

Happy Training!