Music City Triathlon Race Report

This is the second Olympic Distance Race of the season and really the final prep race for Miami Man in November (I'm doing the local sprint this week, but I don't really think it qualifies due to its short distance).

The weekend began with the drive down to Nashville to stay with Amber's very hospitable family (A big Thanks to the Leslie's). Saturday, we went over to get registered since I signed up late and was on the waitlist. I was pretty sure I would get in, but didn't want to leave it to chance, so I showed up before they opened. I got in, got the right size t-shirt and a blue cap (you'll see below why this was so interesting-it did help the spectators find me though. I might try to do this in other races). Race Report Below: The pic below is me hangin' out before the race. I'm easy to find with my blue cap. If you look directly to the left of me, you'll see a guy who I think is related to Mr. Miyagi. Dude was whipping out some dojo stretches before the race and Steve and I shared a few good-natured laughs over it. Steve also gave me some swimming tips on streamlining my body in the water. Thanks brotha!
Swim: 1500 m (I think + run to transition, not sure) - 27:32.87 (1:50/100m)

I felt pretty good most of the swim. I also felt smoother in my stroke than I did a couple weeks ago. I still swam off course a little bit, but still an improvement. I'm hoping to keep getting better on the sighting. It'll come. I got out and my adoring fans were cheering me on the run to transition. It was pretty cool.

T1: 2:08.9 - No big deal. I ran out the wrong way at first and had to turn around. I just need to keep getting quicker.

Bike: 22.5 miles - 1:01:28.43 (21.96 mph)

The bike was really good. It was a hilly course, but most of the hills were shorter than the ones here in KY. Honestly, I just had one of those really good days where I felt like I had juice in my legs in almost every gear. At about mile 16, I thought a big climb was coming up and tried to gear into my small chainring. As I did this and threw the chain, I swore at myself for being an idiot. I had to slow down and stop to put it back on and lost probably a minute to minute and a half. In hindsight, this was a painful mistake. About 10 people I had passed in the last 5 minutes passed me when I stopped. I was pissed, but decided I was going to use it for motivation to track people down on the run. All in all good bike, but I need to not have mistakes like that

Run: 10k - 40:12.21 (6:29/mile) PR by 6 seconds for a 10k!

I got out of T2 and almost fell down on some uneven ground. Ran about a quarter mile and then went up a 1/2-mile switchback hill that was brutal. At the top, I fell back just a little bit of some skinny dude that looked to me like he was going to put together a good run. So I latched onto him a little bit to try to keep a good pace. After a while we got out to the dam and I was running next to another guy named Rod. It was an out and back and we ran over a dam and down a large hill that we had to come back up (also painful but we made it). On the back, Rod pulled me up one hill and said "hang on and get up here!" I'm grateful for that as I would not have had the run I did without him. As we were getting back to mile 5, I knew it was mostly downhill and I wanted to repay Rod for his help, so we started picking it up to try and catch dude in gray who was in Rod's AG. On the .5 mile steep downhill, I just let it rip striding out fully and going about 5min/mi pace. Rod yelled at me from behind "It's not even fair with those long legs you've got!" I told him my large arse was pushing me down the hill. At the bottom of the hill, I was hurting bad, but still had about .3 miles left. We had passed gray suit dude on the hill and all I wanted to do was beat him. We caught another old guy at mile 6, and I poured on almost all I had. At about 50 yards out, we went in through the fence (and my cousin Steve said he thought I would get kicked at the end), I decided I'd worked too hard to lose at the end, so I poured on everything else I had and finished strong in front of rod and old dude. We must've dusted gray suit dude (or he was demoralized by watching me stride past him like a bloated camel), because he wasn't in the video that Amber took.

Total Time: 2:14:06.25, 4/29 in AG, A really solid race for me. The real twist now as I look at the race results is if the guy ahead of me is really in 3rd place since he had a 2 min drafting penalty (cheater). If his penalty has yet to be assessed, I finished 3rd. Oh well. Good day regardless. I'm asking the RD if I'm reading the results correctly and will update when I find out.

Summary: I need to keep getting better on sighting in the water, keep speeding up my transitions, and not do stupid crap like throw chains on the bike. However, I do believe this HR training/base training really works. I feel so much better running at that speed now. It's uncanny. I'm really looking forward to lower volume, smooth pace base work this winter in hopes of really cranking it up for next spring at the Louisville Triple Crown and St. Anthony's.

I've attached some pics below of Amber and Myself after the race, and Steve messin' with my bike with me thinking I was leaning out of the picture.