Racin'

After my midseason break, June, July and August were dedicated to getting back in shape and preparing for a fall season of racing. My original goal was to race a bunch in April and May this year. I think I was a little intimated by the 70.3 distance though and overcooked myself in training. It's a fine line between being really, really fit and being really, really tired and I just missed my footing and went over the edge in May. That's a post for another day however.

Between being really unmotivated for a lot of April and May and then taking a couple weeks almost completely off I was pretty unfit by the time I started training regularly again. It was slow going the first few weeks but I was determined not to get ahead of myself and just let the training come to me. June and July was actually kind of fun because I could track my improvements every week as I slowly regained my form. By the end of August I was ready to stop training and starting RACING.

I kicked things off at the Trifest for MS in Bentonville, Arkansas. This year we were racing a double sprint format of swim/bike/run/swim/bike/run. The total added up to an Olympic distance but with 5 transitions. We'd done a similar format last year and so I knew the 2nd swim and run were going to be really tough. I paced the first round pretty evenly and then tried to push it a little harder the 2nd round. Nick Waninger, was the only other male pro there and he beat me by a good 4 minutes. I felt pretty solid but lacked the ability to really push the pace hard. My plan all along had been to build with each race I did this fall and Trifest was a perfect way to kickstart the next 7 weeks of racing.

I have now reached the part of the season I was really looking forward to but the one that is sometimes the hardest to negotiate correctly. From September 1st to October 27th I have 7 races on the calendar. The work is done and I'm not going to get much gain from training myself into the ground. It is time to start resting and letting the body freshen up so that I can really rev the engine when it comes time to hurt. I think a lot of the time we get so wrapped up in just training that we forget the whole goal of training is to RACE. I love racing and so if lying around and only doing short swims, bikes and runs are going to help me race faster then by all means I'm in!

September 14th and 15th was a double race weekend. On Saturday I raced the Rose City Sprint Triathlon  where I placed 3rd behind Barrett Brandon of Fort Worth and Robbie Wade of San Antonio (local training partner and good buddy). Barrett is an excellent swimmer and absolutely dusted Robbie and I by over a minute on the 650m swim. We worked together on the bike but only pulled 20sec or so back on Barrett. Starting the 3 mile run I had a slight gap on Robbie and absolutely went for it. I ran the first mile as hard as I could then blew up slightly while Robbie didn't let up and kept after Barrett. Barrett was running strong though and Robbie could only get within 10 seconds of him. All 3 of us broke the existing course record.

As soon as we hopped off the podium, Robbie and I hightailed it out to Possum Kingdom Lake for the Trifecta Triathlon the next day. This is a top notch event put on by Cadence Sports, in what I'd argue is the prettiest lake in Texas. Decide for yourself-

This race had a pro field of 6 guys and so I knew it would be a good fight to get on the podium. Brent Poulsen got off to a fast start in the swim and put 2min on Robbie, Mark Hillers and I. I need to work on my "suckitupandhurtmore" pain face in the swim... 

because I came out of the water 12sec behind Robbie and (other) Mark and had to sprint my butt through transition and the first 3 miles of the bike to catch up to them. I've been swimming quite well in training and was disappointed at being 4th out of the water when I knew I should have been 2nd. Those first 3 miles on the bike going all out might have cost me a bit later because after putting 30sec into (other) Mark before the turn around I faded a little the second half and he caught me and got off the bike about 10sec ahead of me. I had a quick T2 and started the run just in front of (other) Mark. Last year at Trifecta we were supposed to run on some trails during the race but rains turned them to mud so we were re-routed. This year though we got the full trail experience. 3.5 miles of twisting, turning, up and down, rocks and roots. It was incredibly hard but also a lot of fun. I was focusing so hard on trying to drop Mark (not myself) and also not falling on my face that I forgot my lungs had crept from their normal location in my chest cavity up into my mouth. It was exactly as I'd imagine an Xterra to be and others who have done one confirmed this. Brent and Robbie were up the road and I ran as hard as I could through the trail section to try and gap Mark. (As a sidenot- it always sounds weird referring to someone else who has my same name). Once on the road my legs felt absolutely atrocious but I kept the pressure on in case he was lurking close behind. I held my spot and was able to walk away with another podium spot to cap off the weekend.

Only a week to recover before Galveston 5150 and I didn't do much other than sleep a lot and have some severe allergy problems. I'm not sure what triggered it, maybe the storm system that was blowing in, but all of a sudden on Wednesday I was sneezing a ton and woke up Thursday with a headache and ridiculously congested. I backed off my training even more know that rest was the key and just kept it to one light workout a day in hopes that I'd bounce back for Galveston. 

I drove down Friday night and should have brought my canoe to get there. What should have been a 3 1/2 trip turned in to 5 hours because of torrential downpours and Texas drivers on oily roads. At the pro meeting on Saturday we were told that the swim might be canceled because the winds were too severe and only supposed to get worse over night. Another guy from Detroit, Brooks Cowan, was staying with me and when we got to race site on Sunday morning we heard the confirmation that the swim was indeed canceled. Even though the swim isn't my strongest suit I was a little disappointed to not race a triathlon and not get another chance to test myself and my pain face. The race was now turned into a 40k bike with a 10k run in a time trial start format. The lined the 13 of us up and started us every 30sec. I was number 7 so I had guys to chase and a few guys chasing me.  It was a tailwind all the way out to the turnaround and I was flying! Definitely a lot of fun seeing your average at 30mph after 12 miles of riding. Unfortunately that 24min trip out turned into 34min back. I tried to stay aero and just keep pushing the best I could. I ended up with a decent bike split of 58min but can see there's still some work to do to get up with the lead guys riding 55-56min. My run has been coming along well and so I hit the run hard. James Burns caught me around mile 2 and kept going to the fastest split of the day. I wasn't losing much time to him until my quad started cramping going into the 2nd lap. I had to back off a little and run steady for the next 2 miles to make sure I didn't completely seize up. I picked it up again the last mile and was pleased to come home in 8th place with a pr run for me. 

I get a weekend off now and then will be hitting it out at the Lifetime Fitness Triathlon in Dallas, Tx on October 6th. The season is already almost over and I feel like I'm just getting started but... oh well. I want to say a huge, huge thank you to Cobb Cycling, Fluid Nutrition, Superfeet, Zoggs USA and SockGuy for their continued support. I only use products that I think are good and that I actually believe in so I mean it wholeheartedly when I say that, in my opinion, these companies are the best at what they do.

Stay tuned for more updates to come and a new "Training Tip Tuesday" series I'll be starting next week.