I haven’t been good at writing in my blog in recent weeks, but I couldn’t go without writing a post race report for the Got the Nerve? triathlon.. I guess to sum it up in a few words? I did it!
I headed out to Mt Gretna early in the afternoon on Friday to get my packet and get a feel for the transition area and what the course looked like. Unfortunately it was raining pretty bad, so I didn’t get much of a chance to see the park where the race was without getting soaked, but I did get my first glance at the lake, where i’d be swimming on Saturday. I’m not sure which leg of the race I was more concerned about, the swim or the bike .. I guess both had me worried because I never really competed in those events before. The run didn’t even bother me, I knew I could knock that out easily.
Anyway, I got my packet (and there was no expo) and slowly made my way back to the hotel I was staying in just north of the race in Lebanon. I was worried about leaving my bike on my bike rack overnight at the hotel, even though it was locked, so I decided to bring it into the hotel room with me .. yep, i looked a little funny rolling a bike into a hotel room, but i’d rather be safe than sorry. I noticed later on that other people were doing the same thing.
I didn’t sleep well at all overnight on Friday, my nerves just got me … I didn’t know if I was more excited or nervous about the race, but whatever it was caused me to only get 4-5 hours of sleep. I had spent the last 24 weeks preparing for this race, 8 weeks of base training and 16 weeks of formal triathlon ttraining. It would all come down to two hours on this one day .. and i’ll tell you it was worth it.
I woke up at my normal 5am time on Saturday just before the alarm, hopped in the shower and got myself ready .. then woke the family up to get them ready. My goal was to get to the race area by 6:30am so I could get parking, get marked up and setup my transition area. I had never setup a transition area before, so I didn’t even know where to start. Once I got there, it was pretty easy, I just followed what everyone else was doing for the most part except they had some gear that I didn’t have (which i’ll have to get). The biggest thing that I was unsure about was what to wear on top, just like when I was doing marathons… after I figured that out, it was time to get ready for the race.
After I got my family settled in the spectator area, I headed to the transition area to get my wetsuit on and get ready for the race… at this point it was starting to get warm out, and even with only the legs of the wetsuit on, I was sweating, so I decided to lose the Under Armour shirt I was going to wear under the suit to stay cool.. thankfully I did because it was a long wait once we headed to the beach…
The Swim (500 yards)
The national anthem was sung (it was done beautifully) and it was time to get this thing started. I was in the 6th wave of swimmers to go out, which meant I had about 15 minutes from when the first wave went out to stand there and ponder what I was doing. The final announcements were read and off went the elite swimmers into the water.. each wave of swimmers got a chance to get in the water and get wet for 2-3 minutes before the wave started the race, so i slowly creeped up until it was our turn to get into the water. WOW, it was cold! Some of us were joking about what the water temperature was, and some guys didn’t have wetsuits, I could only imagine how cold they were.
The starter called 30 seconds to start .. and my heart started pounding. I tried to find a spot that was away from the others as best as I could and made sure I pointed myself toward the first buoy. Next thing I knew, we were off .. in the water I went. Did I mention it was COLD? The feeling of that cold water hitting my face was like needles, it was awful, which instantly put me into a panic mode.. It was SO hard to get going with all the people and the rough water being created from the other swimmers. It was nothing like swimming in a pool and nothing like the open water swimming I had practiced in the past. I’m thankful I did what I did though because I don’t think there was a way to train for this.
I tried getting into my swim rhythm, but kept taking water in my mouth and nose from the waves and at one point during the first 2-3 minutes, I was in a panic like I wouldn’t make it. I calmed myself as best as I could and fell back to the rear of the pack to catch my breath and stay away from the choppy water. Once I got myself calmed, i was able to focus a little better. I sighted a few times to see the buoy so I knew where to turn and I was right on target, except for the people I kept running into. I think it was that I was in a good spot by myself, but being a stronger swimmer, I kept passing people because I swam fast, so I always had people in my face. It seems that the strategy for this is a lot like doing running races where you have to break away from the pack and find your own place, its just harder to do when you’re swimming.
Finally I was on my way as I passed the first buoy and turned left towards the second one. I felt myself getting into rhythm and it was getting easier now .. the amount of people around me was less and I could focus now. I remember saying to myself “just swim” .. which helped. The biggest issue from here was that my “no-fog” goggles were fogged up so I couldn’t see really great.. I cut the turn around the last buoy close so I didn’t swim more than I needed to and at this point the number of people swimming around me was much less. I sighted up ahead the final buoy although I had probably 200 yards to go but it was clearly on my path. I put my head down and just swam, only checking where I was going a few times and running over a few people in the way…
The next thing I knew, I saw people standing around me so I put my feet down on to solid ground in the water .. I did it, I was at the beach.. I got out of the water, and was really light headed, wow … not sure if it was the cold water, the long swim or what, but wow. I had to get my bearings but still keep moving up the beach so i wasn’t in the way, which I did. The challenge now was the swim transition, which I had not been able to practice so much, but wasn’t concerned about. It was a long run from the beach to the transition area and it was uphill (and had steps). The cheer of the crowd was amazing and really keeps you going when you need it the most .. nothing like when you’re running marathons.
After I got my head together and got to my transition area, I ripped off the wetsuit, put on my cycling gear and made my way through the muddy transition area … I saw the “mount bike” sign, and got on and away I went. I forgot to turn my Garmin watch on in the transition area and actually didn’t get it going until about a mile or so into the ride, so the link above to my Garmin site is short by a mile or so, but it shows my progress.
I was worried about the hills in the bike course. In comparing them to the hills I had trained on, I thought I was going to be in trouble. Remembering that my goal was to finish the race, I just took it slow .. after a few minutes I had realized that I never put my saddle bag on my bike after I pulled it off the car rack earlier in the morning. Uh-oh. This meant that if I got a flat or had a mechanical bike issue, my race was over since I had no tubes, co2 or tools to change a flat or adjust the bike if I needed to. Thankfully I didn’t need to.
I had spent some time learning about “drafting” since I thought there were going to be course marshals out monitoring the bike leg.. but there weren’t. I know I was always courteous to other cyclists and most others were back to me, but I can’t say the same for some animals who were out there. Some of these guys were flying double and triple wide past people with no notification that they were even coming, then there were others who were passing on the right side .. it was dangerous, it really was. There were some decent hills, with the worst one being around 7 miles in where I saw people actually walking it with their bikes. I just kept on pushing and pushing and passing people and somehow made it to the top .. Thankfully the hills always seemed to peak and then the downhill was right there so you could recover. One interesting thing I noticed was that I saw people doing the race with mountain bikes, which I had to imagine was killer on the hills.. good for them if they can do it, but wow, thats tough.
Anyway, after about 10 miles of rolling hills, I was pretty beat up but knew I had one more hill to go before I was back at the transition. It turned out to not be as bad as I had thought because it was a slow incline so I could stay in a high gear and just push and push. My legs were burning by the time I got to the top, but once I hit the downhill, I knew I was home free. There was a steep downhill at that point and it felt good just to fly down it, I had nobody near me. We made the final turn on to Mt Gretna road to return to the lake and transition into the run.
I had done it, the bike course didn’t beat me and I had no mechanical problems, awesome.
I got to the “unmount bike” sign at the transition point and unclipped my bike pedals and started to make my way up the hill again in the mud to my spot. I had practiced this several times, so I was good at it. I almost left without tying my shoes though, but I did forget to put my running hat on (the one my sister got me). Oh well, it was too late to turn back once I left the transition, but I was on my way. Being a runner, the 5K was nothing, plus it was flat.. I actually ran it faster than I had thought I would. It was totally under tree cover, so the sun didn’t plan a factor in it all (which was probably a good thing).
There was an eerie sense of quiet on the 5K course though, nobody was talking to anyone and everyone was focused, but everyone seemed happy. A few people were in some pain and were walking, but I didn’t see anybody without a smile on their face.
Before I knew it, I was turning back on to the main road for the finish. Although there were no big crowds cheering or anything at the finish, the feeling of crossing that finish line and knowing that I had done it is like nothing else you can feel in the world. I did it. No other words could say it any better, except I did it.
After getting some post-race refreshment and snapping pictures with my family, it was over and I was on my way back home to recover.
This was a journey that I had started last fall when I decided that running marathons was just getting old and my body couldn’t continue to take the pounding of running all the time. I started to swim in October, didn’t really start cycling until December (spin class) and didn’t get ON the bike until early March I’d say I did good. I attribute all the success to just believing in myself and having the courage and confidence to tell myself that I can do it. There were many ups and downs and times when I thought I couldn’t do it (the first minutes of the swim) .. but mind over matter will get you there, as long as you believe.
So whats next? well, 11 weeks until the Wilkes-Barre Triathlon, which is an Olympic distance triathlon meaning 1500m swim, 26 mile bike and 7 mile run and I know I have a lot of work to do to get there. My first triathlon taught me what I needed to know to get through and showed me where my weaknesses are, so now its time to overcome them.. hopefully i’ll write more this summer about the story on how I get there.
Remember, believe in yourself and you can do anything..