Ok, so it’s just a 10k, and our very local, 17th Annual race, starting at the high school my kids attended and that I pass every day to commute to NYC, but I still want to talk about this race. Because it’s the first one I’ve completed since early May!
Broke my collarbone the end of May; threw out my back in September (note to self: don’t rush the kettlebell workout; respect the cannonball); tried to do an Olympic distance tri two weeks later but simply could not run.
Back got better, trained up a bit, and I really had no idea how fast I could run – because of the disrupted season and a less than stellar half marathon in the spring and of course the passage of another year. “Getting older,” I think it’s called.
So I do my warmup and strides, and I’m at the starting line with LOTS of little kids in the front (visiting from another school where Ed Beglane is the principal, eager to do the 5k), with two of the Killer Bunny Runaways Team, guys who run together three days a week.
With Ned Towle and Amish Kapadia. Guess who doesn’t like the team name?
And we start, and I can’t help but laugh at all these kids!, a lot to dodge, and my buddy Dietmar plows ahead, short sleeves dark blue shirt and steady bounding until he’s gone from sight (he takes 1st place for 40-49), and another guy Daniel in a lighter blue running jacket and baseball cap (he takes 2nd OA), and somewhere way ahead is a bright blue sweatshirt (turns out it’s my local, annual nemesis,James- with whom I’ve swapped places on the age group podium every year)
The day before, I ran one loop of the course, and now that I’m racing I’m running a lot harder but it feels solid, panting but solid, and I’m still smiling (which both Coach Debi and Juan had told me was good for running). I can’t help but marvel at this little woman in bright orange zooming past me and I’m in the middle of and ready for the long hill up Broadway until we turn left at the nursing home (get a shout out from Lisa and Greg) and glorious downhill to Tompkins, left and up up up, there’s Rory directing traffic, and those back roads by Dietmar’s house aren’t so bad the first time, and the .3 mile straightaway back to the school (I had measured it during yesterday’s run).
And the next loop of course is harder but for once I’m not wishingI could stop, this second loopain’tso bad, up Broadway again and past Lisa and Greg again and it’s hard work and even though I’m not looking at my watch I know this not as fast as I’ve been in the past. But this is The Best I Can Do Today, and truly accepting that is terrific. The season of no-racing is over.
Suddenly at Mile 4 1/2 my left calf cramps up, and I had felt this at the end of the prior day’sworkout, and if this were the beginning or middle of the race season I would stop to avoid compounding the injury, but NO, I’ve been sidelined by injuries all season!, this is my last race and I am going to do the best I can, and I’m hobbling through it, feels a lot slower but ends up being the same pace as the prior uphill mile, and some guy with a gray beard (my AG?) andwearing yet another shade of blue is running behind then beside me and I will NOT let him beat me, I want that podium more than he does (if I can’t catch the bunny ahead of me I will run away from the monster behind me) and I find the juice to sprint harder, and I hear Rachel shout my name and I FINISH.
Results: 43:53 (but to be honest, it’s really 5.9 Miles/9.5 km; 17 years of the same, short course; so it’s 7:26 min/mile avg.). 10/64 overall. 3/12 age group (meaning, 50-59); a tiny bronze medal, hurray! I never even see James Cochrane’s face until the race is over – so, this year, he takes 1st in AG.
Glad to confirm that I can train at 9:00+ minute per mile, and still race at sub-7:30s. Not my fastest – actually, my slowest – but the fastest I could do today. Great to run through myl’iltown and see folks I’ve known for years. A satisfying finish to an interrupted season.
The best part of this race was hanging out with training buddy, tri guy Ziv Abramowicz, both before and after the race. If I hadn’t signed up with him, I might not have run.
With Ziv Abramowicz, pre-race
The Friday before this Sunday race, I went to the doctor to address an asthmatic cough. I hadn’t thought of myself as allergic, but asked the doctor to check when last I was there, and sure enough, a year and two weeks ago, I’d been treated for the same thing. I guess the change into spring is a trigger. Anyway, this time I got antibiotics as well as steroids, and a cough suppressant, and by Saturday morning, I could run again.
The park in Uniondale was nice enough, and the race was well organized, but UGLY. Miles of the Jericho Turnpike, Wantagh Parkway and Carman Avenue? Really? And just to confirm these really were highways closed for the race, I ran past a dead cat on the shoulder at one point.
Was shooting for 7:20s or faster in order to PR, and started off at 7:40 min/mile in high zone 1,/low zone 2, but by mile 4, I realized (a) I was not feeling the love (not panting, but not strong) and (b) I was not going to go faster than 7:40. So I adjusted to that reality, stopped feeling disappointed, and just hung on. But by mile 9.5, here come those calf cramps again, and I’m struggling to stumble through 9:00+ Miles, and people I passed are passing me in droves, and that means they’ve been steady and I’ve not. I end up at 1:45:10 (8:02 min/mile) – my slowest HM yet, even slower than the much hillier Sleepy Hollow HM I ran 6 weeks ago “at a fun pace”instead of fastest.
Something has to change. I took “sportslegs” before the race to try battling lactate buildup, but forgot my chewable salt tablets in the car (note to self: don’t switch to the race-approved clear plastic bag in the parking lot). I had half a gel with electrolytes towards the end, but couldn’t stomach more. Maybe it’s my form; sent videos after I got home to Coach Debi, who said to work on a shorter stride and land on balls of my feet; or maybe it’s just that allergy season knocks back the best of us, including cyclist Chris Dudko (who told me that because of the pollen he had no power for his recent race, either). Maybe sessions again with the Mile Hugh Running Club. But I’d rather not give up on this distance.
This is not a dramatic tale; my slowest half marathon ever; but successful in a new way.
My second race of 2018 (following last weekend’s indoor relay marathon at the New York Armory),
and my third or fourth time at Sleepy Hollow. And I had a new goal: to have fun. Not to relax, not to go easy, but to watch my heart rate, do the course and ignore the splits, see if I could listen to my body and go by feel for most of the race and then burst into flame the last few miles. I wanted to run without a terror in my heart (or as my wife’s typo suggested, and as Coach Debi would agree, without a terrier in my heart). I quietly hoped I’d sneak up and seize my fastest race – but I wasn’t worried about it.
It was great seeing lots of friends at this very local race – Zander Reyna (a fellow Killer Bunny and triathlete, and incredibly disciplined at pacing this race – “The New Zander” he calls it), and Nicholas Moore (fellow tri guy who generously took my home after the race, even though he lives practically on top of Sleepy Hollow),
Dietmar Serbee (training seriously for the London Marathon in a few weeks, ready to SLAY this course, and indeed, 2nd place for AG),
Ken Fuirst (king of the 10k, never ran a HM, amazing results), my friendly nemesis Mike Kaiser (all the way from New Jersey, who ran steps behind me at this race in 2014 until passing me the last mile, then went on to a 3:20 marathon a month later and a 3:09 in Boston the next year), and Ralph Miccio (fellow Sunday-morning cyclist , riding alongside, chaperoning the runners and warning off the drivers; so GOOD to have a friend along the entire route).
So the race itself passed as planned, and despite the 4 ½ miles of uphill straight from the start I was in control, running MY race,
heart rate was at 154 (low to mid-Zone 2 but who cares because it felt RIGHT and when I went above I was huffing and puffing so I slowed down) and the rolling hills and downhills of Route 117 didn’t seem terrible at all, and able to chat with new friends (John, from Scotland, carrying water in a CamelBak and chatting about his 150km race in Chile last October; Bob Carey, big former football player, 61 years old who beat me by a minute and was delighted to discover he took third place for his AG; and John Lombardi in the same age group who came in right after Bob ).
(Bob Casey and Mike Kaiser, awaiting their hardware.)
And those stupid corporate parking lots and the climbs back to the road weren’t horrible at all, and I couldn’t believe that it was such a short distance to get to the train station and that the climb up to the last 2 miles was much faster than I recalled, and it felt AMAZING until those last 3 miles, when I poured it on to get faster and got hit with calf cramps (this time at mile 12 i stead of mile 10– stumbling but knowing it wasn’t for long!).
(With Ralph Miccio, guardian angel on a bicycle)
I finished in 1:43:22, avg. 7:54, 4 minutes slower than my two HMs last year, 5/23 AG, 138/652 OA.
But somehow a great race.
I still want to get a PR; I still want to go as fast as possible; but at THIS race I felt great, not wiped out all day at the end, able to bike the next day no problem. It’s a different way of racing, and it’s nice to learn that I have this option. Bring on the season, I’m ready.
Initially planned to do this final race of the season with Rivertown elites Kevin Carlsten and Jisk Hoogma, but they wanted to leave later than I did, so to preserve my calm, I went alone. But arrived at the same time, and parked almost next to each other. (They even drive faster than I do!)
A bit of an ominous start: as I check my bag, the security guard (clearly an off duty or retired cop) tells me that my bib number, 1013, is the code police use on the radio when they need backup… Cold start – 36 degrees. Felt very local, hanging out in the loose corrals, supposedly grouped by expected finish times. Another cop (” NYPD Marathon” shirt) notes that my number is the one a cop never wants to use… Stripped off the sweat pants and sweat shirt, but still in tights. (A guy in his later 60s is wearing track shorts and tank top, shivering at the starting line. My money is on HIM, and sure enough he passes me early on. But that’s OK, I’m running MY race.)
Horn blows, I’m near the front of the pack, we’re off around a park and little pond, then off through residential neighborhoods, almost no spectators, a good pace, feeling solid. My goal is to break 1:36 (which I’ve done, although that was 3 years ago), maybe even 1:35, and Coach Debi has told me to run 7:40 the first mile, 7:20s until mile 10 to avoid “blowing up”, then surge for the last 3 miles. Feels like a lot of gentle downhills at the start, but I’m not rushing it. Strangely difficult to measure my pace – the Garmin swings wildly from 6:53 to 7:40 within moments, and credits me for completing miles long before reaching the course markers – must be from the city geography.
So my first mile is spot on; at 5k I’m averaging 7:25s; at 10k, 7:21s (good!); but I’m not feeling the love, and despite reasonable nutrition (EAAs at 25 minutes and 59 minutes, and a gel at 1:07 – reminded by the digital monitors to eat), dropping to 7:40 at 15k (8 miles) and more and more people are passing me.
At mile 9 1/2, my left calf starts to cramp. I am stumbling, and yelling “whoa!” with each potential face-plant, and worried that my bib number is going to be needed (“I need backup!”). In an almost flat course, there’s an uphill, a ramp to cross a bridge, and the lead runners are running along the other side towards me, which means I’ll have to do it twice. At 20k, I’ve dropped to 8:09 min/miles. Kind of cool seeing the World’s Fair globe so close up, but I’m just this side of miserable and I’m not into sightseeing…
(A spectator, clearly another cop, shouts out, “Hey, love your number!”, then turns to explain to his friends. Shut up…). The temptation to quit and walk is rearing its ugly head, because the digital monitors indicate there’s no way I’m breaking 1:36, unless I can speed up to 7 minute miles, but when I try to accelerate the calf cramp gets more frequent (“whoa!”) so faster is not an option. So I slog the last mile or two, not walking, this may not be my PR but I don’t have to walk it. And push a little harder, nothing to lose now! Finish. Thank you. Done.
And I see Kevin and Jisk just after I cross the finish line.
Bottom line: 1:40:14. Not my fastest; indeed, my slowest; but none of the wheels fell off. Plus, among my peers (aging and slowing, alas!) I do pretty well: 5/63 AG, 264/3156 OA, 226/1575 males. And there may be a silver lining – Coach Debi thinks the cramping indicates something is wrong with my form. So, during the off season, I can work on changing my mechanics. And maybe I can still get faster…
Meanwhile, the off season has arrived. Done, done, done.
Three goals for this race in our little village: do a PR; if not, at least do better than last year; and beat my nemesis and inspiration James Condon. (He took first place last year; I took it the year before; I took second and he took third two years ago…). We only see each other at this race, which is full of small children and more casual runners, mostly doing the 5k.
We’re off, heading around the high school, and my target passes me in the first half mile, light blue sweatshirt and long, long legs (“Mr. Condon!” I shout, he laughs), and he quickly gets at least two blocks ahead. My buddy Dietmar, recovered from a great Chicago Marathon, generously runs with me for the first mile, then takes off, never to be seen again.
The second 5k loop on this hilly course is always a challenge, given the temptation to quit and just walk home, but once again Jim Nolan is at the first turn shouting encouragement, shaming me into finishing the race. I’m close to maximum effort, and that light blue sweatshirt is still far ahead, but nothing is impossible and I have that bunny to chase, and I realize that he’s slowing on the downhills, he’s tired like the rest of us and thinks he can ease up when it’s easier, but doesn’t know I’m still there, and I push off harder and let gravity do its thing, and by the end of the second descent I’m close, and as we make the turns through all those short backstreets I pass him a half mile from the end, my neighbors Anthony and Amy are cheering, and an older guy who I always see walkin/ jogging around town is finishing the 5k and says, “9”, must be counting the guys who are in the lead, and I am sprinting to get a safety margin against Condon making a surge, and the Finish Line is mine.
Cross the finish line: 41:49 (to be honest, for a 5.9 miles/9.5 km course). Faster than last year, slower than my best, but I am 1/9 AG (50-59), 8/44 OA. And it’s nice to be the Fastest Old Guy.
This was the shortest multi-sport race I’ve done: 2.2 mile run, 12 mile bike, 2.2 mile run. As a French ultra-marathoner friend once wrote, “The shorter distances. They are more violent.” So the strategy (other than to get out of bed at 5:15, not crazy early in the day but late enough in the season to think, “Really? Do I really have to do this?” And that, my friends, is why I register in advance of race day: it forces me to get up and do the damn race…): to run really as fast as I can for the first run, imagine I am only riding the bike leg, and then with a slight pause to “find my legs” off the bike, go maximum effort again. Privately, I was shooting for 7:00 minute/miles, and 20 mph on the bike. So, that’s just over an hour, 1:10 to be precise, without including the two transition times.
Nice, small bunch of people: some first time couples on their mountain bikes, some experienced and older and FAST people. Bumped into Danny Secow, who I’d met at Westchester Tri last year.
I’m glad that I’ve aged out from your age group: he’s unbelievably fast, and ends up in this race taking third place for his class. (But I’m getting ahead of myself.)
The race itself is relatively uneventful, except that the initial uphill brings my HR all the way to maximum and it’s a short out an back on the east side of the Park, and I’m just pushing hard, and it feels good, and I manage to average 7:08s. Though I am largely ignoring my watch, avoiding the distraction and potential worry about metrics, it beeps at the end of each mile, and I peek, because nothing wrong with getting encouraging news.
The bike is more challenging, not that The Hill is so terrible, but because by 8:40 a.m., the Park is filling up with people: joggers and bicyclists and strollers and dog-walkers. So even though I had been concerned about getting swept up in the danger of the other racers going too fast and too closely together, the danger turned out to be the pedestrians/civilians. Almost everyone were fine with my calling out “On your left!” or more frequently (because of the way the no-cars traffic seemed to work) “on your right!” Some even thanked me. Well, one did anyway… And one woman yells, not yet seeing me, “Oh, really? I don’t friggin believe it!”
This is why I love New York.
Bikes get pretty spread out, though I did leap frog with one young guy in a black shirt and tights (even though it was a gorgeous sunny day, temps at 58 and went up to maybe 70), the downhill around the public pool is pretty technical and scary, and I was afraid if I wasn’t careful, I’d end up overshooting the transition area and do THIRD lap by mistake. Bike: 20.8 mph.
The run was rough, only because I wanted to go fast as I can, and I had pushed pretty hard on the bike, and on the way back on the last mile I’m thinking “Wherever I am near the podium, it won’t make a difference now: whoever’s ahead is way ahead, and whoever’s behind is… Wait, that guy who was running towards me and was about to turnaround … He could catch me.” So I am doing what I can as hard as I can, and I GET TO THE FINISH LINE.
(Short race, great to have a short race).
And the second run is in 16:25, or 7:24 per mile. So the average of the two runs is 7:14 min/mile – almost as I had been hoping.
Final time, 1:08:18. More notably: Second Place for my Age Group!
With Tim Bradley
This is turning out to be a good season. Thank you, Coach Debi.
Though I signed up in the early spring, I didn’t decide to do this race until 2 days before, because I had tendinitis in my rotator cuff and biceps (no doubt from improper swimming form) and hadn’t swum in 5 weeks, since the day after Poconos 70.3. (Ironically the swim in that tri had never felt better.) I actually rode the course the week before with my nemesis/racing buddy Scott Schiffer, who had come down from Poughkeepsie, because I didn’t know if I would actually see him on race day.
“By the dawn’s early light…” with Scott Schiffer
But I had swum 500 yds. on Friday morning, when it felt okay, and another ten minutes off the beach at Rye Playland on Saturday morning (when Alan Golds and I went there for packet pickup), and it felt GREAT — the cold water felt like I was immersed in ice packs! Coach Debi told me to “RACE!” (last tri of the season; “so, worst case, you don’t swim for a couple months”), and my saintly but human wife Rachel wanted me to stop moping.
I also wanted to go because there’d be lots of friends there: Drew Ahkao and NIcholas Moore (damn, what happened to those photos?!), Scott , the Hastings team (almost all of us after/still recovering from various injuries).
with Alan Golds, Tom Andrews, John McDermott and Kevin Carlsten – where did Zander Reyna GO?!
A real community, since this Olympic was so close to home.
With Jason, Ziv Abramowicz, and Vadim Shteynberg
Waited to the last minute to warm up, as we were the last of 9 waves. Doesn’t matter how many races I’ve done, I’m always scared as we enter the shoot, cross the mat, and await the horn…. HOOOOOOT.
It was low tide, so we ran some 25, 50 yards before getting to water deep enough for swimming. I’m swimming alongside Alan for a while, then jostled by crowds as they pass me, or I pass them. (People in wetsuits are so BIG.) I was committed to minimizing injury by being relaxed, and build into whatever I could handle, and relaxation HAS to be good for swimming; I had to look left at the buoys in this counterclockwise course, which was better for my injury and my stronger side; and I had tapered a LOT in the prior week, including two nights of 9+ hours sleep in the last few days. So I wasn’t surprised that, despite the shoulder injury, it turned out to be my best swim ever: 26:08. YES.
T1 went well (which is to say I found my bike where I left it), in and out in 2:50, but Scott runs past me as I’m taking off my wetsuit.
I have a few goals for the bike: to beat Scott (who had taken first place to my third place at the Stissing Sprint earlier this year); to ride at 20 to 21 mph (instead of the 19+ that I had done in recent races); and to beat my best time on this course of 1:12. Took a while to catch up with Scott; he passed me; I passed him again at some hill, but the fear of him breathing down my neck kept me going. Panting despite Debi’s orders. I am tapping whatever power I have, pushing pushing. Almost no one passed me, and no one in my age group. So, towards the end, when I saw I had already used up my 1:12, I thought, I won’t beat my best time, but maybe I’d make the podium anyway. That would be a great consolation prize. Bike: 1:15:25, or 20.84 mph.
T2 does not go perfectly — I go to the wrong row to rack my bike, but I find my spot without losing too much time. 2:07; lost maybe 20 seconds. Who cares, right?
For the run, I finally had learned to wear sunglasses on that first shadeless out and back, and as I’m returning, there’s Scott; and I pass another guy in our AG. Mile 1 is 7:21. OK, I have some lead, but there’s very little cushion there. By Mile 3, I realize all I can do is maintain whatever pace I am doing, and if someone else has the juice to go faster, God be with them. By Mile 4, I am miserable, panting and slogging, but remembered from my last race, the Poconos 70.3, that everyone else is probably hurting too and not to assume I’m in last place. Sure enough, by mile 5, I pass Phil Gormley, who OWNS this race; he always comes in the top 5 or better; I make the turnaround, and here comes Scott running towards me, and he seems like he’s closer since I last saw him, and I SOOOOO want to walk, I am sooooo tired, but I have a shot at the podium if I can stay ahead of Phil and Scott, and I remember that the turn off the road isn’t at the first view of the park but here comes the second, and that last grassy 0.2 miles is as sweet as ever, and BAM I cross the finish line, walking in circles to let my heart rate drop to something reasonable. Run time: 48:28, or 7:50 min/mile. Not my best, but I’ll take it.
As I wait on line for a free massage, to be followed by free beer (such a civilized race), Scott gets our results; he’s taken 3rd Place and I have finished in 2nd Place for our age group! YES, YES, YES.
“One of these is mine!”
2:34:58, 2/36 AG, 83/618 OA.
First place, Bruce Kaliner (whom I’d met years ago at this race, and is gracious enough to tell me “you kicked my butt at the NYC Tri this year”), beats me by 19 seconds… I was faster on the bike and the run, but he was faster on the swim and T2! But I am delighted, having chased this age group podium since I started racing 6 years ago — coming in 19th, then 13th, then 8th, then 8th again – then a year off, to train for the NYC Marathon. Finally! Mine, mine, mine.
I haven’t gotten faster — in fact, I was 6 minutes slower than my best race in 2013, and 2 minutes slower than last year – but I’ve gotten older. I haven’t given up on more PRs, but I am happy to do well among my peers.
And my shoulder still hurts, but somehow I feel a lot better.
Seen on a spectator’s shirt: “That’s a terrible idea. What time does it start?”
This was planned to be my longest race of the season, fit my schedule, and was in a scenic part of Pennsylvania where I might have visited my cousins if their schedules had fit, so I didn’t even look at the course until just before the race: 1.2 mile swim in a big, clean lake; 56 miles through a lot of rolling hills and some short steep ones; and 13.1 miles of running four loops around a ridiculously hilly course. (Add ’em up – 70.3 miles – a.k.a. a Half-Ironman® distance). Ignorance was bliss…
Actually, I almost wasn’t able to race. On the Tuesday before the race, I “supplemented” a rest day (mistake no. 1) with kettle bell deadlifts, which I belatedly remembered are different from kettle bell swings (mistake no. 2) and hurt my lower back. A tweak in the morning, a growing awareness in the afternoon, hard to walk by evening. Coach Debi recommended YouTube videos to stretch my QL. Man, they WORKED. Did it again Saturday morning, texted Kevin Carlsten (whom I had convinced to do his first 70.3), that I’d be ready by 2 pm, and we were off!
Small race – 750 people including the Olympic distance (oh, that would have been lovely…), 250 in our race. Set up in transition- and couldn’t find my racing glasses! Oh, well, my regular glasses would have to do. And couldn’t find my baggy of Ucan powder for electrolytes and carbs! Oh, well, I had a plan B: EAA crunchy tablets, more Huma gels than I really needed for both the bike and run, and chewable Saltstick tabs. So, overstuffed the Bento box with fuel (need a bigger one, even if it’s less aerodynamic!) hustled onto the line for the outhouses, went to the warmup area of the lake (a very shallow, very weedy lagoon – useless!) and shivered waiting for the race to start. But: bumped into Rob Martzen, fresh from IM Lake Placid, and Jan Swenson, there to cheer on Fran – and Kevin again, with whom I buddied up for a bizarre swim start: two at a time, “two seconds” from the pair ahead of you, sitting and pushing off from a dock!
The staggered beginning around a big, counterclockwise rectangle made for an immediate realization: very hard to find someone off whom I could draft. Because if I could catch ’em, they were too slow for me. And if they could catch me, I’d better be ready to hustle to stick with ‘em.
I started comfortable and smooth, and building into a strong, deliberate, faster groove, sleeveless and loving the 73 degree water, breathing to the right on the first leg to avoid looking into the sun, alternating sides on the second and third leg, breathing right on the fourth. And passing people, not knowing if they were my age group, but feeling (maybe for the first time) that I was in my element, for the whole swim. Felt like I had a current behind me, lifting me forward. Wasn’t prepared to climb a ladder onto the dock, and couldn’t find the rungs for a moment, but stumbled onto land, hooray! Time, including stumbling across the transition mat while peeling off the top of the wetsuit: 34:50, or 1:49/100 meters. Solid, but more importantly, comfortable in a way I hadn’t known.
Pretty good transition (3:09), considering that I couldn’t get the wetsuit off my ankles… Because I had registered late (and was racked with those who picked up packets on race day), I couldn’t estimate how many in my age group had already left. So I run out as best I can, assuming I’m in the middle of the pack. (Mistake no. 3.)
Ah, the bike. We had been told we’d be on the Poconos Raceway, but I hadn’t realized until we’d been riding a few miles that they meant a NASCAR raceway. Pretty cool to be on such flat, well-paved tarmac, made to go zoom, including the banked roadway on the way back. We get back on the regular road, played leap frog with a woman almost my age, passing her, she passes me, back and forth, until I failed to shift to a low enough gear to deal with the turnaround at mile 10, and she takes off. I kept planning to say, “Damn, you’re fast!” but I didn’t catch up with her to say so until after the race finished…
I knew it was rolling hills, net downhill the first 38 miles, then a short sharp ascent in the village of White Haven, and the balance of 18-19 miles (it’s a slightly long course) is net uphill. I had started out pretty much alone, passing a few people, feeling strong, but I had found early on that my injured back really ached when I climbed, so I was staying in aero position as much as possible. I dropped from averaging 20-21 mph to 14-15 mph going up the steep sections, trying to keep my heart rate within zone 2 (131-141), working my nutrition, drinking most of my 3 bottles of water (OK, that may have been overkill and not worth the weight). The roads are beautiful, the weather is amazing (breezy, starting at 69 degrees, reaching to 80), shady under the trees, beautiful sunshine.
But folks starting passing me. A lot of guys didn’t have their age marked on their calves, so I was assuming that the older-looking ones were my age group, and feeling like I was being repeatedly dropped by the competition. (Another mistake…) Every 70.3 race, I am reminded how LONG 56 miles can be, and was pretty spent and ready for the change of a run by the time I finished: 3:04:39, or 18.55 mph average. Not my fastest, but solid, especially with that terrain.
Get off the bike, sit down to change shoes, and stumble out of transition area. A terrific T2 – only 1:29.
But, my back, my poor back: I can barely walk! I hobble, then walk, then jog, trying to get back to that good feeling I had the morning before, and amazingly, after around a ½ mile, it feels okay. However, it feels exhausting. I finish Mile 1, and I am ready to be DONE. And it’s 12.1 miles to go…
Four, brutal 3.2-mile loops. Steep hills out of the resort area (there’s an older, heavy woman sitting in a chair at the top of the first hill, cheering us on, God bless her), I’m averaging 9:30s, more hills, a flat section, then downhill where I’m averaging 8:10s (there’s a volunteer running in place, dancing and waving her arms as she shouts “To the right, to the right!”), to a turnaround where we cross the timing chip mats, back past the dancing woman (by the second loop it becomes unbearable to hear her…), up again, a short out and back to add mileage to the Olympic 10k course so our race will add up to 13.1, up, up, up a long hill, back down past the crowds near transition….
4 times.
By the second loop, I’m not only walking the water stops, but also walking the steep hills. I wonder about quitting, but I stop to pee in an outhouse (losing another 2 minutes, but what does it matter, I’m so far behind everyone…. Another mistake), and stumble uphill. Kevin and I pass going in opposite directions; I had thought he had passed me on the bike, and that he was almost done, but he was on the second loop as well.
Kevin Carlsten — killing it on his first 70.3
By the third loop, I really want to quit, but manage to get through it. As I finish THAT loop, I overhear a spectator say, “I mean, if he finished 6 miles, he could have friggin’ WALKED the rest of the race!” and realized that someone else had quit, it wasn’t me, and I only had one loop to go. Kevin catches up, I gasp that I might walk the rest of the way, he goes on and walk/runs as well, I walk a lot more, depleted, passed by a guy in a green felt, pointed cap (dressed as either Pinocchio or Peter Pan, I’m not sure – but it’s like the NY Marathon, you know things are bad when the guys in costume pass you), and when I ask him, he confirms that he’s in my age group. So I am sure that I am struggling for 6th, 7th or 10th place, and I lose my give-a-damn. (Two more mistakes…)
So by Mile 11, I am walking as much as running, but I pick it up at the top of that last long hill, and stumble some more, digging deeper to reach that sweet finish line. And I have survived perhaps the hardest run I’ve ever known, and my back is intact, and I finished: 2:05:56, or 9:37/mile, and a total finish of 5:50:01. A good 25 minutes slower than my better races.
Ah, the Finish Line…
And then the shock: 4/13 for my AG, 77/239 overall! I was in 3rd place the WHOLE RACE up to somewhere between Mile 8 and 11 of the run! If I hadn’t made all those mistaken assumptions about being the last in the pack, I wouldn’t have stopped to pee. I might have worked harder, I coulda been a contender and on the podium.
Look, it might not have made a difference – I might still have “lost” to the 3rd place finisher by a minute or two – but the lesson here is not assume, by default, that I’m alone in the race because I’m BEHIND everyone. I might be alone because I’m AHEAD. (And also: 4th place isn’t really a “loss” after finishing a Half Ironman distance.)
Rough race.
Glad it’s over.
When’s the next one?
Home again, home again with Kevin – and a car full of bicycles and gear…
This was my third time doing this Olympic distance triathlon and I caught myself early from getting caught up in an unrealistic goal: the podium for my age group. I mean, this is a big race – over 3,100 – with professionals and elites from all over the country, and guys my age that are still standing and doing this stuff are pretty serious. But I shot for a more reachable goal: the top 10 for my age group. After all, I had been 15th or 16th in 2013 and 2016, and I was among the youngest in my division, now.
Being in the first wave (after the pros and elites) at 6:00 a.m., I was in bed on Saturday night by 8:45 and woke up at 2:45 a.m., surprisingly wired and ready (WTF, I know.). The generous Vadim Shteynberg picked me up at 3:30, flexing his numbered tattoos (I rushed back into the house to put on mine!),and we got to the City and found parking by 4:05; got to transition near 72nd Street (where we had all racked our bikes the day before – thank you Rachel for coming with me!); and had almost an hour to set up and, get through toilet lines before transition closed at 5:15.
Did I tell you, transition opened early in the morning?
(Announcement: “A professional has had a blow out. Does anyone have a spare front wheel?” Seriously?). Another 30-minute walk to the swim start; at Vadim’s suggestion and another racer’s confirmation, I left a pair of worn out running shoes near the exit from the swim (for the half mile run back to transition); and around 15 minutes to chat with my fellow almost-the-oldest guys.
With college roommate Dzu Do – his first triathlon since NYC in 2001!
No time to spare before being hustled onto the temporary barge sticking into the Hudson at 97th Street. We walk down the plank, line up in groups of 15, the horn blares and we jump!
The water is salty but warm (73 degrees) and I am surprised that my sleeveless wetsuit feels great (even though the full-length always seems faster) and I am shooting to swim as far to the right as I can, not only to avoid the disguising flotsam and jetsam we had seen by the riverbank while waiting to start, but also to get the stronger current. And I get into the best groove I’ve ever known: reaching and pulling strong, breathing to the left (my “bad” side) to watch the shore zoom by (God bless the current!), keeping my head together, this is MY race, no time or wasted energy to ponder whether I am “behind everyone”, I have no idea who started ahead of or behind me, anyway; suddenly tapping into rotating through my core as I’ve only sometimes felt through all these years of training, and I am actually passing people, and I’m at the dock, and I scramble up the ramp with strong volunteers grabbing me by the arms and pulling me to SHORE! Time: 15:26 for 1.5 km (0.9 miles); 9/137 for the AG. Even with the current, that’s my fastest and best placement ever – and I am told that the current only got faster as the day progressed.
Start running to transition, then remember that I stored my old shoes by the exit, but I’ve forgotten to count the fence posts and… I can’t find them! Screw it, I’ve run this 1/2 mile barefoot before, and I am not going to lose time looking for my time-saving sneakers.
Shoes? I don”t need no stinkin shoes!
Count the rows and racks to my bike, strip the wetsuit, switch goggles for glasses, slap on my helmet with magnetic, wraparound “windshield” (borrowed from Alan Golds, who couldn’t race this one) and bike shoes and GO! Bike Out is really close to where our age group was assigned, so this is a great T1 (5:41, including the run along the river, 7/137 for AG) and up that steep hill out of Riverside Park and onto the crappy road that is the 79th Street roundabout and up the ramp onto the West Side Drive and GO!
My heart rate is literally in Zone 4 (hitting 153 BPM) before I cool down and settle into high z2, flying as best I can after whoever finished the swim ahead of me (podium? Maybe?), and then I’m passed by four guys who vanish out of sight (damn, dropped again, i’m fighting for 6th place at best). And until I turn around at the almost midpoint, I am alone- no novices on mountain bikes, dangerously cluttering the fast-as-I-can descents, but no one in target distance to keep me at maximum effort, and Alan had warned me about this- keep an eye on the Garmin to keep my RPM up to 90 (but when I shift to a gear that’s “comfortable”, those guys had pulled even farther ahead…) but a few times my heart rate dips to zone 1 which means I’m not. Working. Hard. Enough.
And by the time I reach the first turnaround, some of the more powerful 40-somethings pass me, one of them coming dangerously between two of us (me yelling, “Hey, pass on the left side!”),
and I pass one of the elite woman, and I’m passed by a guy with 62 (years) on his calf (“60-freakin 2! Look at you!”). And I’m doing the best I can not to be passed by Vadim (as he did at Quassy) and I get to the second turnaround at 60th street, and I feel like I’m in the middle of the pack. Oh, well, best I can do today. Time: 1:16:01, which is 19.62 mph average. 17/136 for AG. (Yep, biking is where I need to improve the most.)
Bike In is, again, near my rack, I swap shoes, swap storm trooper helmet for my lucky Ironman baseball cap, run out and as I ascend the hill realize I have once again left my watch on the bike. But T2 in 1:44 (gaining from 17th place to 10th place!)
I don’t know if I am taking the 1st mile too hard (I want that top 10!) so I slow down as I leave the park and feel strong as I plow down 72nd Street towards Central Park,
but starting at Mike 2 I am feeling pretty grim, grabbing water at the rest stop, and by mile 3, I am just hanging on to survive, and the only good news is that the hilly loop around Central Park feels “easier” clockwise, at least we can descend that One Big Hill. But it feels like this slogging is all I’ve got, walking a couple of water stations, struggling to give a damn, whoever has the juice to pass me, God bless ’em, and sure enough as we approach the Finish Line, a 63-year old – whose age group started after me – passes.
Humility and inspiration at the same time!
`
Not sure whether the Garmin would have helped – maybe I would have felt better to see that I was doing 7:27 min/mile the first half, and been inspired to go faster than 7:32 in the second half.
But even if the run was rough, I finish in 46:45 – and my overall time is 2:25:43! And best of all, I met my goal of the top 10: 8/136 for AG (well within the top 10% needed to qualify for the Nationals), 303/2192 men, 356/3132 OA. 8th place. Damn, that’s satisfying.
with Vadim ShteynbergWith more Rivertowners: John McDermott and Kevin Carlsten
So, compared to last year, that’s 4 minutes slower, and 6 blocks (0.3 miles) shorter on the bike course (they announced at orientation that the turnaround at 60th instead of 57th now makes he course the correct distance), but run is 1 mile longer than last year (when they cut short the run to 5 miles because of the heat). So I figure a PR of around 2:30 minutes (effectively, 2:18:30 on last year’s course).
So, on the one hand, I want to ratchet up my bike speed to at least 21 mph. I did 22 in Milwaukee, but that was really flat. On the other hand, I jumped from 17th place on the bike to 8th place on the run – so maybe a measured, controlled bike leg IS the route for me…
Now, that it’s over, and that grueling run has ended: “that was fun.” And I’m ready to get to work – I have Poconos 70.3 (half Ironman distance) in 4 weeks!
This was a good one. I hadn’t done this race since 2013, and it was a good way to get together with my racing buddy Scott Schiffer who lives nearby – or least nearer than I do. We had dinner at a diner in Fishkill, New York; watched some of the replay from the Tour de France time trial; and I was in bed by 9 o’clock. Got up at 4:30, because no matter how well prepared I am I can’t get out in less than an hour. Drove 15 minutes to Pine Plains, New York and checked in for a very small, very local race.
Only 70 people had signed up, and only 66 showed up, because it was the Sunday of a four-day July 4th weekend, and how many idiots would spend part of a mini-vacation doing a sprint triathlon? Around 66.
Me and Scott Schiffer, pre-race
Had a new realization on the way to the race. I was scared. (That’s not new; bizarrely, after all of these triathlons, I’m always scared to start the race.) So, next I asked and answered, what’s scaring me? I was afraid of failing. I suppose a lot of us feel that way; maybe it’s heightened before a challenge (and sprint or Ironman, every race is a challenge; as French ultra-marathoner Emanuelle Jaeger said, “the shorter races – they are more violent!”). But the new part was realizing: what would failure look like? I mean, having survived a few bad races, I don’t think I’d recognize “failure” if it bit me on the butt! It’s ridiculous. I race and finish triathlons. Would failure mean: coming in less than 1st place for my age group (as I had done in this race last time?). REALLY? And coming in after Scott, an excellent athlete who trains virtually every day? REALLY? Or not doing better than the 1:30 I had done last time? How the hell does that equate to failure? Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous!
So I realized this was a morning filled with opportunity, with possibility, simply to do the best I could. And really, every race is like that. (REALLY, every morning is as well.)
I arrive at 6:30 to start at 8 a.m. Call me crazy, but the extra time makes me calmer. I set up in the semi-assigned transition area. Meet some nice guys, one of whom lends me a race belt (as I later find mine in the car). Go down to warm up in the l’il Stissing Lake (so small that motorboats aren’t allowed). The water is really warm, and I’m tempted to wear my speed suit instead of sleeveless wetsuit, but I am not a capital S Swimmer and need all the help I can get. Some back stroke, some fast work, some standing around on the beach with a nice bunch on a beautiful day. (74 degrees, whatever % humidity.).
Total of two waves – based on date of registration, not age or gender! – and so informal, we start with a “Go!”
Well-placed, multiple buoys, I’m knocked by a big fella who passes me, nudges me off course, slows down- someone to get around! Round the first buoy, it’s only .5 miles in total, I’m going strong but focusing on smooth, breathing every stroke on the left side which feels better for a change, it’s a long, second side of a 4-sided figure, the sun is bright, the water clean, round the last buoy, haul in as fast as I can, run through the lake weeds (ugh) onto the beach, and DONE. 14:34, some 30 seconds slower than in 2013. Oh, well. But not bad!
Get to the bike, Scott is leaving as I arrive (“I’ll get you, Red Baron!” No, I didn’t say that out loud), decent transition, out into the asphalt, stumble a little with getting clipped in, and I have a LOT of catching up to do.
Fabulous Bruce Cadenhead in his USAT suit passes me (having started the swim 3 to 5 minutes after I started), another guy passes me, and I am just pouring it on as fast as I can to catch SOMEBODY, for a moment someone off the bike and fixing his chain is within target distance, but he’s gone as well. I mean, after all my training in heart rate Zone 1, I am in Zone 3, and why not, it’s a sprint, time for everything I’ve got. I’m cooking along, taking in some nutrition, and at about 40 minutes, I think, shouldn’t this be curving more to the right to be near the starting line? Maybe an optical illusion. And: not a soul in sight, shouldn’t I have a least SEEN some of the 6 or 7 guys who finished swimming ahead of me? And: it finally dawns on me, this is supposed to be a 2-hill course, but I’m on hill number 5 or 6…. I must have missed a turn.
I slow down, some of the fire gone since I can’t possibly make the podium now, but still in Zone 2. I wave down a van, asking the driver if she’s seen any other bikes, and she says “yeah, they’re going down Route 82. Hauling ass!” And it’s a good thing I talked with her, because Route 82 took a sharp right shortly after that, and I went with it, and suddenly I’m on top of a policeman directing traffic to allow other cyclists turn right, ONTO the road I’ve been riding, and these guys are not the elite athletes I’ve been chasing, these guys are slugging along on bikes with great big saddles, and I ask someone in a blue helmet, “what mile is this?” And he answers, “15”. And I laugh out loud because I’m on mile 18 of a 16.5 mile course!
Perfect for confirming that basic lesson: I really am racing against myself. Bike, after 3.2 extra miles and a lot more hills, is 19.8 miles in 1:02 (19.2 mph, a lot slower than the 20.5 of 2013 – but also 1,220 feet of climbing….)
So I jump off into transition, and there’s a goofy tape which I guess is supposed to make us run around the entire transition area in order to “be fair”, and I’m doing the best I can. Keep it slow the first 200 meters, then pour it on, it’s mostly shady roads, I pass 6 people, one guy passes me (“How old are you?” “31!” “You may pass…”) and it’s painful and it’s hard to focus past the “why bother?” Because I’m not going to beat anyone who’s ridden 3 miles less, but I want at least to RUN faster than I did four years ago, and each mile of the 3.5 miles is a mini victory, I can’t sustain this 166, then 167, ultimately 170 beats a minute, rounding the athletic fields, slowing slightly with the thought that those orange cones require us to do some stupid loop, but no, I turn left, down the grass and across! the! Finish! Line!
OMG, that hurt, wait, I’ll give you my racing chip in a moment…
25:08 for a 3.5 mile course. Avg. 7:11 min/miles, and only 8 seconds slower than the last time I did this race, 4 years ago. I’ll TAKE it! Total time, 1:45:37.
And two great kickers: the Race Director overheard me talking with Scott (who took 1st place for our age group), and she asked, “did you miss that turn where the sign blew down?” Me: “I wouldn’t know!” RD: “Well, we didn’t have enough volunteers this year. I’m going to give you your money back.” And she brings me a check made out to cash!
Well, that’s extremely decent. But after cleaning up I realize that I won’t keep it, and I tell her, “listen, I still did a race, and USAT Rules say that I’m supposed to know the course, and it was a great day.” A moment later, a guy comes up to tell her that he rode 20 EXTRA MILES because of missing that turn (and, I bet, not taking that sharp right to stay on Route 82!). I have to hope she gave him the check I gave back to her…
And, I also tell the Race Director: I may be 54, but I’m 55 in triathlon years, and for once, I want to be older, because that means I came in THIRD PLACE for my age group! (And if I subtract some 10 minutes for the extra 3.2 miles – then, I would have finished in 1:35, which would be Second Place, by a good 5 minutes.). 3/10 AG, 24/66 OA.
This is not a dramatic tale; my slowest half marathon ever; but successful in a new way.
