2019 Race Reports – Mark Kaufman

Westchester Triathlon, 9/22/2019

My only regret in this race is falling in love with the podium and getting jilted… I had won for my age group last Sunday’s 70.3, and two years ago I had just aged up and came in 2nd at this race. In between came last year’s Did Not Finish at this very race (my only DNF and only race of which I did NOT blog): I hadn’t finished because of back spasms, and when I got off the bike could not run a step. So, really, if I finish this race, it’s a 100% improvement over last year. And yet, I still coveted the podium.

So, I do my normal pre-race routine (for which I was taunted by Alan Golds, who drove us to Rye Playland Beach the day before we raced to register and swim the waves, feel the salt water: “you’re getting up at 3:30 a.m.?!”). Yeah, I need an hour to shovel down all that nutrition. Yeah, I already had racked my bike, but had to plan… For example, to prevent the helmet shield from getting covered with dew or humidity, cover the whole helmet with part of the large towel where bike shoes await. There. A new efficiency.

I stroll down the row to see Zander, John McD, Tom Andrews and Kevin Carlsten getting ready, racked very near each other and giving me a shout out. Nice to see the Home Team. Our newest plebe, Michael Litsky, is doing his first Olympic distance (0.9 mile swim, 25.6 mile bike, 6.2 mile rrrrrrrun), after his first Sprint distance this summer. “Ah, welcome to the Dark Side, Mike…”

Tom Andrews, John McDermott, me, Zander Reyna, Alan Golds, and Kevin Carlsten

Zander is missing, replaced by Mike Litsky. Some believe they are one person…

Stroll down to the beach at Rye Playland – I’m so early, it’s not clear where the gate is unlocked – and a couple dozen of us watch a beautiful sunrise waiting for the lifeguards to get out on kayaks. Relaxing warmup, but the air and water are both around 67 degrees and as I predicted, I’m shivering for the next 20 minutes. Bruce Kaliner is waiting as well – he took first place to my second place in 2017 – and I realize I need to avoid starting the swim with him, I’ll be swimming HIS race instead of my own … So I hang out with Kevin, always a source of positive energy.

Rolling, self-seeded start. I had done the Toughman a week ago at a 1:44 pace, so went for the “1:45 or Faster” section. (Shut UP, Zander! Not all of us swim at 1:10!). The only starting horn is for the first group – those promising collegiates, who look fast, but ‘tis a pleasure to later pass them on the bike and run – and the rest of us wait 3 seconds at a time, like cattle, to run into the water. I splash up to my thighs, then almost waist deep then, okay, swim, dammit! Feels smooth, strong, more relaxed than fast – trying to feel my lats engaged is harder with the full sleeve wetsuit – drafting briefly, passing here and there, mostly clear water and of course that beautiful sunrise is now a bright glare in my face. So it’s hard to see the buoys, but there are a lot of them (weird, a giant ball amidst the other pyramids) and that reassuring 500-yd. buzz from the Garmin suggests that I’m making progress.

Turn at the outer point (just beyond the jetty – Alan had teased Mike that we had to swim to the horizon), maybe 15 yards to the next red buoy, then some confusion as three or four guys ahead of me start heading towards the buoys from the first leg instead of straight into shore – another fine lesson of Racing MY Race; literally, “that’s the wrong course, guys.” Maybe a current was pushing against me on the way out, maybe the same one helps to push to shore, but it feels great, and 0.9 Miles is DONE. More water to run through, get onto shore and start stripping my wetsuit and RUNNING uphill to transition among the folks taking their sweet time. And Jeff Boyer, coach for some friends, shouting from the sidelines, “Ah, THERE’s someone who’s racing!”

T1 feels fast and relatively efficient, and the helmet-under-towel works well (I don’t lose more time wiping off that shield/visor) and I am OUT just after Bruce K, my nemesis-for-a-day.

The road is pretty broken up so I can scarcely ride in the aero position for the first 4 Miles, and I am breathing pretty steady and unlike last week’s 70.3 I am more consistently in zone 2, cranking up the watts, yes there are hills but so much shorter than I’ve been suffering, I’m passing a lot of people and only occasionally passed by others, but almost no one seems to be in my age group. A few fast descents, one (younger) guy to whom I warn “on your left” later passes me and says, “I’ve seen you before at another race – you pass me on the downhill flats and I get you on the hills!” At about mile 20, I pass him, and knowing the elevation map, say “There are no more hills, Red Baron.”

I get to T2 and lo, mine is the first bike on our rack. And I get out before Bruce, who says hello and I say goodbye.

I am ready for a fast, light run, bouncing off the springy boards of the boardwalk along the Rye Playland amusement park, off into that darn unshaded marsh, but it’s not as long and awful as prior races, and as I actually reach the turnaround, I realize (a) I am running towards Bruce, which means I’m ahead, but that he’s chasing me, so I am running from a demon, and (b) with a shorter race – 10k rather than last week’s half marathon — every single mile is harder because it is faster. I later do the math, and I’m pushing 14% harder than the 9:00 min./mile average with which I was delighted for the Half Marathon at the end of last week’s 70.3. That’s a big difference.

Goal is first two miles in zone 2, and I slow down a little after the hill that goes past the transition area (and the crowds of spectators, a gauntlet before hitting the tree lined streets of Rye) to bring my heart rate down from 154. (I went out too fast in Florida last April, I won’t do that again!). Gulp down my liquid nutrition – last of the UCAN – and then wish I could throw away my hydration belt….

And then it’s every mile by feel, pushing as hard as I can in that moment, ignoring the watch. Mile 3 feels solid but hard, and I decide that Mile 4 will be lighter, not slower but landing more lightly and feeling my full height, I pass someone in my age group (big guy with 56 on his calf; great, maybe I will get 2nd or 3rd) and where oh where is that turnaround, it is a really long time to reach Mile 5, but as I run back I see coming towards me Alan and Tom and… Bruce, and I realize he’s close but unless he gets a lot faster he won’t catch me, and I’m dying for that right hand turn into the temporary fairgrounds and finally it’s here, Mile 6, those last 0.2 Miles down the grassy chute are killing me, I later learn that my heart rate climbed from the 160s to 173, and I raise my hands for the Finish!

Done, done, done! And almost immediately I’m greeted by Danny Sokol, whom I’d met in prior years, and he’s extremely fast on the bike and run and… he has aged up to my group. And I’m thinking if he has 1st Place, I’ll have 2nd, that’s cool. But Danny announces that he came in 3rd. And turns out, someone else came right after him, so I came in 5th (and Bruce in 6th).

Disappointing after taking 1st Place the week before, but.. Oh, well. You can’t control who shows up on race day. And if Danny, stunning athlete that he is, only took 3rd, well,this was a competitive race.

Bottom line; 5/39 AG, 73/600 OA. Swim in 28:30 (=1:47 min/100 yds). Bike in 1:19:59 (=19.9 mph). Run in 48:05 (7:45 min/mile). T1 in 2:28, T2 in 1:51, a grand total of… 2:40:56.

The dumb thing is feeling this need to apologize, as if completing a fifth triathlon in the year and the second in 8 days wasn’t sufficient. “Oh, alas, I am not as fast as I used to be.” What athlete doesn’t wish they didn’t age? And who doesn’t covet the podium, whether from up close or a distance?

Slower than past years, but a solid, hardworking result on each part. And 100% better than last year – because I finished this year. During the race, I felt great – and no injury, a huge accomplishment. I was craving a PR – but that’s not realistic. I’m older, and it’s nice to work towards being faster, but makes no sense to be disappointed if I don’t improve on what I’ve done in the past.

And our team did well. Alan took the podium (3rd Place for 60-64 – he’s disappointed for ending his 1st Place streak), Kevin takes 5th overall for the aqua bike (hamstring injury prevented him from running), John takes 5th for 50-54, Zander takes 5th for 45-50, and Mike Litsky finishes his first Oly.

A day full of successes, and the end of a season. Maybe a running race or two in the next couple of months, but I am soooo done with triathlons for 2019!

Toughman New York – 70.3 Triathlon – September 15, 2019

Spoiler alert: this was a good one.

I had done the local Toughman on a different course in 2013, and had come in second place for my age group in 2014 (which was a huge thrill), but this was in Harriman State Park, near Bear Mountain. And this is much, much hillier: 4,500 feet of elevation for the 56-mile bike (even more than half the Ironman Lake Placid course I had raced at the end of July), and 1,000 feet of climbing on the 13.1-mile run. The 1.2-Mile swim is, thankfully, flat. So among 70.3 or “half Ironman” distance races, this is among the toughest I’ve done.

My goal is simple: to do a strong run, instead of walking a lot as I had in the last two long races (April’s Florida 70.3 and July’s IM Lake Placid).

Harriman is only a 40-minute drive from my house, but I still wake up at 3:15; eat and pack up my ton of food as prescribed by Dina Griffin, Goddess of Nutrition and Patience,The Nutrition Mechanic, LLC; drive to the race and arrived as transition opened. (I really need almost 1 ½ hours to get situated, mentally and physically- like, “how many rows from Swim In to my bike?” And: “where’s the nearest plastic outhouse?”). The dew is so heavy that after an hour, my bike is drenched, just sitting there, and I put on an extra shirt because of the chill.

This Toughman is not as polished as other triathlons: volunteers don’t appear until shortly before transition closed to bodymark the athletes, and then only write bib numbers but not ages on us – so we will have no idea whether we were chasing someone in our age group. Also, no one ever announces the water temperature or that it’s wetsuit legal – but one guy near the bathrooms tells me it was 68 degrees the day before, during the kids race. (Well, THAT’s wetsuit legal!). Convinced that it was really cold, I don’t get in the lake to get warm up – for fear of freezing while waiting to start – so instead I run around in my wetsuit to get my heart rate up.

But when the race begins, the water’s fine!

I’m in the third wave, consisting of Men 55-59 (yes indeed!), 50-54, and… 30-34. What the heck? We go through the inflatable archway, standing ankle deep in the water… 30 second warning … 10 second warning… GO! I’ve seeded myself in the second row of a pretty sparse group, and I think I’m going straight for the first buoy and I’m pulling pretty strong but quickly get passed, which of course is demoralizing, but I remember what I learned at IM Lake Placid, where I had a great swim and a less than great race: the swim really doesn’t matter that much.

And I draft off someone for a little bit but I don’t want to be the obnoxious stranger brushing a competitor’s feet (which at first means they are too slow for the job – until they get too fast for me to catch up). And the water really is beautiful, kind of metallic tasting (ah, my iron supplement for the day), the sun hasn’t quite risen over the trees, and with the buoys on the left, well it makes sense to breathe entirely on my left side, and lo! that recurring pain in the right side of my neck disappears, and I’m sighting every 20-25 strokes, and pretty much on course, the open water is lovely but that means I’m either way ahead or way behind the rest of my wave. But this is MY race, my super-swimmer friends can scoff if they want, I’m feeling smooth and measured and the goal of this race is simple: to have a strong run. Turn at the first yellow buoy, a few yards to the next buoy and turn again – and I pass a guy doing backstroke (what the heck?!) and realize there are almost NO kayakers out here, God forbid anyone should really get in trouble (again, this is a less than polished race…), and breathing to the left is especially good now because we’ve turned around so the rising sun is now on our right side and it is blinding bright, and there’s the inflatable archway and the shallow water, I swim as far as I can until I have to trudge in the last 15 yards (ugh! My legs…) and I’m out of the water and have survived another swim!

Swim results: 38:29, =1:44 min/100 yds.; 4/7 age group (at the time, I had no idea the group was so small…), 56/146 overall (ugh; and wow, I thought there were 400 participants…)

As I leave the beach, some guy tells me they have strippers – meaning, volunteers to strip off your wetsuit (nothing x-rated) – but I learned from Lake Placid, I’m faster taking it off myself, thank you. Jog into T1, lots of roots (taped in orange) to avoid in my bare feet , I’m on the second rack, two bikes missing (so at least two guys in my age group are already ahead of me), sit down to put on socks and swap goggles for glasses and my Darth Vader helmet, and an extra 10 seconds to wipe the dew off the visor/shield with the “special cloth” that came with the snake oil “anti-fogging” stuff I bought at the Lake Placid expo. T1 in 3:40 (a horrendous 81/146 OA).

On the bike, a long jog in click-clacking bike shoes from transition timing mat to the line where I’m allowed to mount, off we go, and at least it starts downhill, I start counting how many I pass (up to 6 or 7) and subtract when I’m passed (by the end of the ride, I’m down to net 1 or 2). It IS hilly, but rather than lots of relatively short steep hills as in IMLP, these are more gradual and very long – sometimes for 2 to 4 Miles.

Coach Debi Bernardes, Queen of Cruelty and Patience, www.ucandoitcoach.com, had strict directives: Zone 2 on the bike (heart rate at 131 to 141 bpm), with special dispensation, if my heart rate was in Zone 1, to look to power — 90% of FTP (around 200 watts). Again, stronger cyclists may scoff, but my goal is a strong run and, well, a 3-hour split. That would be nice.

The ride IS beautiful, but it takes an effort to enjoy the view because I’m focused on the road (really cracked up in places) and my keeping up the work. I use my watch only to keep track of when it’s time for nutrition — but before I can have first solid food at 15 minutes, I drop the entire Base bar package! Fortunately I have a wee bit of backup fuel, so I eat that and hope I don’t get a flat or bonk.

I start taking mental notes for this blog, and then think, “F— me! Stay present!”, and then think, “Whoa! Keep away from negative thoughts!” And I think, I don’t see guys my age, maybe I’ll make the podium, and then think, “F— me! Stay present!”, and then, “Whoa! Keep away from negative thoughts!” And I fantasize, “I’m going to be light and fast on the run” [an easy fantasy during the first bike loop]; but again, the punishment, the Zen, and the forgiveness. Is this what it’s like to have multiple personalities?

What goes up…

By 0:55 or so, I’ve drained my torpedo “sippy cup”, pour in a few squeezes from the spare bottle, and 10 minutes later grab a bottle from one of the eager young men as I ride by. In my other bottle is a UCAN “superstarch” drink, the bold new experiment of Dina’s Nutrition Plan to see if I can avoid the meltdown I had at Lake Placid. That, and Saltstick tablets every hour during the race (sometimes with caffeine, which fill me with optimism!). And it seems to work: even if I’m a little hungry for a moment, if I stick to Dina’s plan and I’ll be alright.

On the second loop, my HR is only at the top of Zone 1 and my power is only around 200, but with 15 miles to go my legs aren’t turning over so well, and my glutes have been on fire for a while, and my lower back is aching (Debi had said to get the bike re-fitted, but who has the time?).

Here’s the revelation, somewhere around Mile 40: I embrace the discomfort. As Zander had said when we were running last week, discomfort simply is part of this work; if we couldn’t handle it, we wouldn’t race. And for me, right then, I ask: what’s stopping me from accepting, from even embracing, all of this? It’s that I’m afraid I can’t sustain it, afraid I’m going to bonk. But I’ve hired a professional nutritionist, and a professional coach, and I can depend on the plans we’ve made. So, the only thing blocking me is my anxiety, not anything real.

F—- the anxiety.

So I crank along as best I can, and around Mile 50, two guys come burning past me as if I’m standing still, and I wonder where do they find the reserve to put out that power, but I think, this is MY race, and it has three parts (and I’m not going to blow up on the bike and get shin splints on the run, like I did at Quassy 70.3 in 2015); and I think, the second rider is a BIG guy, he’s going to have a hard time running. And with a couple miles left, I see elite guys running towards me (because part of the run route overlaps the bike route) and they are at Mile 5 already, and burning up hill… Humbling. Extraordinary.

Get to transition. My Garmin says I rode in 3:03, the exact time of my first loop at IMLP, but official time is 3:07, = avg. 17.9 mph. There are a couple of bikes racked near me so I’m pretty sure I’m in 3rd place at best, but I have already planned out T2. My wife and sons will be impressed to learn that I haven’t peed for almost 4 hours (okay, when you’re male and hit your mid-50’s, then you can scoff), but that plastic outhouse which I had scouted when I arrived is right next to the row of bikes where I’m racked, so before I put on my race belt and water belt I use the outhouse. Yeah, T2 in 3:02 is pretty slow, but faster than stopping on the run.

Ah, the run.

At Florida 70.3, I had my best ride ever, but ran way too hard OTB (off the bike); my heart rate was soaring within a couple of miles and the end results were, well, sub-optimal. Coach Debi’s plan is simple: keep HR within Zone 2 (141 to 151 Bpm) through Mile 4, then ignore the watch and go by feel, pushing as much as seems right each mile. Ah, yes, Grasshopper. Stay present.

Started pretty stiff and creaky, but again, recalled last week’s brick with Zander (my friendly Nemesis): Me:“I’m not feeling the love…”. Z: “Oh, come on. You’ve got this.” And lo, that big man who burned past me on the bike? He had a slow T2, I guess, because we’re suddenly running together, and his name is Derrick from County Mayo (Ireland), and he’s only 40 (the shaved head was confusing…), and we finish the first downhill mile at a nice 8:39 pace, and he says, “I’ll see you…”

And he doesn’t pass me; rather, he stops trying to keep up with me.

Well, I keep going, slowing down when HR ticks over 151 for a moment (“Be still, my foolish heart!”), not quite understanding how this course loops around but recognizing those hills from the bike ride and I am patience incarnate. Control, control, control. My goal is a strong run.

By the end of Mile 4, I have settled in, and I figure: on the downhills I’m doing 8:00 to 8:30 min/mile, on the uphills I might do 9:30 to 10:00s, it could balance to 9:00 min/mile. Yeah, that adds up to sub-2:00 hours, sounds like a reasonable goal. But I won’t know it until the end, because I. Am. Ignoring. The Watch. (No peeking! It will only disappoint me or make me feel invincible, neither of which will help.)

By Mile 6, I realize that most of the course has no tree cover (despite the guy who said before the race began, “oh, we’re in the woods a lot, I don’t need sunscreen”) and that I am not yet halfway done. At Lake Placid, I had wanted to quit at Mile 4, so with this 70.3 race (half the distance, twice the fun!), I thought maybe I’ll want to quit at Mile 8… At Mile 8, I allow myself to think I’m closer to done, and I’m really embracing the suck: what am I afraid of? I’m sustaining… These hills go on and on and with people coming at me and sometimes passing me, I’m checking the bib numbers to try to confirm where I stand: 173, 174, 168, definitely my age group, is he on his first or second loop? Am I fighting for 4th or 5th place? Doesn’t matter. The goal is a strong run. My race.

I don’t stop for water (other than to grab a cup and pour it on my head or my back) because I’m wearing the hydration belt, and I gulp down the first two doses of UCAN but can’t handle the third, that’s okay, 3 or 4 Miles to go. At somewhere between Mile 9 and 10, two young women are dancing in place at the fork in the road. It’s not clear where I’m supposed to go, and I yell, “Which way?” To which one responds, “Oh, this way, to the left, and you never have to see us again!” So I guess I wasn’t the first person to be annoyed… By the end of passing and being passed, I’m at about net zero. But I am still running.

When we get back to the starting area, we still have 3-4 miles to go. Finally, enter some shade, but it’s also a dirt trail with lots of rocks, so for 1 ½ miles I’m running over rocks and going uphill. But that means the finish will be on a descent… And I am still running, I haven’t stopped to walk, I am ignoring the watch and finally get to the turnaround and go down, down, down past the lake and around the orange flags into the chute and to the FINISH LINE and doggamn but I have done it.

Bottom line: 5:50:26, with a 1:57:33 run — and that’s 8:58 min/mile, almost exactly my 9 minute goal; the fast descent and slow ascents really did balance out. Victory. My race. I did that.

I immediately go to the massage tent — like, I’m still panting, that’s how immediate — and am sooooo grateful to be still. I get a plate of food, which I can’t eat. Excellent beer is on tap (note to self, avoid beer on an empty stomach — not because of getting buzzed, which was more than fine, but because my stomach is so full of acids from the race, the beer shuts down digestion for 24 hours…).

I get on line to look at the results tacked up on a board and… I have won for my age group. Talk about icing on the cake. 1/7 AG, 49/146 OA.

AND I’m uninjured, recovering via a pre-scheduled sport massage the next day with the fantastic Conrad Scharf, http://www.trueactionpotential.com/. So… I think I’ll race the Westchester Olympic-distance triathlon next weekend. Just to round out the season. Why not?

Ironman Lake Placid, 7/28/19

Ok, settle in, it’s an Ironman®. Took a long time to do it (spoiler alert, a very long time – that’s the good, bad and ugly).

It takes a village to race an Ironman. Not just the Ironman Village of vendors galore (I got suckered into buying some lens-cleaning snake oil), but all the people who got me to the starting line and through the finish line. My wife Rachel, of course – for whom I tried to minimize my year-long chatter of training and concerns. She didn’t come with me to upstate New York for excellent reasons: she had to teach until 2 pm on Friday, and we had to pick up registration by 5 pm on Friday; and Rachel won Best Director of a high school play by the National Youth Arts Awards, http://www.nationalyouththeatre.com/news/news_nya_awards2019_eastern_evening.asp#awards, for her production of Laramie Project, and her cast won a number of awards as well, and her awards ceremony was on… race day!

Rachel, getting her award for Best Director of high school drama, for “The Laramie Project.”

Rachel with Ruby and Lior, winners of supporting actors and part of Best Ensemble

A lot of other people got me to the starting line: in the weeks before, my Mom and Dad (“be careful, please”) and my sisters Jean and Louise (“we are so proud of you”) and Dom Chiaverini (who was with me when I fell and got scraped up running on the aqueduct, “you are ready for this, man”). And training runs with Zander or Dietmar. A pep talk from Coach Debi Bernardes at a rest stop during the 4 ½ hour drive. And I also called and chatted with cousin Rob Falk (“I dunno, I feel totally relaxed and not ready to tear up and conquer the race”; Rob: “Sounds like you’re experienced, now.”), and Jason Santarcangelo (“It’s a fast swim, because Mirror Lake is so small that the swimmers actually create a current…”), and total strangers, Mark and Becky from western Mass who talked with me during Friday’s dinner on the patio of The Dancing Bears (the mac and cheese didn’t have truffle oil as advertised, but I’m avoiding any negative thinking, and it’s still mac and cheese…).

Friday night dinner: Ambrosia and nectar of the gods.

And what a blessing literally to walk into Greg Bassett while strolling into town on Saturday who took me out to lunch (“Yeah, leave your car parked just off Main Street overnight”)

and right after, get a text from Bill Logan, who was visiting and having lunch in the restaurant across the street, and who took me in his classic car to drive the bike course.

With Bill Logan, AIA and bicycle design innovator

And all their emails from the gang from the NY Sports Club breakfast club. So even though I came to Lake Placid without anyone else, I didn’t feel alone.

I was especially “eager” about the swim (avoiding words like “anxious” because I was trying to avoid negative thinking…): despite my form feeling good and pain-free, my recent workouts had been exhausting and slow. Ten days before the race, had a lesson with Joe E. at Swimlabs in Elmsford, and we found the silver bullet: slow down my cadence, reach farther to engage the lats and pull stronger, and everything became faster and easier.

Mirror Lake, view from the red turnaround buoys

Swam 20 minutes of the course on Friday after registration, had dinner; slept 9 hours Friday night, and Kenneth Ruterbois (who took 4th place OA at IM Wisconsin 12 years ago) later said “oh, if you got 9 hours sleep, you could not sleep at all on Saturday and be fine for the race”.

Saturday morning, swam for 15 minutes from the side of the lake near my supposedly 3-star Summit Hotel, rode for 15 minutes, and ran for 6 minutes (because the free pancake breakfast was almost over…). And racked my bike.

My beast, resting before the race. Recovery is so important for all of us…

Saturday night I went to bed around 8:45 pm; sure enough, woke up at 12:22 a.m., and didn’t fall back asleep before the alarm went off at 3:15 a.m. Kenneth’s advice gave me solace. Had my Bullet Proof®-style coffee, two eggs, half a Sunbutter® and honey sandwich, prepped my whey protein plus Ucan® starch drink for sipping on the walk over and my Skratch® sodium drink for just before leaving transition and another sandwich… nutritionist Dina Griffin had prepped me well. A little after 4:30, checked and added some dry Skratch and my lucky Ironman Mt. Tremblant hat into my plastic Run Bag and Bike Bag, hanging from racks with our bib numbers.

Run and bike transition bags, waiting for race day

I found a new friend having trouble with his pump and then pumped my tires (avoiding a 20-30 minute wait for the mechanics…); filled my bento box on the bike with nutrition. Left transition before 6 a.m. to get on a long, long line for the portable toilets (both athletes and spectators, but we all feared how long the line might be for 2,800 of us down by Mirror Lake).

Walked down to the lake, put on the full wetsuit, splashed around for 5-10 minutes and rushed out for another potty break just as the pros start the race, finishing just in time to squeeze into the crowd on the beach for the “first” wave of swimmers, as the second wave was for those expecting to take 1:30 hours or more to finish…

I had been swimming what would translate to 1:18 finish for the swim, and Debi said to seed myself for a 1:13 finish, so I jump into the 1:10 to 1:20 corral and work my way towards the front…

And in we go! For the first time, in less than 100 yards, I’m in a groove, and of course I’m drafting off one, two guys in front of me and there’s someone grabbing my leg and I’m bumping arms and trying to avoid being kicked when suddenly a miracle happens: I find myself on top of the cable that connects the buoys, in a straight line. Sure, others are jostling to get there (interesting, the women find clean water slightly off to the left, it’s not worth the trouble; and the men are much more aggressive, really pushing to get the perfect fastest course), but I’m an attorney by day and I can be pretty aggressive too. So I’m not shaken off this line, I pull past the guys that are insisting on staying in my path, I swim under the twelve big pyramid sight buoys, twice feeling caught under the boat-like things (a little panic and leg cramping), and my arms swing around and over the little yellow ball buoys, but I don’t need to lift my head to sight for the next buoy and I never swerve off the path! And I see the guys around me with their fast and furious cadences and think to myself, “that’s not my style anymore,” I am grabbing bushels full of water and finishing the stroke and feeling unstoppable and relaxed.

We reach the shore, only to cross the mat to note our time, then back for a second 1.2 mile loop.

Sure, when we get out and run across the beach for the second loop, I’m more tired, and feel I’m slower, but it’s over so fast, and ultimately it’s the same speed as my Ironman race at Mt. Tremblant, 4 years ago: 1:11. Solid.

The descent out of T1 and onto the course!

T1 in sub-9:00, including the run through main street carrying the wetsuit that a volunteer had stripped off me, grabbing bag of Bike Gear and putting on shoes and helmet and visor, slathered with sunscreen, then run down the aisle to the bike – second to last row, second from end, a prime spot—and out the door, WHOOP!

Feeling great through mile 35 or 40. The descents into Keene are fast and thrilling. The ascents take a lot out of me, even though I was in a pretty low gear, but I start to feel I don’t have sufficient leg strength. Wished I had done more leg presses and other weight lifting.

About 1:40 into the bike, I take a pit stop – ah, this changing body! And I’m too well toilet-trained to pee while riding … I mess with my Garmin to take it off auto-pause, but I screw it up and have to stop and start the watch. Whereupon the helpful device advises me “[Take] 11 Hours [for] Recovery”. Ha!

First the more elite age group athletes, then other people pass me, on the hills as planned (Debi said to take it easy, and maybe I can go slower, but not much slower; I’m taking the hills in the small ring and 2nd gear on the cassette, sometimes the 1st gear). Tired at the start of second loop (though thrilled to see Greg Bassett again, waiting for me with special needs bag – and I’m flooded with emotion, I’m really not alone at this race, not just Greg but everyone else who’s watching me on the tracker app and the crowd is amazing (one spectator: “Look at this guy! He’s actually smiling!”))

But I couldn’t eat more than a bite of the sandwich, the honey instead of jam that had tasted great for breakfast now tasted way too dry (even though Dina and I had planned on the sandwich as big source of calories – more UCAN next time, if there ever is a next time?).

More pass me on the second loop (everyone seeming to be 44 years old) more and more heaviness in legs on the hills. Decent turnover but not great. At mile 85 it suddenly drizzles, then pours for 5-10 minutes, but we’re going uphill so it’s not dangerously fast and slippery and feels terrific. Dan Ostrowski, a younger guy from Kansas City (whose last name I learn because he’s miraculously in the video montage they show at the awards ceremony the next day) is leapfrogging with me, and tells me I’m looking strong, and I pick up the cadence, and he says “THAT’s what I’m talking about.” Man, does that help. Temp is in the 80s but I don’t feel overly hot inside the helmet visor.

But at about mile 85 or 90, I start feeling queasy. Poetically, just as I start to unravel, the tape unravels on one of my handlebars. By mile 90 I’m accepting that I am not going to do match the 6-hour ride I did in Mt. Tremblant.

Finally, I’m finishing the 112-mile ride. Less cheering (other than the fiercely loyal TriLatino crowd, waiting for their teammates) — almost hitting the curb at the hairpin turn just before getting back into town. Yep, I’m tired. I later learn (because I’m only looking at the watch for feeding times) that I finish in 6:33 = 16.7 mph average, slower than I had expected, but all that I could do today.

I take over 11 minutes for T2, between putting on shoes, learning that passion fruit-flavored Skratch drink that’s been in the sun doesn’t just get hot, it FERMENTS (so I dump it and make another flask of the stuff with the powder I brought as backup), going out for sunscreen, going back for another bathroom break…

Finally, I start the run.

Debi said I was required, which now felt “allowed,” to run in zone 1 HR for the first 4 mile. Honestly, I am ready to quit after 4 miles. But I’ve spent so much time training, so much money getting to this race, so many people are tracking me. I remember what Ziv Abramowicz had texted me on Friday, “if you slow down, know that I’m yelling at you” – and somehow that helps: the hell with anyone who says I’m too slow, this is all I can handle today, but I will not DNF.

And I suddenly remember that I’m part of the Hastings High School science project of Ali Manly, who has those of us in the Hastings Running Group reporting our average cadence, so I try to pick up my cadence on the second loop (not speed, just number of steps) and damn, it feels better and sustainable. I still keep stopping at every rest stop, indulging in water and fruit and a pretzel (ugh! So dry!) and coke (ugh! So bubbly!), and maybe I could minimize the stops and shave off 15 minutes from what is looking like much more than the 4-hour marathon I had wanted but walking feels so good…

Back to the higher cadence “run”, and there’s a younger guy lying on his back on the outbound side who sits up as I pass him, on the way back there’s a guy around 50 sprawled on his stomach and they’re getting him an ambulance, and some white-haired guy a little later on a stretcher… so, maybe my “giving in” to what my body can do today is the smartest thing I’ve done in a while. At the turnaround, the heavy guy sitting in a chair says “you have to finish this run in 5 ½ hours”, and I misunderstand him: I think that whenever we start the run, we have only 5 ½ hours, later realizing he meant that’s how long we have until midnight, but it inspires me to walk less and run more because if I walk the whole way I might not make what I think is the cutoff and, hey, it would be nice to finish in less than 5 hours, I can do that I think.

And I’m walking the long hill by the ski jump, and on the hill into town some spectator says “this hill can’t beat you” and I say “that’s why I’m walking it, I’m in control of this hill” and there’s the out and back along Mirror Lake where I had thought my swim was going to make for a great race and the downhill towards the 1980 Olympic speed skating oval is glorious and I’m in the shoot and cross the last beeping sensor (there’s been one virtually every mile to make sure we don’t cheat!) and the famous Ironman announcer Mike Reilly calls out those roaring words, “Mark Kaufman of Hastings on Hudson, New York: You. Are. An. Ironman!”

I don’t even look at my results until I talk with Rachel, over an hour later (after sitting in the athlete eating area, staring into space and gathering strength to get my stuff up to my car – safely parked a few blocks away, but up up up a hill next to the Crown Plaza Hotel).

And I finally learn my final time: 13:03. The run in 4:58. Not what I planned, not what I wanted, but I realized: I just completed an Ironman. AND I’m 25/172 for my AG, and suddenly delighted. Because once again, you never can tell during the race that you’re actually doing relatively well. Even though official results deduct the 35 guys who started but got DNFs (Did Not Finish), I’m including them, thank you: they all trained their butts off, too, and thought they could do this, and tried as best they could.

Matt Russell, after winning in 8:27. “Tears were shown.” Copyright 2019, Bill Logan

Matt Russell, going up up up to his hotel after the awards ceremony — wearing a lei, because he’s going to Kona

AND, George Koefler? Who took 2nd Place for AG when I took 3rd at the Devilman Olympic Tri this past May, and said hello when we racked our bikes on Saturday? He came in 45 minutes after me at this race. When I saw that, I realized: he’s a great athlete (man, watching him run at me in May, returning from the out and back …) but he was set back by this tough course and the heat, too. And, just recognizing that even top competitors, my peers, are humbled at this race, that makes me feel better. Tough course, we’re getting older, we do what we can.

Next race, I want to approach the triathlon like I approach playing saxophone: it feels amazing to make music. I want to be thrilled to be racing and pour my heart into it and leave nothing behind on the course. But this race, this was what I could do, and I’m okay with that. And I finished an Ironman.

New Jersey Devilman Olympic Triathlon – May 5, 2019

Oh, I came so close to not doing this race. All week long, the weather prediction was for 50%, then 77%, then 88% chance of rain during the race, with temps around 55 degrees (Fahrenheit; Centigrade friends, do your own math). And water temps in the 50’s or 60’s. With a 3-hour drive each way, spending the night in a nearby hotel. And me worried about finally healed from breaking my collar bone in a bike accident almost a year ago.

As wise cousin Rob Falk said, “Sounds like the likelihood of having fun is not high.” Rachel (my poor wife!) listens to me vacillate, but Coach Debi tells me she’s driven TEN hours to race in FIFTY degree water and race in the rain (I’m supposed to aspire to greater heights of self-punishment? And she never answers my texted question: “Did you have fun?”). But it was a text from Kevin Carlsten, who was planning to do this with John McDermott and me, that swung my vote: “What, are we going to melt?” Besides, I skipped a race last year because of the rain… So, time to “man up” and get over this fear of slippery roads and shivering.

So, John generously drove us in the Family Minivan – enough room to stand all three bikes inside – and the long haul didn’t feel so long with good conversation and someone else driving. We ate outdoors and drank local micro-brew beer in Millville, NJ, marveling at the nice weather and our lousy timing for the next day. Sure enough, when I woke up at 3:40 a.m. that night, the rain was pounding and I couldn’t get back to sleep…

It was barely drizzling when we left the hotel, but that was NOT gonna last. We got to the school/recreation center at around 7; transition was open until 7:45; and the first wave hit the water at 8 a.m. Pretty civilized. I was trying to cover my shoes, etc. from the anticipated deluge, and neglected to count the bike racks from Swim In to where I had racked my Beastie. But because it was such a small race – less than 300 BEFORE the weather prediction, with just over 100 signed up for the Olympic distance – so not a serious SNAFU.

The swim was two loops around a square marked by yellow triangle buoys and orange sight buoys, a short course totaling only 0.6 miles (instead of 0.9 – if you just swam the course, that is…). Just before the swim, a stranger said my wetsuit zipper was down – I let him pull it “tight” and as designed the suit came undone – but despite my thinking I’d have to take the whole thing OFF, Kevin simply re-zipped it. Amazing; I hadn’t thought that was possible.

I hadn’t warmed up at all – not even a run, let alone dunk in – but the in-water standing start was surprisingly comfortable. 61 or 66 degrees? didn’t have time to get cold, HONK, my wave is off (“Males Over 40”. Really, it’s a small race.). Wished I had warmed up, though – all that blood rushing into my arms and legs, felt heavy. Tried to swim hard and felt pretty smooth (these days, if swimming doesn’t injure me I assume I’m swimming well), but really didn’t feel I was keeping up and realized I veered off course – a current? Damn, I have a lot of distance to make up! Guy in a red cap (wave ahead of me) heads to shore as I start the second loop – is he so much faster that he’s lapped me, has he miscounted, or is he doing the sprint distance? No matter, I have to do another loop, and I should push harder, and only on the last leg do I feel I’ve hit my stride. As I’m coming up the metal ramp to land, two guys from another wave are going DOWN the ramp: “Move! Move!”

Bottom line… I don’t know what my swim time is. Because the official results show nothing for the swim (for me and lots of other racers) but 23:05 for T1! And I had hit “start” rather than “lap” on my ancient Garmin (another guy told me he did the same thing – clearly, another guy in his 50’s). BUT: Working off the time of No. 74, the Man in Black (see below), I figure my swim and T1 were 1:30 faster than his – so I’ll guess my “0.6” mile swim was 20:45 (or 1:53 per 100 yds.) and my T1 was 2:15. Ok, pretty slow (depending on how far I really swam), but not as slow as I’d thought.

T1 goes well – despite running past my bike rack (see above SNAFU) – and it looks like only one or two bikes in my rack (that is, my age group) have already left. So, there’s hope for the podium.

You know it’s a small, rainy race when there’s no spectators on the course, no photographers, and cars and pickup trucks sharing the road with the bikes. But: it was not as cold as I had feared! Left the arm warmers and gloves (wet, anyway) and Debi was right (again, and of course): I was sweating almost right away, even in my one-piece tri suit. The out and back course was exceedingly flat and straight (truly, the only turns were when we left the school and at the turnaround to head back), with police at the intersections (“Thank you, Officer!”), so I tucked into aero for most of the ride. I counted how many I passed and how many passed me and I was at net 8 until No. 74, dressed in black, with 55 on his calf, passes me as if I’m standing still (arghh, I’m fighting for 2nd or 3rd Place now), and then KEVIN (dammit! Of course he caught me, he’s really strong, but I had passed him while he got his shoes on in T1 – and I had forgotten about him…) and eventually, of course, McDermott (who’s only doing an aquabike and started 20 minutes after us, but ends up averaging 23.5 mph), but this is MY race. Whenever I feel too comfortable the Garmin reminds me to keep the wattage to 85-90% FTP (that’s all my glutes and quads could handle without cramping), salt tablets, EAA tablets, Huma gel and half a Real Bar at prescribed times because I am burning fuel, even have to refill my torpedo with water (glad I brought that extra half bottle, this is MY body) and lo! I pass another guy with a ridiculous yellow rain coat filling like a parachute in the wind and 55 on his calf, whoa, had I been in 3rd or even 4th place (or was this guy finishing the half-length sprint distance)? And wow, despite my fears of cold and slipping it’s really kind of delightful in the rain without any turns, and literally the only time I touch the brakes is at the turnaround and turning back into the school. Which is a good thing because my hands are almost too cold to grip the brakes… Finished the bike in 1:12:18 (20.3 mph, faster than the 70.3 three weeks ago), 30/108 overall for the bike.

T2 is uneventful, except that my hands are so cold it takes me a while to un-clip my helmet, I squeeze on the shoes (don’t know if it would’ve be easier with wet socks, but no choice, I have to sit down) and out the door (which door? John tells me Kevin ran the wrong direction, too) in 2:09.

Ah, the 10k run. It’s raining less now, but I’m loving the cool, not cold. Pretty flat, with a slight descent in the beginning (oh no, we’ll be climbing up this on the way back) and long straight stretches (which often are mentally draining, because I feel like I’m not making any progress), and Mile 1 seems awfully long, but I am determined to have learned from the race in Florida 3 weeks ago: I am NOT going to tank on this run, so my 8:08 pace seems a tad ambitious and when my heart rate creeps up to 147 by Mile 1.5, I slow down, but get into a groove that feels sustainable, somehow Miles 2, 3 are at 7:47 and 7:48 (damn, I’m consistent), and then I vow to ignore my pace for the remaining 3 Miles, ugh, here comes No. 74, the Man in Black, already coming back from the turnaround, grinning in recognition and gyrating his arms (how does he DO that?) and it is really hurting and I’m thinking about what I’m going to write and thinking about getting dry again and thinking…

SHMUCK! Stay present! You are not there yet, you are here! You want to look ahead, look at that tree on the horizon (branches look like the bamboo roots coming out of a Japanese mask we have at home), that’s all you’re allowed. Stay. Here. Now. And I remember to be grateful that I can run; that I’m not injured; that there’s folks using canes or having a hard time getting out of bed and I. Am. Running. The turn into the school comes soon enough, I’m finally catching up with No. 18 and am close enough to see age 30 on his calf and as he slows down running over the first mat at the Finish Line I surge and pass him before he reaches the second mat.

Little victories.

Bottom line: run is 47:37, which is 7:40 min/Miles, among my slower times for an Olympic distance but a LOT faster than the lousy run at the end of April’s 70.3, and I am happy. It was fun. So glad I got past my fear of riding a race in the rain. And total time 2:25:08, which is good enough for 3rd place. Ok, that’s 3/5 AG… and 34/108 who signed up. But 23 people didn’t finish (or more likely, didn’t start). And I did.

And…

Epilogue: Joe Taylor, a total stranger, came up after the race and said he used to be a Coach Debi client; he still gets emails for the team; and he reads my race reports! Super nice guy. (I realized, it was easy to recognize me, with my photos in every blog…)

And two days later, I did an indoor TrainerRoad ride at 105% FTP, and FINISHED the workout for the first time. So what they say is true: This race didn’t kill me; it made me stronger. On to Lake Placid… Bring it on.

Sleepy Hollow Half Marathon – 3/23/2019

So this is our local, very hilly race, so local that you can buy your entry the morning of the race, but I bought mine a few days ahead – my first race of the year, so I better commit.

A civilized race starts at 9:30 a.m. That gave me time to eat a LOT – BP coffee, fried egg, banana, and UCAN starch drink on the drive over. When I got there, it was really cold and windy – 35 degrees and 17-18 mph winds coming off the Hudson River; I was shivering as I walked from the high school parking lot. The running warm-up didn’t make me much warmer. At the last minute – after doing some yoga actually raised my body temp – I took back my checked bag and stuffed my heavy running jacket into it. Dressed for speed not for comfort (and not, as my sons would tell you, for fashion): T-shirt, long-sleeved shirt, light tights under tri shorts (side pockets for nutrition), heavy hat and light gloves.

Sure enough, starting up the hill out of the village Main Street, I was warm in less than a mile and glad I had dumped the jacket (as, yes, Coach Debi had advised). This was the first time we ran the “normal” course – the last 3 times I had done this race, snow or muddy trails kept us off the aqueduct and out of Rockefeller Preserve, but there we were, trotting on through, only a short hill at the start (instead of the 4-mile ascent of prior years).

I was shooting to start at 7:52, then descend to 7:25’s. I stayed on track the first few miles, and it was silent and sparse, bare trees and beautiful quiet, and the folks around me are deadly quiet and serious…

Derek Alcon, who won the race in 1:10:12 (5:22 min./mile). Now, THAT’S running.

And I am in this to be steady and stay present and do the best I can, today, keeping an eye on my watch (okay that was a good mile) and my heart rate (hmmm, zone 3? Let’s back it down a little), but by Mile 4.5 here’s that steep climb (oh, yeah, I trained on this with Dietmar and Ziv months ago, that was fun, this is a little less fun), and I get passed by a lot of younger runners, oh, well, stay present, imagining more than the mile I’m in right now is too big a picture.

Running along the river, chilly and windy but beautiful. By mile 6, we’ve had all of 2 water stops, but I have forgotten that I wanted to urinate, and we hit the road that loops around the Regeneron offices (ah, so much nicer doing this counterclockwise, bigger hill going down than up, and skipping that stupid parking lot!), and start climbing the Route 117 highway, I’ve slogged up here on my bike with Alan Golds, it’s somehow easier on the run (I later realize we ran with the wind at our backs!). I’m slower on the uphills, freaking out a little when I see at the start of one mile that I’m running at a 9:47 pace, but then my actual pace sets in – my slowest mile ends up being 8:14 (which ain’t bad), and what the hell, a good mile here, a slower mile there.

OMG, here comes the lead runner, screaming downhill on the other side of the highway (second place comes a full 2 minutes later…), what an inspiration (me: “What, he’s 3 miles ahead of us?” Younger woman passing me, “I don’t want to think about it…”), she’s not male or my age group, it’s okay… but by the time we turn and start the Mile 8-9 descent the wind is against us (who cares, it’s DOWNHILL)

I become convinced that the tall guy up ahead in in the blue jacket is in my age group, and I assume there’s at least 1 or 2 guys ahead of HIM who took off like rockets at the start, and another guy who is probably my age passes me, so here I am fighting for something like 4th or 5th place. Oh, well, I will NOT look at the total time elapsed, and I might not meet my goals, but keeping my eye on each mile’s pace keeps me pushing harder.

By Mile 10 we’re climbing out of Phelps Hospital (I hate this hill). But lo! my calves are not cramping for the first time in the last 3 half marathons (stop thinking about it, it’s making me imagine they are cramping) and as we approach the old railway station (oh that upcoming hill killed me a few years ago, shut up, we’re on THIS mile), I grab my last sip of water from a gaggle of kids.

The wind off the river is pretty damn cold but hurray! the course doesn’t go around that stupid little lighthouse. I’m heading into Mile 12 and my calves still haven’t cramped up (no, don’t think about it!) and then through those quiet but flat suburban streets and then it’s UP that hellacious hill for the last 0.2 mile and the finish line looks so far away and I sprint as best I can and CROSS IT.

1:39:25 – slower than my best, but… faster than my prior five half marathons. And my fastest since 2014 (beating out 2015 by 1 second)! If this is really 13.1 miles (despite my Garmin saying it’s a ¼ mile short), then I averaged 7:35 min/mile. (My Garmin also says it was 1,010 feet of climbing — but the course map says 1,643 feet).

And…. 2nd place! 2/27 AG, 107/702 overall. Proving: never give up. Also proving: no matter how old those other guys looked… I’m older.

And: no injuries! (Though I pumped my arms so hard, my pecs still hurt three days later….) Now, onto Florida 70.3 (Half Ironman), in three weeks… same distance run, plus the swim and bike… Um, hooray? Yes. Hooray!