I was going to skip picking up registration before the race, but from where I dropped off my son to the packet pickup location,the driving distance was an auspicious 26.2 miles away. This is not a great race for cost, swag or nutrition: $90-100 for just a running race, with cotton t-shirts instead of technical shirts before the race and unripe bananas after it. I mean, come on, some bagels for the athletes?
Westchester Half Marathon – Easy to smile near the start
Anyway, this was my second time doing this Half Marathon. Last year, i did it in 1:37, and this year I wanted to do a minute faster from my best HM in the spring – the very hilly Sleepy Hollow, in 1:36, or 7:20 min/mile. To do 1:35 would require 7:15 minute miles. Ambitious, but plausible.
The challenge is pacing this course, not steeply hilly, but net downhill along the Bronx River Parkway for the first half from White Plains to Scarsdale, and net uphill for the second half. So, race plan was to run the first half in z2 to low z3 (heart rate of 141-154 bpm), with the first mile at 7:36 and the rest of the race at 7:15 to 7:20 – kicking up and ignoring the heart rate for the second half, keep up the same pace despite the incline. My other, conflicting goal was to “enjoy” the race, to have fun for the first 10 miles, or at least to not be miserable for the entire 13.1 like I was last year (when i started in the third row and took my pace from capital R Runners, rather than choose my own pace). This time, I was going to run MY race, not someone else’s.
So, I started in the 6th row, and HONNNK! Watch the masters tear out ahead. Despite my zen attitude, did the first half of mile 1 at 6:45 (!), slowed down to finish it in 7:32, and even if my HR spiked to the high end of z3 now and then as we went up some hills on the first half (i said “net” downhill, right?), it was surprisingly comfortable when i broke 7:12 on mile 2, 7:22 for miles 3 and 4, but 7:30ish for 5 and 6. I was at a deficit already, but feeling good. Along that first half, I ran with Mary Beth, a short older woman I had met last year at the same race and who was wearing the Sleepy Hollow HM shirt (kindred spirit) and we are on the exact same pace, and she says don’t let me slow you down, and I say this is actually a little too fast, I’m going to slow down, I enjoy your company but I am running MY race.
Westchester Half Marathon – kick it up at the turnaround
So as we round the turn to go back, I kick it up, and starting counting how many I can pass. Tall guy in white shirt and yellow cap stays exactly a block ahead for 5 miles, and I am trying hard to go fast, faster, but these long loping hills resist and I can scarcely crack 7:40s. I look at my watch with two miles to go and I’m at 1:22, there’s no way I can do 2.1 miles in 13 or even 14 minutes, and I run as hard as I can but I can’t get the turnover, and at least I pass the tall guy in the white shirt but i cannot catch the TIME I am shooting for and there’s that annoying hairpin turn before doubling back to the finish line and I am DONE with the race, DONE with the 2014 season, Done. Done. Done.
At 1:38:13.
Oh, well. Not the time i wanted, a minute SLOWER than my goal, but (here’s the kicker): i managed my second goal, to enjoy most of the race. And maybe it was unreasonable to expect I could both run with less than everything I’ve got and still run faster. And the excuses, it seems to me, make sense: not that the weather was tough, or my shoes were bad, or the sun got in my eyes. More like the reality that this was after a summer of five triathlons, including a 70.3; that I had been tapering for 2 weeks after my last Olympic; that I had missed my final 10-mile run because I was getting over a cold; and that in the spring, when I had trained for Quassy and ignored the oncoming cold, I had become too sick to race. So, I had made choices, not excuses, and even if the magic of adrenaline and other competitors makes every race outcome a total surprise to me (how did I DO that?!) it’s not magic and not a surprise that I have to work hard to race faster. And I will.
Westchester Jarden Olympic 2014 — Home, again, home again, with my Beastie
These reports get longer and longer, but I promise, a dramatic ending.
I’ve done this race every year since I started doing tris, a half hour away on the other side of Westchester County. This wasn’t my “A” race — it couldn’t be, realistically, as it was two weeks after doing the Toughman Half, from which I had to recover, then build up, then taper. 3 years ago, my goal had been merely to survive this race, my first Olympic; but now, despite the recovery/taper thing, I wanted to nail it. So, got there with plenty of time, and bumped into so many friends from my town and prior races – Teresa, Tom Andrews, John McDermott, Alan Golds, Drew Ahkao, Dave Bertan (guess that was after the race; he was the first to tell me, “sign up for a sprint, it’s just a sprint!”), BJ Wilson all the way from “upstate”, Vadim (on the beach before the swim); and Ken Fuirst (photos, photos, fresh from his cross-country bike trip) and Bob Gusick, both from HIGH SCHOOL – a real community event, like the kaleidoscope of a wedding where folks from different parts of your life are all together in a room.
And Drew and Ken are pumped up for me, and asking/telling me that with my season so far, I could podium, and I manage to answer, “my strategy? My strategy is not to think about the podium. I can’t race like that.” And no blame on them, it’s terrific to get their support, but I have to admit, I’m already fantasizing about the finish line rather than the present, and I have to get my head together. The swim beach has a big area to the left of the starting corral for warming up right up until wave 7 is finally called, and that’s great. The water is 71 degrees or so, just on the cusp of justifying use of my full sleeve wetsuit (or “weresuit”, a nice typo; grrrrrrr!) which is faster than my sleeveless.
and there I am, chatting up friends and strangers alike, and when the announcer says for each and every wave “you’ll swim to the right of the buoy” instead of “leave the buoy to your left”, it drives me nuts. (O! C! D!). All the old men (50-59) corral together and I boldly go to the third row right next to Alan (who took second for his age group last year) and HONNNK, we’re off!, running into the water.
And all I want to do is get through the first 5 minutes of intensity and get past the panic and then get my groove on and I actually swallow some salt water but manage to cough it out while I swim and sight and then immediately, shamelessly, start drafting. Follow the froth, touch the feet of whoever is ahead of me, he’s too slow, grab the froth of the next guy, I am scarcely sighting for the buoys and delighted as we pass the first one on our left, then out beyond the jetty and I am breathing to the right for every stroke, when I breathe to the left I somehow start to lose Mr. Froth. I really should pass this guy rather than touching his feet EVERY stroke (every other stroke might be a better measure) and draft off someone faster, but the ease of swimming is sooo clear when I momentarily lose my “host”, I’m frankly too scared to switch, until we’re heading back towards the beach (hooray!) and my lead is pulling off to the left (maybe to get rid of me) so I jump ship like a good rat and grab another guy’s froth and I am IN and on the beach!
My watch says 26 minutes, a 1′ PR for .9 miles, but the race mat is outside of transition and clocks me at 27′ – which is still a 2 minute PR for this course. So, when I’m out of T1 at 29:00, I am delighted. (It helps that THIS year, I went to the right row and could find my bicycle…). The racks looked pretty full, but it’s hard to know how many guys in my age group are already way ahead of me on the bike. The bike route winds through the town of Rye, and lots of traffic-area turns (“thank you, Officer!”), and I’m going pretty hard, some slight inclines building to mile 8 and so-called Claire’s Hill at mile 10, but it’s really not much compared to the terrain we ride on the West side of the County, what’s hard is the road itself, which is pretty good for the Connecticut portion but pretty horrendous on the New York side.
And damn! There’s a truck on the course! When they say not closed to traffic, they mean it! Big green monster, moseying along, and I’m doing 20+ on a flat area, and now I’m not yelling “on your left” to another cyclist but coming behind and then next to the open passenger window and yelling “i’m passing on your right side! Your right side!” passing a lot of people in earlier, younger waves (which, of course, is gratifying), getting passed by some guys here and there, and not seeing anyone 50-54, but out of nowhere comes this guy in navy, with “50” on his calf, and he’s passed me as if I’m standing still, and a few minutes later I realize that was Bruce Cadenhead (who lives just up the road from me in Dobbs Ferry, and once again made the US team at the Nationals this year whereas I had a more humble result in that race) and there’s only two slots left on the podium, baby, cuz Bruce is in the house.
And I hit a bump, and dammit, my left elbow pad bracket slips (I had specifically tightened it yesterday!) and I figure that if the bracket can slip down it can slip up as well so I tug on it and… The elbow pad bracket snaps off in my hands. Which I stuff into my back pocket; littering can cost you a penalty, right, Coach? It’s Mile 18. Seven more to go with compromised, sometimes painful aero position. And damn these bumpy, New York roads! At one point, big guy with 56 on his calf yells at a guy who’s loping uphill in the left lane and tells the slowpoke to get out of MY way. Thank you, Pedro! (i guess because we took the time to exchange names, we were both going too slow…)
Got through dismount with no problems (ugh, wait to the end of this report) and transition felt good and no stumble as I put on the racing flats and GO. The run goes out through Rye Playland’s boardwalk, there’s Ken cheering us on again!, and I’m doing 7:15s and in the bottom of heart rate zone 3 and I don’t know if I can keep it up and aren’t some of those guys running towards me after the first turnaround in my age group?, no other old guys near me but apparently quite a few ahead of me, Ken reminds me to pump my arms, and it’s only mile 1.
Chugging along, keeping my feet light and I’m standing tall, flat suburban streets, something like 5-7 water stops for 6 miles, grab and go for most of them but paused at mile 4 (where I was starting to feel that familiar “can we stop now, please?” And again wondering, “whom am I asking?”) to pull it together, I am pushing as hard as I can but slowing down to 7:38 and at the turnaround there are those familiar guys again, and it doesn’t matter that I’m passing collegiate athletes and guys in their 30s, the guys I want to pass are too far ahead to catch. I pull through, trying to break 7:30 min/miles, at least, and then burst through onto that last grassy 2/10th of a mile to the FINISH! LINE!
And i’ve done 45:12, or 7:18 min/mile avg, some 40 seconds faster than last year’s 45:55 (7:20).
Ultimately, I did 2:28:10, almost a 5-minute PR for this course (last year I called my 2:32:59 a “2:32”; this year it’s a “2:33″…) consisting of 2 minutes off the swim, the same bike time, almost a minute off the run – and 2 minutes off T1 (because I found my bike right away, this time…). for 8/77 AG, 46/768 OA.
I’d LIKE to sum up with how it’s taken me three days to get over my misdirected disappointment not to have ranked better in my AG, and instead to find the better bottom line: a 5-minute course PR is an achievement worthy of the endeavor, and the only thing I really can “control” or at least own and take some degree of satisfaction. I’d LIKE to finish that way, but I can’t because of the awful denouement:
After the race had finished, i’d had a massage, had some beer, saw high school friend Scott Shaefitz playing bass with band (wow!), turned on my phone to call my wife, I saw and responded to her text: “call me soon, something has happened.” Turns out, my parents actually DID show up to cheer me on, and saw me come out of the swim, missed me coming out of T1, but at the end of the bike, Dad had crossed the street so he could photograph me at the end of the bike and Mom stayed by the dismount area and A CYCLIST JUMPED THE CURB AND HIT MY MOTHER! Must have gotten his cleats stuck in the pedals, or attempted a flying dismount. And, she tells me (from the ER at the hospital!) this guy just grabbed his bike and continued with his race! Oh, my God, I am so frightened her pelvis or some other bone is shattered, she’s mumble, mumble years old and a broken bone could really change her life, and I say goodbye and shout the bad news to all the Hastings folks gathered post-race (so much for THAT photo opp) and drive too fast to the hospital and… She’s ok. We wait awhile with Dad to get CAT scan results, and she has a severe and painful bruise on her backside, but ultimately no broken bones and no head injury. She takes Advil instead of the prescription painkillers and is using a cane – but she proudly chalks up her doing so well to doing her daily exercises.
And it’s a shame she didn’t finish (DNF) the race, because she’d be the youngest in her age group, and had a real chance at the podium.
Timed my wake up and out of the house prep perfectly: 3:30 alarm, stretch my back and that damned right heel, “breakfast” and out the door by 4:30; arrive at 5 a.m, as transition area opens. Time to rack bike, walk from “Swim In” to my bike ( British woman left a Union Jack shirt hanging from the end of the rack before mine) and from “Bike In” to my running shoes. Chatted with my age groupers, and I am relaxed for a change, I’ve actually done almost all the training I planned, and I feel ready for my second “A” race of the year.
The swimmers wait for wave 2 (with two other, younger age groups!) and we line up on the beach on the Hudson in a bay formed by the Croton peninsula. With more confidence in my swimming this year, lined up in 2nd row at the end near the line of buoys stretching out towards a small sailboat (we had expected something more impressive, like a full schooner, perhaps). 30 second warning and then GO!
Starts very shallow, run a few yards in soft mud, and the mosh pit begins, but I am managing to get a groove early on and at cousin Rob’s suggestion I latch onto the draft of a guy who seems to be my pace, and I know it must be annoying, but I stay close to the froth from his kick and touch his feet practically every other stroke, and he speeds up a little, and I hang onto his pace for dear life because it IS easier, and I don’t know what he looks like but I know that the ball of his right foot has a rough callous. And everything is GREAT, i am humming along and achieving my first goal of the race (getting into my groove and not worrying that my arms are aching and actually enjoying the swim) and we’re at the first and virtually only turn in the course when i suddenly realize that…
My chip has fallen off. And this is the Hudson. And I am not going to find it.
So I stop and shout to a kayaker that I’ve lost my chip (bring duct tape next time!) and he says to tell someone when I get to shore (read: not his problem). Well, the guy I was drafting has turned the buoy and is gone, baby, gone, probably quite happy to be rid of me, and I am suddenly faced with a Big Realization: this really is My Race, and I will simply do the best I can, because without that tracking chip I may not get any credit for completing it! “I am racing, it makes me stronger.” So I dive on, see that even though we were supposed to leave the buoys to the left, NO ONE is going all the way over there, they’re just heading for the finish line in a rough corridor between two sets of buoys and eventually my straight line crosses over the line of buoys leaving them to my left and (as advertised) I suddenly have a CURRENT carrying me forward, and even though other people complain post-race that the current was against them, I feel with every stroke as if I’m borne up by a phalanx of dolphins nudging me along. And I get to shore! 39 minutes for 1.25 miles (others report it’s 1.45 miles), so i can’t compare it to last year’s 24 minutes for 0.9 miles. (Measuring this course seems to be a perennial problem…)
I get out and shout that I’ve lost my chip, I’ve lost my chip (so much for the placid, Zen approach to triathlons…) and a volunteer says, take this new chip!, they had planned for this problem, and I tell her my old number and she takes note of it and I cross over the transition mat and it gives a reassuring BEEP and I am back in the race! (I later realize they HAD to account for me, or they’d have to search for the body of no. 217 who never came out of the water…)
I am so wacked out by this turn of events that I forget to count the racks to my bike but, God bless the Queen, there’s the Union Jack shirt, and I see my black and red Cervelo and my blue inside-out Vortex wetsuit and start to change and realize, wait, I’m still wearing a wetsuit.
That’s not my bike.
So i run a few feet more, find my bike, swap goggles for glasses, strip the wetsuit (so easy with the sleeveless) put on socks and bike shoes (standing up, no more of this dizzy and sit down stuff) and where’s the chip! That strip of foam they gave me?!! OMG, they can scarcely give me a second one and then… duh, I dropped it by the other guy’s bike, and there it is, I am golden again. T1 in “only” 3:41.
The bike is on two lanes of route 9A’s rolling highway, closed to traffic, south then north for roughly 2 1/2 loops. On the one hand I am much more mentally prepared for how LONG 56 miles is, but I had forgotten how many hills there were, 3000 feet in elevation changes, but coach Debi and I have a plan, and I stick to it: z2 heart rate (keep it to 141 bpm and under) and if I stick to the pace I will survive the run. But there are a LOT of 50-54 year old guys passing me, 4 or 5 of ’em, and putting aside that Zen stuff, I want that podium. So Mr. Gray Helmet and I leapfrog 3-4 times, and he says, you look familiar as he passes, and I say, we’re keeping each other honest as I pass, and… That’s the last I see him. And no. 221 leapfrogs with me, and I get out of the saddle to stretch my hips and incidentally go faster (though I’m in conservative gears, shooting for 90 rpm and averaging 80) and no. 221 is dropped. And no. 197 Glenn (he’s wearing his running tag) leap frogs with me over longer sets of miles, maybe he’s pacing off me, well, this is MY race, I will not go faster than planned, and Mr. Green is coming in from a port a potty!, he must have KILLED the swim to have gotten such a lead on the bike, and I tell him so as he passes me. but he squandered it taking a leak, and even though he shoots WAY ahead i somehow eventually catch him.
Toughman Half -2nd Place AG
It’s like this: by the time I turn at mile 40 (worrying that I should have taken that bottle swap earlier cuz I am running dry after my two bottles) I am sometimes in heart rate zone 1 and when I really tuck down in my aero helmet with my face next to the straw on my sippy cup I don’t feel the wind (that everyone complained about after the race) and I am a bullet and my legs are soooo strong and it hurts and I pass everyone, 197 Glenn and Mr. Green and who else is there ahead of me? and I slow down at the narrow winding bike path entrance back into the park (where I almost fell last year) and i am in transition, 2:52
(19.5 mph), WELL under last year’s 3:02, and I am the FIRST bike back on our rack!
OMG, I am in first place. There was no one else who stole a long swim lead. It was only those 4-5 guys. And I waste some energy yelping, “Whoooooo!”
Twice.
But I am not going to survive a half marathon by thinking about the podium, and Mr. Green is getting off his bike as I run out so HE’s on my tail, and his wife says “you’re almost done” and y’know I don’t think she understands and I don’t think he believes her and I never see him again. But I am racing, and it makes my stronger, and my feet are light, my neck is tall, my elbows are going and I am keeping that heart rate to zone 2 (141-151) for 4 miles, 7:40 for the first mile, slowing down to 8:10 then 8:40 at the slight ascent on miles 3-4 and then… I realize that my HR is good, going up miles 6-7 in the shade and some dirt and gravel is fine, and the high school cheerleaders are sweet and the focus is on MY race and I manage to smile or at least give a thumbs up for the big photo in front of Croton Dam. But frankly I don’t have the turnover, whether it’s uphill or flat or downhill I cannot get my legs to go faster the bike was too punishing on my quads. And at Mile 8 I ask whether I can stop now, please. And at mile 9-10 it’s another hill and around then comes 197 Glenn, and he is TALL and flows by easy and all I can do is hope Mr. Green doesn’t catch up because I. Can. Not. Go faster. Tom Andrews from our Hastings team says looking good just before Glenn calmly goes so far ahead that he either has a 5-10 minute lead or maybe, maybe, he stopped at the port a potty? And yes it’s downhill and I am just trying to stay in it without caving into the temptation to walk. To rest. And the last mile is soooooooooo lonnnnnnng and bright sun on the concrete road, too bright, everything hurts, the finish line seems impossibly far away and I get there and cross it and the run is 1:53:05 (2 minute PR for this race), an 8:38 per mile pace, and it’s 5:29:29 total.
And. I. Am. Finished.
And…. SECOND PLACE for my age group! In a race where last year, I just wanted to close the gap between 5th and 3rd place (20 minutes away!). 51/406 OA. Scratching the swim, a 12 minute PR. And with 2/21 AG (top 10%), I am qualified to go to the 70.3 Nationals.
Toughman Half -2nd Place AG
And the best part: up until Mile 8, I actually enjoyed most of it. It’s the first Tri that i’ve actually stayed present and focussed and digging into MY race for all three legs. The podium is icing on the cake (even if Coach Debi wants us to avoid sugar!). I raced. It made my stronger. That’s all I wanted.
Sorry, the more I race, the longer my race reports.
As most of you know, to qualify for the Age Group Nationals, you have to come in 1st place or the top 10% for your age group in an Olympic or a Sprint distance. So, by definition, these are the most competitive triathletes, who are accustomed to winning. And this was a particularly tough crowd, because the World’s in 2015 will take place in Chicago — not Beijing or Sydney or some other expensive and arduous trip — so, more people are here in order to qualify for that race next year. So, it’s like a high school valedictorian going to Harvard — EVERYONE was a valedictorian, and suddenly you’re surrounded by other smart, talented people. Now, I’ve come in pretty far off the podium in most my races; I ain’t no superstar; but still, I was surprised to realize how small is the pond in which I’ve been a-swimmin’. I was thrilled to qualify, theoretically ready to be humbled, but kind of thinking i might surprise everybody and actually do well among my peers.
So, getting to Milwaukee the afternoon before the race (and i wish I’d come earlier, for the warmup swim from 11 to 1 pm), I was surrounded by the hubbub, the confident murmur, of people who were both very relaxed and very intense. Like, a bunch of leopards, but with fancy bikes, or lounging around a restaurant to carb-load on pasta instead of attacking a herd of antelope.
Woke up at 4:10 a.m., decided I really should get out of bed, I’d travelled so far and spent money for this race… Shared a cab from the Hilton and got there smack on time – 5:30, when the transition area opened. I had already racked my bike, as required, and so glad I used Race Day Transport to get my beastie there (cheaper than lugging it to and from the airplane and a fraction of the hassle).
People are friendly and the where-you-froms are impressive (Florida, California, Kentucky, Georgia, Seattle…). Measured the distance again to my bike rack, five rows from Swim In and Bike In …
So, the race. Crowded in with the previous wave (pink-swimcapped, 55+ women) waiting to get down the ramp to the dock so I could get IN the water to warm up, and it’s perfect water — 70 degrees, not too warm for the full sleeve wetsuit, the swim is sheltered by breakwaters from the rest of Lake Michigan, we’re hanging out on the dock and referencing age-group era tv shows. And then in the water and moving up to the middle/front of the group for the in-water start and BAM! it’s a moshpit. Which normally happens the first couple of minutes of a race, faster guys trying to get ahead, swimming over or around me, but then I’d normally crawl over or pass the slower guys, but there are very, very few slower guys here. It’s the Nationals. So the moshpit keeps moving, we’re going under a narrow bridge, bumping and getting kicked and grabbing the rubber leg of another wetsuit and drafting off someone’s froth and approaching the first big yellow triangle buoy. And I am trying not to blow all my strength on the swim, trying to be polite and not bother the feet of the guy ahead of me, trying to get into my core and my groove, but imagining that I am going to come in last among this pack of powerhouse capital S Swimmers! Sighted with my head too high, but burrowed down again to swim, get on course, calm down and work. Finished the swim and up the steep slippery ramp and it’s 27:36, a PR by about a minute. But a LOT slower, by some 6 or 7 minutes, than literally most of the guys I’m racing against. This is a different breed of animal – guys who are great at swimming AND biking AND running.
So, run the .2 miles barefoot on concrete in the wetsuit, my right heel NOT hurting (the miracle of adrenaline), stripping off the sleeves as I run, and then along the grass to the end of that 5th rack, and it’s a pretty good transition, but I need to learn to get on the bike barefoot with the bike shoes already cleated in, because that’s what most of the other guys have done. (Opted NOT to take off my GPS watch and put it on the bike because that is TIME! No one else is wasting TIME!) Bikes of guys on my rack are mostly still there (so I beat at least four guys in the swim) and I fumble a little at the beginning to get my cleats in but I am RIDING and I lock in. THIS is my race.
And I pass a few guys, and start keeping track of those in my age group, and I’m up to 14 by the midway point, before I net out to 8 or 9 by the guys who pass me. It’s a flat, fast course, with the only “hills” being two ramps up either side of highway bridge, and I’m in aero position zooming down a highway with only a couple of mildly broken areas (nothing like the rough roads where I train). And even though this is the Nationals, I can still try to catch the guys who left me behind in the swim and at one point two guys try passing me and I won’t let them. But I’m also riding within my range — ok, that guy passed me because he’s keeping up the same high cadence as I am but he’s in a heavier gear and I KNOW I haven’t the power to do that — and at the end of it I’ve finished 24 miles in 1:06, averaging 22.3 MPH, and that is a substantial PR. I mean, that’s FAST.
Transition felt pretty efficient, probably paused too much to make sure I had everything (oh, yeah, the race belt with my number…) but I’m rocking along at 7:20, and then this guy in a bright blue shirt who I’d been leapfrogging on the bike is on my tail, so I run faster, and he starts to pass me, so i run faster, and my second mile is 6:59, and I can’t keep that up, and he passes me and says, angrily, “Why don’t you pick a pace?!” Well, that pisses me off, but I realize he’s right and I need to settle into MY race, but by that time I’ve pushed too hard, and even though I pass the SOB. I’m slowing down to 7:30, then 7:44, and I can’t get the turnover, and I’m thinking that I’m not in pain, the heel is fine, the hip is fine, the back isn’t flaring, but I am So. Damn. Tired. And this is by definition the hardest thing I can do and only my fear of being passed by that guy who taunted me (and who actually apologized to me at the finish line!) stops me from walking. And a woman on the sideline, who must be a coach, quietly says “use your arms more” and she’s right, I’ve forgotten to use my elbows, and I remember my mantras, and I get that sensation of being picked up under the armpits by a gust of wind and the last mile is not so bad and I sprint the last .2 miles and pass another guy who had passed me moments before and I AM DONE! 46:07, averaging 7:24 minutes/mile, which is slower than my best run in an Olympic (7:10s) and I wish I’d had the power to do better, or at least the discipline to have gone slower and stayed a steady pace. But I’ve crossed the finished line and I am done.
So my results as far as standings were less than the average, and a far cry from the first 25 necessary to get on the USAT team (ok, that was unrealistic) or from the top third (also unrealistic) but I had hoped to get in the top half (which was realistic) and came in, instead, at 114/193 for the AG, and that’s the top 59%. 1263/3067 overall, top 41%. (Ironic symmetry, eh? Once again showing that the older guys do disproportionately well.)
But my personal results were stellar: 2:24:57, almost a 7-minute PR, and that’s when I realized I had a great race. I enjoyed most of it, I crushed the bike course, and actually got faster (in comparison with my age group) with each leg: 135th in the swim, 106th for the bike, 100th for the run.
So many – probably, a majority – of those folks who came from all over the country were DISAPPOINTED, and at first I was, as well, and that’s crazy! By definition, this is the cream of the crop, and our average is very, very high. We’re just not accustomed to coming in so far away from the podium. But that can’t be the reason for racing. Everyone is shadowed by their demons, everyone is worried about the next faster guy/gal. I have to swim/bike/run MY race (especially the swim!), battle MY demons, and enjoy the thrill of pushing harder than I ever did before. Room for improvement, sure, but I ran my best race, ever, inspired by the speed of the extraordinary athletes around me, and I was at The Nationals.
“So, how much can he write about a lousy little sprint?”
Spent the night with racing buddy (and age group competitior) Scott Schiffer outside Poughkeepsie, 15 minutes from the race. So grateful that, even as we approached our early bedtime hour, he drove us through the bike and running course – really helped to know that after that barn, the hill doesn’t stop; remember, it’s a 3.4 mile run, so at this turn there’s a half mile to the finish…
Gorgeous day. Got there early, picked prime spot on the assigned rack – until the last minute stragglers tried crowding 2 more bikes on, and the rack started collapsing. So three of us at last minute moved to an empty rack nearby, where the transition real estate was a little less prime. Scraped a gash in the wetsuit as I put it on, three finger-tips wide (coincidentally? I think not). Warmed up in warm, clear lake water – worried that full sleeve wetsuit would be too hot, but it was only be a half-mile swim. Streamline kick drills (thank you, Debi), backstroke, getting used to the suit and enjoying the compression on my sore sore glutes, miraculously recovered from Monday’s back spasms.
(Middle age ain’t for the faint-hearted!)
Swim went fine after the first buoy, passed folks in prior wave (bizarrely, waves were based on order of registration rather than age or gender – so, who’s in my age group?!), focussed on core, core, core and high recovery elbow (thank you, Val). Ran through the lake weeds at the shore, didn’t stumble on my way out up to Transition. Official Swim time, including run to the bike: 14:02, or 1:36/100 yds – almost my Tt for 800; i’ll take it.
Transition was decent, for a change; helped to be in the back row near the swim in! As I’m getting on my shoes (alas, with dizzy run and hurting back earlier in week, sat down to change shoes rather than balance one legged), Scott runs past me with his bike. “Nice swim, Mark!” (I guess that’s the nicest thing to say, but it still made me mad.)
Few things inspire me more than a bunny to chase – and he’s one of the only guys in my age group in my wave that I know of (these goofy waves, right?). Managed to pass him after a few miles, but i’m huffing and puffing and grateful it’s “just a sprint” because i don’t know if i can keep this up even for 45 minutes and i’m certain that scott is close, close behind me. Played leap frog with another age grouper (“ol’ Blue Shirt”), and he just takes off and passe and logs in a few blocks’ lead on me, then out of sight. Well, one less slot on the podium available, i figure, and keep grinding along, including some long downhills and flats. There’s Blue Shirt again! But he’s coasting in aero position, knees up against the bike frame, and i can’t gain on him despite my pedaling hard.. (I guess he weighs more than I do, or has a realllly good bike). Oddly, felt like more downhills than up, which is a rarity and i’m not complaining, and suddenly at the very end i pass that guy, with a couple miles to T2. 48:51 for 16 miles, avg 20.9 mph!
Felt like a long jog with the bike, and again sat down to change shoes, which accounts for 71/190 for T2. Gotta work on those transitions!
The run was rough – at .8 miles I couldn’t believe i had much more to do. Passed 4 people, got passed twice (who was that woman with the pony tail? She’s gone, baby, gone..), so i guess i’m towards the front of the pack, but i know Scott and Blue Shirt must be close behind and I’ll go nuts if i hear their slap-slap-slap right on my heels, so i’m running as fast as i can and manage to work negative splits, from 7:44 to 7:12, avg 7:28, and just dying in that last half mile after the barn. And thank God it’s a short run.
No pain in my back or glutes! And after i walk walk walk (no sitting for me, for fear of cramping and that back…) and see the stars (Bruce Cadenhead, brother of my neighbor, is on the US team for Oly distance) Scott tells me, don’t freak out, and it’s not official yet, but you came in 1st for our age group. 1:30:11. Beating second place by only 9 seconds! (Not blue shirt i think – He must have been in a different wave – which shows you, even if you think you’re just racing yourself, you’re not!). Scott comes in third, and we have made the f’ing podium, i’m at the top of the podium, and I still can’t believe it.
1/17 AG, 9/158 OA. (And official results say I’m 5/10 male Masters. What does THAT mean?) Finally, I caught the bouquet.
So, mostly because I want to figure out what I learned from this week’s race, but partly because some of the folks at Tri Camp said they actually enjoed my race reports (ah, an audience!), I’m writing again. (Yeah, it’s long – i shudder to think how much I’ll write if i ever do an Ironman…)
The day-before adversity was terrific and fun: a party for 60 people at our house on Saturday to celebrate my older son’s graduating from high school. But, of course, I could only have one beer and had to go to bed at 8:45 and listen to the reveling continue…. (Really, it was quieting down and i missed cleanup, so i can’t complain.)
Woke up at 3:15 because it always takes me an hour to do stretches for my aching heel (PF), eat and get out the door to a race. And because the schedule was nuts: 5 a.m. set up at T2 (and to register, if i hadn’t already done so in NYC), bike 2 miles to T1, set up there, get on wetsuit, practice swim from 6 to 6:20, and race at 6:30! And I was glad to get there as early as i did, because the rows at the swim start had the same numbers as the rows in T2, but the racks were not numbered yet, so I grabbed a good spot on the aisle…
Despite my warmup (ahem) when the race began for my wave, i wasn’t feeling the love: “sighting” was more an excuse to pause and feel like i was panting and tasting Long Island Sound salt water and feeling lonely in the back of the pack. I had done some homework: with 6 buoys, each was around 250 yards apart for the .9 miles, and how hard could that be? But for almost the whole race, i just wanted the swim to be OVER. Tried to use the new techniques i had learned the weekend before (thanks Val!) but bottom line is i need more time in open water and the wetsuit. It wasn’t fun until the last 500 yards, when I realized that when I breathed on my left side, i was faster. Like, finally passing the guys around me faster. (Ultimately finished 9/22 AG on the swim, in 28:05 – not terrific, but my average.)
T1 felt good, having cut off below the calves of my wetsuit and practiced stripping a few times, but somehow my transition was 60/190 OA. Ugh. Must have been too slow getting to the bike and getting out onto the road. For next point to point race, i’m practicing stuffing into a drawstring bag! Also, i probably dawdled with the Garmin, discovering that I had pressed LAP instead of START and had no race recorded yet.
The bike, though, was good, and i now know it’s presently my strongest suit. First got passed by a guy in my row (clearly an AG competitor, even though almost all the body markings had faded already – what did they use, Magic Markers?) who left T1 around the same time, so I had to pass him, of course. Tooling along as fast as i could, huffing out most of the ride despite Coach Debi’s sage advice to only do that now and then, “valiantly trying” to catch up to the guys who had taken their bikes from T1 already. And it felt STRONG. Wasn’t sure whether I could keep up that pace for 25 miles, or whether I”d be trashed for the run, but it was fun to race.
And then … My chain fell off the little ring, and i tried to pedal it back on, and i was going up hill and couldn’t get out of my cleats, and I FELL. (“You OK, Mark?” – must be my buddy Drew, he’s the only guy I know here!). Had been going slow, so not hurt at all, got my chain back on. I probably lost less than 45 seconds, but i was so mad for letting 5 people pass me that i went faster than i normally would, passed them all, and kept up the pace. (Only at the finish line did I find my left shin covered with blood…). Played leap frog with an older guy (55) who was really strong and would smile and pass me any time i slowed down, and that kept me going. (I like chasing; i hate being chased.). Finally passed him at the end as well. Final time: 1:14 (19.9 mph).
Run, like the swim, was just something i wanted to finish, starting at mile 2. Couldn’t get faster than 7:30s, and no one was near me to chase or be chased – that guy who passed me early on kept going, going, gone… Passed net 9-10 people, came in 44:26 (theoretically 7:10 avg, but the course was only 5.9 miles).
So, the overall results were pretty good – 2:31:36 (which i thought was a PR, but it’s really a tie for my best time), 5/22 AG (with 3rd place some 6 minutes far, far away – always a bridesmaid…), 37/189 OA. Not bad for having lost 2-3 weeks, traveling and then recovering from bronchitis after traveling.
But Debi recently wrote about trying to get into the Flow, and i wish i could feel it for at least two-thirds of the 3-legged race. Didn’t hit my Fun Quotient, so feeling less positive about this race.
On the other hand, as my friend BJ Wilson emailed, “sometimes we don’t feel the Flow, but we race anyway. It’s what we do.” Yep. More work ahead, mostly mental. And this was a decent, delayed start to the season. AND I don’t want to forget to be grateful for being able to do what I can do. So:
On June 24, 2012, I first lost my virginity at the Sleepy Hollow Sprint Triathlon. Yesterday, I did it again.
First, a big shout out to Jeff Levine, cousin of my cousins Linda and Jonathan. At the second Passover dinner, I learned that Jeff lived in Long Branch, a few minutes away from the starting line at Monmouth park race track in Oceanport, NJ. Not only did he let me stay in his house (dayenu!) and feed me vegan pizza (dayenu!), but he got up at 5:30 with me, tried to feed me breakfast (thanks, I brought my own applesauce and protein powder), gave me a ride to the park, and picked me up at the end of the race (dayenu! Though the last being oh so necessary…). What a terrific host. Thank you, Jeff (and Linda and Jonthan!)
Foolishly brought a backpack for bag check – sanctioned plastic bag only, of course, but I managed to fit my sweats and jacket and all other gear in two bags that they tied together. A little chilly in my NYC tri shirt and shorts for the 90 minute wait (got there early to beat the traffic that would have started with the 6:45 HM), stayed in the sun, ran around for all of ten minutes and loaded into the corals for an 8:00 curtain. Coach Debi said to ignore those stupid pacers, but I started with the 3:30 guys, if only to have a reference point (and to shoot for the Boston Qualifying time for my age group). Chatter, chatter with a few other first-timers, and some very seasoned veterans (17th here, 2nd there, 87th for a guy in his late 50s who told borscht belt jokes at mile 5 or so…) Cousin Rob’s mantra kept me stable: “I am excited, not nervous. That’s my choice to make.”
Took it easy, but not so slow, zone 1 heart rate until mile 3-4 (but just out of curiosity, 8ish minute miles), zone 2 in mile 4-5, and then hang there, trotting along… By this time I’d fallen in with the 3:35 pacer, and reading my shirt he chatted about doing the NYC Tri this year, but by mile 6 or 7 i was staying with the faster pacers. Walked along the water stops and then caught up with that 3:30 group – I wasn’t chasing a person, but a time. Kept up, with shot blocks and power gels as planned, kicking in the caffeine at 90 minutes, switching to water instead of Gatorade (cuz my stomach said, “No, No, No!”), and suddenly realizing I was feeling pretty good at 2 hours but how will i keep this up??
Then we left the town streets of Long Branch and Deal and hit the boardwalk. Wind, wind, wind. As if I were with my Sunday bike group, I rushed ahead just to be able to draft off others and save some energy. Can’t complain though – the course was so flat, the day was bright and rainless, the scenery was pretty (when I could consciously look up and say to myself, huh, pretty). One big accomplishment: I really had fun for most of the race, despite the worry about whether I was going to survive. Also, I now see that I my average HR exceeded zone 2 as early as… mile 10. Whoops.
Got some time in the bank – other than miles 1, 5, 8 and 13, all of the first 20 miles were sub-8s – but by mile 22, I was starting to lose the pacers. Debi and I planned that walking at water stations should stop at mile 18, but I gave in to the ache in my left hip (more precisely, my piriformis and gluteus media – I am learning more about my anatomy than I ever wished to know…) that had plagued me since mile 9, and that right heel ached now and then, and which hamstring was playing that high C at any given minute? After walking along that mile 23 water stop, I did an 8:44 and lost the pacers so thoroughly I wondered if they had quit.
Anyway, despite the time in the bank, the wind and the mental fatigue took over and I didn’t get back to 8s. Now, I realized I planned not look at my watch/heartrate that late in the race in terms of limiting my exertion, I needed to look at it to reassure myself that I was fine, to see that I was slow, and that I should push harder.
Sprinted that last 0.2 (avg. 7:29), but never caught up with my goal, and came in at 3:31:36. Which, of course, is pretty fabulous for a first Marathon. I’m not even sure if I want to DO Boston; I simply wanted to be able to say, “I qualified in my first attempt.”
Despite my lack of self-restraint, I was better off than a lot of other people: from miles 18 to the end I passed (net) 68 runners, many of them walking. But OK, “I didn’t believe hard enough” that I could ever catch up, and the 8’ miles felt so gooood. Staying slower is gonna take a bigger leap of faith than I was mentally prepared to take before this race.
BUT (and here’s the takeaway): in retrospect, I feel fine about the 1 minute and change. It’s everything I could physically plus mentally do at that time. Next time (if I choose to do this again!) my mental part, at least, will be better able to handle that level of discomfort and adversity and with THIS race in my Experience Bank, I’ll have the confidence that I can push harder and not perish.
And one thing which I forgot during the race: “Remember the secret of the Tarahumara: they run with joy!”
