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| Not sure what's up with my face. Seriously. |
The Bike – Goal – 6:00
I exited transition with the cloud of Jake's disappointing DNF and worries about my friends hanging over my
head. I was still intent on enjoying my day and racing smartly so I immediately set to the task of taking in some nutrition. I
had prepared some peanut butter and Nutella tortilla wraps for the
beginning and halfway point of the bike. I pulled them out and hung
the bag from my aerobar for easy snacking. I spun easy as I worked
the legs out of the shock of switching from swim to bike, and I
reached into the bag. I had not predicted how messy my food would be.
That is...incredibly messy. Should've kept them chilled somehow. My
fingers were COVERED in chocolatey-hazelnutty mess. It was a small
ordeal getting these down, but I managed and was soon focused on the
task of setting an aggressive but maintainable pace.
This wasn't quite as straightforward as
I thought it might be though. I was effortlessly cruising at 19-20
mph, so I decided to stick with that effort level. Ten miles out came
the “only climb on the course” or so I had read. A bridge over
the bay constituted the highest point on the entire race course. Once
that was behind me, I settled back into modest effort spinning. My
average pace steadily rose from 17...to 18....to 19(above target
pace) topping out at 19.5. This all felt like easy effort so I
decided to see how high I could get my average without "spending too many pennies" as they say.
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| 15-20 miles in. Straight up crushing. |
I had heard and read stories about this
race being notorious for blatant and shameless drafting(which is
illegal in most triathlons, including this one). Race reports told of
drafting mobs numbering in 20-30 riders at a time. Since I had come
out of the water at 1:15, I was on the very tail end of the pack of
athletes who would conceivably be competing for age group awards,
though I had no intention of riding or running fast enough to do so.
Therefore I was only witness to one of these mobs. Sure enough, about
15-20 miles into my day, a pack of about 25 riders came blazing by,
all tucked right behind one another...not even PRETENDING like they
were there by accident. I guess the time gained from drafting for
several hours is worth the possible 4 minute penalty they'd serve if
they were caught doing so.
Still not my style...I let them pass
and joked with a few other racers who looked on in disgust. In my opinion, if you
need the PR that badly, I'll let you worry about sleeping soundly at
night knowing how you got it.
The ride went pretty
smoothly...literally...until about the halfway point. We hit the
first of two out-and-back portions of the ride, and then the road
quality turned from “well-maintained” to
“OW....SHIT.....OW....FUCK......DAMN IT.... OWWWWW!” This road was in such a shoddy
state of disrepair that it shook you to your bones with large,
uniform cracks across the asphalt...roughly every 10 feet. This
resulted in a very rhythmic “Kathunk....Kathunk” which lasted for
the next 10 miles. It was utterly miserable and really brought the
slowly growing fatigue in my body into sharp focus. Each rut in the
road punished my back, which had been tucked in aero position for the
past 3 hours. So I began to sit up. And the speed dropped. There was
no getting around it. The cracks went all the way across the road,
and we had to ride each and every one of
them....TWICE!(remember...out-and-back) This was the point in my day
when I really began to hurt like you're supposed to hurt in an
Ironman.
The special needs drop point was on
this out-and-back stretch, and I was getting hungry. I was still
hanging on to a decent average speed, so I was hoping for a quick
in-and-out stop here. I remembered how efficient and helpful the
special needs volunteers were in Coeur d'Alene, so I was severely
disappointed when I rolled in and nobody had my bag ready for me.
Nobody was even looking for it.
Don't get me wrong...they were all
busting their asses helping SOMEbody. But not me. I stopped my bike and
stared back at the numbered station where my bag would be. It was
several seconds before somebody noticed me standing there, wondering
if I should just get off the bike and go get it myself. That person
immediately ran over, dug through the box, retrieved bag #1385 and
handed it to me. He then went off to help somebody else. I guess my
disappointment stemmed from the fact that in CDA, one volunteer had
your bag ready when you arrived. They got your gear out of it for you. They held your bike if
you wanted to stop and eat or use the bathroom, and they were basically
your slave for whatever amount of time you spent there. Here
in Florida, once they handed you your bag, you were on your own. I
guess I was spoiled last time.
I took a few puffs from my inhaler to
prevent the airways from tightening up, grabbed my 2nd bag
of melty peanut butter and Nutella tortillas, and rolled over to the
porta-potty. After doing my business, I got back on the crappy road
and continued.
Here are some nitty gritty details concerning hydration: I
was hoping to pee by mile 40. I didn't pee until nearly mile 60...and
it wasn't very clear or voluminous. This should have been a HUGE red
flag, but for some reason I didn't worry about it too much. I figured
I'd catch up on the fluids by the end of the ride, but since I'm
mentioning it now, with my history of epic dehydrated blow-ups, you just KNOW that this is foreshadowing of some
kind.
We finally got off the crappy road and
hit a section of small to medium sized rolling hills. Wait! I thought
this course was FLAT! Meh, I ride in KS/MO, I can handle this. Now
that the roads were smooth again, I assumed I'd be able to pick the
pace back up and make up the time I spent in special needs. Only I
couldn't. The rolling hills were enough to hold me just under my
target speed. And it felt like we had a headwind. No worries,
once we turn, that'll disappear lickety-split. Only it didn't. The
course turned, and once again....a headwind? Ok...now for real...the
NEXT time we turn, I'll DEFINITELY have a tailwind and I'll rip up
the rest of this ride. Only I didn't. The course turned
again....headwind?
I'm not sure what direction the wind
was blowing, or if it was shifting, or if it was just my tired legs
convincing my brain it wasn't their fault and that there was actually
no wind. Whatever the case, my pace slowly dropped and I couldn't
ride faster than 17-18 for any decent stretch. And my body was really
beginning to feel the punishment. I couldn't stay properly tucked for
long periods of time, even on smooth roads, and I sat up more and
more. I clearly just hadn't spent enough hours in the saddle training
my body to maintain this strenuous position.
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| Nearly 100 miles in, and feeling it. |
I began to lose steam for the last 20
miles of the ride, and my morale was beginning to suffer as well. I
did end up seeing Delaware on one of the out-and-back sections, so I
at least knew one of my friends had made it out of the water
successfully. I still worried about Alan and Adam though. I worried
that I had once again torched my legs and that I was in for a
miserable marathon. I worried about my nutrition strategies.
I
worried about everything as I ground the gears back towards the
beach...this time into a very real and very persistent headwind. I
turned onto the home stretch that took us back towards transition and
was grateful for the high-rise condos lining the road that provided
shelter from the wind. The pace picked back up and my mood began to
improve. I lightheartedly joked with some other racers. One of them
asked if I was looking forward to finally getting off the bike, to
which I replied, “Yes, but not as much as I'm looking forward to my post-race massage, peel-and-eat shrimp, and snow crab legs.”
Final Bike Time – 6:09:29. A bike split PR of almost 50 minutes, but almost 10 minutes shy of my
goal.
I rolled into transition and immediately needed to
change my attitude. I wasn't going to defeat myself by believing that I had overexerted
on the bike, and I began quietly chanting to myself, “Legs for days.
Legs for days. You've got legs for fucking days......DAYS!” I changed into my running
gear, hit a porta-potty(disappointing output, once again) and charged
out onto the run course.
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