Dam Sprint Race Report

or, Kicking it Old School

Well, today I went back to my roots. After this insane focus on doing the Olympic distance, I returned to 2 oldies but goodies: the Sprint, and last year's uniform.

And it was good to be back! Now that I've done an Olympic, I have no shame in saying, "I'm doing the Sprint." When you do Olympic, you get to go fast, but you have to play your cards right. In the Sprint, you just hammer it out. I prefer to keep it simple.

I went to packet pickup yesterday with my husband, which was nice because I had a chance to scope out the site and see where everything was going to take place. It was also an hour and ten minutes away, so driving it the day before took away a lot of my early morning anxiety. As far as races go, this one was quite small. I'm not going to venture a guess, but it was smaller than Bonelli and quite intimate.....but not in a bad way.

I left the house at 4:30am and was at the race site by 5:30am. Hit the potties, then went and set up my bike in transition. I had PLENTY of time, as the pre-race meeting wasn't until 6:30am, and I didn't have anybody there with me to distract me. I got an end, but it wasn't on the highly-trafficked side. It was a gamble, but in the end I'm not sure it added more than a few seconds of an impact...and in a race this small, a few seconds is no big deal.

I knew *1* person there. Just one. But that was fine, because I wan't as stressed as I could have been. I will admit, as I walked down to the water and pulled my wetsuit up, I was starting to think I was the world's biggest idiot for doing this alone. I mean, I really hate the pre-race. I psych myself out and convince myself that I am not worthy of towing the line. I lose my competitive drive. I just want to go home and go back to bed.

But before I knew it, we were waste deep in the shockingly warm (as in, imagine 50 people standing in one place before the race goes off and you tell ME why it was that warm) Lake and awaiting the gun. It was supposed to be a 750 meter loop, but we started 9 minutes after the first group and the leader of that pack (who was a good 100 meters ahead of everyone else) had yet to reach the turnaround point....... I suspected at this point that the course was a little long, and I still think it was, but we'll never really know. Anyway, off we went.

Despite the co-ed wading start, it wasn't too killer out there at the start. But unfortunately, it was super choppy on the Lake, and it seemed that I could not shake any purple caps for quite some time. (Purple was for women-folk and "everyone else," red was for "men 45 to eternity"....yeah, how fabulous is it going to be to get old?!) For the first time in 7 open water triathlons, I had a bit of a panic attack out there. I'd heard a lot of people talk about them, but thankfully I'd never been plagued and I always blew it off. But 100 meters into my swim, I was convinced that it was too choppy and that I was not a good enough swimmer to stay on course. I fought these insane mental demons that were telling me I was weak....that I was scared.... I mean, come on-- I'm in a freaking Lake!! What was going on? It wasn't even a heart rate issue. I just think for a few moments, I went totally nuts. Thankfully, I was able to pull it together and continue on. It helped that some of the men in my heat were floating around and commenting on what a hellatious swim it was....that made me feel like I wasn't in my own personal hell. I will say that this felt like my weakest and slowest swim ever, but I will wait until I see the splits to determine that.

I emerged from the water completely alone, with no women in sight. We had a very long run to transition, up the rough beach and then through a long grass lawn. They'd tied it all off with tape, so it was easy to find.....but I was tired! I remembered my Las Vegas run to T1 and decided that this time, I was going to catch my breath and try to recover. So, I walked. Just a little bit, but enough to not feel like I was going to pass out when I got to my cycling shoes. I had sand all over my feet, so I had to pour some water over them before putting on my socks....a first for me, as I usually just go for it and screw comfort. But today was a glorified practice for me, so I made sure I took my sweet time.

Was out of transition as quickly as I could and then headed onto the bike. This is where I saw my first woman, on her fancy, gorgeous, pimped-out Cervelo tri bike. This would also be the last time I saw said woman. We took off and my measly 20mph could not catch her. Ouch! The bike was mostly flat, with a small hill at the start to get us out of the Lake area. I was tired climbing this hill, so clearly my weakness is in coming out of the swim and onto the bike. Must train this more. Anyways, going down this hill was a blast. I even exceeded the 35 mph speed limit!!! And then I started picking off the dudes on their hybrid bikes. Bless them, they were trying so hard. Anyways, I got passed by boat loads of men with disc wheels and fancy tri bikes and goober helmets. More than I can count, I am sure.... I did my best to try to push an average of 18mph the entire time, but I wasn't sure how to pace myself. I've been training for 24 miles, not 12! So I think I left a little on the table in the bike, but not much....the final hill chewed me up and spit me out. I had to abandon the big ring and then join the painfully slow process up 400 feet in a mile. Which doesn't sound like much, but after pushing big gears for 9 miles, your dead legs are NOT in the mood for climbing. But with every climb is a downhill, and for good measure I threw it back into the biggie and finished the bike segment with a rockin' downhill.

T2 was not so bad for me, but I did take the time to grab my Garmin off my bike because my trusty old race watch was not working anymore. I grabbed my hat, watch, water bottle, and number and bolted out over the mat. I looked like a bag lady crossing that line, I am sure, but why put it on in T2 when you can get dressed later?!

The run was an odd one for me. Typically, I get out of T2 and I am thrashed. I absolutely HAVE to walk, or I convince myself to stay running for 5 minutes and THEN I die. Today, my legs had life. Even though I couldn't feel my feet (it was cold), I felt strangely strong and had no need to actually stop. This didn't stop my brain from trying to play with me, though. So today I decided to try out positive mental affirmations. I wasn't feeling like experimenting with nutrition, or clipped-in shoes on the bike, or new equipment.....I needed to work on my mind games. I had done a 5K time trial a few days earlier and knew for certain that I had the stamina to power through it without walking and to maintain a fairly strong pace. So I used that knowledge to fight back whenever I felt like walking. I passed the only girl out on course who had passed me (on the bike), and I buried her! Me, passing a runner...who would have thought the day would come?

The turnaround came and went, and I had only seen a very small handful of women coming back in to the finish. I was confused, but they were running so fast that I was convinced they had to have been in the front of the pack. As I made my way back to the finish, I started to see other women out there. I wanted to yell at them and ask them why they were hiding for the entire race!! We were few and far between out there, for sure. The finish chute was lovely....just enough of a runway that you could sprint and NOT vomit at the end because it was too long. I told the guy ahead of me to hurry because I was going to close fast, and we both high-tailed it in to the finish.

Overall, I felt pretty good. Disappointed in my swim, a little upset that my bike was so slow, but psyched about the run. I have never had a run where I didn't feel stomach cramps or feel like I wanted to die. This run was as good as it gets for me, and I had plenty left in my legs at the end. (Could have gone even faster, maybe?)

The real kicker of the day was that because there were so few women, yours truly was 1st in her age group and the 5th girl across the line!!! Now, I have no idea how many of us womenfolk there were, but there were only 2 in my age group so the victory wasn't that sweet. Regardless, I will take it. If for nothing else than the shock factor.

And of course, I attribute all of my happy thoughts to the day to my old uniform. It hides the belly pudge and carries good chi. :)