Kinetic Sprint Triathlon 22 Apr 07

First Race of the Season!!

I actually hadn't planned on doing this race, but when my friend Michelle told me a group was getting together to rent a cabin on the lake, and as luck would have it, I happened into a free entry, I thought "what the heck!?"

So, Friday afternoon Michelle and I road-tripped about 1.5 hours south of DC into Spotsylvania County (read "the backcountry of Virginia") to get to the cabin first. It was spectacular, right on the water! What a great excape from the city, work, and all the stress of late!


Friday night it was just us girls, myself, Michelle, and Jean. We checked in Michelle and Jean, took a quick ride around part of the bike course, and headed off into Spotsylvania County for dinner. Not exactly the best pre-race meal, but we found some protein, carbs, and headed back to get a good night's sleep.

Well, I did anyway, but Michelle swears that the walls were paper-thin and that "someone" was snoring...whatever!! We woke bright and early to a freezing cold morning, and off went the girls to transition. I met them there before the race; it was very strange being the spectator for the day!

We met up with Jason, the lone guy friend who was racing the Half-ironman with the girls, and Jean's man Ken, who was spectating with me. Ken and I spent the day running all around trying to cheer everyone on at the transitions and turn-around points. Reminded me of watching my sister run X-country when we were in High School!

In the end Jean had a fantastic race, and both she and Michelle finished 4th in their age groups! Jason also had a very strong race. And we got to cheer on DC Mayor Adrien Fenty! All in all a great first day.


Saturday night Jean was replaced with Dave, and we decided not to venture out into the restaurant world for dinner. We stayed in, enjoyed the cabin, and had a wonderful BBQ meal of chicken, asparagus, and rice. Good fuel!

We prepped our bikes, and headed off for bed again. The sprint race didn't start until 10am, so we got a full night in the bag.




Race morning arrived, Dave and I headed into transition. There were twice as many racers for the sprint as there had been for the half the day before, and I was not pleased to discover that the F 35-39 was the biggest, and most challenging, field of the day.

SWIM (750m): 14:25 (14th)

BRRRRR. The water temp was a balmy 56 degrees. Nothing I hadn't swam in before, but it definitely got the juices flowing! I finished right smack in the middle; guess all that coaching and Master's swim was for naught!

T1: 1:50 (4th)


BIKE (18mi): 52:42 (5th)

The bike was crazy. I hit it hard, uphill for the first jaunt out of transition, but then flat for a few miles out of the park. Only about 2 miles into it I was passed by a lady who looked fast. I was determined to keep with her. We jockied for position the entire race, keeping just far enough off each other to avoid a drafting penatly. She kept pushing me up the hills and I kept screaming past her on the descent. Finally at the end she yelled at me that she didn't want to have to pass me again and encouraged me to kick it in. I was very pleased with my bike split!


T2: 0:56 (1st)
I always have the fasted T2 split. Nothing else to say here!



RUN (5K): 25:53 (7th)




SHOCKER--the fact that I haven't run a brick yet this season really showed here, and it really hurt! My heartrate was redlined the entire bike, so I had nothing left to give to the run. It was all I could do to finish it without puking. The week before Michelle, Jason and I had decided our new triathlon motto was "Embrace the Suffering". Well, there was suffering all around me, and I had no choice but to embrace it! Nuff said on this one too!

FINAL: 1:35:44 (5th/33 age-group, 27th overall)
Fifth place sucks; not good enough to podium, but close enough to know that I should have podiumed! Oh well, it was the first race of the season, it was a much bigger field than anticipated, and it will hopefully serve as motivation to train harder!!

The Cherry Blossoms are in bloom!!

Sunday morning did not look very Spring-like! It was, however, ideal running conditions. Overcast, and temps in the mid 50's.

I didn't sleep well the night before, got a wrong number call at 3am, and never fell back asleep before the alarm went of at 5!

And for some reason, Saturday night I just wasn't really "in the mood" to run the race. I didn't lay out my gear ahead of time, didn't pack my bag, gather my nutrition, or do any of my normal pre-race routine. That would come back an haunt me later.

So, I rushed to get everything together (it's just a run, not like I had to remember all my tri gear...) and get in the car to drive to the Metro. Yes, I drove 9 blocks to the Metro, to go run a 10 mile race. I got on the Metro and started hydrating. And hydrating. And hydrating.

As soon as I got off the metro, and waited in line for one of 100 school buses to take us to the start of the race, I realized I needed a porta-potty. In addition to all that hydrating, the wine and pizza from the night before were now turning out to have been a very bad idea.

Somehow I survived, managed to make the porta-potty in time before the race start. Mayor Adrian Fenty was there, and he gave a little motivational speech to all the racers before the gun went off. It's cool to have a Mayor who's 34 and out there and doing active things, especially in a place like DC.


So, I snuck into the first wave (I was placed in the 3rd wave, and I learned from the Army Ten Miler that to be anything but in front, you spend 3 miles walking through all the "runners"--so frustrating!) and soon we were off. I had met up with a group of guys and started running with them, we were fairly well paced at first. That was until Mile 1 and I realized I was still a bit overhydrated. Off to the porta-potty. I have NEVER stopped in a race, not even my half-Ironman 70.3 mile races to stop and pee, but there I was, less than 8 minutes into it, and I had to pee!


I pushed on, running over the Memorial Bridge, past the Washinton Monument, and the entire grove of Cherry Blossoms in full bloom. It was beautiful. Then we took the turn down along the Potomac and headed past the Kennedy Center and the famed "Watergate" Hotel. As I was passing mile-marker 4 the first Elite man was cruising his way back down, shortly followed by the lead Elite woman. Go girl!


We ran up Rock Creek Parkway, up and up and up! It was a gradual hill, but a long hill. About this time I remember that I had forgotten the body glide. My underarms and thighs were dying. I thought I was going to break out into bleeding blisters at any second. I think because it was so cold, I wasn't sweating, so there was no natural lubrication between my skin. It hurt. Half-way point was a medical station. Stop Number Two. Vasoline, does anyone have any vasoline?! It was so cold the vasoline wouldn't come out of the tube. Another wasted 2 minutes.

I sucked it up, got back on the road and started the long, easy descent back to the Lincoln Memorial and Hain's Point. Along the way I started pacing with a girl, we pushed each other along for a couple miles and then started chatting. Turns out she was running 6 weeks pregnant!!! At that point I figured any pain and discomfort I was feeling was really lame, and so I pushed on


I finished the race in 1:17:21 just seconds faster than my Army Ten-Miler time. But when you consider the bathroom and vasoline stops, I probably ran it faster than that! Next time, I will make sure I'm in "race ready" mode the night before!



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