Triangle Sprint race report

The Triangle Sprint Triathlon was an absolutely amazing race! I had heard that it was a tougher course than what I was used to racing. I knew it was going to be hot. It turned out to be completely incredible.

In transition, getting setup before the start.

We got up at 5:30, out the door by 6. Had no idea where the race site was, but I knew it was only a few miles away from the house. The web site said parking was kind of tight. We ended up parking 2 miles away from the race site, and had to walk in carrying the transition bag and my bike, Roberta. Even at that hour, it was incredibly hot and humid. Kelley and I were both drenched by the time we got to the transition area.

At the first of the year when I laid out my 2010 goals, this one was in there:

12. Take the 6 pack out of the fridge. Hopefully my 14 workouts a week will bring out the abs. Related goal: Run one of my summer sprint triathlons without wearing a shirt. I got these great SUGOi Velocity tri shorts & singlet, but I'm too tall for the singlet to fit right. So I want to run topless without being embarrassed.

Well, the outfit in the picture above was the entire race kit. All I needed. It was incredibly freeing. I LOVED riding the bike without a shirt on. The sun, the breeze, the freedom, it all felt amazing. However, I did not bring the 6 pack out of the fridge. It is still comfortably insulated. I was starting to see more definition before we moved into the new house. So I wasn't the picture of HTFU that I was expecting, but I certainly was not embarrassed out there.

This race was at Harris Lake. The water in Harris Lake is pulled into the nuclear power plant, used to cool off the nuclear reactors, and returned into Harris Lake. The running joke with the kids was that daddy was going to be used as their nightlite last night, and for me to keep an eye out for any three-eyed fish. The water temperature at the swim start was 90 degrees.


Lining up to get in the lake before the swim start

I've been trying to gear up for the 2 mile OWS in a few weeks, and this was the only time I was going to be in a lake before that race. So I wanted to kick some tail in the water. It went so much better than I expected.

That's me with my whole head out of the water and shoulders out of position. Kelley is an incredible photographer to be able to keep up with my position in the washing machine like that.

We had an in-water start about waist deep. I found my stroke and held it. Just like what happens every time in the pool, the lungs tightened up a bit once my breathing got taxed, then loosened up and I was in my groove. The swim was 750 meters, and I held my stroke the entire time! Normally in OWS I have to throw in a couple of breast strokes to get my head above water and catch my breath up every so often. But at this race I just kept on stroking. It felt incredible.

Heading into T1

There was a long run coming out of the water back into the transition area, and I felt so great after the swim it didn't bother me at all. I dried off my feet, put on socks, bike shoes, helmet, and took off with Roberta.


Roberta has been having some saddle problems lately. So guess what happened as soon as I sat down? Shtoink! The seat went immediately loose, back, and pointing straight up. I had just tightened everything down the night before! So there I was riding out of the state park, less than a hundred yards into a 17.5 mile bike ride with a seat playing divide and conquer with my nutsack. I immediately abandoned any time goals on the bike.

Fortunately, at the park exit there was a sag guy. You don't normally see those in sprint tri's. He didn't have an alan wrench to tighten the seat back down, but did at least get it pointed in the right direction. The dangerous part about a carbon fiber seatpost is that you can tighten the saddle down too tight and actually crack the post. If you do that it's just a matter of time before the seat comes off in the middle of a ride. So now I just wanted to finish. I'll deal with replacing the seatpost later if I need to. I knew I couldn't sit on the back half of the saddle for the rest of the ride, and when I go aero I typically move back on the saddle. So this would be your basic nightmare.

Still, the bike leg in it's entirety was really good. The course had lots of rolling hills, two pretty good climbs, and no traffic. It took me about 12 miles to really get my cycling legs warmed up, but once it felt good it felt GREAT! Mechanical difficulties aside, I tackled those hills with precision and power. It felt like I was back at the transition area much faster than I was expecting. I did take a gel as soon as the bike came back into the state park so I'd be fueled up for the run.





T2 felt very fast. Ran with Roberta back to my rack, switched out the bike shoes for the run shoes (with Yanx, no tying), and traded the bike helmet for a headsweats visor and I was off and running.

The run course was a loop with an out and back, all in the state park, and mostly on trails. The trails threw me off mentally, there were tons of roots and loose dirt that I wasn't expecting. The hills on the trails were tough! I wanted a harder course though. and I got it. There were plenty of aid stations with water. It was so hot I walked through them and drank as much as I could take down. Pouring with sweat, it was so freaking humid you could feel the air move around you while running. I kept a good pace, held good form, and ran my race. It ended up being the slowest 5k I've turned in over the last several months, but it still fit. Coming back into the finish line:

Check out the muscle definition in those gams!


I hit the finish line happy to be done. Through all the ups and downs, this has got to be one of my favorite races ever.

Final stats:
Swim: 16:55
T1: 3:24
Bike 59:33
T2: 1:51
Run: 29:28

Overall: 382/481 men
AG: 71/72 35-39 age men

In the swim I was 57th AG, and 69th AG in the bike and run. so it must have been the transition times that pushed me next to last in the age group. I knew I did pretty good in the swim, I passed a bunch of people in the water. And a bunch of people passed me on the bike and run. The strange thing is that in SC I would have been much closer to middle of the pack. Raleigh is so much more competitive! So overall this was a fantastic race and I can't wait to do it again next year. I can see why it's so popular.

This week

This week is nuts. and tons of fun. It all started last thursday.

I love a long holiday weekend. Gives me the time to do whatever needs to be done. Thursday I got to put in a fun brick after work. 15 miles on the bike followed by a hard, fast and fun 6.5 mile run. I feel like I'm starting to plateau my speed and conditioning, especially on the bike and run. So that was a well earned brick workout. and it was FUN.

Friday I rested. it was glorious. We went out to dinner with some friends to kick off the holiday.

By Saturday, I knew it was time to swim. I hit the pool and left 100 laps in there. That's 1.55 miles, and a personal distance record. I hit it in 1:03, which is also a pretty fast time to go that long. No stops, rests, catching my breath between sets..... Just start swimming and keep on freaking swimming. I'm trying to get ready for The Big Deuce 2 mile open water swim on July 24th, and this has me feeling great. I feel like I could have gone longer if I needed to. This is like the 20 mile run before the marathon; it gives you confidence going into the event. and that's fantastic.

Sunday I went outside for a run. I tried Lake Johnson after hearing there was a good trail around the lake. You may remember how much I loved running around the lake at Furman University. It was a 1.1 mile loop around the lake with some shade and some sun. There were water fountains and rest rooms on both sides of the lake. and there was a hill at furman, or a cutoff to keep from having to run it.

Lake Johnson = hill work. I had no idea, and started out on the flat side of the path. Then hit the hills just before coming to the closing of the loop at the parking lot/boathouse. I discovered that it was easier if you ran the route the other way. So the total path was 2.9 miles. There were no bathroom or water fountains along the way, but there were trash cans. and did I mention I got surprised by the hills? It looks like a fun place to take the family, but not the Furman lake replacement trail that I was hoping for. Still, a long run outside on a hot day can only be so bad. I covered 7 miles total.

The funny part was that my mp3 player battery died less than 2 miles in. Then about 5.5 miles in the Garmin battery died off. So I was left with just me and the mile markers. and the heat. yes it was about 98 out there.

Sunday night we had a fantastic cookout with the Pattersons (Chris ran the B2B with me last year), and then watched fireworks from the backyard. The new backyard is very close to the state fairgrounds, so we had the best fireworks show in raleigh from the comfort of our own backyard. Bigun called it "the best appendix day fireworks show ever" and absolutely loved it. In the past she's been scared of the loud sounds and bright explosions. It was so much fun to see her enjoy it.

Monday was reserved for a bike ride with the Raleigh Gyros. It turned out to be about 100 degrees, so I opted out of that and instead went to the gym for a couple of hours. I hit abs and lower back first, then an hour and a half on the bike. My legs were pretty sore after the hill run, so it felt great to spin them out. Again, I'm still feeling plateau'd on the bike so it's crazy. I've got to find a way to push the bounds more. To make matters worse, the gym plays cardio cinema, where they put a different movie every day on a big projection screen. There's no treadmills in the theater, but there is a good bike. so the movie (Surrogates with Bruce Willis) was playing monday, and I watched it.

Today I got in some good yoga before work, and a hard and fast 1000 yds in the pool over lunch. I'm feeling good in the water these days.

Tomorrow's going to be fun. For starter's, it's my 35th birthday! Mentally I'm having kind of a midlife thing. But it's still going to be a good day. A lot of people took this week off from work, so it's an easy week in the office. And I'm hitting up another brick after work tomorrow. Going to be a long one, maybe an hour on the bike and an hour running. maybe even a longer bike ride.

It's also the last workout of the week. Saturday I've got the Triangle Sprint triathlon and I am ready to taper! if you can call 3 days a taper. This promises to be a tough course. I'm ready for it. The 750 m swim is in Lake Harris, which I'm not familiar with. It's a local race though, not far away from the house. The bike is 17.5 miles of rollers, and the run is a 5k in rolling trails. It's going to be hot. I'm going to go fast. I'm not setting official time goals, but I want to cover the bike in under an hour and the run in under 30 minutes.

The real goal for this triathlon was set back in January with my First of the Year Goal post. Specifically, this particularly gay goal was set to run a summer triathlon without a shirt, and look like I belong there. Since this is my only summer triathlon, I'm going topless. and I'll let fate (and the gentle interweb pictures) tell if I deserved to be running with the hardbodies. That means I've been watching the fuel really closely this week, trying to make myself as lean as possible. I hope I can pull it off. Kelley's coming to take pics, so sometime over the weekend I'll post a race report.

Then saturday night we're having some peeps over for beers and fun to celebrate my birthday. should be a blast! have a great week!

Also, happy birthday to Amanda, who turned 30 yesterday. Welcome to the new age group! She's still way faster than me.

June Totals

This might be embarassing:

Swim: 3.85 miles, 5 swims, 1 almost race?
Bike: 130 miles, 6 rides
Run: 16 miles, 4 runs
Strength: 1 hour, 3 workouts
Yoga: 30 minutes, 1 workout

yep. pitiful. Just like my recent posting habits. 16 miles running should be 1 run, not 1 month. 130 miles on the bike is pretty good. and almost 4 miles of swimming isn't that bad. But I've got to run more.

The one race I had planned for june I missed thanks to a thunderstorm. It was just a 1 mile open water swim, and I didn't feel like a lake swim when it was lightning outside. of course the lightning went away before the swim actually started, but I was fast asleep and had no idea.

July's going to be a fun month for racing. I have a sprint tri coming up July 10th, and a 2 mile OWS July 24. Coolio!

Father's Day

We had an awesome weekend down in SC. Went back to Greenville to visit the folks, celebrate father's day, and the SC portion of Bigun's 5th birthday. It started with a party:

Uncle Michael and Aunt Summer got her a princess costume that was adorable! They had cake, it was so much fun! My grandmothers both came over for the dinner, as well as plenty of old family friends. Earlier saturday, we (me, Kelley, Morgan, and Michael) took Bigun and Evil Genius to the movie theater to see Toy Story 3. It was a pretty good flick, and EG's first time at the theater. She LOVED it. The first time we took bigun, the big screen and loud sounds scared her pretty good. But not with EG. She was right at home.

These guys were just hanging out at the dollhouse porch all weekend. Hilarious!


Sunday we all got in the pool:

Fun in the sun!

There has not, however, been very much fun in the sun on the training front. It has been HOT down here! Yowza hot. So I've been inside training as much as I can. Last week I got in a few good workouts, including a nice brick thursday night. I'm falling into a pattern of a long bike ride monday, run tuesday, lunchtime swims, and a thursday night brick. It's certainly much less training than I've been doing this year. But they are all good quality workouts. Last thursday's brick was an hour of tough hills on the bike followed by a 30 minute run. I was watching the Celtics lose game 7, which was tougher than the brick. I wanted to keep running but the gym was closing.

Yesterday we got back into town about 8 pm with a full uhaul - the last of our stuff from SC! We got it all unloaded, returned the truck, and got the kids down about 11 pm. ugh. Also, I seriously wrenched my lower back into some serious pain. ouch! So as bad as I was stuffing my face on Mom's Good Southern Cooking all weekend long, I was unable to jump back into regular workouts today. Tomorrow I'm going to the chiropractor for an adjustment. I think some swimming might help too. Then tomorrow night it's date night! We're going rock climbing, as strange as that might sound. Indoor rock wall with a local group of climbers, then joining the group for dinner later. Fun times as long as I'm not in agonizing pain.

I'm going to have to step back up to the plate to really be in shape for a 6 hour half ironman by september. Did you know today was the summer solstice? Longest day of the year. I do hope you got to enjoy the extra daylight. Here in the south we're going to have light outside until about 9 pm. But that means tomorrow, the days start getting shorter. And that means fall is on the way and we've only got a few months of this dang heat left. It makes me optimistic.

Ya want to talk about Evil Genius? Why do we call her Evil Genius? Today she took a dump on the floor at the local DMV. Then she accidentally stepped in it. I wish I could say that was the worst smelling thing in that office. Future parents beware.

EG Got Cut & Swim Preview

Evil Genius got her first haircut ever today! She's three years old now and was born with a full head of hair. We've never even had it trimmed before. It was getting too hard for me to wash, so it was time to get chopped! Bigun was also in dire need of a trim. Here's the before:



How insane! Hair down to their elbows. Impossible to maintain. The bottom several inches were just tangles.


EG did really well in the chair. She looked down when the stylist told her too, and sat up straight when she needed to. It was the only time all day she was actually well behaved.


After. How ADORABLE is that?


Of course Bigun got a summer 'do to. She loves it. Very cute!


I also went this afternoon to pick up my packet for the OWS tomorrow. The Jordan Lake Open Water Challenge has a cool shirt. Water temp is 81 degrees today so no wetsuits. Got to plan my "race outfit" carefully tonight. Wait, all I can wear is the swim cap they gave me and a black speedo. That was easy.

I've never tried just a swimming event before. I feel very well trained for this one. I've been in the pool a bunch lately, never swimming less than a mile. So I'm in good shape for this event. There's an open water swim clinic starting at 7 AM, and the race starts at 7:30. My goal time is 40 minutes.

I'm doing this event specifically to try and conquer a problem with open water swimming. It always ends up being the most hated part of a tri, and I think I have the most room for improvement by gaining appreciation for the open water. This one is a precursor to the big deuce 2 mile OWS on july 24th. That one I'm going to have to really increase my swimming endurance for. Might even have to find a bigger pool (like a lake for regular OWS).

Go Total Immersion! I hope TI really makes this fun tomorrow.

**update: Thunderstorms kicked in loud enough to wake me up about 3:30 am. I checked the weather report, the storm wasn't supposed to pass until about 9 am so I just turned off the alarm clock. Woke up at 9, made pancakes for the kids and us for breakfast, and found out that the storm passed early and it turned out to be a beautiful day and they had the swim anyway. I wasn't about to swim in a like while it was lightning, so I just plain missed it. I ended up putting a mile in the pool in 34 minutes today instead.

Game ON

I just completed registration for the Patriot's Half - a half ironman in historic Williamsburg VA. I've been waiting and waiting for the OBX half ironman to open registration, but they still don't have all of the permits in place. I've been training at a level that I expect will allow me to be quite competitive in a half iron distance in September, and the Patriot's half is the weekend before the OBX was supposed to happen. So I'm not considering the OBX anymore, it's VA all the way!

It's on like donkey kong, people. Come on out to VA and join me!

May's Review

I am at a loss of words to describe May. it's been an incredibly wild month. We got closed and got moved into the house. I did very little training and no races. here's the low down:

Swim: 5.5 miles, 6 swimsBike: 90 miles, 5 ridesRun: 18.75 miles, 4 runsStrength: 4 times, 1 hour total
Yoga: 4 workouts, 2 hoursand we moved into a new house. there are so many boxes. The furniture was so heavy. We haven't seen that stuff in 2 months. there are more boxes than I can remember. It's rendered me incoherent.

Yesterday Evil Genius turned three years old. I have some pictures to prove it.


She wanted cupcakes instead of a real cake. I say good call.


The proud big sister!


Cupcakes again. They were just that good.


Her favorite presents were a new baby doll, bean bag chair, and a princess blanket


So CUTE! We are so proud and blessed to have our little 3 year old EG!

I have high hopes for june. I just haven't figured out what they are yet. I know saturday Kyle is coming with me back to Greenville to load up the storage unit. We're going to climb paris mountain on the bikes a few times while we're there. And the next weekend I've got the 1 mile open water swim. Nuts I tell ya.