BryanU
06-16-2009, 12:19 AM
This is really long – but hopefully you’ll find it a) entertaining, b) instructional, c) idiotic, d) all of the above. If you’re not into pre-race details, go ahead and skip down to “THE RACE”.
First off, Tri Bike Transport – it’s a great deal when you consider airline bike fees, other costs of moving a bike and box around, and having to disassemble the bike – but only if you send the bike that you actually race on. You’ll understand soon enough.
Ht,
Briefly back to Tuesday evening - arriving at Speedy Reedy to drop off the trusty road bike for Tri Bike Transport, I opt for a trip around the block for a few extra minutes of workout. I find myself following a Ford Explorer too closely, lose concentration just long enough for them to stop, and collide at nearly 20mph, leaving me with a slightly sore neck and even sorer upper-right back shoulder, but no feeling of internal shoulder injuries – lucky.
Saturday morning, arriving at SFO and preparing to get off the plane, Pritchard calls and offers to pick me up. After a brief detour (a.k.a. Oakland airport) Mike and Mary pick me up – we go to breakfast and then to Sports Basement where I pick up my bike and swap seatposts for my Profile Designs Fast Forward seatpost for a more tri-bike geometry. Nothing like throwing on clip-ons and changing your bike geometry at the last minute.
1:30 - To the Dolphin Club at Aquatic Park for a swim, where an ex-coworker Conor is a member. The Dolphin Club is an insane swimming/(non-motorized) boating club with a huge locker room, a sauna and steaming hot showers, about 2 short flights of stairs from the beach, where they frown upon wetsuits and some members compete to see who can chalk up 100 miles the earliest in the year. I’m told that it was completed within the first days of January this year. I met up with Conor and one other for around a mile swim. Conor was going wetsuit-less and another V02 teammate had posted that their wetsuit-less swim on Friday was good, so I decide it sounds like fun. Along the shore/buoy-line, it pretty damn cold, but almost bearable. Turning out from shore, the temperature drops rapidly and half-way out I can’t feel my extremities and turn for shore, realizing the severity of the situation I’m facing. I’m not far out at all, but 50 feet might as well be a mile when you’re losing coordination. I manage to stumble up the stairs, into the locker room and compose myself enough to request “where sana”. After 20-30 minutes of sauna and hot showers, I can feel my hands and feet again and speak in full sentences – lucky.
3:00 – Registration and the expo. 6:30 – dinner near Fishermans Wharf with Andrew, Mike, Mary, Jeff and his wife, and Ryan Baldwin.
8:30 – On the ride back to my hotel I opt for a hotel-block tour to scout for coffee shops. Suddenly, “clickety-clack, clickety-clack, grrrsssshhhhhhhhhh”. Stepping off, I see the chain sandwich – chain playing “meat” while cassette and spokes play “bread” – and my derailleur imitating a common male morning occurrence. 30 minutes later, with as much allen-tool-able disassembling as can be done, the chain is free but the rear wheel won’t come off… or spin. I start noticing oddities: the derailleur moves more than I’d like. I begin removing the derailleur hanger – there’s a screw missing… and the upside-down U-shaped flange of the derailleur hanger doesn’t come close to filling its home in the rear-dropout of the frame… and the rear-dropout of the frame looks oddly wide. S&#%! The rear-dropout is bent backward, moving the derailleur hanger rearwards, cocking the wheel up against the frame. It’s bent and it’s aluminum and that’s a big problem. There’s no way, after 9pm the night before a race, that this is going to get fixed – or even rigged up well enough to ride the half-mile to the race! After a call to Pritchard and another back home to Sarah, I remember Conor’s Trek that he left at the Dolphin Club. It’s nearly 10pm - I call and he’s not too far away and happy to lend me the bike – lucky.
10:15 pm – I’m riding hotelward on a Trek road bike on which I can barely reach the handlebars from the seat and the pedals are all wrong. At the hotel, I swap seat-posts and seats, drop in my rear wheel, pack transition bags and hit the sack at midnight.
Sunday
4:10 am – wakey wakey. A shower, 2 cups of warm, half-cooked oatmeal (only hot tap water and no coffee machine) and I’m on one bike with a backpack and another bike hanging on my shoulder, riding to the race. At transition, there’s no bike tech so I walk through transition in the pre-dawn light, calling out “anyone have a pedal wrench?”, finally find one and proceed to strain my back during the 10 minutes it takes to get the pedals off the Trek, but I do it and now have a bike that I think I know my shoes will fit on – and I think I will fit on. I set up transition with a multi-tool handy for adjustments if needed.
After body marking and port-a-pottying, I board the boat early, and flop down next to Ryan Baldwin and fall asleep for most of the cruise to Alcatraz.
THE RACE
I felt like I was navigating much better than last year (I saw lots of other swimmers this time), but I also notice that these packs are heading far too east, probably waiting for the current to take them west, but it doesn’t appear to be happening. I manage to pee, thinking about how sharks can smell urine from miles away, but otherwise have a fairly relaxed swim, avoiding pushing hard knowing that I haven’t been swimming much this year. One calf cramps for a bit, but eventually subsides. Swim time: 45:04 (~10 minutes slower than last year) – 536th Overall.
Exiting the swim, my left adductor cramps and I’m immobilized in the exit chute, 10 feet from an aid station – but I can’t get to it for what feels like ages, watching people hustle past. Finally, the cramp releases, I grad a few drinks and start the T1-run. Without a third pair of shoes (1 for the morning, 1 for T1, 1 for the run), I opt for a barefoot run to T2. It’s not all that smooth and somewhere around ¾ mile and Pritchard runs by halfway there, saying “that was a cluster….”.
On the bike, I feel pretty good and the bike feels good aside from feeling a bit forward over the bars. I tried to hold back a bit on the ride but kept on the power down the hills and passed tons of people, especially on the climbs. The course has plenty of technical turns but that’s one area I hate holding back and the unfamiliar bike performs well. Overall, I’m really happy with my ride as I felt strong, got 300+ calories and paced it well, even with the multitude of hills. Bike time: 55:02 (53:45 last year) – 60th overall.
On the run I felt great but felt like I held back more than usual, maintaining a high cadence and staying relaxed. I had few people pass me but pulled nearly all of them back as I was passing a lot more people than usual, which continued throughout the run. I drank cytomax and sometimes water at each aid station without stopping and finished feeling good. Run time – 58:40 (58:54 last year with a much higher RPE) – 126th overall.
SUMMARY
This race is just plain fun. It’s like no other in any of the disciplines and a great experience. I went in feeling good but just hoping for a good run and, under the circumstances, I’m totally satisfied with my race. The lessons to be learned? Where do I start!
First off, Tri Bike Transport – it’s a great deal when you consider airline bike fees, other costs of moving a bike and box around, and having to disassemble the bike – but only if you send the bike that you actually race on. You’ll understand soon enough.
Ht,
Briefly back to Tuesday evening - arriving at Speedy Reedy to drop off the trusty road bike for Tri Bike Transport, I opt for a trip around the block for a few extra minutes of workout. I find myself following a Ford Explorer too closely, lose concentration just long enough for them to stop, and collide at nearly 20mph, leaving me with a slightly sore neck and even sorer upper-right back shoulder, but no feeling of internal shoulder injuries – lucky.
Saturday morning, arriving at SFO and preparing to get off the plane, Pritchard calls and offers to pick me up. After a brief detour (a.k.a. Oakland airport) Mike and Mary pick me up – we go to breakfast and then to Sports Basement where I pick up my bike and swap seatposts for my Profile Designs Fast Forward seatpost for a more tri-bike geometry. Nothing like throwing on clip-ons and changing your bike geometry at the last minute.
1:30 - To the Dolphin Club at Aquatic Park for a swim, where an ex-coworker Conor is a member. The Dolphin Club is an insane swimming/(non-motorized) boating club with a huge locker room, a sauna and steaming hot showers, about 2 short flights of stairs from the beach, where they frown upon wetsuits and some members compete to see who can chalk up 100 miles the earliest in the year. I’m told that it was completed within the first days of January this year. I met up with Conor and one other for around a mile swim. Conor was going wetsuit-less and another V02 teammate had posted that their wetsuit-less swim on Friday was good, so I decide it sounds like fun. Along the shore/buoy-line, it pretty damn cold, but almost bearable. Turning out from shore, the temperature drops rapidly and half-way out I can’t feel my extremities and turn for shore, realizing the severity of the situation I’m facing. I’m not far out at all, but 50 feet might as well be a mile when you’re losing coordination. I manage to stumble up the stairs, into the locker room and compose myself enough to request “where sana”. After 20-30 minutes of sauna and hot showers, I can feel my hands and feet again and speak in full sentences – lucky.
3:00 – Registration and the expo. 6:30 – dinner near Fishermans Wharf with Andrew, Mike, Mary, Jeff and his wife, and Ryan Baldwin.
8:30 – On the ride back to my hotel I opt for a hotel-block tour to scout for coffee shops. Suddenly, “clickety-clack, clickety-clack, grrrsssshhhhhhhhhh”. Stepping off, I see the chain sandwich – chain playing “meat” while cassette and spokes play “bread” – and my derailleur imitating a common male morning occurrence. 30 minutes later, with as much allen-tool-able disassembling as can be done, the chain is free but the rear wheel won’t come off… or spin. I start noticing oddities: the derailleur moves more than I’d like. I begin removing the derailleur hanger – there’s a screw missing… and the upside-down U-shaped flange of the derailleur hanger doesn’t come close to filling its home in the rear-dropout of the frame… and the rear-dropout of the frame looks oddly wide. S&#%! The rear-dropout is bent backward, moving the derailleur hanger rearwards, cocking the wheel up against the frame. It’s bent and it’s aluminum and that’s a big problem. There’s no way, after 9pm the night before a race, that this is going to get fixed – or even rigged up well enough to ride the half-mile to the race! After a call to Pritchard and another back home to Sarah, I remember Conor’s Trek that he left at the Dolphin Club. It’s nearly 10pm - I call and he’s not too far away and happy to lend me the bike – lucky.
10:15 pm – I’m riding hotelward on a Trek road bike on which I can barely reach the handlebars from the seat and the pedals are all wrong. At the hotel, I swap seat-posts and seats, drop in my rear wheel, pack transition bags and hit the sack at midnight.
Sunday
4:10 am – wakey wakey. A shower, 2 cups of warm, half-cooked oatmeal (only hot tap water and no coffee machine) and I’m on one bike with a backpack and another bike hanging on my shoulder, riding to the race. At transition, there’s no bike tech so I walk through transition in the pre-dawn light, calling out “anyone have a pedal wrench?”, finally find one and proceed to strain my back during the 10 minutes it takes to get the pedals off the Trek, but I do it and now have a bike that I think I know my shoes will fit on – and I think I will fit on. I set up transition with a multi-tool handy for adjustments if needed.
After body marking and port-a-pottying, I board the boat early, and flop down next to Ryan Baldwin and fall asleep for most of the cruise to Alcatraz.
THE RACE
I felt like I was navigating much better than last year (I saw lots of other swimmers this time), but I also notice that these packs are heading far too east, probably waiting for the current to take them west, but it doesn’t appear to be happening. I manage to pee, thinking about how sharks can smell urine from miles away, but otherwise have a fairly relaxed swim, avoiding pushing hard knowing that I haven’t been swimming much this year. One calf cramps for a bit, but eventually subsides. Swim time: 45:04 (~10 minutes slower than last year) – 536th Overall.
Exiting the swim, my left adductor cramps and I’m immobilized in the exit chute, 10 feet from an aid station – but I can’t get to it for what feels like ages, watching people hustle past. Finally, the cramp releases, I grad a few drinks and start the T1-run. Without a third pair of shoes (1 for the morning, 1 for T1, 1 for the run), I opt for a barefoot run to T2. It’s not all that smooth and somewhere around ¾ mile and Pritchard runs by halfway there, saying “that was a cluster….”.
On the bike, I feel pretty good and the bike feels good aside from feeling a bit forward over the bars. I tried to hold back a bit on the ride but kept on the power down the hills and passed tons of people, especially on the climbs. The course has plenty of technical turns but that’s one area I hate holding back and the unfamiliar bike performs well. Overall, I’m really happy with my ride as I felt strong, got 300+ calories and paced it well, even with the multitude of hills. Bike time: 55:02 (53:45 last year) – 60th overall.
On the run I felt great but felt like I held back more than usual, maintaining a high cadence and staying relaxed. I had few people pass me but pulled nearly all of them back as I was passing a lot more people than usual, which continued throughout the run. I drank cytomax and sometimes water at each aid station without stopping and finished feeling good. Run time – 58:40 (58:54 last year with a much higher RPE) – 126th overall.
SUMMARY
This race is just plain fun. It’s like no other in any of the disciplines and a great experience. I went in feeling good but just hoping for a good run and, under the circumstances, I’m totally satisfied with my race. The lessons to be learned? Where do I start!