Cascade's Edge Olympic

[chrisesposito]

Cold, Wet. Repeat...

The weather for the day was cold, wet, and generally miserable and had a few other issues as well but overall a very good day. Maureen and I get there about 7:30 and I get my packet for the Olympic. Shortly thereafter I hear from a volunteer that the measured water temperature at the first turn was 52 degrees but had "warmed up" to 53 at the second buoy. After a short deliberation I decide that 30+ minutes in water that cold wasn't something I wanted to experience so I switched to the Olympic Duathlon; I would later hear that they cut the length of the Olympic swim leg in half (2 loops to 1) due to the extremely cold water temperature.

The oly duathlon was to be a time trial start in pairs and I go off in about the 10th pair. After only a few miles my powertap begins to work only occasionally and then just quits altogether. It rained, often hard, throughout the bike ride so I presume that was the cause. Then I notice that I'm spinning out on downhills that just aren't that big and I soon determine that I can't shift onto the smallest 3 or 4 cogs in the rear. Since I had moved up through the field to be in the top 5 or 6 riders I decided that I would just ride hard. My bike split wound up as 1:07:33, 5th fastest overall and a 40K PR by 3 minutes over my 2009 Black Diamond standalone 40K time.

The run terrain was constantly rolling, with few really flat sections. Running all those loops of the bike on Wednesday nights at VO2 for the last 3 months really paid off as I ran a 52:37, another PR by a minute over my Mercer Island standalone 10K time. At the finish line I notice that my timing chip had fallen off. Since I have an official bike split but no other times it must have fallen off between the bike finish timing mat and the rack for my bike. Given the times that I know, I probably finished between 10th and 12th out of 40 racers.

[benbiggles]

Awesome work Chris, that is indeed cold water. I looked at the results and wondered if you had perhaps decided to not race, the lost chip explains it all.

Great work and nice to see some PR's.

BB

[EdBull]

Well, here's my story... I too was tempted to switch to the Du but not really and when my friend Adam, the bartender at Jak's in Issaquah, came up to me and said "well Ed you motivated me last Fall to do this tri stuff and I'm here to do my first race!" and he was doing the OLY. So I figured I needed to stick it out.
The water temp was very cold and so they shortened the swim for safety to 1 loop (750m) and made wetsuits mandatory. I wore 2 caps left my neoprene at home, thanks for the good quality VO2 cap!
I swam with my head up the first 100 yards or so in order to adjust and it was crowded as I started in the back. A new strategy from starting in the front and getting swum over. I ended up feeling pretty slow but comfortable. Strange situation though when I got out of the water my right eye was completely blurred vision! There seemed to be an irritant in my eye so I walked transition instead of my normally speedy T1.
Bike:
The blurred vision began to clear in the first 10 minutes on the bike. Oh yeah my left eye was fine. I put on my 'tuke', my VO2 armwarmers and had my BlueSeventytoe warmers on my shoes, per BB's recommendation 2 months ago when I bought them, and I put on socks. I had a good 1:13 ride and it was pretty dry until the last 5 miles. SteveH passed my on the ride and one other guy my AG, darn.
I then did a 47:14 run.... didn't know my final time because I didn't start my watch.
Because it was then raining a lot and really cold I just left and walked, .5 miles, to my car. Changing in the car I realized I had my chip on still so I drove back to the park and parked in the lot.
As I was walking up to the race site, I heard my name being called.... 3rd in AG out of 9! woohoo.... Thanks VO2!! That's only my 2nd podium ever....
Great to see all the VO2 folks out there, thanks for all your wonderful support.
Ed
PS: Great Waves played a good show at Pogacha Saturday night!

[chrisesposito]

"Greater love hath no man than to be willing to freeze your ass off for a friend..."

So how did Adam do in his first race?

[danap]

I think its also noteworthy that Maureen and I took first place in our Du Team Division and Second Place for Du teams overall. (and yes, there were no other teams in our division and only one other du team, but we still brought home hardware and that's all that really counts!!!)

A special thanks to Steve Q for keeping me motivated on the run!!!

[maureenf]

Pretty fun event in spite of the misery. I didn't mind being 4th female bike split on the Du either. I'd attribute that to all the good coaching going on at the PC over the winter and to all the fast folks not doin' the Du

The best part of the ride was when I was riding along in the low 20s on a fairly flat piece of road and having Rhae Shaw fly by like I was standing still and tossing me a "good job". I couldn't help but smile at thinking of all the guys who were getting chicked

Thanks Dana for being my partner. It was fun.

[steveH]

I'm still trying to thaw out from that freezing swim! I was also tempted to switch to the Du but when I found out I had to change out my numbers I decided it was too much of a hassle . I had a brain freeze headache for the first 5 minutes of the swim and then kind of settled in. Since swimming is not my strong suite I decided to play conservative and stay back and outside for the whole swim. I felt better than I thought I would coming out of the cold water -- with the exception of my feet which just felt like stumps until about mile 3 of the run. I felt OK for most of the bike but developed a slight side stitch about 18 miles in. I felt like I was relatively fast however when comparing to the last time I rode the coarse (Black Diamond '05) I was 1 minute slower this year. I carried my side stitch into the run and didn't lose it until about mile 4. I could feel someone following me entering the trail around the lake and he passed me as we started the path. I saw that he was in my age group so I decided to try to stay with him. He looked very fast -- I think he was around 8 feet tall -- so I didn't think I could hang for long. But I did manage to stay with him all the way around the lake and sprint out the finish with him but I just couldn't get past him and crossed the line right on his heels. That was probably the fastest mile I have ever run.

Overall it was a fun race and it was great to be a part of a team for the first time!

[LuisG]

Quite a race from what it sounds. Congratulations to all who competed!

[DougJ]

OK- First Olympic* under my belt!

First off, it was great fun sharing the awesome weather with a bunch of similarly misguided team mates! Definitely made the day more enjoyable, as misery loves company! (Actually I did have fun time!)

As for my race report--
Swim-- Water was COLD. Had the neoprene hood which kept the ice cream headache at bay- I'm gonna use that thing until at least July! In the race, started about 4 rows back from the middle-front, which kept me from getting swum over by a few guys, though I did get smacked around a bit until the first buoy, including almost losing my goggles (glad I put them on under the latex cap as I was able to reposition them back on.) I made it a point to sight more frequently so that I wouldn't get any "bonus" distance in as I am prone to do, and that seemed to help. I was excited to see several green swim caps in the water behind me as I exited- not last, woo hoo! Came out of the water just behind Steve Hamilton and said hi!

T1- usually I'm pretty quick in the transitions, however the combination of frozen fingers and the repeated urging of the race organizer to take your time and watch out for hypothermia caused me to change my plans a little: I put on arm warmers, which I've never done in a race, and that took me at least an extra minute if not more to get over my wet arms. Once that was accomplished, I felt my teeth chatter (literally!) so I grabbed my VO2 cycling jacket and threw that on as well (also something I've never done in a race). Ran out of T1 and running mount on the bike and I was off.

Bike- Stuck to my plan of riding to FTP watts for the full ride. Overall felt the ride went pretty well. Wish I was a little more aero with the jacket on. Had 1 gel on the bike at the mid-point per my plan. The cold weather caused the Roctane to get very thick-- it felt like I squeezed a travel-sized tube of toothpaste in my mouth! Gulped it down with my remaining Gu Brew but it didn't sit very well... Running dismount into T2 and passed more guys in the chute.

T2- went better than T1. Still couldn't feel my feet, stripped jacket and arm warmers and took off. Grabbed what I thought was water on the way out of T2 and gulped it-- it was Gleukos, heavily concentrated, and BTW- that stuff burns your eyes if you miss your mouth! Didn't need that...

Run- As I started out, Gerry Marvin paced me for the 1st 100m cheering me on- thanks! Also saw Steve H and Ed B heading out for the run, and then Dana and Steve Quinn right behind them. Was feeling a little crampy in the stomach (either that roctane or gleukos I think) so kept my pace about :30-1:00 off of my planned pace. Saw Charles R on his way to second place in the race (way to go!) but I was too zoned to say hi back to him in time! Chased Dana and Steve and met up with them at the entrance to the park and said hi. 1.4 mi to go I was able to reel in another guy in my AG but couldn't pass a 26 y/o I was trading spots back and forth since the midpoint of the bike. Finished the race feeling like I probably couldn't have run that much harder, at least in the last mile, so I am reasonably happy with that.

Overall, had fun, though not super psyched at my placing-- firmly MOP and I was hoping for better. My swim was about as I expected (slow but not terrible), my bike was on plan (4w below planned pacing), and my run was slower than I had hoped due to my stomach not feeling right. T times were higher than I normally do as well, which I attribute to the conditions mainly.

Looking forward to more races, and in warmer conditions!

* Disclaimer- since it wasn't a full Oly distance swim, still gotta get a "full" Oly in-- Federal Escape will be my next chance.

[Cindybigglestone]

Great work out there team!!!