Tomorrow (8/11), I’m doing the run leg of the Coeur d’Alene Triathlon. 6.2 miles. 10 kilometers.
If I don’t make it, you can have my stuff. If I do live, fascinating tidbits about my morning will be posted here.
<later…>
Caveat: A month ago I infamously twisted my ankle. Which put a severe crimp in my eight weeks of prep that I had for this race. Making my longest run thus far 5 miles. Suffice it to say I was woefully underprepared for this race. Which was depressing.
My morning, which started at the ungodly hour of 5:30am, started with a shower and packing up everything I thought I would need. I’m going to be sitting around for an hour or two, after all. Choke down some cottage cheese and an oatmeal raisin health cookie that came free in my bag o’ loot one gets for signing up and giving them lots o’ money. Saved me from having to make oatmeal at least. Double check the stuff in my backpack, and I’m out the door, to Starbucks for the very important part of my nutrition plan, caffeine. Yes, that is the key to a good race.
Get down to the Park, find a parking place across the street in the county building. Not bad really. Get into the park, thousands of people. Yeah, finding my teammates will be a challenge. Granted, there are over 1100 participants so that wasn’t really surprising.
So I mosey down to the seawall, if you will, to look at the swim course. My heart stops in fear of the distance. And then I think, I am so glad I don’t have to swim that. I hang out down there listening to a newbie who is planning to swim in his board shorts. Oh, drag. I’d have to have a wetsuit and floaties before I considered it. More power to him. I come across a couple of friends and figure I’ll hang out with them until the crowds thin. We go over to the Steps and try to find one person in the sea of red swim caps. I’m video taping the start. It is an awesome sight when 600 or so people all jump in the water at once.
The swim started I head to the Relay team pen to find my other teammate. I eventually track him down and we chat for a while, scoff at the Vertical Earth guys with their really nice bikes and their trainers warming up. Jealousy, you know. Well, about a half an hour, he takes off. I now have an hour and fifteen minutes. I listen to some music, get my shoes on, warm up, find my hat, stand around watching the people coming in and going out, warm up again, and then, whoa, there he is 10 minutes ahead of schedule.
So, I’m off. I start out with my 11 minute/mile pace, which would be my training pace, not my race pace. On the other hand, I want to finish and not die. I figure it’s an acceptable tradeoff. I trot along, being passed occasionally. Mile 1, piece of cake. Mile 2, another 11 minute/mile. Yes, looking good. Now here’s something; Mile 3 is more or less uphill but you don’t realize it until the end. Starts out less but ends with an impactful more. I start wondering if this will ever end. We have to run back you know. Still, I do Mile 3 at 11:30 minutes/mile. Somewhere in the middle of Mile 3 my ankle gives me a twinge. I ignore it. Luckily it goes away. Mile 4, 11:30 minutes/mile. This is where it starts falling apart. My band-aid fell off my toe, my feet start heating up, my timing chip starts chafing. I think I had it on a smidge too tight, giving me a hamstrung effect. But I suffer through. Mile 5, now it’s getting ugly. My hip flexors start telling me they’re going to quit and my knee starts aching, and my back is tired of the whole thing. Of course, what can I do, just keep moving. Mile 6. This is when the chills started. But when you’ve gone 5 miles already you say things to yourself like, “only 1 more mile” Ha. Only. Then in my push to the finish through the park those last .2 miles I thought I was going to barf. You hear your name being announce and finally: I’m through the arch. Finished. Done. Trying not to barf on the nice girl taking off my timing chip.
I recover, have a bottle of water (free!), chat with my teammates, go get my nice shirt (free!) that they give finishers, and get in line for a delicious Joey’s bbq pork sandwich and some salad (free!). Really, it was good. I’m not just saying that because I spent the last hour running and would consider eating small bugs if they were prepared right.
It was a good time, more or less. In the sense that when you finish you swear you’ll never do anything like that again, but a half hour later you start thinking you can do the entire thing next year. Because it seems like such fun. I’m firmly convinced that you should pick a training plan one distance further than you want to race. If you want to do a sprint, train for an oly. Doing an oly, train for a half IM. Doing a half IM, train for a full. Doing a full IM, well, you’re nuts. It builds in some safety and even if you’re no speed demon, you can finish strong and not strung out at the end of you endurance. I’ll try my clever plan next year and let you know how that goes for me.
Not So Fast 