JW's 2013 Quassy Report
Rev3 Quassy Half - 5:59:53
Swim: 35:25
I have done VERY LITTLE swimming so far this yr. I can count my total number of swims on 1 hand. The water was nice and clean and a perfect temperature for swimming. I was able to get in a decent groove and generally swam straight. I maybe went a little wide on each of the two turns, but all in all a pretty good swim for me. My time was within 1 minute of every other swim I have done in the past 3 yrs and I wasn’t tired at all, so it really doesn’t motivate me to swim train much more…
T1: 2:09
Bike: 3:22:40* (2:56:17 moving time)
I went back and forth about what strategy to use for this race. It was a B race, so part of me wanted to fully overcook the bike to try and replicate my quad cramping and suffer through the run for real practice for the IM run. Instead I tried the opposite approach for the first time in my life… Ride a stupid conservative bike and see if I could actually put together a decent run on fresh legs. I had fun on the bike and I didn't think the hills were all that crazy. I love bombing down hills and many of the Quassy downhills were short or technical, but I did reach a top speed of 52.2 mph!
I was hydrating well and dialling in my easy pace for power. I was experimenting with a new supplement strategy to try and avoid my quad cramping. I had a pill box and ~15 mins into my ride, I took 3 pills, (salt stick, magnesium, calcium). I then repeated this at hours 1, 2, and 3, so in total, I had 4 of each. I also took 3 Advil at about hour 3 as my lower back started to flair up. I made it a point to sit way up during all climbing and watched tons of people pass me on the uphills. I returned the favour on the downhills and there were no flat sections on this course.
I started doing the math around mile 45 or so and knew I would come just under 3 hrs on the bike. Not bad considering I was riding around an IF of ~70% and had an average HR of 137 up until that point. I had peed once and knew I was well hydrated. I was cooling in all of the aid stations and just plain felt great. I was already looking forward to the run (which was a first for me).
Bike Comedy show begins in 3, 2, 1...
At mile 48, I heard a loud “Pssssst, pssssst, pssssst, psssssst” and looked down and could see the air shooting out of my front tire on every revolution. My Garmin showed 5:29:xx. Crap. I pulled over and decided to see how fast I could change it. (Side note, I flatted at AmZof two weeks ago and it was so cold that it took me 15+ mins to change it. 2 days before the race, I took my spare tube back out and loaded in a new latex tube in my wheel and put my spare back under my seat). I was better prepared this time. Spare tire out, Co2 off, Nano inflator at the ready. I pulled the tire off in a few seconds and pulled out the latex tube. I had already peed once on the bike and decided to multi-task. While I was changing my tire I started to pee. For future reference, I do not recommend this. At 20mph, when you pee on the bike it simply flies off into the abyss behind you and you barely even notice it. While you are stationary changing a tire, it runs down your leg and pools in you bike shoes. Yuck. I was having lower back problems earlier in the week and my back cramped a bit when I would bend over for the tire. Either way, I got the spare in and the tire back on when I realized I hadn’t checked for anything sharp inside the tire. I made the executive decision to take the tire back off and examine the inside of the tire first since I only had one spare tube. I ran my fingers around inside and out. I did find a small hole, but nothing in it and nothing sharp. I put the piece of electric tape that was around my spare inside my tire where the small hole was just in case. I put the tire back on and put the Co2 on the valve. It was about 95% inflated when I heard “Boom, PSSSSSSSSHHHHHT”. Um, this sucks. I took the tire back off the rim and saw a hole in the tube the size of a quarter about an inch away from the valve stem. It was a full blow out. I took a long swig of my Infinit and smiled and thought, better now than at IMUSA… I looked at my Garmin and it took me less than 5 mins up until this point.
At least 5-10 people asked me if I needed anything, but nobody had a spare that would fit my 808. Note to self, throw a long Zipp extender into my bento box for future situations like this. I ate the rest of my Powerbar chomps and wondered what I should do… I decided to try to take off the valve extenders from my tubes. Not so easy to do without any tools… I found that if I wrapped the other tube around it to get some grip that I could squeeze tight and twist slowly and they both came off. (FYI, I was a college wrestler and to this day still have a grip strength stronger than anyone else I have ever met). I put the tire back on my rim and put the wheel back on my bike, draped the old tubes over my shoulder and started walking. I drank the rest of my bottle of Infinit and drank some water. I figured I could absorb it well as I was not actually moving. Oh yeah, remember the pooling in my shoes from 10 mins ago, squish, squish, squish, gross. Luckily for me, it was only about a hundred yds or so to the next intersection and I could see two police officers directing traffic. As I approached they asked if I had a mechanical problem with my bike… I was like, “um, yeah… that’s why I am walking and carrying the front wheel off the ground.” Just through the intersection, a car pulled over and the cop said he thought it was an official from the race. Saved!
The guy jumped out of his car like he was on fire. He ran over to me like he was on a NASCAR pit crew. He asked if I had a flat and said he could help me change it quickly. I told him to relax and calm down. It had already been ~20 mins so no worries now. He gave me a tube with a long stem and I noticed it was still too short for an 808. I asked if I could borrow his pliers to take the core out and he said he didn’t have any tools… What kind of bike race support doesn’t at least carry a set of needle nose pliers. Hmmmmm, what to do. I saw that he had two tire levers sitting on his trunk, so I took them and squeezed them together on the core and was able to use them like pliers to take the valve core out (thank you again grip strength). He looked at me and honestly said “Wow, you are a genius… How did you even think of that?” I responded with “Yeah, I’m a genius… a genius that only brought one spare tube to a half Ironman”. I twisted the extender on, put the tube in and inflated it to 100psi with the guy’s pump. I figured it was better to be a little low and be a little safer.
I hit the road again and looked down to see I had lost just over 25 minutes. Doh. Even worse was that this was sufficiently long enough to allow my legs and back to start filling with lactic acid and start cramping a bit. I knew I should ride the last 8 miles pretty easy as I had to let my legs warm-up again.
After about 2-3 miles I caught up with Brian Lee who is a fellow Team ReserveAid member who I saw pass me as I was using the guy’s pump to inflate my now working front tire. We rode together for the rest of the bike leg. He had asked me if I wanted to run with him and I said sure, if he would slow down for me. He is a much faster runner than me, but he broke his leg skiing this yr and his longest run so far this yr was 5 miles. Because I was still riding at only ~70%, we were chatting away as we were climbing the last hill into transition at about mile 54, when somebody yelled “Withrow! You are supposed to be racing!”… It was Coach P who was already a couple of miles into his run. I was mortified. Totally busted by Coach P for slacking off, but I was dialled into my actual goal watts, so I didn’t feel too bad…
|
|
Miles 0-48 |
Miles 48-56 |
Total Moving |
Total Race |
|
Time |
2:29:34 |
0:26:43 |
2:56:17 |
3:22:40 |
|
NP |
219W |
221W |
219W |
217W |
|
IF |
0.694 |
0.703 |
0.700 |
0.690 |
|
VI |
1.04 |
1.04 |
1.04 |
1.18 |
Bike Nutrition:
- 2.75 Infinit Servings: 767 Calories
- 1 package of Powerbar Energy Blasts chomps: 130 Calories
- 4x Salt Stick Pills
- 4x Magnesium Pills
- 4x Calcium Pills
- ~50oz of Water
T2: 1:44
Run: 1:57:55
While I was still in Transition I saw my friend Brian Lee starting the run already. He yelled to me to catch up with him and I took off. I had my fuel belt, my visor, and my race number belt in a ziplock baggie that I took with me as I exited the run. My gel flasks with my Infinit Napalm had fallen out into the baggie so I stopped for a few seconds to put everything on and organize myself. I turned my metronome on which was set at a 92 cadence and clipped it onto my visor.
The first few miles were net downhill and I caught Brian within about 1.5-2 miles. I actually stopped at a tree to pee again so I knew I was hydrated. The course is uphill from about miles 3-7 and it was brutally hot and humid. I slowed through every aid station dumping ice into my DeSoto CoolWings sleeves. I highly recommend these for any hot race. After dousing with water and filling with ice, they would keep me cool for at least 0.75 miles. I would also carry ice out of the aid stations and chew on it as I went. I ran my run and Brian came along for the ride, partly to his detriment later. I run fast downhills and walk all of the steep uphills. Before Placid, I need to figure out how to also run fast uphills and not have my HR spike in brutal heat and humidity... Um, yeah... I generally got through the aid stations quicker than Brian and he would run hard to catch up, usually breathing very hard when he got there. It was kind of nice to have company and we chatted about a lot of things. Good thing Coach P wasn't around to bust me for this...
I had told myself before the run that I should be able to do a 2:00:00 run and my legs actually felt really good. About halfway through the run, I changed my metronome to beat at a 90 cadence instead of 92 since I couldn't quite keep up with the 92. Somewhere around mile 9 there was a decent downhill section and I clocked a 8:07 mile with much of it run near 7:00 and I felt good. My HR was planted firmly right around 150 and I was just running to RPE. After the next aid station, I looked back and Brian was about 20yds behind me. I didn't want to slow down and figured he'd catch me on the next uphill. But surprisingly, I ran the next hill and after an out and back turnaround, I realized that I had put several hundred yds into him. I told him to finish strong and picked up the pace. I figured I only had a 5k to go so I wanted to see if I could take my HR up so I picked up the pace. Maddeningly, they decided to put another long steep hill at mile 12 which I had to walk parts of. I ran most of it though and saw my HR creep up to around 160. It was flat now and I could see the Amusement park so I kicked it up another notch and finished strong.
A picture is worth a thousand words. Many of you may know that I have been on a quest to improve my terrible run form. The lovely Brenda Ross took this picture at some point during the run and it's only one picture, but my form looks pretty darn good to me...
I talked to Brian after the race and it turns out that I put 6 minutes into him in the last 3 miles of the run. Mostly this was due to his admittedly poor run fitness, but part of it was from my relatively strong finish. He did beat me by 5 mins overall though, so I'll have to exact my revenge at IMUSA. I didn't need a med tent and quite frankly I wasn't that tired and my legs still felt pretty good. I sat with Normatec boots on for about 20 minutes and switched into my compression pants before the 2 hour drive home.
It was great to hang around with all the Team EN and Team ReserveAid people before and after the race. The mojo was also great during the race. I was happy with my performance but really thought I left a whole bunch of time on the course.
My Take-Aways (please don't be shy... flame me if you disagree or have others for me to consider):
- I can't think of a reason why I should swim more than 1x a week going forward.
- Always have 2 spare tubes and/or an extra screw on valve extender
- I know I biked stupid easy at 0.70 IF for a HIM, but it was an experiment to see if I could make it up on the run
- I couldn't make it up on the run... It was too hot and too steep to keep my HR/RPE in check on the steep hills in that heat without walking. And whether I was walking with fresh legs or on cramping legs, I would still be walking up the hills either way. Maybe I ran 5 mins faster because of fresh legs, but I honestly think I left 15+ minutes on the table on the bike (ignoring the flat tire). I simply could not run hard enough to tax my legs on the run...
- I'm sure there's a happy medium with an "appropriately paced" bike leg which I need to find.
The good news from this race is that I feel great now. At 6AM this morning (2 days after the race) I did my regular IM planned run of 7 miles with 3 x 1 mile intervals that I nailed at Z4 pace with core work before and strength training afterwards. I fully plan to do a hard bike tomorrow morning and my long run the next day. My recovery time was literally 0 days from this race. I'm feeling good about my fitness but still need to improve many things if I expect to convert a 5:59:xx HIM into my goal of a 10:45:xx at IMUSA.
Comments
For cadence 'help', I have been listening to a PODRUNNER podcast (thanks WJ!) that is set to 180bpm or using the FINIS swim metronome. Can't use the former in a race, and the latter works well under a swim cap, but not so much clipped on to my hat. Agreed that it puts you into a trance....I can hit my desired 90-cadence w/o thinking about it.
Any further thoughts on the NormaTec boots? Does Jess use/like?
Sorry I didn't get to say hello but I did see Jess so at least I saw one Withrow!
John - Wow....That bike finish totally sucks. By mile 48 you are starting to think about T2 and your run. Goes to show you, stay in your box and don't take anything for granted. Sounds like you made the best of it, and I certainly learned not to pee myself when i'm not on the move
. I agree with you on swim training. Sounds like unless you are willing to devote considerable time to improve your swim, you are at a steady state with a minimal time investment and still have a very respectable swim time. It's up to you if you want to make that investment or not.
Good for you for experimenting with bike pacing to see what happens. In your summary i think you hit it spot on. It kinda goes without saying, but it's not about putting down the fastest individual bike or run, but rather finding the fastest combined bike and run.
Fitness-wise sounds like your in a good place considering how quickly you were back on track. Nice work and good luck in placid!
One question on your VI.....Why is your overall VI at 1.18 when your 2 splits are 1.04? I'm really focusing in on my VI as i'm trying to ride as steady as possible in all my race rehearsals, so that's why that number really stood out for me.
@Kim- Jess is the cooler Withrow anyways...
@Mark- Re: VI, I was shocked that it was as low as it was on that course... It must have been because it was easy to dial in at the low goal watts and I really pushed the downhills. To calculate the VI for 0-48 and 48-56 I simply selected those ranges ( before I stopped and after I started again) in Trainingpeaks and saw what it told me. The VI for the whole ride was higher because it includes 25:xx of time with 0 power while I was stopped changing the tire. I'll look at the file again to see if I screwed something up with it and if you're into the geek era and really want to see it yourself, I'm happy to email you (or anyone) my bike file. I would have expected power 'spikes' to make a much bigger VI, I am surprised as well that all of those 0 had that big of an effect. I guess it's because it brought my 'AP' way down, but maybe the 0‘s didn't get included when it calculated 'NP'?? Not sure, but good observation.
http://members.endurancenation.us/Forums/tabid/57/aft/12088/Default.aspx
@Claire-- I have a necrotic Sacroiliac Joint (SI Joint) from a severe infection I got when I was a freshman in college (~20 yrs ago). The SI joint is basically where your pelvis meets your spine. It is "usually" fine, but I sometimes get "twinges" in it. On the Tuesday before the race, I was at my regular chiropractor and she adjusted me the same as she always does and something in my SI joint didn't like it. It caused my lower back and all the tiny muscles in my rear pelvis area to spasm for days and days. I went in to see her on the Saturday morning before the race and got a stim treatment. I had been icing and heating all week. I used a hot pad right before I went to bed on Saturday night. It actually didn't feel that bad on race day. It got a tiny bet sore on the bike, but then cramped up when I stopped for 25 mins, then it mostly loosened up again by the time I finished the bike (maybe it was the 3 Advil I took...). I could definitely tell there was something there on the run, but in no way was it a limiter for me on the day. It feels much better now and hopefully after a long massage tonight it will be much better for the weekend. If you "regularly" have back pain on the bike, you may have a bike fit issue... Most people will say it's a terrible idea to take Advil during races, but I do it anyways. I used to take Advil like candy, but over the last yr I have tried to completely eliminate it and literally took Advil for the first time last week in the last 6 months.
@Joe-- Here are two pics of my metronome clipped on my visor so you can see the size...
Way to work through the day.
Clip the metronome on your nose?
I think I will start a thread on stuff to carry on the bike. I carry EVERYTHING even racing. I figure the extra 3 ounces is worth not wasting six months of training.
I think (hope) that this "might" explain why I flatted at Quassy.
Since I got a flat 2 weeks earlier at AmZof, I put my spare in my tire. When I was replacing it in the freezing cold, the bead was the tire when I hit it with my CO2 and I had to deflate it, fix the bead, and immediately use a 2nd CO2 which "double froze the rubber near my valve stem. Fast Forward to the day before Quassy. I knew I was going to be trashing my race tires after the race (because I always get a new pair before an Ironman and then just continue to race on them the following yr). So I looked into my tire/tube drawer and there were several Latex tubes that I had used in previous races. I didn't think it was a big deal, so I just grabbed a previously used one and added my extender and installed it, figuring I would save the new ones for Placid. It turns out this was probably a bad idea (So thanks again to Trevor's PSA). And since I had only used my spare for one bike loop at AmZof and the following weekend of training, I simply put it back under my seat after I replaced it with the used latex tube. I'm guessing that hitting it with the CO2 again was probably too much for the tube to take after becoming a bit brittle after the double shot of it previously. It's the only reason I can think of that it literally blew a big hole in it right near the valve stem.
So... What lessons did I learn:
1) Forget the extra baby powder... I will only be using NEW latex tubes while racing from now on and if I ever need to take them out of my tires, they will go in the garbage.
2) I will only be using NEW butyl tubes as spares for all races.
A few dollars for new tubes is just too small of an amount to worry about conserving given how much time and money I spend on this sport. I just ordered a bunch of new tubes so I will have a healthy supply going forward.