Bob Hiller's Aquabike Race Report
MiamiMan USAT LC AG National Championships. M65-69. My first AquaBike. Observation: There were 17 in my AG in the AquaBike, and 20 men in the Half Tri. Will this be a degenerative trend?!
Bottom line: 3:16:15, 6th of 17 in AG, Swim 33:04 (3rd), T-1 1:58 (2nd), Bike 2:41:13 (9th). If you're considering an Aquabike with a pancake flat bike, and don't mind a little wind in your face, this could be a race for you. My goals were simple, make the podium (top 5) and leave it all on the course. Although I came up just short on both, I still felt pretty good about my race. There's plenty of room for improvement, which at my age is definitely a positive. 
I begin with the admission of a Rookie mistake: Don't forget to change the battery in your Power Meter, especially before your biggest race of the year. 
SWIM. The swim is in a relatively small, fresh water lake. It has been wetsuit legal for at least 10 years. According to USAT rules, it just needed to be below 78 and it was 76. 
(I love wetsuit swims.) The swim is 2 loops. Half way they have you exit the water, run about 10 yards and run back in. As usual for me, unless I'm in salt water or murky water, I don't wear goggles. That's how I swam in practice when I was on a team in the late 50's and 60's because goggles hadn't been invented. When I lift my head to sight, I can see very clearly, and I don't have to worry about foggy goggles or getting them knocked off. (Coach P just shakes his head when this comes up in our conversations.) The Half Tri AG's were in first 7 or so waves and my AG was in the final wave. I'm usually a decent swimmer for my AG, so I line up at the front. After halfway, I found myself behind a man with the same color cap and was able to draft off him and let him do the sighting for about 600 yards, which was nice. Came out of the water feeling like I could have gone harder, but I never went easy, so it was okay. I pointed to a strong looking young man and he stripped my wetsuit off nicely.
T-1. I actually practice my transitions a bit during the 2 week taper. I clip in my shoes, lean my bike against something and put my helmet on my handlebars. Then, I run up, put on my helmet, do a rolling start, put my feet in my shoes while I'm moving, strap my shoes without veering and off I go. 
My thinking is, a few seconds here and there may make a big difference if you're racing for a PR or a chance on the podium. At 1:58, my T-1 was only 2 seconds behind the 1st guy in my AG, and he and I were also 1st and 2nd of all men over 55.
BIKE. Although I had done a shake out ride of 12 miles 2 days before the race and my PM worked fine, after I mounted my bike and started my Garmin 520, no power, no cadence. Fiddled with it a little and decided the battery was dead. In training, watts were the primary sources of guidance and feedback. But, I had HR and speed, so I immediately implemented Plan B. My avg HR ended up at 121 and my max was 134. I was getting splits every 3 miles and looking at my info later showed I only went over 130 in 3 of the last 4 laps. This may sound low, but my resting heart rate is usually about 42-45 and in my last race rehearsal, I was 191w NP and HR was 122-135. The TSS in my race was 277, but that seems too high. I averaged 20.1 mph. I was going pretty hard as often as I could and I would guess I was aero about 95-98% of the time. The course was about 2 miles short and when I thought I was 4 miles from the finish, I put the hammer down. Passed many in those last 2 miles, but when I saw the entrance to the park where we would dismount, I realized I could have started making my move much earlier. 
FINISH. The AquaBikers dismounted in the same place as those doing the Tri and we ran our bikes to the T-2 entrance which was our finish line. We were encouraged to rack our bikes and run across the regular finish line to get a traditional finish line photo. 
TAKE AWAYS. First - put a new battery in my PM. (I had brought a 2 pack with me. 
 
Second - at about 20 miles, I thought I was going to be disqualified or at least given a 4 minute penalty. I was approaching 2 riders who I would be passing soon. A line of 3 bikers, probably drafting, passed me on the left. After the 3 bikers were sufficiently ahead of me, but they were still to the left of the 2 slower bikers, I went left to pass as well. The last of the 3 bikers suddenly slowed which put me within 3 bike lengths of his rear wheel. According to the rules told to us the day before, I was now required to pass this guy within 15 seconds. He was in the middle of the lane, so there was room on the left for me to pass him and the bikers to his right. As I was passing him, he wiggled to the left a bit, which made me wiggle to the left. I think I rolled on the middle line, maybe a couple of inches over into the oncoming lane, for maybe 1-2 seconds. Of course, there was a bike marshal on a motorcycle directly behind all of us when this happened. As the marshal passed us, he was making notes on his little pad. My decisions and actions, and the thought of a DQ or extra 4 minutes added on, occupied my mind for several miles. It was distracting, but I kept telling myself to assume I was okay and to keep my HR and speed up. If I face this again, I think I'll just bite the bullet and wait a few more seconds to let the others clear out a bit before I put myself in a vulnerable position. Especially with an official watching.
Although I didn't get to meet Al Truscott and Paul Hough, who did the Half Tri, I enjoyed the weekend in Southern Florida. Thanks for reading my Report. 
Comments
Thanks, Paul. HR may be more important as you say. I pay attention to HR when I train and race, but focus on Watts and Cadence during both. This was a good lesson in doing with what ya got and making do. Have a great OS.
Hey, Bob, strong work. Yeah, I can remember in the late '60s when some kids on the Marlins came back from a national meet with a new thing Speedo was importing from Sweden: goggles!. We thought they were very cool, mainly because if you were swimming 4 hours a day, your eyes got a little irritated. Now it's kinda like bike helmets - the thought of going without is apocryphal. I never started using them until I began swimming in the ocean when I moved to the beach in LA in 1975. So I never really learned how to do a racing dive with goggles on. Turns out Paul also did the race without goggles, involuntarily.
Good on you for besting me on the bike course. I had the opposite issue from you - I neglected to change my wheel circumference on the bike computer from 2096 mm to 1949 (I have a 650c TT bike), so I ended up riding "60" miles, and kept wondering when the damn thing was going to end!
I noticed that most of the Aquabikers were OFs, and agree, that's an issue for folks as they put more run miles on their chassis and it starts to breakdown. Luckily, I didn't start running until I was 50, so hopefully I'll be able to keep going awhile.
Hi Bob, Just saw your. race report. Outstanding bike split 20+ mph woof Sorry about your rookie PW battery oops mistake but it had little impact your race just your post race assessment. Nice to have data - my power meter failed in IM Lk Placid much to my disappointment but still had a good bike split and used HR like you did. It sounds like you enjoyed your race based on the tenor of your report and I envy you that cause I did not enjoy my races very much this year and that was my goal - to find enjoyment. So cudos to you. And no comment about your knee so I guess it worked for you without the support device. How was your nutrition on the bike? What did you use? You had one long season training into November. Most are worn out by then. Sorry you did not connect with Al Triscott. He is enjoyable to talk to - full on knowledge and he had a great half making the podium. Are you going to race Lk Placid next year? Or do the camp? I am signed up for both and hope we can be roommates again. Rock on
@Al - I remember in 1969 Gary Hall came to Indiana as a freshman with those Swedish Speedo goggles too. Even when everyone had them the next year, It took awhile for guys to use them off the blocks in races. They really helped studying at night after practice without tearing from the chlorine. You had a great race in Miami. Looking at your speed during the bike must have pumped you up! Sorry we didn't get to meet in person. Hopefully that will happen. I may have told you I can't make Worlds in Penticton. Our youngest son gets married the next weekend.
@Eric - Thanks so much for your comments. I did enjoy the race. I'd prefer to be able to run at the end, but I've resigned myself to the life of an Aquabiker. I still get to train with worthwhile, challenging goals. Sorry I won't be coming to the LP camp or race, but I will follow you again online. I'm happy to hear you are still pushing yourself. With your tenacity, good swimming and biking, and especially strong run, the sky's the limit. I feel our paths will meet again.
Are you going back to Miami next year?
@Paul - sorry about losing the use of your goggles part way through. With the miracle of modern medicine, I had lasik eye surgery years ago and now have near perfect vision. I did need to wear goggles with contacts before. Glad you didn't lose one before the bike.
I hope to see you next year.
@David - yes, I have already entered MM for next Nov. I've set new goals for the swim and bike, but according to Coaches RnP I shouldn't be thinking about them for several months. I'll just retire to my pain cave and improve with blinders on. If you can make it next year, I hope to meet you.