An Olympic to Finish the Season

Edwin Croucher

I Raced a local Olympic yesterday with my friend Shaun Smith. I had originally planned to complete the Half Iron distance. The race was at a State Park in Sackets Harbor,NY. The swim was in Lake Ontario and the bike was on the local roads. Race day started pretty cold. The temperature was low forty degrees with a light breeze. I arrived knowing the race had a low number of athletes who signed up. However, when I saw the transition area, I was surprised. Total number for both the Olympic and the Half combined was around 40. Then, I looked at the Lake. At 6:30 a.m., the waves were a foot and a half. I went down to the beach and the water was cold. It was warmer than the air, but only around 60 degrees. I thought for a while and since Shaun was going to do the Olympic, I changed my registration to the Olympic as well. I walked into the water to try and get a warm-up completed. I was shivering before I even got in, so there was a lot of self talk to motivate me into the warm-up swim. By the time the race began, the waves had increased to over 2 feet. When the horn sounded I dove in and just started going. I was getting swamped over and over. The waves were knocking me around enough that I was sure I would be swimming off course very quickly. There was only a few times when I was lucky enough to lift my head and sight the buoy on the first try. It was usually on my third attempt. The swim was two loops and with the small number of racers, there was no contact. I finished the second loop and stopped my garmin. When I looked at if after the race, It said I had swam 1,755 yards and my pace was 1:53/hundred. That was the 6th best time out of the 23 other racers. Considering the wave action and as poorly as I have swam this year I am pretty happy with that.
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1967474954
     So, I had a pretty uneventfUL T-1. I did not blaze through it, but I got on my bike had headed out. My first thought was how cold I felt. I was really hoping to dry off quickly and warm-up. I wanted to ride fast but still remain in control so I could run well. I had not ridden or even previewed the course before the race. I was surprised from the On-line profile how much the course seemed to be uphill at the start. I was trying to get my watts up to 80%. The problem was really cold. I could not get my legs to warm up and my toes were freezing. Still, for the entire ride I averaged 196 Watts (78%) and was pretty smooth. I held good speed through the entire ride and finished with the second fastest ride, only topped by Peter Konecny from Ottawa. Those Canadians are fast. As I rode into the Park, I rode passed the three athletes in front of me. I was excited and knew I had some work to do to catch any of them.
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1967463722
     T-2 is where my Trouble began. As I approached the dismount line, I reached down and pulled my left foot out of the shoe. That was the wrong thing to do. I always take my right foot out first because for some reason it is harder to get out. So, I had to stop and then take it out. My feet were really cold and I couldn't feel my toes. When I started to run towards the Transition area, I stubbed my right big toe. I hit it really hard into the pavement. My toes were so cold, I couldn't really feel how bad it was. I put my running shoes on and started to run.
     As I started out I had a little trouble getting my legs going. I hadn't gone very far when I realized I had not tied my right shoe. I stopped and got that set and then tried to get going. My first mile was slower than I wanted but I was warming up. I was into mile two when I thought the course marking indicated a U-turn. I turned and followed the markings back. I know the guy who was doing the race timing and he said I was in first. I knew that was not the case and I realized I missed a turn. So, I turned around and headed back. On the plus side, I got to run an extra .3 miles. The bad side was that when I stopped to turn around, my foot strated to really hurt. I tried to put it out of my mind and pick up the pace. That worked for a while but the longer I ran, the warmer I got and the more my foot hurt. Fortunately, this was an Olympic and I only had 6.5 miles to run. 
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1967476090
So, it was a fun race. I got to do it with a friend and some really great competition.

Al Truscott

Sounds like a true Comedy of Errors. Shorter races are a blast when done soon after long-course. This year is the first since I started triathlon in 1999 that I have NOT had a big race scheduled for Oct or November. I was all worried about Post Ironman Depression Syndrome (even though my race was only like 3/4 of an IM) after doing the ITU WC Aug 27. So I signed up for two sprints the past two weekends. In the first, I was second in my AG (and 18/200 OA) by three seconds, despite besting my competition in all three legs - he had me by 38 seconds in the transitions. Yesterday, in our rematch, I got that down to 25 seconds. But I was a bit more recovered, and bested him by over a minute after blasting the 14 mile/40 minute bike in a 1.0 IF. I had never met him before, though he lives in nearby Olympia, ands been racing for decades. I guess that's because he does almost exclusively sprints, and I;ve been avoiding those as not worth the admin time involved. We had a great time talking about a bunch of non-triathlon things after the race, e.g., his wife is Cuban, I went there earlier this year, how good it is to be retired, etc. It felt good to simply go balls-to-the wall without worrying about power or HR, just going as hard as I could for as long as I could. And get to make a new acquaintance in the bargain.

Edwin Croucher

@Al Truscott, I do like the Olympic distance especially at the end of the season. It does help to ease the PID syndrome. I have been fighting signing up for one of the late races. Here in Northern New York it is difficult to find an Olympic race this time of year where weather isn't an issue. I was actually pretty lucky this weekend. In previous years the temp has been low forty degrees all day and raining. This race was a nice course. The bike had enough uphill to challenge. It is unfortunate but this will probably be the last year for it.