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Rhode Island Half
This was my first official big race so we had planned on getting into town early and making it our family vacation for the year. I was a little worried about the hills, since I do not have anything but flats where I live but I figured that I would wing it if they got really bad.
We got in on Friday evening and went to the expo to register. Strangest expo I have ever been to. There was almost no one there, I walked right up and signed in, filled out my paper work and was out in no time at all. Compared to the Philadelphia marathon this was a ghost town. We bought some cowbells and various bottles and hats and left. The whole thing took about 15 minutes. On Saturday we dropped off the bike early at T1, again there was almost no one around. We tried to drive the bike course, but we kept getting lost so we skipped over a few bits. I did get my first look at "rolling hills" which are larger than anything that I have ever ridden on, and the really big hill towards the end which I decided to ride how I felt by the time I got there. Then back to T2 to drop off the bag for T2. We were all in bed at 8 PM since we needed to be up and ready for the 4 AM bus ride to the start.
On Sunday, we caught the bus to the start. I like the bus; it took a lot of the worry about driving off me on race morning. We got to the start with more than enough time to set up, look at the water, warm up and get extremely nervous. I put on two kinds of sunscreen, but I was very very careful not to put sunscreen where my numbers would go so that the ink would not run. (This will come back to haunt me 12 hours later...)
Swim: My wave went off at 6:25 to "All the single ladies". The water was calm and warm. There were jellyfish but I luckily managed not to get stung. After the first few minutes, I found a nice clear spot. I felt like I was fighting a current on the way out, I kept veering off the course and I had to sight often. On the way back I think that I met most of the kayakers as I zigzagged the course. I got out of the water as the last wave was going in, I was elated thinking that the last wave went at 7AM so I thought that I had swam it in less than 35 minutes, but turns out it was just over 39. Still with all of the extra swimming that I did, I felt great about the swim. I walked up the beach to the little baby pools and rinsed off, then I found the biggest toughest looking wetsuit strippers and laid down. Guess either I am too little or they were too big 'cause they first dragged me all over and yet that stubborn wetsuit stayed on, I was squeaking and there was sand going up my back so finally I grabbed the fence and off that stubborn wetsuit came. At least my shorts stayed on or that could have been really embarrassing.
Bike: I spent more than 3 minutes in T1, the bags for my entire bike and swim supplies were a little confusing. My plan was to stick to 106 watts for the bike portion of the race with up to a max of 120 on the hills. After the first set of hills this was clearly impossible, I would have fallen over. So I did the best I could. At mile 35 the guy in front of me went down hard. I stopped to help with another racer. The guy who crashed looked like he had broken his collar bone, because the bone was pushing up at his shoulder. He was confused and wanted to continue. I had no phone, and I did not know how to contact the race people. Finally, a man on a motorcycle stopped and had a phone so we called 911. In the future, I will bring a phone with me on these races. I still have not been able to find out if he is OK. Once a group of spectators were waiting with him I went on with my race. At the time I figured I spend 1/2 hour on the side of the road but it turned out to be about 7 minutes. Most of the hills were tough but not horrible, but the last one was ridiculous. I stood up and just climbed, at 2 mph :0. I have only seen hills like that on TV. I need to go bike in some new places. I had figured on about 3:30 bike split, and I ended up with 3:49, not too bad considering the hills. I would like to do much better in the next race.
Entire workout (99 watts):
Duration: 3:42:55 (3:49:31)
Work: 1320 kJ
TSS: 273.3 (intensity factor 0.86)
Norm Power: 116
VI: 1.18
Pw:HR: n/a
Pa:HR: n/a
Distance: 56.959 mi
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 280 99 watts
Cadence: 30 182 73 rpm
Speed 2.2 35.8 15.4 mph
Pace 1:41 26:49 3:54 min/mi
Crank
Torque: 0 577 122 lb-in
Run: At T2 I parked my bike and spent a long time trying to unknot my bag. I should have just torn it open, but I was not thinking. My goal was to run as much as I could with an overall average of 12:30 per mile. I ran until the first big hill, walked up that one, and then jogged to the next water stop. I really liked the zig-zag part in the park while the man with a Vuvuzela danced. It was so loud that I could hear it 1/4 mile away! In my first half last year, I ran the first 6 miles and then did a sort-of death march to the end. This year despite a cramp in my calf and the hills on both the bike and the run I ran most of the time. Even better, I felt great. During training, I have not been able to run more than 9 miles without serious stomach distress so I was dreading mile 9. It passed without any major incident. My nutrition must have been spot-on during the bike. I saw several EN team members and waved, I am sorry that I did not know anyone's name. I took water and sponges at every stop and powerdrink for the first loop of the run. On the second loop my stomach started feeling funny (particularly around underpass that reeked of stale beer and trash) so I stuck with just water. I talked to several people on the second half, one guy told me he had fallen twice on his bike on the final huge hill cause his legs had failed and he finally walked up it, turned out he didn't live far from me. Next year I will work on running the whole thing. For the first time it seems possible for me.
Official run time 2:48:08.
Lap 1 (2:45:50.76):
Duration: 2:47:03 (2:48:33)
Work: n/a
rTSS: 185.3 (0.769)
NGP: 11:46 (136.7 m/min)
VI: n/a
Pw:HR: n/a
Pa:HR: 17.92%
Distance: 12.769 mi
Elevation Gain: 3587 ft
Elevation Loss: 3950 ft
Grade: -0.6 % (-372 ft)
Min Max Avg
Heart Rate: 135 179 163 bpm
Speed: 0 12.4 4.6 mph
Pace 4:51 0:00 13:05 min/mi
Altitude: -96 505 67 ft
Finish 7:25:23 51/56 in my age group (yey not last!)
Overall I am happy, but I would like to have done better, particularly on the bike portion. I need a little more power if I plan on riding on hills. On the other hand I am sure that if I had tried this last year I would not have been able to finish. I ended up sore, but not like last year and I finished really smiling (not like last year). When I got back to the hotel I did realize I missed one critical step. I never put sunscreen on top of those numbers...
Sharpie marker is just like sunscreen, can you guess what my number was?
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Comments
Sorry we never got a chance to meet up. We were running late and didn't get down there till Saturday afternoon so we were running around trying to drop everything off and get settled.
Love the sunburn!
Good job for your first "official big race". Hope you had fun. Good karma on stopping for that guy.
Congrats on doing way more than just surviving a really tough race. You did great...I am proud of how you executed and of your perspective on the finish. I see faster times in your future!!!!
P
Christy, nice job! Very kind of you to stop for the guy that went down. Congrats on a great race.
Dave