Cuse 70.3 Race Report including bloody crash pics
Summary:
4:46:xx 36:14/1:58/2:33:45/3:43/1:30:36
Because my super selfish sister in law planned her wedding the weekend of Timberman, I was left without a late season half. The nerve of some people not consulting my race schedule before planning major life events. My sister had been trying to talk me into racing the new half in Syracuse anyhow so I figured why not. Then my sister promptly got pregnant. It is a little late in the year for me and I was not all that excited going in. Of very realistic concern I thought it would be very cold. Ended up being fine.
Anyhow, a friend of mine from high school recently got into doing tri’s and signed up for it as his first half. I traveled the 2 hours out to Cuse with him on Saturday mid morning. Kinda let me see all of it through the eyes of a newbie, totally different perspective, made it fun. Can say whatever you want about the WTC folks but they are no joke. Thing was massively organized. They put of a first class race for 2000 plus as a first time in a new city with a point to point run. Impressive to say the least. For me it seems like a logistical nightmare to coordinate 3 couples going out to dinner. Anyhow registered and checked out the IM store. My buddy natch bought about $100 worth of IM stuff. Marketing genius how there is no such thing as a half IM anymore, IM 70.3. Makes it much easier to return to work on Monday and say you did the IM in cuse. Figure no one who does not race understands the difference between the local pool sprint and Kona anyhow so it is not a hard trick really. When you remove the word “half” from the equation it is perfect.
Then we drove out to the race site. Checked the bikes. Looked at the far run from the lake [on a paved path] up to the transition. Had to be farther than the run to T1 at LP and up hill instead of down. Had a pretty good rack spot. Also there was an interesting grass run up leaving transition with the bikes. Ran into Cary and Joe, turns out Cary lives one beach up from my buddy in LI. Made plans to meet up with Dan Forbes and fam for dinner. Then we started driving the bike course. Looked like lots of turns and all up hill for the first 11 miles or so. Also lots of very exposed places, great views but it looked like it could be nasty when the wind blows. Also there were a few turns and roads that looked like they could be scary, especially if it was wet. One strange thing was that instead of paint they had all the turns marked with pink duct tape arrows [also pot holes and such marked with tape]. My buddy and I both thought they might be slippery if wet.
Anyhow, took forever and by the time we were done were totally late to meet Dan Forbes and fam for dinner. Decided to go to the marriot instead. Had dinner at the Ruby Tuesday in the parking lot. They actually had a decent micro brew selection for the 3 4 a PB thing. Went to sleep early.
Got up and it was warm which was great. Had been planning on toe covers, arm warmers and gloves but it was warm and humid. Saw a bunch of EN and ST people and headed down to the water. Water was not warm. 62 degrees announced. Not harriman in May cold but pretty cold.
Was in the 5 or 6th wave, second group of 35-39. Hate when they split the AG but it ended up not mattering at all later. Weird swim, felt like I was swimming ok and fairly straight but I was clean water almost the whole way. Never had any feet. Also caught the slow guys from the waves in front really fast. Weird. Out of the water in 34:xx. There was a really long run up to transition. That must have been the mat they used. Official swim was a Murphy’s Law like 36:14.
Sat down to put socks on before the bike, did the long run up the grass chute thing to the mount line and I was off. T1 listed at 1:58. In my defense the transition area was freakin huge.
Like I mentioned it was crazy warm for Cuse this time of year. Felt great starting on the bike. Rolled up tons of AG and 30-34 folks quick. It was raining really lightly. Got to the first set of railroad tracks and watched a dude crash and fall on his face. No I did not stop, there were a bunch of people there helping him. Even seeing that still slid sideways a tad on the tracks, those things were like ice. Made a mental note to take it really easy as I did not want to crash like a jackass. So about 2 minutes later…a group of 30-34 or earlier wave 35-39 were kinda bunched up before the first turn at that town. Yelled stay right to the one in the middle of the road and went around them. Guess I was going into the turn a little hot. I hit the brakes and in a split second I was upside down. Landed on my elbow and shoulder blade and my knee was hurting. There were 3 national guard guys right there and one picked up my bike. I was thinking my day was over. I was bleeding pretty good and kind of in shock. I was looking right in the eye of this national guard guy. He was a little older than I am. His uniform was not new. He looked like he was in Iraq or Afgahnistan recently. He said nothing but I was thinking that he was thinking “look, ahh, spandex boy skinned his knee and quit, pussy”. Another one said something about a medic. One of them handed my bontrager bottle that had come off. I grabbed the bike which looked ok and started pedaling. The file shows that I went upside down at 1.98 miles going 22 mph and then started pedaling again 37 seconds later. Sure felt longer than that.
Once I was going again I noticed that my bento box was ripped and hanging below the top tube. I was going to chuck it but thought I might want the flat stuff later. I stopped and managed to use the non torn straps to get it back in place. Was pissed and freaked out and figured I would ride for a while and see how I felt. I was bleeding but thought I only had road rash. The first 11 miles or so were hilly and rainy/foggy. Visibility sucked. I was very conservative for the rest of the bike. Figured out pretty quick that my front 808 was out of true. Could see it wobble a bit and using the front brake at all was scary. Vibrated like crazy. Figured out later that it was rubbing the brake pretty bad. Very happy it did not come apart. Managed to cover less than 20 miles the first hour. Was sitting on .87 on the Joule, WTF? A tad after that the adrenaline wore off. Felt weird but did not really hurt. I lost some time for sure on the way back in as I took all the turns like a wuss and did not push the down hills like I normally would. Lead to the biggest VI I have ever had in a race. Previous was 1.07 at AZ [the real one, not Arizona :-)]. Was a bit pissed to not be off the bike in less than 2:30 notwithstanding the jackassery of crashing.
Duration: 2:33:56
Work: 2172 kJ
TSS: 178.5 (intensity factor 0.834)
Norm Power: 254
VI: 1.08
Distance: 55.843 mi
Elevation Gain: 3395 ft
Elevation Loss: 3425 ft
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 544 235 watts
Cadence: 30 231 91 rpm
Speed: 0 51.4 21.9 mph
As I had forgotten to order infinit bike nutrition was a pack of cliff shots [200 cals], 3 scoops of IM perform in my frame aero bottle [210 cals] and a bottle of Gatorade off the course [thought they had switched but whatever - 200 cals] Not sure if I really drank all of either bottle so cals were about 450-500 total which is about right for me.
Official bike time was 2:33:45, Ran down the grass into transition. Sat down and for the first time looked at my knee. It was pretty ugly. Looked like hamburger. Did not hurt so I figured I would try running. Sat there for a bit, changed socks [way worse than Curt Schillings] hit the porta potty and I was out of there. T2 was a forever 3:43 but I likely wasted half of that deciding if running was a good call.
After the quick out and back the run tracked the bike course for the first couple miles. Ran by the scene of the crash. Had built it up in my mind to be a crazy decreasing radius fall away curve but realized it was just a flat and very normal looking corner. The national guard guys were there and I gave one of them a high 5. There were a couple of up hills but the first 5 miles were mostly downhill. Was running well. My hip was hurting a bit where I landed on it but I felt pretty good. The open flap on my knee was splashing blood on my other leg while I was running. I was scaring the hell out of spectators. You could see the expression change from “yeah, your are looking good” to “holy crap” when I got close. Generally was scaring the spectators the whole way. Miles were clicking by at sub 7. Figured I had little to lose and that the bottom might drop out at any moment. My hip gave me something to think about other than running. Pretty lonely run on one of the least scenic run courses ever. Lot of it was down the left center lane of a 4 lane highway. Kinda like “hey I’ve been to that Bruegers, look another Sunoco”. At mile 10 or so I was hurting pretty good and started to think that I was slowing cause I had lost a lot of blood. Total nonsense but I can often convince myself that something horrible is happening to me and I should go slower. Once without any idea what it even means I was convinced I was going to have nerve damage cause my feet were numb after biking in cold weather at harriman. Managed to shake the hypocondriacal [sp?] delusion and run the last couple pretty well. Ran basically alone. Thought I had a chance at sub 1:30 and would have had I not forgot about that pesky .1 at the end. Had no real kick left but never really felt that bad while running which is strange for me. I almost always about hyperventilate when coming through the line.
Here is the run:
Lap 1: 6:53
Lap 2: 6:50
Lap 3: 6:51
Lap 4: 6:45
Lap 5: 6:59
Lap 6: 7:00
Lap 7: 6:48
Lap 8: 6:57
Lap 9: 6:58
Lap 10: 6:53
Lap 11: 7:01
Lap 12: 7:32 [weak]
Lap 13: 6:55
Entire workout (6:57 min/mi):
Duration: 1:30:37
Work: n/a
rTSS: 140.4 (0.912)
NGP: 7:03 (228.1 m/min)
Distance: 13.019 mi
Elevation Gain: 1115 ft
Elevation Loss: 1407 ft
Grade: -0.4 % (-292 ft)
Min Max Avg
Speed: 3.9 9.9 8.6 mph
Pace 6:0415:346:57 min/mi
Altitude: 383 726 510 ft
Run pr for me. Previously I think Timberman was the flattest half run I have done so that was a huge help. Think I had a couple minutes faster in me on a different day. Time will tell.
In the med tent:
The medical people grabbed me within seconds of finishing as I was a bloody mess. They said that the hole in my knee was too deep to deal with in the tent and wanted to stick me in an ambulance. As it was a point to point run that meant an ER in Syracuse with no phone or wallet. That seemed like a bad call. Also, I was skeptical. I mean really, if it was that bad I would never have been able to ride 54 and run a 1:30, right? They agreed to patch it and let me go if I promised I would go to an ER to get it cleaned, stitched and some antibiotics. Also have a maybe 4x6 patch of road rash on my right shoulder and some on the elbow. Gonna need a new EN singlet for next year as it is torn. Ran into an ER doc friend a while later who told me going when I got home that night would be fine.
Got some chow, watched my buddy finish. Saw a bunch of ST and EN peeps. It was fun. Saw Jonathon finish as well as Joe. Never did get to meet Dan Forbes somehow.
Took the bus back to transition. Drove back a couple of hours. Went to the urgent care place by my house when I got home a few hours later. Got 16 stitches to hold it all together. For sure impaled myself on the chain ring. Not clue how that happened. You can see the chain ring marks if you look close:
Taking some forced time off til the stiches are out. I guess if I bend the knee it will not heal. Can't wait to see the official on course pictures of me running. That should be interesting. All in all I am happy that I did not quit. I would have been even more pissed if I did. I will note however that I WAS THE ONLY EN TEAM MEMBER TO RACE AND NOT HAVE A PR which is a little weak of me but...hey...I have a decent excuse 
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Comments
Take it easy and get better soon.
You are one tough cookie!! How satisfying to get up with blood running and finish anyway!! Love that attitude! My boys always tell me that their wounds prove they did something hard....guess that applies to you also!! Good job!
Not sure what the national guard guys said if anything at all. I was a bit out of it and people were passing me, which I hate. I am not really hurt that bad, ego bruised more than anything for being so stoopid.
While you may not have had a PR, you did frighten spectators to an extent that a brigade of pink speedos could never achieve. That, my friend, is what you hang your hat on. That and a run PR with a flap of your knee hemorrhaging all over Syracuse. Congratulations, you done good!
Epic AND gnarly. Well done!
Whatever you do, don't learn to ride pre-IMUSA.
P
I think we would for sure all be better off if we kept the rubber side down. And P, didn't you write somewhere that you WANTED the nasty pics?
Jeez Chris, I'm trying to discreetly read the race reports at work! Kidding! I love seeing blood in the afternoon!
You are no joke - great story, major perserverance. And great race - damn, you are fast!
Take care of that hip - my DH has a very long lingering injury from hard impact on his hip.
Seriously, way to man up on the run. That's a heck of a strong finish. Have to hear your 2011 race schedule aside from LP... Maybe I can convince the wife to make an upstate tri trip.
Great report and race Chris! A run PR with that knee is pretty darn impressive... imagine what you might have done if you'd peeled both knees
My favorite part was scaring the spectators...
Love the gnarly pics... cool too that you did it on WTGU day
Knee "splahing" on the other knee????? OMG, you are an animal! Way to run it down and PR through all that. Make no mistake, all that "should I-shouldn't I," "am-I-OK" stress and uncertainty took a toll--and yet you had a super race. Congrats, Chris. Way to show us how to hand tough--to say the least.
@everyone else - thanks for the props!
Wow we are getting soft! Can't beleive it took 18 posts before someone finally asked!
Oh the bike...
It looks like a took a bullet for her. The only damage appears to be that the front wheel is out of true fairly bad. I will have it looked at pretty hard.
Just got the link to the race pictures. I am smiling a lot less than I usually am in race pics. There are some good bloody leg shots. I actually bought the digital images [highway robbery] cause I think I need one for the wall in my office.
www.brightroom.com/view_user_event.asp
All in a days work!
Wow, now I know how to get a lot of shots to choose from - bleed profusely
That profile bike shot is cool!
Impressive bloody pics. Send one to RnP for picture of the week!
Great race under tough circumstances. Very entertaining report. Heal up.
Nice, VERY NICE!!! Welcome to the club.
Oh and nice race and report.
nice to see you round these parts there drillbit!
Those pics are suhweet! and throw in a 1:30 run...u gotta be kidding me.
Chris,
Minus the crash, injury and damage to the tire it was a very intertaining race report.
1) Official swim was a Murphy’s Law like 36:14. - I know he was a memeber of EN at one point but I only know this guy from ST but he even gets hammered on here in race reports.
2) “look, ahh, spandex boy skinned his knee and quit, pussy”... "I lost some time for sure on the way back in as I took all the turns like a wuss and did not push the down hills like I normally would."
It seems that your are 1/2 wimp and 1/2 pussy which is better than me as you don't want to DNF at IMC but I thougth I would throw the reference.
3) "WAS THE ONLY EN TEAM MEMBER TO RACE AND NOT HAVE A PR" You did get a run PR after all that, plus the bonus pictures on the race course. I guess you were easy to pick out.
Way to tough it out to the finish.
Gordon