Race Rpeot for Superfrog 2011
Sunday, September 11, 2011 - Air temp was 66 at start and got up to 75 on the run. Overcast at the start and sunny by bike time.
By the way I copied the format for this race report from John Stack our fearless Race Director
This was definitely a very cool race for 9/11 (parachute teams came in at the start, awards (although I didn’t get any were wood carved old style detonator plungers and overall winner carved wood oar). John Collins was there and it was a bit special for me as I was about 300 yards from the North Tower of the World Trade Center when it came down (I lived in NYC at the time).
I can’t believe I missed breaking 5 hours by 29 seconds!
Set-up:
- I was looking for a race that would give me some experience on a flat course (use my aero jacket) prior to IMAZ
- I have never done this race, but it seemed like a cool idea on 9/11 to do a race at the Special Warfare Training Station with a bunch of Navy Seals (show your ID to get to the race and registration the day before).
- I did sort of have a taper as my week was light due to some tough weeks prior to the race and major family commitments (basically I did a drop taper with nothing but SAU investment for two days prior – no workouts!)
- Goals for this event:
- Open Water swim under 35 (I have a good pool swim but it has never translated into OWS)
- Kill the Bike (the run is on the beach for half of it which usually means a lower effort run for me – I was worried about injuries to my Achilles Tendon, plus I find it hard to run well in Sand), just can’t keep the HR up.
- Get a feel for overall fitness to date.
Swim: 34:46
Two lop swim with a run in between of a hundred or so yards. The good – you get to ride the waves in in. The bad – you fight the waves going out, and they were big. Navy Seals train at this beach for a reason (Imperial Beach). At least 4-5 feet and they broke with a decent curl. Surfing would have been good. The Ugly – the 100 yards up the beach (hill) in soft sand before you hit the timing mats! All in all I was very happy with this as it was a turbulent swim with a beach hill up to the mats and I was still under 35 minutes.
T1: 5:11
The transition area was narrow and not carpeted (oh the days of WTC racing). It was rough and I slowed to walk. As I was half way down. Closer to the beach was best and running with your bike shoes was faster unless you were right by the bike exit. The pros were near the beach so they were better off putting bike shoes on here. I took longer than necessary as I peed sitting down on my wet suit while putting on my bike shoes, I figured it is better than peeing in a port a potty and waiting on line, and I have not figured out peeing on the bike yet. I will not be able to do this in IMAZ as they have chairs.
Bike: 2:27:28
As I said I planned to gun it here as the strategy given the likely effort on the beach running would partially be a rest – so I did. 4 loop course almost all of which is on route 75, very flat with two 180 degree turn around spots on each loop. Wind was 5 mph on the first loop and picked up to maybe 10 mph with some gusts above that on the second loop. The bike course is sheltered from the wind about half the time so it was not that bad on the third and fourth loops.22.7 mph with 200 nPower, average power was also 194 so reasonably even. By loop I eased into it (AP/NP of 187/194, 199/201, 201/203, 201/204, but the first loop includes some admin time and the last does not because I hit interval (the admin at the end was 165/185 for like 2:36 minutes). 0.851 on IF, TSS of 180.8, and VI was 1.03. Again I was very happy with this. My FTP recently bumped up so I was not 100% confident I could hold 0.85 IF for the HIM distance and still run ok. Nutrition was good (750 calories in 4 egels and some HEED with plenty of water) or about 300 calories per hour. I did however have a good size mostly liquid breakfast so I was fully loaded. 640 calories before race time (banana, Bonk Breaker, 200 calories of gel, and 100 calories of HEED).
T2: 2:47
No pit stop here just getting the bike down the long transition area. Maybe could have been 29 second faster here. Damn 29 seconds!
Run: 1:50:16
This is a two loop run on the beach and military base. You exit transition and immediately hit a deep sand downhill to the beach (same place you came in off the swim). Then you do a 3.0 mile loop on the beach and a 3.55 mile loop on the base and repeat. About half the race is on the beach. The first lap on the beach was hard as I was coming off the bike and the water level was high. Every time I got going the water would peak on the beach and I would have to run up into the soft fluffy stuff. I hit the base and did better and dropping about 1:10 per mile on my pace. Then I hit the sand again and my pace dropped again to almost the same pace and HR. Last loop on base started a bit slower but I gunned it the last 20 minutes and ended up negative splitting by 29 seconds from first half to second half. Nutrition was two gels (1 Roctaine and one GU) plus Infinite on the course 4 out of 6 aid stations. At 20 calories per cup that is about 370 for the run or almost 200 per hour.
Post mortem:
Overall time was 5:00:28 and a 0:13:52 HIM PR for me.
Did I meet my goals?:
Swim Under 35:
Definitely exceeded my expectations here, especially when I saw the waves in the morning. I said to myself “I guess I am not doing this race for time”. Then I got out of the water and ran up the beach. Frankly took some time in transition and as I started the bike realized my swim was good.
Kill the Bike:
I know that there is no such thing as a bad run following a good bike. However killing the bike was still defined as IF 0.85 (high end of HIM EN guidance) and I also was looking to do 0.85 with a fairly new FTP of 235. That said it fit the race strategy well because it is hard to keep my HR up on beach runs with the footing so I knew I would have a slower run anyway. I figured I was going to be a little over 1 minute per mile slower on 6 miles of beach run – so I rounded to 7 minutes. That meant to me in this situation to go for it on the bike. As a goal that was a 2:30 split. I nailed it and was happy! Not only that but my best HIM run is 1:43:56 and my run here was 1:50:16 so the beach cost me 6:20. Worked out perfect.
Overall Fitness:
This is always a goal and the cool thing is compared to my last HIM I was faster but also my HR was lower. Boise 70.3 which was 6/11/2011 my HR on the bike was 145 with 185 Np, this was 142 HR with Np of 200. Boise 70.3 Run was HR 158 with a run time of 1:43:56 (7:56 pace) and this run was 1:50:16 and a HR of 152 (8:25 pace). Now I could agree that my HR was 152 (fairly even throughout the run because of the hard bike), but again that was strategy as I think it is hard to keep my effort up running in sand compared to the bike.
Closing:
A great way to head into my last 10 weeks into IMAZ.
Thank you for the support and I look forward to getting it done in November.
Comments
Thanks, I will spell report correctly next time - just noticed that.