IMAZ 09 Race Rehearsal Report

Ten days ago I did my last race rehearsal and while I should have posted this sooner, some times life gets in the way. 



Got up at 2 AM and chugged a bottle of Odwalla High Protein Smoothy and went back to bed.  Got up at 5 and ate a bowl of Cheerio's + scoop of whey and a Cup o' Joe.  Was still a little hungry but at this point there's rarely a time when I'm not hungry.



The plan was to ride up and down on the Chicago lakefront bike path with the hopes that it wouldn't be too crowded due to the time of year.  However, the weather was unseasonably nice (mid 60's, sunny, but windy) and more people were out than I would have preferred.  I was trying out my new wheel cover and aside from a couple gusts of wind early on I was able to hold the bike steady without any issue.  The wheel really helped as I was able to hold 18.5mph with out much effort but the number of other people on the path throughout the day made it hard to stay at this pace for too long.  I ended up averaging much lower watts with a much less steady effort than what I wanted.  For those who are interested, here is the breakdown:



Entire workout (117 watts):

 Duration:   5:57:24 (6:17:37)

 Work:       2517 kJ

 TSS:        197.3 (intensity factor 0.576)

 Norm Power: 128

 VI:         1.09

 Pw:HR:       n/a

 Pa:HR:       n/a

 Distance:   95.044 mi

                      Min Max Avg

 Power:            0 358 117  watts

 Cadence:        30 212 83  rpm

 Speed:          2.2 24.8 16.2  mph

 Pace             2:25 26:49 3:43  min/mi

 Crank Torque: 0 700 119  lb-in



I was drinking a concentrated 3 hour mix of Infinit and stopped half way through the ride to grab a 2nd bottle and refill my water bottles.  This worked out great and is something I'm going to plan on doing race day.



After the ride, I dropped off my bike at home and strapped on my running shoes.  I was out of my run mix of Infinit so I grabbed a gel I had laying around, ate that, and was out the door.



According to my VDOT I should run the first 6 miles at a 10min/mile pace.  As others on the team have reported that pace was feeling way too slow and I finally understand exactly what they were talking about.  On top of forcing my self to stay slow I had to stop and walk just to keep the pacing.  I did two 3 mile loops by my house that include a couple of "Chicago hills" which are really overpasses.  From what I hear, the Tempe run course is made up of a similar terrain.  Not having my nutrition with me I was getting pretty hungry but my legs felt great (probably because I was so far off my wattage) and I could have run all night at that pace.