Swim
The reported water temperature was 53.1 degrees. It didn't feel too bad stepping into the water to warm up because the water temp was higher than the outside temp, but once I dove into the water my face went numb. I swam around for about 30 seconds and then decided to get out because I was getting too cold. I lined up with the first wave to the far right so I could cut in closer to the first turn of the swim. The horn sounded and we ran into the water. One guy dove in prematurely and probably smashed into the ground in the shallow water, but he got back up and continued. Being on the far right worked out well as I went around the first buoy close to the front of the group. Then people started to pass me as I am not a great swimmer. I jumped in the trail of swimmers and tried to draft for a while. I couldn’t see the next buoy because we were swimming right into the rising sun. I just blindly followed everyone else and it just happened to hit the next buoy dead on. The next few straights seemed to take forever and I fell more and more off pace with some of the girls in the top female wave passing me. The cold really got to me in the last part of the swim, my hands and face really hurt and I started to get dizzy. When I exited the swim I was extremely disoriented and staying on the carpeted path running to my bike was a challenge. When I got to my bike and pulled my wetsuit down around my ankles, I became really dizzy and almost fell over. I had to hold on the bike rack to keep from falling. I stood holding the rack for what for what seemed like forever and tried to assess if I would even be able to continue. I was finally able to get my wetsuit off and my sunglasses and helmet on. I decided not to put on arm warmers, figuring running out of transition and climbing the first hill would warm me up and help me get oriented.
Swim time = 29:32 (1:49/100yards...the swim had to of been a little longer than 1500 meters)
Bike
I had my bike shoes already clipped onto my bike which I regret now. Running out of transition on the chip seal asphalt with my bare frozen feet really hurt. Right as I was about to mount my bike some guy crashed just outside of transition going straight over his handlebars and smashing his face into the ground, I found out later he lost a few teeth. Distracted by the crash I did a really bad flying mount and tried to pedal on top of my shoes, but one hit the ground upside down and came unclipped. I slammed on my brakes, took a step back, picked up my shoe, and put it on while straddling my bike. Once clipped in I climbed the first hill, and then tried just to stay on the road while descending the opposite side. All of extremities were really numb, making controlling my bike a challenge. Once out of the canyon it was really flat and there was a tailwind while going east. I was easily cruising at 28mph+, which worried me that coming back was going to be hard. I never felt 100% on the bike probably due to the cold. I tried to drink some and eat a gel but that didn’t make my stomach feel good. It was also fairly hard to hold onto my bottle with my numb hands. Coming to the next section where you go through the canyon again I saw the first guys coming back up the hill. It was a little discouraging that the leaders were so far ahead. Descending into the canyon at 35mph+ scared me a little bit with the deep section Zipp 808 wheels I was using with the strong side winds. After the turn around and going back through the canyon again I was a least a little warmer. Pushing into the wind going west was difficult and I tried to keep my speed 20mph+ with my usual high cadence of around 100rpm to keep from burning up my legs and not being able to run well. I cruised back towards the lake not very pleased with my performance on the bike.
Bike time = 1:09:12 (21.6 mph)
Run
I started the run and immediately my heart rate exploded as usual. I slowed down a bit and tried to ease into a good pace. I was finally warm and could feel my feet again, I even poured water on myself to cool down a bit. I was a little worried that I would ‘bonk’ having only half a gel on the bike, so I took a little more, but it was hard to swallow while running. About 2 miles into the run I could tell the top female athlete was coming up behind me because people at the aid station were yelling to her that she was in the lead; duh, I think she knew. As she came up beside me I gave her a few encouraging words. I picked up my speed slightly and she dropped in pace right behind me. After the turnaround I saw Andy Suter from UA making ground on me, which wasn’t good since he started in a wave behind me. I finished ahead of him at the Lake Havasu triathlon last month, so I could tell he was having a better day than I was. I paced the top girl who went on to win (Jessica Broderick from University Of Colorado-Boulder with a time of 2:18:34) until into the last mile where I made my last kick for the finish. Andy from UA passed me, I tried to stay with him to sprint to cross the line first but my legs cramped and I just cruised into the finish since he was 10 minutes ahead anyways. I was shooting for a sub-40 minute 10K…so close, but at least I didn’t get shown up by our ASU track runner Jocelyn (41:23) on the run. She was ASU’s top female finisher at 2:41:18 taking 46th female undergraduate in her first Olympic distance race, great job!
Run time = 40:08 (6:28/mile)
Total time = 2:23:17
99th Male Undergraduate, 124th overall
Overall my race wasn't bad, I finished in about the same place as last year. Our team did well and had a ton of fun before and after the race making our trip a huge success.
Lessons Learned:
· Bring more clothes for the morning of a cold race
· Cold water is not fun to swim in
· Long swims hurt my chances of doing well
· Put on arm warmers/gloves/something if it is cold out
· Ingest more calories
· There are a lot of really fast collegiate triathletes
ASU Team Results
Female:
26. 448 Arizona State University (2:57:27 11:49:47)
=================================================================
1 47 Jocelyn Buras 2:41:18
2 68 Julie Ryan 2:46:38
3 161 Mary Cameron 3:09:31
4 172 Brenna Boyd 3:12:20
5 (199) Alka Tripathy 3:22:36
6 (216) Kelly Weber 3:34:33
Male:
32. 668 Arizona State University (2:31:23 10:05:31)
=================================================================
1 106 Alan Brown 2:23:17
2 150 Matt Kipper 2:29:21
3 186 Tom Lang 2:33:34
4 226 Gerrit Mack 2:39:19
5 (293) Dan Quick 2:54:17
6 (316) Sean McManus 3:02:23
7 (322) Andrew Bellino 3:03:38
Coed:
Arizona State University - 24th
2009 Collegiate Triathlon National Results
Alan Brown
ASU Triathlon Captain
1 comment:
wow we got 24th overall! that's awesome.
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