Race Reports...Two for One Special!!

My blog updating has never been stellar or timely so racing back to back weekends has caught up to me!

Race 1: Paris Mountain Triathlon

This first ever event was billed as "not for the faint of heart!" The swim is tame enough, 500m in a pond, but the bike course has the climb up Paris Mountain at mile 11 and the run course runs up the back side of the mountain.

Swim: 6:26, 4th AG. Time Trial Start...the swim was over before I knew it. I had trouble seeing the final turn buoy but otherwise it was fine. I could have pushed it harder though.

Bike: 1:03:00, 5th AG. Rolling hills for 11 miles until the base of Paris. I was doing ok on the rollers, but right before the turn up the climb I rolled up on a pack of about four riders and realized I was all up in the draft zone with the marshall right behind me. So, I pushed hard and passed them. Didn't want to spike the HR before the climb, but couldn't afford the drafting penalty. The climb went well. I had a standard on the front and a 23 on the back. This was all I needed until the last 400m where it kicks up in grade. I was grunting to get over that hump. The decent was fast but uneventful.

Run: 35:39, 1st AG. This was the hardest run I've done. I was crusing at a 6:35 pace until mile 1.5 when you had to run up what felt like a wall...I dropped to a 9:40 pace and was working much harder than before. After the 1 mile climb you turned onto a trail and decended just as fast. Very technical and hard to keep a rhythm. I passed a lot of folks on the decent though.

Overall, I finished in 1:49:23, 2nd AG, 13th OA. Great event and a challenging course. Looking forward to tackle that one again next year!

Race 2: Langely Pond Sprint

First time racing here. I thought about doing the olympic race as a prep for next week's 70.3, but Coach said to do the sprint and recover quicker.

Swim: 750m, 13:42, 3rd AG. I felt great the whole swim. My sighting was nearly perfect and I felt like I pushed just enough throughout. I'm happy with the effort, but I know I can be a lot faster than this in the water. I'm waiting for these swim workouts to come together and drop my times.

Bike: 20k, 34:59, 3rd AG. I managed to push through the first half of gradual climbing and made good use of the Zipp 1080's I was running to get some overall speed back. I pushed harder than I usually do on the bike and my HR was up in the 170's most of the time. I was pleased with the 21.4mph pace that I had overall.

Run: 5k (3.36 on my Garmin), 20:51, 2nd AG. Good run for me. I increased the pace every mile and had a strong kick at the end. The course was definitely long, but that allowed me to catch two or three guys that I would not have on a true 5k!

Finished up with a 1:12:24, 3rd AG, 6th OA! I was stoked to break the top ten...but man it stinks to finish that high overall and only get 3rd in the group. I definitely improved my bike split though. I was only about 30 seconds off of the top guy in my AG on the bike. Great day of racing though!!!!