TRI TALK: The Epic Conclusion

Well, it's over and done. And you know what? It was awesome.

We had early start times of 7:20am (Tom) and 7:25am (me – he gets a head start, no fair!). We had to be present and registered an hour before our start times (!) so we were up bright and early. We biked to the pool because a) we had to bring the bikes anyway, b) it's only 2.5km from our house, and c) there was very limited parking on site. When we left the house on our bikes, it was MAYBE 5 degrees Celsius. I was less than impressed and dreading the transition where I had to run out of the pool in only my bathing suit in 5 degree weather. That part wasn't so enjoyable.

Overall, though, it was great. The weather did warm up to be a very nice day by the time we were running, and I brought sufficient layers of clothing so that I didn't freeze completely on the bike section.

The Breakdown!

Swim time: 27:21

Bike time: 1:11:44

Run time: 54:32

Total time: 2:33:36.1

Which means…

·         I finished #217^th overall (don't have a total number of participants yet though)

·         I finished #18^th in my age/gender group (women 19-29)

Goals

I set an A, B, and C goal for this race.

A Goal – Beat Tom :P (definitely not going to happen)

·         I totally beat Tom in the swim (sure, he had a cracked collarbone from rugby the day before and I only beat him by 24 seconds, but I'm counting it as a win)

·         I was also only a minute slower than he was on the run, and if I had known that at the time, I think I could have pushed harder to beat him

B Goal – Finish in less than three hours

·         I finished in 2 hours 33 minutes. WIN!

C Goal – Finish

·         I sure did!

I took 2 minutes off my PB for the swim (yay!), and about five minutes off my PB for the bike. The run was kinda craptacular. I ran the first half (down the hill), but walked a lot coming back up. However, my time was pretty reasonable at only 4 minutes over my indoor PB. The race was very well organized, and it was really fun to see my name show up with a ranking (something that doesn't happen with charity races!).

Most importantly, I survived!

Now I HAVE To Do This

It has been horribly cold and rainy and overcast all week. This is our typical May long weekend weather, albeit a few days late. I am sensibly concerned about the weather for this triathlon because I hate running about the city while soaking wet. Perhaps this is unreasonable. However, since I live in a province where it snows every damn month of the year (the first year I was here, the only month it didn't snow was August. True story.), I think of it as good survival instincts.

Here is the current forecast for Sunday (a large improvement over the one from a few days ago which said NO SUN FOR YOU and also here's a 12 degree high):

TheWeatherNetwork.ca

I had one of the worst runs every last night, which included me stopping at 4.5km to have a cry, then back to finish at 5.5km, despite planning to do 10km, or 8km if I beat my PB time (ahahahahaha). My knee was grumping at me, and it just set off a chain of "why can't I control anything in my life, and nothing goes according to plan, and some things are so up in the air and WHY CAN'T THE CAT AND DOG GET MARRIED AHHHHH". When Tom got home, I was lying on the couch with ice on my knee, and what must have been an impressive scary face because he took one look and said "um, should I go get some chocolate?" - hands off, he's mine.

There are two easy ways to tell my stress level: what am I eating, and how am I running. Considering the M&M cookies I just inhaled as well as last night's breakdown, we can safely put me in the Stress Code Red category. The triathlon is causing me stress, but mostly it's Big Life Decisions ™ that are all hanging in the balance right now until further moves are made. Last night I was seriously considering pulling out of the race, but I told one of the managers at work about entering it (d'oh) and he told the entire team in a meeting today (double d'oh).

Also, because apparently my amnesia has sufficiently kicked in, I may be doing the MS Ride in June (160km in two days). That's a lot shorter than the RTCC (220km in two days), so it'll be a piece of cake, right? RIGHT?!

I need more cookies.

It's Not You, I'm Just Hiding From My Triathlon

It's Wednesday. My triathlon is on Sunday.

*hyperventilates*

I'm pretty sure someone is mucking about with the speed at which I perceive time (I blame Tom, he is an astrophysicist after all).

As someone who has never run a proper race of any kind, I'm a tad smidgey-bit intimidated. I've done charity "races" which are not races at all; this is a bit different obviously, but I kind of feel like I'm defaulting to approaching this one the same way: "go out, don't die, finish, have milkshake".

My training is all over the place this week and last. Soccer just started, so I'm training with my team as well as subbing on a few others, but I'm mostly hiding from my triathlon-specific workouts (good plan, self). I suspect Future Erin will be very angry at Past Erin for this decision. At the same time, all I can think is, will run more distance run really make a difference at this point? Will practicing biking soaking wet make it any less uncomfortable during the race (an emphatic NO on this one).

Tom was in Vegas this weekend, will play rugby on Saturday, and then do the tri with me on Sunday. None of his training has been tri-specific (he trains a lot – just for rugby, not triathlons). I suspect he will still kick my ass time-wise, which makes me put on my annoyed pants.

Here's a time breakdown:

	Erin – Best Times	Tom – Best Estimated
1km Swim	29:30	29:00
26km Bike	76:00	60:00
8km Run	50:15	50:00
TOTAL ESTIMATED:	2:35:45	2:19:00

Holy crap, I am the slowest turtle at turtle school. Following Emilie's suggestion of A, B, and C goals, here's what I hope to do:

A Goal – Beat Tom :P (definitely not going to happen)

B Goal – Finish in less than three hours

C Goal – Finish

I should be fine to hit the swim time. I've been consistently coming in just under 30 minutes (and frustratingly unable to get any faster). The bike is a bit of a crapshoot; Tom is a much better cyclist than I am, riding a much nicer and faster racing bike (while I will be tugboating along on my hybrid mountain bike). I haven't been training on the race route for this section because it's fracking annoying to bike it if the road isn't closed (which it will be for the race). Also it's an exceptionally boring route to train on; it's four loops up and down a main road.

The run I expect will be slower than my best time, partly because I set that time inside and severely up my turtle quotient when I run outside, and partly because it will be done after a 1km swim and 26km bike.

Seriously, whose idea was this? Mine, you say? Oh right. Can I blame my concussions?

Run, Run, Pant, Pant

Yesterday I ran (most of) the route I'll be running for the triathlon. I didn't run all of it because of construction and time constraints. It was a pretty decent run, about 8km in total (7km actually running) and it took me about an hour (50 minutes for the run part - so Jimmy-Bob slow). I'm still getting used to running outside, so I don't mind my pace lagging a bit.

Running outside is still not my favourite for one simple reason: I know those hoots and hollers from passing cars aren't because I look so sexy running (I don't). I like to pretend they are only yelling encouraging things, but let's face it, if my imagination was that good I would have thought of Harry Potter. Maybe they are just enjoying my junk in the trunk; it has been known to bring various suitors to my "yard".

Now that you are sufficiently horrified by that image, it's time for TRI TALK!

Here's the breakdown:

1km swim (in a pool)

26km bike (not in a pool)

8km run (also not in a pool)

Here are the concerns I'm having:

1. The pool will be so filled with people that I will be constantly running into other people's feet, or having other people run into my feet .I don't feel very good about either foot situation.

2. The transition from pool to bike. The actual "getting out of the pool and onto a bike" seems simple enough. Except that I'll be wearing a bathing suit. And be wet. Neither of which are ideal conditions for biking (let alone running).

3. The bike ride isn't a big 26km loop; it's four loops up and down a goddamn hill. I haven't even done it yet – that's how mentally exhausting I find that route.

4. I'm going to have to bike and run while wet, cold, and WEARING A SWIM SUIT.

This was a terrible idea.