Time to Dust Off the Old Blog....Raleigh 70.3 Race Report

Raleigh 70.3 Race Report

4:35:42

9th Men 30-34

56th Overall

results 

It has been quite some time since I've posted.  In fact I skipped several race reports dating back to the end of last year.  Since Ironman Louisville last August, I've competed in the Peluso Open Water 5 Miler, Marine Corps Marathon, Richmond Half Marathon, Love Rox Half Marathon, Shamrock Half Marathon, Monument 10K and Kinetic Half Iron.  In the past I never missed an opportunity to post a race report, but over the last few months I haven't felt motivated to keep the ol' blog updated.  I think my desire to blog has been lacking due to the fact that I have perceived my results to be below my goals/expectations.  This pattern of negativity has been growing with each passing race and actually ended up biting me in the ass this past weekend at Raleigh 70.3.  Fortunately, Raleigh presented an opportunity to learn some valuable lessons and re-focus my energies and mindset in a more positive direction to re-realize that I am doing this for fun (and not for my livelihood).  I tend to take triathlon a bit too seriously and get bogged down in the results.  As I have been chasing my goal of qualifying for Kona I have been failing to practice what I preach and have been focused on the destination instead of the journey.  Recently I have been obsessing over perceived failings in various races and it culminated this weekend in Raleigh.

Before I get into the race report, I want to back up a bit and get you up to speed on my training.  In January I began working with a new coach, Eric Limkemann (http://ericlimkemann.blogspot.com/).  Besides being a top level pro, he also happens to be a great coach and an all around great guy.  I have been very pleased with my training thus far and have been hitting metrics in my workouts that I have never seen before.  I also made a commitment to let the coach do his job and stop doing "extra credit" not in my plan.  One of my weaknesses as an athlete is that I never feel like I am doing enough and I tend to cheat up the distances and intensities in my training sessions.  I'm sure this was a source of frustration for Coach Flanigan the last two years and ultimately hurt my race results.  This year I made a resolution to stick to the plan and stop with the extra BS.  I have been pretty good thus far and I would give myself a B+ for my efforts. Every so often I sneak in a bit extra, but by and large I have stayed committed to my resolution and it has resulted in a productive and injury free block of training since January....Now on to the race report.

Raleigh 70.3 slotted into my season quite nicely.  My goals were to go sub 4:30 and secure a spot to 70.3 World Championships.  I felt reasonably confident that I could put together a good race inasmuch as I raced Kinetic 3 weeks ago at Ironman pace and put up a respectable time.  I was able to do this two weeks after being struck by a car and was pretty sore at the time.  Kinetic gave me a bit of confidence that I could put a great race together at Raleigh.  Additionally, Coach gave me a bit of rest leading into the weekend and I felt I was primed for a good performance.  I arrived in Raleigh on Friday afternoon.  It was a nice treat to have my beautiful wife along for the ride.  We had a nice dinner on Friday and I spent the rest of the evening cleaning up my rig and getting race ready.

scoping out the course with Dan S.

Saturday was a bit of a cluster due to the nature of the course.  The swim took place at Jordan Lake which was about 40 minutes outside of town.  This meant there were two different transition areas and we had to check our bikes into T1 on Saturday.  Much of Saturday was spent checking in at the expo, shuttling back and forth between the transition areas and getting everything ready for Sunday.  The day was over before I knew it.  The best part of the day was sitting down to dinner with friends and family at Mellow Mushroom.  One of life's simple pleasures is dinner the night before an Ironman.  It is one of the few times that I stop obsessing over my diet and focus on fueling for the next day.  I strapped on the feedbag and ate my weight in glorious glorious pizza.  After dinner I topped off the fuel tank with a ridiculous serving of frozen yogurt and headed back to the hotel room to unwind and get ready for the early wake up call.

Race Morning

Feedbag...engage

On race morning I woke up at 4 am to meet my dad down in the lobby.  Big Dan is becoming somewhat of a celebrity around the tri scene.  I think most of my triathlete friends and acquaintances know him as well as they know me from his high quality sherpa skills and general Facebook panache.  As always he was there every step of the way and got up early so he could come on the shuttle with me so I could bring my bike pump and not have to deal with checking a morning clothes bag.  I honestly don't know what I would do at these races if I didn't have him and my mom.  The support they continue to give is remarkable, and I do not express to them enough how thankful and fortunate I am to have them.  This sport is a collaborative effort and nothing I accomplish is possible without Big Dan, Stella, and my unfailingly supportive Iron-wife, Brittany Royce (it never hurts to have a super model wife, standing on the race course when things get rough on the run!).  I told her after the race that no matter how bad I feel, when I see her on the run I get a surge of energy.  I mean who the hell wouldn't want to see this face cheering you on when things get ugly?!?!?!

One unfortunate aspect of the race was that the swim start took place in waves and I had to get to transition early to take a shuttle from T2 to T1.  This meant that I was up at 4 a.m. even though my race wouldn't be starting until 8:02.  Because of the long waiting period I spaced out my morning calories.  I had two packages of oatmeal immediately upon waking up (300 cals).  About an hour and a half later I had peanut butter and jelly on a plain bagel (approx. 450 cals), and I downed a second surge energy gel (90 cals) before the swim. We arrived at T1 at about 6:15 in the morning.  I double and triple checked the transition and tried to relax until my wave went off.  One nice aspect of the late swim start was that I got to see my coach win the swim and come out of the water first in the pro field.  It was pretty cool watching him come out of the water first and head out on the bike to do some serious work.  At about 7:30 I put on my trusty Blue Seventy Helix and started loosening up for the swim.  At 7:45 I got into the water for a quick warmup and then lined up with the guys in my wave and anxiously awaited our start time.  The few minutes just before the start are always electric and it didn't hurt that the speakers were blaring Red Hot Chili Peppers.....Go Time.

Swim
26:09- 3rd AG, 29th OA
The swim course was a triangle shaped course on Jordan Lake.  With two turns built into the course the plan was to stay long and strong until the first buoy and then increase my effort after each turn.  I was a bit concerned about the swim course due to my late wave.  Despite the waves being 4:00 apart, I suspected I would run into traffic pretty early on in the swim.  I started catching the wave in front of me just around the first turn buoy.  The course became more and more congested as the swim progressed.  I'm not sure how many waves I swam through but I suspect I was catching folks that may have been 4-5 waves in front of me.  I think I did an average job holding my lines and feel reasonably confident that I swam straight however I did not feel particularly good in the water.  I attribute this to the fact that I only swam one session during the week leading into the race.  I was scheduled to swim M/W/F and only managed to get the Wednesday session in.  I tend to lose feel for the water pretty quickly when I'm not in the water every other day and I felt this during the race.  I was not particularly pleased with the swim split but it wasn't a disaster.  As always the Blue Seventy Helix wetsuit performed beautifully.  Before I knew it the swim was over and the wetsuit strippers helped me out of my suit. ...On to the bike where I planned on putting out a big effort.

Bike
2:31:28- 7th AG, 43rd OA
56.11 miles, 22.2 mph
AP 284, NP 289, VI 1.02, Avg Cadence 94

The bike course was a point to point course taking us from Jordan Lake into downtown Raleigh.  The course can best be described as rolling.  Most of the course is either going up or coming down but I don't recall any significant climbs.  The back half of the course was definitely more difficult than the front half and it was made slower by a steady headwind for the last 20 or so miles.  The front half of the course is FAST!!!!  After the initial climb out of transition, the first 25 miles were screaming.  At about mile 25 I thought a low 2:20s bike split was in my future.  I made the mistake of underestimating the back half of the course and while I handled it fine from an energy standpoint, it was definitely slower than the front and ultimately brought down my average pace and brought about a slower bike split than I was initially anticipating.

The game plan on the bike was to ride the first half at about 270 Watts and build into the low 280s if I felt good.  I felt really good on the bike and found that I was riding 280 watts right off the bat.  I was initially concerned that it wouldn't be sustainable but as the bike unfolded I found that my average power was holding steady and actually slowly ticking up toward the mid 280s.  At the halfway point I felt confident that I could sustain a wattage near 280.  The ride felt strong and comfortable and I think I was only passed by about 8 cyclists during the course of the ride.  I was able to ride legally with a couple of different cyclists which is always helpful from a pacing standpoint.  The thing I like about Ironman events is the large number of people out on the bike course.  While it does propose some safety issues/challenges, it is nice to be around other people and have the opportunity to be passing people all day.  All too often at smaller races I find myself riding alone for long periods of time.  While it is certainly good mental strength training it is a lot more fun to be suffering with several hundred other crazies.  Toward the tail end of the ride I began to realize that a split in the 2:20s was not going to happen.  This brought on some frustration, but I instead tried to focus on maintaining steady wattage.  As I rolled back into town I felt good and thought that I had enough in the tank for a solid run split.

Bike nutrition consisted of a second surge energy gel (90 cals) at the start of the bike, and I sipped on a carbo pro cocktail for the remainder of my calories.  I had one 600 calorie bottle that contained 6 scoops of carbo pro, two nuun tablets, and two lava salt tablets.  I also took 6 salt stick capsules during the ride.  I drank 1/3 of my nutrition bottle every 45 minutes.  I took 2 salt stick caps with each portion of the cocktail.  My energy felt strong and consistent through the ride.  I think I undercooked the electrolytes a bit as I had some cramping late in the run, but for the most part I think my nutrition was pretty close to dead on.

Run
1:33:40 (7:09/mile)- 9th AG, 56th OA
Run segments
1- 3.5 Miles: 7:03/mile
2- 3.1 Miles: 7:15/mile
3- 3.2 Miles: 7:23/mile
4- 3.3 Miles: 6:55/mile
The run course was not easy.  It was an out and back course done twice.  It was essentially a 3.5 mile climb followed by a 3 mile descent x2.  I felt surprisingly fresh running out of transition with the exception of some quad cramping which is pretty typical for me in the first mile off the bike.  I have found that if I focus on steady pacing the cramps generally subside within the first ten minutes and this run was no exception.  The game plan on the run was to build my effort during each of the four segments.  Eric thought I had the capability to start at 7:00 pace and descend into the 6:50s but as soon as I started the first climb I realized I would have to be smart with my pacing.  The first and third segments were a long steady climb and I focused on good technique and steady pacing around 7:15.  I knew that If I pushed it any harder I would risk exploding on the back half of the run.  The run was not well shaded and it got a bit warm so I was concerned about cramping.  I had a canister of lava salt tablets and I alternated taking 2-3 tablets every 15-20 minutes.  As usual I relied on cola for calories and water for hydration.  I took ice sponges and ice whenever it was available.  I alternated dumping water over my head and ice down my shorts to keep my core temperature down.  One of my only complaints about the race was that the run aid stations were a bit unorganized.  It was sometimes difficult to get your hands on what you were looking for.

I did a good job staying consistent on the run and there wasn't really any section where I felt like I was blowing up.  My third segment split was the slowest by far but I didn't feel as though I was suffering especially badly during that portion of the race.  I felt steady and in control the whole time.  The encouraging news is that my last segment was the fastest of the day which showed I still had some juice in my legs after a big bike effort.  I saw my buddy Dan at the first turn and noticed that our gap was pretty close to the 4 minutes we started the race with (he was one wave behind me).  Dan has had some impressive Ironman run splits and I spent the next hour trying not to let him catch me.  Ultimately he out split me by about a minute but it certainly helped me run faster to know that one of my buddies was hunting me down.  I only noticed about 3 or 4 people pass me on the run. This was less than normal and I take it as a positive that my run continues to progress.  Hopefully over the next month and a half I will continue to improve to the point where a sub 3:30 will be possible at Lake Placid.

Takeaways
Immediately after the race I was disappointed.  I had convinced myself that I was going to put up a time in the low 4:20s.  When I came in at 4:35, I felt like I had let myself down.  Despite finishing 9th in my AG, I was annoyed and angry at another sub-par effort.  As I have had time to reflect, I think this reaction was immature and ridiculous.  As I objectively look at the data and conditions of the day, I had a good race.  I let the negativity get to me and it would end up costing me.

Typically any time I finish within the top 10 I stay for roll down on the off chance that I get a World Championship slot.  However, on Sunday, I decided that my performance left something to be desired and there was no way it would roll to me.  So I collected my things and high tailed it out of town soon after the race.  I didn't even bother to check if the automatic qualifiers had claimed their spots prior to leaving.....amateur move.  As I drove home I got a call from a friend who told me that they were calling my name at roll down for a World Championship slot.  The one time I didn't stay for roll down was the one time I could have qualified for worlds.  I was so angry with myself for letting a poor attitude cost me a WC spot.  It taught me a valuable lesson....never leave roll down if you are in the top 10, and a negative attitude can cost you both during and after your race.  Frankly, this was a wake up call that I needed and I feel it was a good spring board to work the mental component of my training and to start having fun again.  This sport really is about the journey and not the destination. I needed this experience to remind me of that.

I want to thank all my friends and family who took the time to say a kind word or congratulate me on my race.  I posted some word vomit on Facebook immediately after the race about being disappointed and I was overwhelmed by the number of people who reached out to lift me back up.  The tri community is wonderful and I have met some truly inspirational people who lift me up just when I need it.  Thank you to all of you that took the time to say a kind word.  It resonated with me and further cemented the fact that I need to work on being more positive, believe in my abilities, and have confidence I will need to qualify for Kona.  In short I need to stop being so damn hard on myself.

As always thanks for taking the time to read my musings.  Happy training and congrats to everyone that raced last weekend including Nate Deal, Trey McFerren, Dan Szajta, Lindsey Wohlford, Justin Moyer, Rob Green, and Moose Herring.  There were many great performances all around.

Next up Rev 3 Olympic.....stay tuned