Huntington Triathlon

[watchman]

Great weather and great race Rick Cadwell !

It was cool to see many CTC people there Suzi, Jen, Tim, Aussi, Eric, Brian others I cannot remember names
Well

this was my best race to date.

I was 12 minutes faster than my previous races the last two years.
at 1hour 16 minutes . Hey, my goal was to get under 1 hour 20 minutes
a couple a lessons learned.

1. Matt C. you are right. I need more race experience to relax and learn from. I was a little more relaxed. I still could not sleep the night before but I planned on that so I made sure I had plenty of the sleep the WEEK before.

2. Running and riding longer distances preparing for a Olympic. ( what I thought made me ready for a Sprint was not enough, getting ready for an Olympic has probably made me ready for a sprint). The past at the end of the bike I would struggle to stay at 18 mph . Yesterday I was at 22-23mph at the end and getting faster, I started slow. The run, in the past I was dying , again I was feeling better the further I ran. Not one person passed me and I was passing others. I think Mark D. helped me here, when you mentioned going hard at the end of bike and run during training made me feel like going hard at end of race..

3. Eating. in the past I would eat too much the day and morning before. Yesterday I did what I normally eat the day before and ate nothing the morning of. I felt alot better.

4. I should not have worn a wetsuit. I could have done it easily without but 5 minutes before I saw Aussie Rob with his and it made me think I should. Bad decision. I tried to remove it while still in the water ( I almost drowned) The transition was horrible, people were flying by me.


I know I still have 10 minutes to knock off before I can come close to comparing to most of you but that will be my goal for next year.

I owe my improvement by 12 minutes to what I have learned on this forum

thanks.

Congrats to Jen and others (who won age group ) I do not remember names. Maybe someday I will get one.

mike

[Eric]

Great seeing you at the race Mike. We all come out of racing learning how to improve the next race. Fantastic improvement.

[Aussie Rob]

Mate you had a nice race, not getting passed is the first step to passing many when you race. Practise stripping the wetty and it's still a net gain if you can get it off fast. I would try eating something the day of the race though, even if its only a banana or something. Hell, a couple of gels with some caffeine in them might give you a little extra spark without weighing you down.

I wasn't sure what to expect Sunday with this new labouring job kicking the crap out of me and not having really run in 6 weeks. Had a really nice swim though, so so bike (just couldnt find my legs there) and a sub 19 min 5k. Finished 3rd overall and under an hour, very happy, and also pleased that the two guys that beat me were SSSMST teammates, so we swept the podium

Was cool to see so many out there from my various tri circles. I love Huntington, the epitome of the fun local race imo.

[rinibry]

it was a beautiful day for a race, I was at work the night before and had most of my gear with me for race day even though I was not 100% sure I was going to race or volunteer if needed. I am never sure exactly when I will be able to leave so I was prepared either way. I was able to make it on time but after I registered I began to set my transition area and noticed I forgot my wetsuit. I am a firm believer in taking full advantage of the technology at hand and always practice with it so I was feeling a little naked without. The other issue I ran into early on was I was given the wrong color swim cap at registration and did not realize i was supposed to leave with the red caps till after they left. I felt pretty fast on the swim as I flew past all the back and sidestrokers but it was like dodgeball with swimmers (i hope that doesn't sound bad because that was me just 2 years ago and I believe this to be the perfect race for people to try tris). I hope nobody thought that I was getting an early start as the lone purple capped swimmer charged the lake 3 1/2 minutes early as I was actually :30 seconds late. 11 minutes even on the swim is a bit off my pace but not bad under the circumstances.
I really like the bike course for this race, a couple uphill grades but nothing but a couple of turns to break your cadence you can put your head down and hammer. I know this because I saw several people flying past me doing just that.

The run is scenic and enjoyable and I even saw several people enjoying the a park run who were not in the race. The little loop around through the park just before the finish line is a fun little twist, as you run down erie street you can hear the people yelling and you feel you pace quicken and then you find out as you get closer you have to make a right turn and down and back up a hill for a finish instead of the left turn you were planning.
The crowd on hand was loud and supportive, the volunteers were stationed at every turn,I say it was a good race and and a great day.

[watchman]

Aussie Rob you are one of the inspirations on this forum.

I did not realize how fast you are until I saw your time on the results page.

I also never realized what an elite group it is that rides on Monday nights. Mark D. Jen , Rob R and others I cannot remember names.
No wonder I have trouble keeping up at the end.
Lately I have been starting at 5pm at Bagley road riding north then
returning south with the group then stopping. I think I need to make the drive and do the whole thing with you guys since the hardest part is at the end. I think I am going to have to do the entire Monday bricks to knock off another 10 minutes.


As for the eating I should clarify. I did eat exactly what you said a banana and gels but nothing else.

In the past I hate far more and it was not good.

mike

[KC]

I was given the wrong color swim cap too. The woman doing registrations didn't sleep the night before; I told her "that makes two of us."

Although, being the only female with a black cap on came in handy when I was doing what resembled competitive swimming less, and effectively not drowning more. The women cheering on the shore had a way to identify me "you can do it black cap!" ...incredibly encouraging and completely humiliating all at the same time.

[jen]

For this report you are going to get 3 for the price of one!

#1: Started out Saturday morning doing the masters Lake Erie OW swim. Opted for the 1 mile without the wetsuit. Swimming is definitely my least favorite because it's my weakest but wanted to do the event and see how it went.

Everyone was worried about the bacteria but I was more worried about the water being smooth which it appeared to be...started heading west parallel to shore and felt decent but when turning around the farthest buoy and heading back east I couldn't sight anything! I definitely felt like I was "swimming like a worm" so at one point I breast stroked some until I got a big gulp of water and stopped and started coughing. Some nice guy asked if I was ok and I said yea. He tried to encourage me and said we're almost there but really, we were not! Toughed it out to the last buoy and turned for shore-finally! Then I saw a fish or something that kinda freaked me out so I attempted to speed up as I just wanted out of the freakin water. As I am getting out, who is getting out at the same time as me but Rob! I felt so embarrassed but I did it and it can only get better!

#2: That evening was the Winking Lizard shot in the dark. Had never done it but heard it's a fun event. At first I thought about just making it a tempo run since I was doing Huntington the next day but Steve Yutzy told me at the swim that if you place you get a cool shot glass so I decided to go hard.

Did a couple mile warm up and then weezled my way to near the front. Of course started out running like a bat out of he** which I had told Beth before we started that "oh that's what makes it fun!" Then hitting the lorain-carnegie bridge along with the wind slowed quite a bit and couldn't wait to turn north. Kept a decent pace and kept with some girl in a pink shirt. As we turned to head back to finish we had another fun bridge to cross and a slight uphill to finish but felt I held on strong. Did a short cool-down and then found some familiar peeps. Wasn't planning on drinking but upon seeing another person's margarita that looked delicious Beth and I reckoned we needed the salt! So we each went to our cars, changed, and got some cash. Enjoyed our margaritas and seeing other CTC folks out. I even saw a cousin and my old high school chemistry teacher! It definitely was a fun event and I got my shotglass (1st in AG). Finally about 930 we decided it was time to head home, shower and pack up to get some rest for the next day.

#3: Huntington tri! I really wasn't sure how this would go considering the other events I had done. My main goal was to improve from last year. For the swim I tried to put myself more in the "thick of things" than usual which was kinda fun and I thought I hung in there. T1 was ok, took a minute to get clipped in but then took off on the bike which is always fun since I've improved I can pass quite a few people. There was some wind but now I've finally forced myself to use the aerobars on my bike which helps a lot! On the way back east on Lake rd some dude in a car yelled at me to get in the bike lane but 1-there's gravel and 2-I was passing the people in the bike lane! I was mad and gave him a friendly gesture

Got into T2 and felt like it was one of the best T2s I've had...off on the run. There were no mile markers! That kinda stunk because I had no idea how I was doing and I knew people were chasing so I just kept pushing...then I saw the likes of Jen Davila and Joanne and I knew they had made up some time between our waves. Another female I realized was not far behind me as well. It seemed I was keeping her at the same distance behind me but as we turned right and then headed back up the hill to the finish she came right up on me. Usually I have a pretty good kick but she got me-by 5 seconds! I think that's the first time that's happened to me but as Brandy said well for 5 seconds you got a shotglass! Yes I did get a shotglass the night before but those 5 seconds were for 3rd OA. Ended up 1st AG and the biggest thing is my time was 4:40 better than last year! I was even happier to see that my bike was the 2nd best and not too far off from J.D's.

As I said I thought I was in there with the swim but after seeing the times I definitely still have a lot of work to do!

Overall it was a totally fun weekend and great to see what I can do. Thanks to many of you who are crazy too ;D and talk me into signing up for all these things!

[MarkD]

... and I thought a "double shot was impressive". Doin' the triple !! I guess well call that a triathaweekend. Most impressive, Jen.

BTW - we call that "gesture" the 'Ohio wave'

[brandy]

Yes, Jen did awesome and because she went for the shotglass at the Shot in the Dark she missed the OA place at Huntington. And because of THAT, I only got 4th in our AG... if only Jen had found 6 seconds I wouldn't have been one of the only SSSMSTers without a medal. ;-) I have to say, though, for my second triathlon this year, I had a remarkable improvement and had a GREAT time. I even 'ran' the 5k at the end, which I haven't been able to do at many du's over the years.
I agree that it was awesome to see so many people out this weekend!! I'm excited to see what happens when I get some more confidence in the water.