The Long and the Short of it.

Two days. Two completely different activities.

On Friday part of the MooCrew went up to Verona, WI for a training ride on the IMWI bike course. Dennis, Brian, Pam and I arrived at Fireman's Park a little after 8:00AM for our ride. We had left Chicagoland around 5:00AM and had driven through rain and morning commuter traffic. However, by the time we got to Verona, the rain had mostly stopped and it was slowly turning into a nice day - warm and VERY humid - but, a nice day overall.

We started the ride with a 10 mile ride along the course heading towards transition in Madison, and 10 miles back to Verona. Once back in Verona we started the first of our two 40 mile loops (which would give us 100 miles for the day). For the first half of the loop we sort of stayed together, using it as a warm-up. After riding the Horribly Hilly Hundreds, and my little ride out in Colorado, the hills of IMOO seemed to have vanished! Where were the "killer" hills we were worried about? All I could see were small speed bumps!

At the end of the first loop Dennis, Brian and I regrouped at Fireman's Park where we restocked our Gatorade and waited for Pam. However, after a while it was apparent that Pam wasn't coming. A quick phone call and we found out that Pam had already started the 2nd loop, so off we went.

Earlier in the week I had indicated that I was going to ride the second loop at "race pace". I wanted to ride at intensity when I was already trashed. As we started the second loop I settled into a pace that seemed steady and not too uncomfortable. I wanted to ride the loop as close to two hours as I could. Just before Mt. Horeb I saw Pam. She was riding well and smiling (as always). She was working through a side-stitch, but seemed to be coping well. I pressed on. As I neared the halfway point I was settled into a good pace and had a nice tailwind for the ride back into Verona. When I got back to Fireman's Park it was right at two hours, so training objective met! I immediately changed into my running shoes and ran back into the town of Verona for a 2-mile brick. A tough, but completely satisfying day.

All-in-all, I think Dennis, Brian and Pam also accomplished what they were after.

So... earlier in the week Sheila had told be about a 5k race on Saturday at Lake Nokomis, near her house. At the time it sounded like fun (they always sound like a good idea initially). At 6:00AM, getting out of bed with sore legs from the IMWI course, it no longer seemed like a fun idea... But, what the heck - let's just go have fun. We ran down to the lake for the registration and it was a beautiful day - a little on the warm side in the upper 70's, but low humidity.

We both decided to just run our own races and see what happens. As usual, I didn't start my watch, which was a good thing. Even though the course was certified, there were no mile markers until mile 3. This meant we both had to run the race completely based on perceived effort. We both ran even paced races with just the right amount of pain in the last mile.

The results:

We both finished 2nd in our Age Group!! And I "almost" broke 20 minutes, with a 20:03



See you out there.

Epic Vail!

Sunday after Lifetime I flew to Vail, CO for a business conference. On a "hunch" I packed my bike clothes, helmet, pedals and shoes. Monday morning I went out for a run expecting a combination of race fatigue and altitude (8,300 feet) to make for a difficult run. Surprisingly, I did a 10 miler at a normal pace.

After the run I dropped by a local bike rental store (there are dozens of them). They didn't rent road bikes, but suggested a shop that was just one block from my hotel. That shop had low-end K2 road bikes for rent, but they looked like they would do job. They gave me a map of suggested routes and said they opened at 9:00AM.

That night I looked through the routes and found several that look like fun. However, one of the routes was an 85 mile route marked "Most Difficult". The route summited four passes on what was essentially a big-ass climb and a couple of big-ass descents. Sounded like my kind of ride.

The ride starts pretty easy for a few miles, but slowly starts to climb.


The scenery was incredible - breathtaking!


What was strange was going up switch-backs and looking down to see railroad tracks that I had just ridden next to a few minutes earlier. See the tracks down in the valley? I had just been there!


The first climb was Battle Mountain Pass, about 1,200 feet, but not too bad. Along the way I hooked up with two women that were riding about the same pace as me. One of them was a real climber and it turned out she had been the second female in the Triple Bypass bike race on Saturday (yeah, I GUESS she can Climb!!). Following brief descent from Battle Mountain Pass, we started the second climb up Tennessee Pass for another 1,500 feet.



They turned around at Tennessee Pass but gave me some advice for the next climb up to Fremont Pass at Climax, CO. They also asked if I had a jacket, since it was bound to be cold and most likely raining at the summit (WHAT?!?!?).

After Tennessee Pass there is little descent and then flats into the town of Leadville, CO. I stopped at a gas station, refueled with Gatorade and headed out for Fremont Pass. I immediately saw a sign that said Fremont Pass 12 miles, and I knew it was 1,300 feet of climbing. The next thing I saw was riders coming down towards me. They were all saying to me "keep it up", "way to go" and "you can do it". But strangely, I didn't see any other riders heading UP. Over the next 12 miles I probably saw 50 to 75 riders, and to be honest some of them didn't look like they could have done the climb I was doing.

Throughout this ride I learned to look at mountains up ahead to see if there were switchback roads gong up them. If there were, it probably meant I was going to have to climb it - like the one in the middle of the picture.


The first 6 or 7 miles of the climb up Fremont Pass were gentle, but the closer to the top I got, the steeper the climb. At this point I was definitely getting tired. When I FINALLY summited I saw several buses... Buses that take people up to the top of the mountain so that they can ride down (something to consider...). Fortunately, it wasn't raining at the summit and temperature was only in the 50's (vs. the 40's). I stopped for a minute to put on my arm warmers and headed out.


After Fremont Pass there is a nice long descent into the Cooper Mountain Ski Area. Going 30+ MPH and not pedalling for 4 or 5 miles felt GREAT. At Cooper, the road went back up about 800 feet to Vail Pass - the FINAL Pass of the day. After Vail Pass, there was a nice 14 mile, 2,200 foot descent into Vail Village where a nice hot Jacuzzi was awaiting my trashed legs.

I now know what it is like to ride in REAL mountains!

See you out there.

Lifetime Fitness 2007

This was my 3rd Lifetime Fitness Triathlon and the 2nd anniversary of my very first triathlon in 2005. Both 2005 and 2006 were HOT. Last year they shorten the race by cutting the run in half due to the heat – this made the race ideal for me and I won my age group.

I like Lifetime for several reasons. I grew up in Minneapolis and lived in two houses within a block of the bike course near Lake Harriet. I also have many friends and family in the area, so it is almost a hometown race for me.

On the Thursday before this year’s race, I woke up at 4:00AM for a one-day trip to Toronto. I returned to O’Hare late Thursday and headed straight up to Minneapolis arriving just before midnight. A long day to say the least.

Sheila lives just a few blocks from the Lifetime bike course and a mile from the race headquarters on Lake Nokomis, so it is an ideal location for both training and the race. On Friday morning I rode the first half of the bike course with a one mile run – both at race pace. Then we headed to downtown Minneapolis for the race check-in and expo at the Minneapolis convention center.

Since the race had been dangerously hot the last two years, they decided to move the entire race schedule up one hour, meaning that transition would close at 6:30AM – awfully early! Fortunately, I only had a 5 minute ride from Sheila’s house to the transition area. This year there were 51 people registered for my age group (and 45 finishers), so this was going to be one of the biggest fields for us old guys. When I got to transition there appeared to be a lot of fit guys and nice bikes. This was going to be fun.

The Swim

Lifetime is a time trial start with waves according to Age Groups and each individual starting according to their race number one at a time, 3 seconds apart from one another. For the past two years the water temperature has been in the 80’s and there was a wetsuit ban. For some reason when I left Frankfort I threw in my sleeveless just in case. Just before the 6:30 closing of transition they announced a water temperature of 75 and it was a wetsuit legal event. Almost everyone immediately pulled wetsuits out of their bags (including me) and we headed to the start.

The swim was uneventful, and as usual with Lifetime the swim seemed longer than other 1500 meter swims. I started 30 places back in my AG, about 90 seconds behind the first competitor. For the first 500 meters I felt someone on my feet, but I couldn’t find anyone to draft off of. Just before the first turn, my drafter tried to pass me, but apparently he couldn’t hold it and slowly fell back. At about 1000 meters my drafter (or a new one) finally made a pass and gave me some feet to draft off of into the swim finish. I didn’t use a watch, which was good because my time was a disappointing 28:34.

T1

I had a fast transition, grabbed my bike and headed out. For some reason, I grabbed my bike seat and started running with the bike. Now I have seen a lot of people do this before, but for some reason I have never done it. This was not planned – it just happened. And you know what? IT’S FAST! I was in full stride passing everyone else that was struggling to run and steer their bikes by the handlebars. Since it was a huge transition, this must have save me a lot of time. A new lesson learned.

The Bike

I finally broke down and raced with a speedometer. I know this course well and know where I should be flying and where I should be grinding. As I left T1 I took it up to about 23 mph and settled in. It was pretty windy, out of the NW and I knew the first 5 miles were going to be tough. Since I started 90 seconds back in my AG, there were several people out on the course a head of me – I just didn’t know how many. At mile two I passed two of my AGers. At mile 3 another, and mile 5 another. By mile 15 I had passed about six people in my AG. Since the 20-24 and 25-29 AG’s had started just behind me I was expecting to hear some young stud ride up on me at any moment. Just before we got to Lake Harriet at mile 17 I passed another AGer – how many were there??? Half way around Lake Harriet at mile 19 I passed another AGer. This guy looked pretty good and probably wasn’t going to be happy about being passed, so I powered up, passed swiftly and kept the pace up over a hill and around a turn back towards Lake Nokomis. In my mind he had to be the last one… As I entered T2 I realized that no one had passed me on the entire ride. Once again the old guy holds off the young studs.



T2

I knew the wind had taken some speed off the ride, but I also felt I had riden fast for the day. As I approached the dismount, I unclipped the right foot, swung it over to the left side and prepared for a running dismount. Except the left foot didn’t cooperate. I tried to unclip and stride at the same time, but ended up going down and sliding across the dismount line (technically, I think I was legal ;-). I immediately got up with no bruises or scraps and continued into T2

When I arrived at the two racks for our AG I had a truly amazing sight for the second time in my life: Completely empty racks!!! I was first off the bike.

The Run:

I knew the last guy I had passed looked good and that he wouldn’t be too far behind. Now we will find out if he was a runner. Just after mile 1 I had my answer – he was a runner. His number indicated he had started 60 seconds in front of me, so he had to beat me by over 60 seconds… He looked good and we had a lot of run course left, so I said "nice race" as he passed.

My legs felt heavy and I was waiting for my run legs to arrive. The run course is two loops run around Lake Nokomis. On each loop the course diverts onto a causeway for an out and back, giving you a view of who is in front of you and behind you. On the second loop the causeway comes at around mile 4-1/2. When we passed, he looked to be about 90 seconds in front of me… Now the question was how much did each of have left. Could I pick up 30 seconds in the last 1-1/2 miles. My run legs hadn’t arrived, and at this point they weren’t going to. I just had to force the run. For the last 1-1/2 miles I gutted it out, forcing the pace. I crossed the line knowing it was all I could give. He was waiting at the finish and it was obvious he had had a good finishing kick, beating me by 1:27. We introduced and talked about the race. I was pretty certain he was the AG winner and I was second. However, with time trial starts and the starting time differences you just don’t know for a while.



The results:

Lifetime Fitness has a really nice service for finishers: you go up to a tent, give them your number, and in two seconds they hand you a printout of all your splits and your overall placing. Final results:

2nd of 45 Finishers in AG
32nd of 1,088 Finisher OA

I was hoping for a smoking fast bike split. My bike split was 1:05:24, and that wasn’t what I had in mind (although, my computer showed the course at 25.6 miles with a 23.48 mph average). However, the wind must have had a bigger impact than I thought because I ended up with the 16th fastest bike split of the day – OA.



Next up Steelhead 70.3

See you out there

USAT Age Group National Championship

When I was putting the 2007 triathlon season together last Fall, competing in the USAT Age Group National Championship in Portland, OR was not a high priority. I had qualified for it at several races during the season, but Ironman Wisconsin was the main priority. However, after much thought, it started to make some sense and and I decided to fit it into the schedule. How bad could it be. Maybe since it was in Portland not many people would show up...

To be honest a few weeks ago I thought I was completely crazy. With all of my recent races and events I no longer knew if I was operating in recovery mode or taper mode, let alone training. The build up to the USAT Age Group Nationals included the Buffalo (MN) Olympic Triathlon 4 weeks out, the Horribly Hilly Hundreds two weeks out and the MetLife Duathlon one week out... Well, as I said, it made sense at the time. After the HHH, my legs were trashed, so I went fairly easy on the training for the week leading up to the MetLife Du.

[MetLife is a local race put on by Human Racer Gil Hannon, and every year it is one of the best races of the year. The race is 2 mile run, 11 mile bike, 2 mile run. My goal was to go sub-55 minutes. I missed it by a few seconds, but still ended up 1st in AG and 13th OA.]

Coming off MetLife my legs were still trashed and I only had four days before flying out to Portland and six days before the race. So for five days I did absolutely nothing. This was REAL hard, but I knew I needed to let my legs fully recover in order to receive the benefits of all the recent training and racing.

On Thursday a small group of us from VQ flew out to Portland for the race on Saturday. We woke up on Friday morning to temps in the low 50's and rain. The forecast for Saturday was 70's and clear, but we still wanted wanted to pre-ride the course. We decided to head over to race headquarters and get the check-in out of the way, and try a ride in the afternoon (besides, there was a mandatory Friday afternoon bike check-in at T1).

As we were going through the check in process I noticed a lot of people that looked to be about my age. And they all looked very fit and potentially fast. Throughout the process we spoke with a lot of people, and everyone was saying the same thing: since the race was on the west coast it had attracted a large and competitive field. Great. So much for not many people showing up. By now I had heard there were 60 people that had signed up for my Age Group (and everyone of them had also qualified to get in).

After check-in we headed over to the race site for a pre-ride and bike check in. On the drive into the race site it was obvious this was going to be a tough, hilly race. The bike leg was to circle Hagg Lake twice and the run was an out and back along the last three HILLY miles of the bike course. On the pre-ride we discovered there weren't any stretches of the course that allowed for high speed cruising. it was either a twisting road going up or a twisting road going down. This was going to be a challenging and technical race. It needed to be a balance between hammering hard and saving some legs for the hilly run.

Race Day:

We woke up a little before 5:00. The sky was clear, but it was 43 degrees! We hoped that the sun would warm up the course quickly. We headed over to the race site to prepare. Once on site we re-pumped tires and setup our transitions areas. I met several of my age group competitors in my bike rack area and it was obvious most of these guys were here to race. All top end bikes, complete with disc wheels. Crap, this was going to be hard.

The Swim:

As I was lining up for the in-water swim I looked up and down the line. At most races I try to figure out who the "fish" are. At this race I determined that most of these guys were fishes. More great... I started talking with a guy next to me. He was from the west coast and he started pointing out all of the west coast tri-studs and said this was the deepest 50-54 AG ever. Even more great... Soon the race started and the group headed out (I did sneak a look at my watch and it was exactly 7:30). The swim was out and back, with the out was straight into the sun. This made sighting very difficult so I kept an eye on the group out in front of me. After about 400 yards I noticed that a 25 yard gap had opened between me and what seemed like half of my AG. This was not good, so I decided to put in an effort to bridge back up to the group. By the time we made the turn around I had closed the gap. However, just before the turn I took a peek under my arm to see what was behind me, and I saw a nice line of swimmers that had tagged along for the ride. The cruise back to T1 was at a brisk pace, but being in the draft group made it comfortable. When I crossed the chip mat, I glanced at my watch and saw it was a 25 minute swim. Right where I wanted to be - Game On!

The Bike

Coming into T1 I noticed that while it was still cool, the sun made it seem not too bad, so the early morning temps were slowly warming.

The bike was tough. Two loops of a very hilly, twisty course. Within the first several miles I started playing cat and mouse with two guys that definitely knew how to ride bikes. As usual I played it conservative not to draft, but these guys cut the rule very close - maybe 10-15 feet. Along the way, we started passing some of the AG fishes that had gotten out on the course before us. At around mile 3 we encountered a semi-truck - IN OUR LANE... STOPPED!!!! Talk about breaking your concentration! After we dealt with that fiasco, we started up the biggest climb of the loop - a little over a mile long. Just over the top I saw the first draft marshal... or, should I say he saw me. He pulled up next to me and stayed there for about a quarter mile. Now that will unnerve you. I was the one trying to stay clean, so why was he on my wheel? As we started the second loop the 20-24 and 25-29 AGers were starting their first loop. This made the course somewhat crowded. Half way through the second loop my friend the draft marshall was back on my wheel. At the time there was a draft pack 100 yards up in front of me and I was trying to avoid getting caught near it. But just the same he hung on my wheel. Then he started to write in his little book. Crap! A penalty! WTF did I do? Oh well, there was still a race going on and my cat and mouse guys were still in sight as we entered T2. It was a tough bike and I was glad to have it over.

The Run:

This was what I was afraid of. Getting passed by lots and lots of runners on the 10k. However, just like at Buffalo, I came off the bike with loose legs and got into a great stride and cadence before I even exited T2. The run course was very hilly with several long steep up and downs on the way out to the turn around. Pretty soon I started passing runners from other AG's, and by mile 1 I passed the first runner in my AG. Hmmmm. As I got close to the turn around I started counting runners coming at me that appeared to be in my AG based on their race numbers or their apparent age: one, two, three... fourteen, fifteen... It was hard to tell because not all of the runners had their numbers facing forward (a trick I am guilty of on out and backs). Just before the turn around I passed another AGer. (Maybe 14th at this point?). Then right at the turn around I got passed. Crap. My legs were now in the run groove and it was time to hammer the final 3.1 miles. Soon I picked off another AGer. At mile 4 I passed another, and at mile five I got another going up a hill. At mile 5.5 I got one more and it was time to put on the final kick and fly into the finish. It hurt, but maybe I was in 11th, and if there where penalties on people in front of me, AND if I had somehow avoided a penalty... Even though the run was hilly, my legs felt great, and I was happy to learn later that I ran a 45:36.

The Finish:

I crossed the line in 2:22:55. WOW. I will be honest, for that course I was very thrilled with my time. However, my fellow AGer's were congregating around the finish line and there were a lot of them. No way was I 11th. There were way too many people. Top 20 maybe, but no way top ten. At the USAT events they do not post the results until the awards ceremony and banquet later that night. So we had to pack up our bikes and go back to the hotel before we could head over the awards ceremony at 5:00PM to see the results.

The Results and Summary:

No Penalty!!!!!
18th of 48 finishers in AG
355 of 1061 finishers OA
(USAT only posts finishers and excludes DNF's and DQ's)

What shocked me in looking at the results was how competitive the race was. I guess the fact that it was USAT National Championship, this should not have been a surprise. 1st place through 20th were separated by 14 minutes. And 11th through 20th place were separated by only 4:30. Also, based upon the roll down, I probably qualified for TEAM USA and the World Championships this September in Germany (top 16 and roll downs). That's pretty cool, but I already have a race on my September calendar. ;-)

In the end, it was a tough race. A fun race. And for me it was a personally rewarding race. I am glad I did it and I may want to go back in a few years - maybe when I'm 55.

Next up:

Lifetime Fitness
Steelhead 70.3
Ironman Wisconsin

See you out there.