Charleston Sprint Series - Race #1

Hey Everyone! So I had a GREAT race this last weekend! It was awesome to come away with a win on my only race of the year. (The military has "other plans" for me.)

 But this race was a BLAST. But before you read the rest of this blog, you need to watch this video... (see below). It my attempt to do a "vlog" with the kids. And it completely failed on the race report report front, but yielded some pretty awesome results on the "kid humor" front (and I included a couple shots of the race too). I thought it was pretty funny...


So the race went REALLY WELL. Obviously. I'm STOKED. It was awesome to be the first across the line. I think I'm most happy that I won without putting in as much training, because I'm mostly taking this year off racing. I really only did this race for fun because my Uncle Mike came to visit us, and we wanted to do it together. So I really only spent about 5 hours a week prepping for the last couple months. But here's how it went:

Uncle Mike and I got there and grabbed our spots in transition and checked in. We chatted with some of the other athletes. I talked with Sandy, Carole, Jacob, Krista, and some other swimmers from my masters team who were all racing. (Our swim team pretty much rocked the entire swim, BTW. The first 15 people out of the water were almost all Palmetto swimmers...)

So as I was getting in the water and putting on my goggles, *SNAP!* My goggle strap broke. This normally wouldn't be a problem, except - oh by the way - my other pair of goggle broke last week, and I didn't replace them. So now I'm down both sets of goggles, and I'm up a creek, without a paddle, and the race is starting in like... 5 minutes. So I'm running back to transition, and Marian yells, "what are you doing?? The race is THAT way, silly!" And I explain my dilemma... so then Marian Poppins pulls out her magical bottomless bag/purse thingy, and hands me her goggles... which are the same brand as mine.

Ok..... uhm. Thank you....? *sheepish*

After that crisis was averted, I head back to the water and jump in. I hadn't warmed up yet, since (as usual) I'd taken forever getting set up in transition, and talked with a bunch of people. So after then national anthem, I tried to splash around for a couple minutes until they counted down and blew the horn.

AND off we went!

For triathletes: You know how you might know everyone around you in the swim, but then as soon as you start swimming, you forget you're all friends and you suddenly start punching and kicking each other like we're a bunch of wildebeest crossing the Nile while trying to escape the crocodiles? Yeah, that's pretty much what happened. The good news is that we all swam pretty hard and fast. Which is good, because they had lengthened the swim, so even though our official times were a little longer than last year's races; we were pushing the pace more than we normally do.

Unfortunately, because of all the kicking and punching, someone swimming on my feet knocked my timing chip off my foot. First time that's ever happened to me! But otherwise we finished the swim a little battered and bruised, but all the still ready to keep racing... heh. (I heard a couple folks panicked and had to be pulled out. I felt badly for them.)

I jumped out of the water and tried to actually hurry through T1 this time. I failed miserably when I got hung with my aero helmet. Ug..... (This one is my bad, because I hadn't practiced in advance. And the aero helmet is a bit tricky, in my defense.) As I was running out with my bike, Marian, Jenn (Marian's/our really good family friend was also in town visiting us), and Rianna were all cheering up a storm! I LOVE THAT. I also managed to yell to Marian that I'd lost my chip on the swim before I rode off.

So since I'd been passed by a bunch of people in T1, I hammered on the bike for the first 3-4 miles until I saw Jacob up ahead with the lead vehicle just ahead of him. I worked my way up to him and passed him shortly after a sharp turn. I shouted, "alright! Now let's go!" But the truth was, I needed to slow a bit to recover from the catching-up effort.

When we hit the turnaround, I felt like I had some energy again, but then we were working our way into a head-wind, so I needed to be conservative to avoid burnout. It was about this point that a "new guy," named Sterling, passed me and I thought.... "Who is that?!?" He pulled away for a mile or so, but then I increased the effort again and pulled him back in to the minimum legal distance. But then, who should come by me again but Jacob! Then he shortly passes Sterling. And then Sterling passes him back. We were both thinking the same thing, we could tell we needed to keep him close on the bike, lest he escape and we never see him on the run. But I also wanted to avoid leg-burnout. It was a battle of moderation. (Amidst all this, I spotted Uncle Mike going the other direction to the turnaround, and I gave him a holler. That was cool to spot him!)

We came in to transition together... well kinda. Sterling hit the afterburners or something, because he was out of the transition probably 20 seconds before Jacob or I. I almost forgot my race bib, but grabbed it at the last second. Then, amidst the cheering, Marian yelled that the timing folks would manually record my overall time when I finished. So not to worry about the lost chip.

I rocketed out of the transition on a mission to get Sterling. He was moving quickly and with clear purpose to hold us off. So I knew we had to get him in the early stages of the race if either Jacob or I wanted a shot at winning. I saw Jacob put down some pretty fast 5k runs on this course last year, so I also wanted to try and give myself a leading edge by pushing it early in the run and then hope I could hang on in the end.

I caught Sterling right around mile 1, and then decided that I needed to put some time into him. Even though I'd run the first mile quickly, I evaluated myself and decided I had enough in the tank to go faster. So I bumped it up a notch. When I completed the first lap around the lake, Marian, Rianna, and Jenn's cheers pumped me up and gave me a boost to bump it up even more. I didn't look back and held my own all the way around the lake again and then headed out on the dog-leg out-and-back. I got to see Uncle Mike coming in on the bike and gave him a hoot and holler; and he hooted and hollered back!

Then I hit the turnaround and saw that I'd put a good amount of time into Sterling and Jacob; who seemed to be locked in a battle at this point. It would have been enough of a gap to cruise in to the finish, but I wasn't satisfied with that. I pushed the pace even more. Knowing that I could go into the red at this point, because there was less than a quarter-mile to go. Everyone yelled and screamed as I came around the final corner to the final run-in. It's kind of special to be at a race where you've raced enough and most of the volunteers and staff know you on a first name basis.

It was awesome race. We spent the next couple hours just talking with friends and other athletes and cheering Uncle Mike in as he finished the race. Then we ate donuts, and other goodies, and waited for the awards ceremony. Then we refueled at "Boxcar Betty's", which pretty much has the best fried chicken sandwiches EVER. And then we played Candyland with Rianna after eating lunch.

Here are a few photos. Credit goes to Marian!

The Podium, From the left, Sterling, Myself, and Jacob

Fellow teammate, Jake Bergman podiumed in his age-group!

Jake and I together

Some of the Palmetto Masters swimmers

Uncle Mike and I

And then we had naps. The end.

Most thanks go to my coach: Marian. Winning races on 5 hours of training per week is not easy. And requires some tight planning. As usual, she was a big factor in ensuring this training was executed properly.

Also, I have the best team in the world! US Military Endurance Sports is a great team to be a part of. If you're military and you'd like to ask me questions about them, please shoot me a message.

As usual, Trainerroad provided me the best possible time-crunched bike training, and triathlon training plans out there. If you don't know who they are, then you're seriously missing out on one of the best cycling training gems in the world.

Also, Coach Doug and all my teammates at Palmetto Masters Swim Team. You guys are awesome, and I'm so thankful to have such a national-class team with national-class swimmer to kick my butt every day in the pool.