NOLA 67.1??? Race Report

I promise this post will be mostly light-hearted and upbeat, but I am gonna start it off with just a bit of a soap box rant.  Cancelling the swim was RIDICULOUS.  I checked out the water the day before the race, and again on race morning.  Yes, it was choppy.  Yes, it was murky.  It’s an OPEN WATER SWIM.  The last time I did Gulf Coast(2010), the water was MUCH choppier than here in NOLA.  Races take place with ocean swims almost every weekend of the race season, and I guarantee most of those swims are at least as choppy as Lake Pontchartrain on Sunday morning.  And cancelling the swim almost 24 hours BEFORE the race begins is just inexcusable.  The organization for this race was severely lacking.  I talked to several other racers at the expo, and it seemed that the information given out at each race meeting (hourly)changed throughout the day.  And it’s all fine and dandy that every NOLA 70.3 from now on will be in some protected cove, but how does that make me feel any better about my race this weekend?  And thank goodness I didn’t stay at the host hotel, who provided shuttles TO the race site Sunday morning for all participants, but offered NO RETURN SERVICE?? 

Ok enough already, let’s get down to it!  Since no swim was in the plan, we had to complete a 2 mile run instead prior to the bike.  This was done in wave format, just like the swim, with the added bonus of a time trial start, with 2 people leaving every 3 seconds.  I chose to start at the tail end of my wave, and afterward realized this may have been a mistake.  My start time ended up not being until almost 8AM, but I finally stepped up to the mat and took off!  Well, maybe not took off, but started J.  My coach suggested doing the 2 mile preamble at about 10K pace, or slower.  I chose slower, 7:30 it is.  I didn’t want to feel winded at all coming into T1, I figured losing 1-2 mins in that first run was definitely worth it to keep my legs for the bike and run to follow.  7:30 ended up feeling a little uncomfortable so I backed off to 7:45 pace and felt much better.  I found a couple of guys running the same pace and we chatted our way through the 2 miles without any difficulty.  I came into T1 feeling GREAT.  My time was 16:11, but the run was actually 2.1 miles, so I’ll take it.

Quick T1 and out on the bike.  The winds were steady at 15-17mph throughout the day, straight out of the north.  I knew going in that if they stayed that way I’d only have two sections of straight on headwind, otherwise it was going to be crosswind all day.  Which was fine by me.  One thing about the windy season in the desert, I felt the wind today was pretty much a non-factor!  I was actually hoping for some stronger wind to maybe hurt my competition!  Anyway, I wanted to really try and do what my coach has always told suggested I do, which was negative split everything.  I took the first 15 mins of the bike really easily, just trying to find my cycling legs, making sure everything was in order.  After that, found a big gear and just kept a steady cadence.  Cursed, loudly, at the occasional pace line that passed me, but as I started at the end of my age group these were mostly the 25-29 males, so it wasn’t AS frustrating as it could have been.  Around mile 23 I picked up a ‘friend’ who proceeded to ride DIRECTLY behind me.  I let him hang out for a couple of minutes to see if he was gonna pass, but he seemed very content to ride my draft, so I slowed down and pretended to be drinking.  20, 19, 18mph.  Finally he pulled out and passed.  I stayed my 4 bike lengths behind and followed for a few minutes, but he just wasn’t going as fast as I wanted so I put in a burst and passed him.  Within 5 mins he was back, right on my wheel.  Again, I slowed and he eventually passed.  After two more rounds of this, I just stayed back, as we were about to hit the first section of headwind.   We hit the headwind and BAM, I put the hammer down.  As I rolled past him I looked at him and gave him my best EAT SH*T smile.  I crushed the next two miles and hit the turn around.  Now with the tailwind I was flying, and I saw he was still a good 90 seconds  from the turnaround.  I smiled and waved and kept going J  Number 921, you short little man, wherever you are, grow a pair and do your own work.  With just under halfway still to go, my legs felt great and I knew it was time to start pushing a little bit more.  This is where my decision to start at the back of my age group might have been a bad idea.  By this time the line of bikes had really thinned out and I was no longer seeing any 35-39 year olds.  It’s tougher to keep the hammer down if you don’t see someone to chase, ya know?  Anyway, the rest of the bike passed uneventfully and I cruised into T2. 52 miles in 2:24, 21.6mph!  Definitely feeling it a little bit, ready to be off the bike, but looking forward to the run!

After a decent T2, I was out on the run.  Time to see if any of that speedwork has paid off!  I cruised through mile 1 at 7:30 pace and had to slow down at least a half dozen times.  Yes my legs felt  wonderful immediately off the bike(didn’t ride hard enough??), but I’ve got a long way to go!  I slowed down just a bit more and tried to keep the next several miles around 7:35-7:40.  I really wanted to negative split my run if possible.  Hit the halfway mark right around :49, and still felt STRONG.  Definitely thought I was gonna go under 1:40.  Tried to pick it up at that point and pushed the pace up to about 7:15, but after less than 30 seconds I’d glance down and be back to that 7:40 pace.  Dang it!  Go faster Jeremy!  I continued to kinda go up and down til about mile 10, and that was when I started having my first trouble of the day.  Just some mild GI cramping, I never had to stop or even walk, but definitely had several spells where I slowed way down to try and let it pass.  I also started to feel the fatigue at this point, and my last 3 miles ended up with about an 8:05 pace.  I finished up with a 1:41, so close!  Not my goal but a 14 minute PR for a Half-Ironman run!  HUGE IMPROVEMENT!

Overall I have to give myself an A for this race.  Things couldn’t have gone much better!  My nutrition was spot on.  My bike was right where I thought it would be.  I feel that personally I’m a little faster runner than my time, but still a GINORMOUS leap from my last Half-Ironman. 

Now, I’m gonna play with the numbers, because I’m a numbers freak.  And I know this is all speculation, because there’s no way to know that I would have had the same bike and run if I’d have to swim, but… I finished in 4:24.  Minus the 16 minutes for the first run gives you 4:08.  Add on 4 miles on the bike at 3min/mi(20mph) gives you another 12 minutes.  That brings us to 4:20.  I was prepared to CRUSH this swim.  My swim workout last Thursday was 4x500m at 7:30 with 1:00 rest.  So, even with a choppy swim, I definitely should have finished this thing in 4:5x.  Again this is all speculation but helps me put it all in perspective. 

I’ve really been kind of dreading Ironman CDA since Hunter was born.  I’ve skipped a lot of workouts to stay and spend time with Joy and him, and I definitely don’t regret that!  I’ll choose them over silly triathlon any day!  And I’d probably have skipped even more if Joy hadn’t been pushing me out the door.   Because I’ve missed so much I was really feeling unprepared, but this race has given me oodles of confidence!  Now if I can just keep that confidence for the next nine weeks…until next time, cheers!