Boulder Peak Triathlon Race Report

About 12 days ago my body said enough and I hit a wall training-wise.  Fatigue, lack of power, and general disinterest took its toll and without taking too drastic measures my coach scaled back my training and by the end of last week I was tired, but felt recovered to have a good race.  I wasn't.

I was chatting with a pro triathlete at Master's swimming last Wednesday and he remarked that he didn't know how we age groupers did it.  Working full-time with kids and training 10 hours a week.  That was good to hear.

My pre-race went by-the-book and my swim warmup was good and I felt good.  I realized that I'd forgotten to take my GU chomps but got them in first thing on the bike.  I lined up at the front of the swim next to Steve Johnson and Eric Kenney, two VERY fast guys.  Eric asked me if I was going out hard.  I said yes.  He asked "20 minutes?"  "Probably 23," I said, "I'm finding Steve's feet and hanging on."  Eric followed with he needed 10 minutes to stay with Steve.  I said I needed 20.  Eric beat me out of the water by a little over a minute and I over Steve by around the same amount.  Of course, both then proceeded to crush me on the bike and run.

T1 was fast.  This was the first race where I left my bike shoes clipped in and while it was weird getting my feet in my shoes and closing the velcro, everything was fine.  Even with the shoes being a little lose and my feet having sand still on them, after a few minutes I didn't even notice.  Climbing out of the res on 51st and then on Jay was fine, but I should have realized something was up during the long, false flat up to the 36/Broadway merge.  My power was only slightly low, but I couldn't generate it in my aero bars - which was not normal.  By the time I hit the flats on 36 before and after Neva I was riding in my aero bars, but my power was off.  By the end of the bike, my average power was in the low 190s and it should have been between 210 and 220.  As a result, my projected bike time was way off.  I easily lost 5 minutes.

T2 was fast.  I remembered to roll my socks beforehand so I could just unroll them onto my feet (next season, I'm going to start training again without socks.  It's free speed and they're completely unnecessary).  Heading out onto the run, I realized I forgot my Garmin on my bike and had to race by feel.  I held back going out and felt ok until around mile 1 when I noticed the fatigue started setting in.  I didn't have to gut through anything just yet, I just kept running.  No stopping at the aid stations, but grabbing water to hydrate and douse to cool off.  By the time I hit mile 4, I was wiped and was struggling to just stay running.  At one point I had to stop and walk for a minute but forced myself to start jogging again.  At some point past mile 3 after the turnaround, my teammate Jeremy passed me still on his way out.  My first thought was that he was going to catch me and my second was that I really didn't care.  He caught me between miles 5 and 6 and later said that I wasn't looking great by then.  I'm sure.  I was able to pick it up a little the last half to 3/4 of a mile, but it was all I could do to get to the finish.  One positive was that while the run was hot, it didn't really bother me much.  I need to be better about dumping water on my front and and not just the top of my head and down my back.

Thanks to my coach Billy Edwards, my team Foxtrot Wheel & Edge, my teammates, my sponsor GU Energy, Colorado Multisport, and my wife for the support.

Race Results:

165th overall (149th out of 557 men, 948 total athletes, including relays)
32nd out of 98 in age group
Swim (1500m):  21:59 (3rd fastest in AG, and 21st fastest overall)
T1: 1:37
Bike (26 mi): 1:13:23 (37th in AG)
T2: 1:09
Run (10km):  53:16

Total:  2:31:25