Port Macquarie Half Ironman 2010

31 October 2010

Expectations were low.

I entered this race for a bit of fun and to hang out with Tab doing her first ever Half Ironman. Going under 3 hours at the Sydney Marathon was my main focus for the 2nd half of the year, so I focussed almost entirely on running the last few months at the expense of any real bike work. I knew that with only 4 weeks to 'cram' in between I was unlikely to do very well, but hopefully have a good tune up race to kick off my training for Taupo ironman next March.

• This was only my 2nd time riding the new bike (the first was a ride at West Head last weekend).
• The first time ever riding deep dish wheels (Flashpoints I borrowed from Wes on Thursday night)
• I didn't bother tapering at all, apart from cutting 10 mins off my Tuesday Hurts run session.
• I also decided to try a bit of new stuff in the race - Torq bars on the ride which I'd never tasted before (they're fairly new and the only vegan powerbar I've seen), and a caffeinated gel on the run. I don't do caffeine in real life or racing, but thought I might give it a try.

The result?
I think it was as much luck as anything else that I had a good day out there, but I was astonished.

56th overall, out of almost a thousand competitors (including 21 elites)
12th in my age category
I was only beaten by 3 girls!

Even better, my run leg was the 11th fastest of the day. Including the pros.
3rd in my age group.

SWIM
For some reason I was in the orange caps - seeded second slowest. I didn't think that could be accurate, so I put myself near the front of that group, but still behind all the white caps and blue caps, so quite far from the starting line.



I've been really enjoying my swimming lately so was hoping my technique had improved, but it's hard to know whether that translates into a faster time. Certainly I am now more comfortable in the water than I've ever been, so I was pretty confident that I'd have a good swim at least.

From the gun I was passing white and blue caps. My stroke felt good, I was comfortable and relaxed and I didn't get passed once (probably because most of the field was ahead of me!) There were only three or four times throughout the whole swim that I had to mosey along slowly because I had an unbreakable phalanx of swimmers locked together impeding my progress. That's pretty good for a thousand starters in the water. Even then I only had to paddle for a short while before I found a gap each time.

My sighting was spot on and I managed to swim the straightest open water swim I think I've ever done. After the turnaround I knew I had a lot more, so I figured I might as well pick up the speed on the way back. I had stuck my garmin 310XT in my swim cap (another first) to see if I could record the swim and it worked great. So it actually looks like my feeling was correct, I swam a very straight line and my first km was 16:44 while my second km was 14:04

Swim 0:30:59

Overall : 170
Category : 39

TRANSITION 1



BIKE
The new bike felt good from the start. Thankfully I'd had it fitted properly by Blair, because even with only my second ever time riding in a TT position, it was really comfortable.

I had my garmin as my bike computer and didn't have speed displayed at all. Only Cadence, HR and ride time. So the plan was to try to keep my cadence around the 90 mark as much as possible, while keeping the HR aerobic and my body position down on the bars as much as I could.

This seemed to work well, I found a gear which allowed me to pedal comfortably hard at a heart rate between 145 and 155. Basically I worked out that one gear harder my cadence dropped dramatically and I couldn't hold over 85 without burning my legs up. So I guess that was my limit and I just worked it, focusing on complete revolutions.

Ate one third of a bar every 25 to 30 mins. I drank only out of my profile bottle which was in a really good position for me to take regular small sips without moving my arms.

Finished the first of two laps in 1:20, feeling pretty good, but not sure what to expect. Riding has always been my weakest leg and to be honest I was concerned that I'd maybe pushed a bit too hard already and would die in the arse in the second half (as I tend to do).

Going out of town I felt my legs heavy on the hills, but once I hit the flat section after the golf course the tailwind was pushing me along and I thought "this is going to really suck coming back, so I might as well work a bit harder and try to make the best of it while it's working for me". I kept a good rhythm and seemed to be passed by only the odd person, not the legions that normally blow by me at this end of the bike leg.

The "race-ready" bike with Wes's wheels:


My theory was correct. At the turnaround it was clear that the wind had picked up markedly and the last quarter back into town was going to hurt a lot. Wind typically kills me. As a light rider with very little leg strength I find it hard to push through.


Oddly though, after the first five minutes of whining to myself, once I stopped fighting myself I suddenly realised that I was doing ok. I managed to find a gearing (small chainring, 14 or 15 on the back) which let me do my 90rpm at 150 HR and felt good. I guess the TT position, the tri-specific bike and the aero wheels let me cut through the wind a lot better than usual as I amazing started to pass people.


I had a moment of interesting triathlon psychology. I was just trying to ride as steady as possible, but every time I would pass someone, they'd turn themselves inside out to pass me back within a couple of minutes. They clearly couldn't stand being passed and were over-exerting to get in front again. I just kept doing my thing and would go round them again shortly. It was a nice feeling, I'm not used to overtaking people on the bike.


Second half of the ride was 5 mins slower at 1:25, which wasn't a bad effort considering the wind.

Looking at my results today I noticed that everyone who was ahead of me in my category had a bike split between 10 and 15 minutes faster than mine. So there's a still a lot of work to do there, my bike time is much slower than it should be.

Bike 2:47:56
Overall : 191
Category : 45
That's official time including transition. I had it at 2:44:53



TRANSITION 2
The only thing to say here is that I needed to pee, so diverted to the portaloos. They were locked, I had a brief conversation with a woman standing outside (with a yellow "team" number on, so she wasn't even on the clock yet) who haughtily informed me that the 5 or 6 team competitors milling around near the loos were actually waiting.


Bah, no time. I figured I'd do it later. In the end I didn't go at all, I just sweated it out I guess.



RUN
I started the run feeling dreadful. No power at all in the legs. I thought "Oh no, I had a great ride at the expense of my run!" However I figured it might just be my legs getting used to changing from bike to run (esp on a TT position), so I quickened my cadence and tried to get the feeling into them. I saw Mark Fiore just ahead of me at the Panthers turnaround and thought if I can just catch him I can pace off him. Sadly Mark pulled up short with a cramp about 3km in, although I saw him later on and he managed to keep running quite well afterwards.


But speeding up to catch him seemed to set my tempo and my pace was around 4.05min/km in the first 4 km - right where I wanted it to be.




15 minutes in I took a torq gel, the banoffee flavour with something like 89g of caffeine. I wasn't sure how I'd react as I'm not a caffeine taker, but I guess it went well. By the second of three laps I was speeding up. In fact I knocked over the second lap so quickly that I was concerned I was perhaps pushing a little too hard and may cark it on the last lap.


45mins in I took my 2nd and final (non-caffeinated) gel and in between it was just a sip of water at each aid station and the rest over my head. No sports drink all day.




Last lap. I was still feeling strong, but didn't want to flog myself, so I thought I'll try to keep a steady even pace on the way out and then if I'm still feeling good at the turnaround I can smash myself. Passed Tab on the waterfront with a pat on the arse, she looked like she was running well - really upright with good form.


This was the point where I really started passing people. The great thing was that the more people I passed, the stronger and faster I felt. Purely psychological I'm sure, but it was a great boost. At the final turnaround I saw Nerissa and gave her a push up the hill for a couple of metres, then decided to take off and knock out the last 3km as hard as I could.


This was probably the best feeling I've ever had in a triathlon. I felt like I was flying, passed loads of people and knew I would finish strongly. So exciting to have such a good race!

Finish chute:




Run 1:28:07
Overall : 11
Category : 3


Once again, take away the transition time and according to my watch: 1:26:28




Official Race Time 4:47:03
Overall : 56 / 928
Gender : 53 / 723
Category : 12 / 176