New Jersey State Triathlon, Race Report #5

One week after the NYC Triathlon, I raced the third annual NJ State Triathlon. I've competed in this Olympic distance race since it began in 2006 and it holds a special place in my heart as it was the very first triathlon that I ever did. My first year, I finished in 2:59--my goal had been to break 3 hours. This year, more experienced and much fitter, I was hoping to go sub-2:20.

The week between NYC and NJ State was a light one for me. I had decided early in the year that I'd try to pull off good performances on these shorter races by taking training light in July and then just kick up my volume right after. Although this decision might hurt my base that I was developing for the Ironman, I think it was the right decision in retrospect: it gave my some speedwork and variety in my training and I really did end up getting the chance to nail these two triathlons.

Anyway, coming in off of some easy weeks and basically having had 0 training post-NYC, I was nervous about how I'd perform in New Jersey. Also, I've neglected my swim pretty badly this summer and with no wetsuit and no current, I was a little worried about the water.

My parents had come down to the US with some friends to watch the race... exciting since they'd never seen me compete during my three years as a triathlete. Of course, this also added a little pressure to kick it hard.

I spent two days before the race just taking it easy with the family and showing them around the area--the race takes place right near Princeton. On Saturday, I checked in at the race site and heard the standard pre-race talk. I also took my bike out for a little spin just to check on the race wheels and do a little last minute tuning. I hadn't ridden these roads since I graduated over a year before and, much fitter now, I decided to have a little fun and gun it around my old haunts.

Here's a picture of me headed out from the hotel to explore the area... I'm sporting my SBR team bib-shorts with my old Princeton jersey for kicks.

Saturday night, my parents, their friends and I all had a nice meal and then I was off to bed. I had already warned everyone that Sunday was going to be an early morning but I don't think it really hit them until I woke up at 4:45 am. My dad drove me over to the race site and I got all prepped in transition while he swung back by the hotel to pick everyone else up. I had a lot on my mind that morning--we had received news two days earlier that my grandfather had passed away suddenly--so I spent a little extra time in transition making sure everything was good-to-go and trying to clear my mind.

The week before had been a relatively easy race in my category; Ironman Lake Placid had a lot of the competition tied up. This race, however, had a really strong U25 heat and I definitely spent a good amount of time sizing up the competition.

We all headed over to the swim start (about 1km away from transition) right around 7am. I had to kill a fair amount of time while the sprint waves left... as usual I spent this chatting with people and giving a few tips/encouragement to first timers.

My wave headed out around 8:10. The start was fast but not too, too crowded. Only got hit a few times. Took me a long while to find a pace and, stupidly, I spent a lot of the swim trying to draft off of fellow racers. Unfortunately, I chose guys who really couldn't swim straight and this ended up costing me time and focus. Oh well. After the final turn, the swim just seemed to take forever and I couldn't really spot the exit. I eventually got out of the water, sprinting to the ramp out of the water. I checked my time on the way out: 32 minutes. Faster than last year, but in general, a pretty shitty time. I knew I'd have to make it up on the bike.

I gunned through transition and was out pretty fast. Having spent a good amount of time improving my transition technique, I think I was able to make up a few seconds here. The run to the bike start was long and that favoured me; I leave my shoes clipped in and slide into them while riding, so I'm able to run much faster with my bike during T1.

The bike went well. The first half has a lot of stupid turns to make up mileage and this becomes annoying. I spent a good amount of the race passing and then being passed by this one guy. At first, we were pissing each other off because everytime you are passed you're required to fall back about 10m to avoid drafting penalties. By the end, we were laughing at each other... we both had such close paces that we just couldn't manage not to do this back-and-forth.

Coming in off the bike, I had only been passed (without passing back...) once. A good sign. I gunned it through T2 and headed out for the run. It was a HOT day and I had trouble keeping cool. Thankfully, they had tonnes of icy towels and that made a huge difference. Managed 1 Gu during the run and a decent amount of fluid. By mile 4 (like the week before), I was hurting. I held strong through the final hills and had a decent kick at the end. I sprinted to the finish hurting, but ok. And, again, like the week before, I almost collapsed at the end. The race officials are so funny. They go to catch you but let you stumble as much as possible before grabbing you to avoid (if possible) getting covered in a mixture of lake water, sweat, Gu, "sport drink" and potentially other nice fluids. In the end, I was ok, lay down and checked my watch. 2:19 by my count. Personal best for the course and for Olympics in general. Nice! I'd like to think that my grandfather--an avid athlete--would have been proud.

My family gave me a little time to settle and then I grabbed my stuff and we headed off.

And now, a few pictures from the race...

Exiting the water after the swim.

Sprinting up from the swim exit into T1.

Running my bike out from T1 to the bike mount point.

Headed out on the bike and getting ready to put my feet in my shoes.

Defeating the purpose of a Giro aerohelemnt by looking down at something...

Running my bike into T2.


Headed out on the run.

About 1/2 mile into the run.

Grabbing some aid at about the 3-mile marker.

Headed out to the second half of the run.

Finished and ready to grab my stuff and go home.

My parents first time watching a triathlon!

Sue and Blaine--cheering section and official photographers.

Cleaned up and headed home.

Lots of thanks to Sue for providing most of the great pictures!

Nautica New York City Triathlon, Race Report #4

The Nautica NYC marked the beginning of my 2008 triathlon race season. The event, an Olympic distance triathlon (1500m swim, 40km bike, 10km run), was a pretty lightweight challenge given my Ironman training and was a good chance to just go all out and see how I could do. From the moment I got out of the water, I had planned to go as hard as possible and, in the end, this seemed like a pretty successful strategy.

My only beef these days with Olympic triathlons is that they're pretty short for the amount of preparation involved. Having not raced anything but road races since my Half Ironman last October, I had completely forgotten what goes into a race weekend. On Saturday, I spent an hour checking in at the official race hotel and then took it easy for the afternoon. Later that evening, I hauled over to the west end of Manhattan to get my bike checked in and prep my transition area.

By the time I arrived home from all of this, it was 9PM and I still hadn't started getting my nutrition and swim and run equipment ready. It took about two hours to get everything ready (since I hadn't done real race prep in so long) and by 11 I was finally ready for bed.
I managed to squeeze in 5 hours of sleep and then got up so I could eat a little and get down to the race site. Although my wave didn't leave until 7am, the race started quite early and the transition area was closing at 5:45.

Unfortunately, when I went downstairs, I found that a massive party had gone down and a bunch of drunk people had moved all my nicely prepared gear in every direction. After 30 minutes of scrambling to find my heartrate monitor, shoes, wetsuit, etc. I was finally out the door. I greeted the local corner drug dealer and hopped in a cab headed down to the west side.
The transition area buzzed even though it was only 5am. I took my time doing final preparations on my bike and running gear and laying things out nicely. At 5:30, I met up with other guys on my team; we all Body-Glided up, grabbed our wetsuits and made the 1 mile trek uptown to the swim start.

The race consisted of swimming about a mile down the Hudson River, hitting transition, biking north on an out-and-back 40 km bike course, transitioning again and then making the final haul--a 10km run--into and around Central Park.

The swim went quite well, although currents weren't nearly as favourable as expected. I tried to do some drafting but the group broke up a fair amount and this was tough. Adding to the difficulty was avoiding the many jellyfish--only got stung 4 times-- and navigating around the physically challenged wave. (As an aside, hats off to these champions. Everything from the legally blind to people with various amputations, these guys really made you realize what can be accomplished with hard work and dedication.)

I finished the swim in about 22 minutes, jump up on the make-shift pier and gunned it to transition. I wasn't really sure how far back I was but I suspected that my swim had been pretty weak (I've neglected this leg far too much this year). As I ran towards transition (which was more than 500m away), I passed a bunch of guys. This was all in keeping with my plan to go as hard as possible and not worry about blowing up.

Out on the bike, I blew past a bunch of people in my age category in the first 20 minutes. Then, I just started picking off people from the swim waves that had left 30 minutes before me. My legs were screaming, especially on the hills, but I settled into a decent pace and felt reasonably good out on the bike. The aero helmet and Zipp 404s really added to my confidence and, in the end, I think I took down about 400 people on the ride.

Getting back into transition, I was worried about my legs. I hadn't done much short course preparation this year and was pretty sure that a hard ride was going to kill me on the run. But, in the end, the legs were pretty good. I made it out of transition, worked my way up the first hill and then picked up my pace as I headed for the Park.

Things didn't start to really hurt until about mile 4 of the run and, at this point, I was so close to the end that I just sucked it up. There was a brief moment of in-the-mouth-vomitting but other than that, things went pretty well. Passed a good number of people on the run and gunned it at the end. Crossing the finish line, I had no feeling for how I'd done in my age category, but given that I nearly fell over a few steps after finishing, I knew that I had given it my best. I was also quite happy with my 2:25:29 as it was a personal record.

A day later, I checked online and found out that I had come 3rd for U25 men and had qualified for the age group national championships out in Dallas. Now, I'm just debating if I can race those post-Ironman. More to come on that front.

And now for a few pictures from the race...

On the way out on the bike, drinking from my aero bottle.

Downhill coming back around kilometre 21.

Drinking from the aero bottle.

Goldman Sachs Tech Cup and JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge, Race Reports #2 and #3

These are long overdue, but I figured that they were worth getting down.

GS Tech Cup: This Spring I competed in the "Goldman Tech Cup" for the second time--this race was formerly the "GS Unofficial Corporate Challenge" but we wanted to add a little bit of prestige to it this time round. The race is organized by managing directors in Technology who basically all want to vie for having the fittest employees. Each of the six teams had five runners, one of whom had to be a woman and one of whom had to be the MD. The race course was a 4.2 mi loop of Central Park.

We had won the race last year--a good thing since our MD is extremely competitive and made it clear that it was going to be a bad time if we didn't clean up. This year, we were aiming to take a second win. Oh, and beyond bragging rights, winners get the chance to drink for free!

The teams were definitely much more stacked this year. When we rolled into the Park the evening of the race, we were shocked by how strong the competition looked.

My boss, John, and I had decided that this year we were going to try for 1st and 2nd. We had taken 2nd and 3rd the year before and were looking to improve. Our strategy was simple: run as fast as possible and try not to blow up.

When the gun went off, the front runners bolted. I was wearing my SBR team kit and figured that I needed to stick out front for a bit to at least justify the way I was dressed. (Note: most people we wearing standard t-shirts and shorts.) I took the lead around 300 yards in and lead the front pack through the 1st mile marker. By the end of mile 1.5, the pack had narrowed to 4 runners. Although sticking in 2nd or 3rd place for the first half of a run is probably a better place to be than out front, I figured my best bet was to lead the group and try to control pacing. This worked pretty well and by 2.5 miles in, there were just three of us left out front. At the 3rd mile marker, I started to break down. The two guys I had been leading pulled ahead by about 100 yards over the course of the next minute. At this point, I didn't have any real kick left and I was forced to resign myself to sticking in 3rd (with the hope that one of them would blow up before the end).

I crossed the finish line pretty torn up. The humidity had been awful and I was decently happy with my 6:06 / mile pace. John came 5th with a solid finish considering how little training he's been able to do this year.

Once everyone finished, we all migrated to the bar. After an hour of drinks / suspense, it was announced that we had won again. Nothing could trump the smirk on my MD's face as he walked around and (sort of) congratulated the competition. The night concluded with many more beers than it should have and my boss playing wingman. All in all, a good race!

Some pictures:

My MD, Damian, stretching alongside the competition.

The startline. I'm obscured in the second row in my yellow and black SBR singlet.

The announcement that we won. Damian's immediately pumps his fist into the air!

The winner's circle.

And the second annual champagne Tech cup chug!

JPMorgan Chase Corporate Challenge: This was a race that should not have mattered. Only 3.5 miles and awfully big crowds. But, I had gone in March and made a bet with a friend that a) he could not break 24:30 on the course and b) he couldn't beat me. There was a significant amount of money riding on this run and so, when I showed up feverish and sick from some bad training-related heatstroke, I was reluctantly forced to take things seriously.

I got to the race really early so I could queue up in the elite coral. This was a good decision since there were some 17,000 runners in the race. The humidity was awful and storms were brewing. As I stood around waiting for the start, all I could think about was how sick I felt and how little I wanted to run. Oh well!

When the gun went off, I kicked out of the start as fast as possible. I was across the startline in 3 seconds and proceeded to gun it through the first three hills of the course. The rain had started and slippery conditions made it difficult to really light up on the downhills.

All my training has been for long-course so I'm not really used to the pain of a "short" run. This caused some issues around mile 2 when I started to feel the lactic acid build up and my legs slow down. I tried to pace myself but really couldn't and just ended up throwing as much as I could into the run without blowing up.

I ended up finishing in 22:36, about 1.5 minutes off of my desired time. I crossed the finish right next to another guy from Goldman and we both agreed that conditions had really slowed us up.
The silver lining was that my fever subsided that night, I came 3rd in all of Goldman Sachs and my buddy (failing to break 24:30) owes me some drinks at the bar.

Hanging with the greats

It has been 2 months since my last post has gone up. Training has been going really well save for one week of pretty bad, sun-induced illness. Lots to talk about... Will try to get a few updates posted in the next few days to cover my bases. Well, possibly one of the coolest things to happen in the last few weeks was SBR Tri Team's special event in Central Park with the Challenged Athletes Foundation (CAF). The event consisted of a short run of 5 or 6 miles lead by none other than Dave Scott (6-time World Ironman Champion) and Scott Tinley (2-time World Ironman Champion)... We are talking the best of the best! The event was designed to give people the chance to meet Dave and Scott and to promote the CAF's work.

Scott Tinley

Dave Scott

The CAF is group responsible for promoting athleticism in physically-challenge athletes... And they certainly do not mess around. Among the athletes at the event, for example, was a young swimmer--both of his legs removed beneat-the-knee--who is competing at the ParaOlympics in Beijing for fly and IM. Also in attendance was a remarkable young lady--the first woman with an above-the-knee amputation to complete the Ironman. Absolutely remarkable!

Anyway, the evening was great and really sparked an interest for me in the Foundation. I am now thinking of trying to do some work with the group. Oh, and the run was definitely amazing. Dave and Scott are just the friendliest guys and to spend a short jog with two of the best triathletes in history was incredible. Haha, and along the run whom did we pass? Lance Armstrong, who was out for a short run himself. Only in New York....

And the perfect way not to recover from Saturday's race

... is crowd surfing for 3 hours on Sunday.

'nuf said:

Brooklyn Half Marathon -- Race Report #1

This past Saturday I officially fired up my 2008 race season and ran the Brooklyn Half. I had originally hoped to do the Ocean Drive Marathon back at the end of March, but that plan was nixed when I managed to really mess up my IT band in mid-January. Since hurting myself, I've spent a bunch of time in the pool and on the bike. I know that the break has definitely taken a toll on my running but I have decided this is the year to be smart and take the long-term approach to racing; With my big races later on in the year, recovery is way more important than maintaining fitness and risking further injury. Anyway, with my leg finally recovered, I decided that it was time to test the engine a bit and get a race under my belt.

As a preface, I'll begin by saying that the Half didn't really go all that well. Nonetheless, I took a lot of lessons away from it and, in that regard, I think that it was a decent race.

As usual, I introduced a little pre-race stress by not registering ahead of time and then cutting my timing really close on race day. I always seem to have a pre-race plan but more often than not I find a way to throw it to the wind... Well, on Saturday I woke up at 6:30. Registration was open from 7:30 until 8:30 and I figured 2 hours was more than enough time to make it to Brooklyn. Of course, the subway wasn't as fast as I had expected and I ended up having to run a decent clip when I reached Coney Island to make it to the registration tent. Oh well, call it a warm-up. Lesson #1: sign up ahead of time.

After registering, I headed to queue up in the second corral. The race was relatively small -- 5000 runners I've been told -- so I could actually see the front of the pack before we took off. There were a few pre-gun comments from the organizers and then we were off. My plan had been to take the run pretty easy and just get a feel for my race fitness at this point in the year. Having gotten a lot of course-specific tips from my SBR buddies and a very detailed race strategy from Lidia, I figured I'd run 7:15s or 7:30s for the first 9 miles and then pick it up once we hit Prospect Park. My legs were pretty juiced from 3 hard weeks of periodization and I could always pick up the pace later. I even decided not to wear a watch so I wouldn't be tempted to gun it.

Lesson #2: Not wearing a watch does not prevent you from gunning it. When we took off I found myself moving a little faster than I had expected... Probably about 7:05s. At the first turn-around I caught a glimpse of a my friend who ran Cross Country for Princeton. I remember thinking, "Hmm, I'm only about 300 m back from her, maybe I'm going a little too quickly." Well, needless to say I wasn't running 7:05s. When I hit mile 4, the clock read 27:45. "Uh oh!" Now, back in my day, I have run 1:30 halfs but I knew my running fitness post-injury just wasn't there and this was probably a little fast for me. "Oh well," I figured... My legs were a little tired from my training but my heart rate didn't seem too high... "Maybe I can hold this... maybe I'll even hit 1:30." Well, by mile 8, things starting falling apart and all I could think about was how I hadn't even hit the hills yet.

Anyway, the race got bad quickly. And the worst part was that I basicaly spent the last 6 miles just flipping out on myself in my head. "Why aren't you running as well as you used to?! Why did you take the opening so fast... everyone said to pick it up at the end and you've just done the opposite?! Why isn't my gel sitting as well as normal?! How does this possibly seem harder than the half at the end of a 70.3?!" (Lesson #3: gels go down much better when you plodding along during a slow run at the end of a tri than when racing a half.)

Once we got into the park I just tried to hold the hills together as well as possible, but I really couldn't get my focus back. At some point, Hillary passed me and gave me a little encouragement which picked me up for a mile or so. Then I ended up just trying to hold on. And of course, as a newcomer to the City and having never run Prospect Park, I had no idea that the race was basically some rolling hills for the last 4 miles. Great...

I hit mile 12 and was really slowing down. At some point, a cyclist passed me and yelled out something like "let's hurry up SBR." It was the kick that I needed. Pulled it together for the last mile and gave a pseudo-decent kick at the end.

I ended up finishing in 1:42. Oh, and then I walked the 0.5 mile to the train shivering because I didn't bring a warm-down jacket... Lesson #4: check a bag with warm stuff.

So, I guess the morning was pretty disappointing. In the end, it was even the time that got to me but that the race just felt so bad. I'm doing my first Ironman this year and to have such a bad half marathon was big wake-up call.

The upside of the race was that I then went home and put down about 70 miles on the bike. The legs were cooked at the beginning but I found a good rhythm by the time I was headed back to the City along 9W. Also, my nutrition went nicely on the bike and I had no problems with the gels/bars at all. By the time I got home, I had a smile on my face and was at least proud that I got out and had a nice ride.

So, I think the take-away from Saturday is that a) my running has definitely suffered from my injury and I'll have to put in more time there but b) my riding is coming along nicely. And, I have a good amount of time until the IM so I'll definitely have a chance to get a lot more racing (road races and tris) under my belt and build up that confidence.

Thanks to Hillary and the unidentified cyclist for race day encouragement and to everyone who gave me pre-race advice... I promise I'll listen better next time!