Lake Stevens 70.3 & Solana Beach Triathlon Stories

I know most endurance athletes have had an injury that’s held them back at some point in their lives, so I really don’t need to stress the point far, but damn… injuries are annoying. I lost a little over 3 months of my year to a lower leg injury (or gained 3 months of solid swim/bike fitness..). The good in this is that I feel MEGA fresh at the moment and am chomping at the bit to work hard and race now that I’m running again. I’m going to make a solid push in fitness for some “late season” races and hopefully get back to where I was at before my leg decided to be a party pooper.

Lake Stevens 70.3

Yes, I'm in a women's tri suit.

I love everything about this race. The location is rad; It’s like racing in the middle of a forest. The swim course is in a lake with rowing lines to follow (which, with my Stevie Wonder sighting, is a game changer). The bike course is a challenging one, to say the least; with lots of technical descents and punchy little climbs. The run is a relatively flat course with a few slight grades thrown in to keep you honest. Talking with my chief advisor, Mitch Hall, it was agreed upon well in advance that I’d only do 5k of the run because I had just started running, pain free, that week. So my goal was to hit the bike leg hard and win the “bike split bet” I had going on with James Walsh.

The trip to Washington was sweet, and it was great to see a lot of my family (thank you all for being so supportive)! The weather was unpredictable & ominous though. It seems like whenever/wherever I travel to race, I always get there and the weather is insane; then the locals always say the same thing: “It’s not normally like this”, while throwing their hands up in the air as if to gesture “Don’t shoot.. it’s not my fault! I swear it’s beautiful the rest of the year”. The night I flew in, it was sunny skies and 78 degrees. The next morning it was pouring and cloudy with thunder & lightning storms.. What?!? The weather decided to stay lame like that the rest of the trip. I stayed with my family in Edmonds for a night then headed a little closer to the race site and stayed with James, Beth, & her parents for the two days preceding the race. When doing a preview ride on the course the day before, no one said it, but we all knew, bringing a disc to ride on this course was a bad choice.

Race Day:

Swim:

I had the swim I was supposed to have in Hawaii. I felt good and ended up leading the wave from start to finish. 26:06

Bike:

Most likely taken before things got stupid.

Despite the rain and wet roads, I started hard charging the bike course and was feeling fearless until around mile 20. I was maxed out and flooring it thru a downhill section and noticed a sweeping right-hand turn ahead. In normal conditions I’d have had too much speed to make it without braking, and with wet conditions, knew I definitely would’ve lost traction on the road trying to hang on. I tried to slow, but my cork brake pads didn’t grip my carbon rims in the rain, so I had a minor freak out and yanked my rear brake, full force. My wheel locked up (as I should’ve known it would) and I started fishtailing off into the other lane. Luckily, I picked the best section of the course to “pull a triathlete” on. I had a fairly controlled bail out into a grass ditch on the opposite side of the road and had slowed enough to make me look/feel only half retarded. It was more hurtful to my pride than it was to me physically. I just felt stupid for not being able to make that turn. Two guys passed by me while I was getting back on my bike and the second I started pedaling again I was completely “over” the course. I was so shaken up that every descent I took was at 1/4^th of the speed I’d have normally taken it at and I just didn’t have the drive to push hard. James caught up to me around mile 50 (his wave started 3 minutes back) and I was so stoked to see him. We rode hard the rest of the way together (legally).

No Caption Needed

Run:

The picture sums up what my 5k was like; James and I, nonchalantly frolicking around while out in front of a 70.3. We ran a conversational 6:15-6:20 pace for the 1^st 3 miles then I dropped out when we got back into town and quickly found the café for some coffee and donuts to watch the sufferfest from the sidelines.

Post race:

I dominated the Jacuzzi Marathon back at the Walsh’s pad. It seemed like (and probably was) hours of hot tub/pizza/beer action. Good times with friends after races is what it’s all about.

Solana Beach Triathlon

I wasn’t too serious about this race, but I felt it would be a fun one to do since B+L was sponsoring it, & it was in my new backyard. Mostly, I just wanted to beat up the stingray who took me out last year.

I rolled out of bed late and had a productive warm-up, charging the 4-5 miles from my house to the start in my orange and yellow snakeskin/goldfish tights from Rio (thank you, Julie). I knew there were a ton of local fast guys here, but honestly the result didn’t matter to me. I just wanted to have fun and go hard. It was the 1^st race I’ve actually been able to finish/race since Oceanside 70.3.

Before the start I went hunting for that damn stingray to give it a piece of my mind, but he flaked and didn’t show. When the horn went off, I tried to give the spectators that were lining the start to the water high fives and everyone was just really confused as I ran by with my hand in the air (fail). I think I got 2 or 3 though. I came out of the water with the front pack of guys in just over 6 minutes (Charlie was 10-15 seconds up on everyone). I don’t know what was going on in T1 but I must’ve been having a solo tea party, because everyone that I came out of the water with was already out on the bike course.

(I hate doing pitches in the middle of my blogs, but…) I have to thank Mark Palmer (B+L) for my new S-works Trivent bike shoes. That was the easiest flying mount onto my bike I’ve ever had. Those shoes are top-notch! This bike course is RIDICULOUS. 6 hairpin turns and 4 right turns in 9 miles is about 6-10 too many. Add in a circus of 1^st time triathletes on beach cruisers, unicycles, tandems, big wheels, recumbents, recumbents towing trailers with smiling loved ones, and clown cars…. you have a catastrophe waiting to happen. I caught up to Charlie, who was in the lead, at the beginning of the 2^nd lap and then was tasked with leading everyone behind me through the barrage of chaos on the 101. I almost went down 2-3 times dodging & weaving around people (including avoiding disaster at a turn with a 7 year old, who had probably just taken his training wheels off the morning before the race). I probably expelled ½ of my energy yelling “on your left”. I wasn’t even “competitive mad”, I just wanted to make it out of this alive. I’d just like to quickly note: it’s very hard to get any separation on a short & flat course with 6 turns, so I fully expected there to be packs of bunched up cyclists and can’t really complain about it. I think I had the fastest bike split of the day with a 21:40-something.

 

I got to T2 in 1^st, and got onto the 5k run course in 3^rd. Hmmm… it seems my transitions skills have disappeared completely. Once on the run course, I caught up to Charlie who was a couple seconds ahead of me and he was struggling with some cramping issues. We ran together for a bit but he dropped back a little. Tristan Bunch, who is a 16-year-old endurance phenom, had put around 15-20 seconds on me in T2 and the 1^st mile. Knowing it was my 2^nd week back running, I didn’t have too much passion to try and catch him. I just wanted to run strong and not aggravate my leg. I ended up running a steady 17:20 and hung on to 2^nd place overall (1^st place Pro). Not close to my 5k PR in a tri, but not too bad for being on the sidelines for the last 3 months. I’d like to give a shout out to a cat who was hard charging on the run, Nick Bernal (4^th place overall)… ran a 15:16!! That’s pretty impressive coming off the bike. USA ITU needs you Nick.

Overall, it was a fun day seeing people I knew all over the course and racing against some good friends. It feels good to be a triathlete again and not just an aquacyclist.

How many questionable pics can I put in this blog post?

1,2,3 pro field W/ Charlie, and Nick Sigmon

I’m seriously excited to start working hard again and get in some legit training before the 70.3 World Championship in Vegas!! I’ve also decided to add in the SUPERFROG on Sept. 30. I love a good ½ Ironman so close to home! Big thanks to my dog, Kevin, @ B+L Bikes for staying late at the shop till 9pm the night before Solana Beach, to flawlessly glue on a new tire to my disc. It’s, no joke, faultless.. I’ve never seen a more perfect tubular; Kev is a boss. Thanks to my wise coach/advisor for teaching me patience.. Lord knows I’d probably still be injured if it weren’t for Mitch, continuously calling the ‘common sense police’ on me. And finally, a massive thanks to my family for all their support, I love you guys.

Hawaii Pt. 2: I'm Good for Coffee

That was a fun vacation. I’m fairly sure I had a smile on my face the preponderance of the time, and if I didn’t, it was short lived and replaced by a look of sheer panic and terror while riding my bike (more on that in a bit). This trip was livened with great friends and good times such as: swimming daily with turtles and other tropical, fun loving, under-the-sea creatures; Blustery & death defying rides up the coast; Breaking out of guest-hotel parking; Invading and drinking on a complete stranger’s patio after racing; Crashing (flash mobbing) a wedding; Hotel bar-hopping across Waikoloa; The Great Kona Coffee-Off of 2012; Paddle boarding while buzzing out of control as a result of the Great Kona Coffee-Off of 2012; Cramming entirely too many people into a 1 man lifeguard tower; and a bit of racing. 

Lance, looking human- out of his aerobars in the wind

As I mentioned in a tweet, it felt good to go for a ride this morning and not have the growing fear of crapping my pants of the high possibility of being blown across the highway into some lava rocks. When riding, there’s wind (eg. Ah this is sucky, now I have to push a little harder) & then there’s WIND (eg. Sweet Jesus, there’s a good chance I’m going to die if another semi comes in the opposite direction). I have no idea how Lance Armstrong managed to clock a 2:01 bike split in those conditions (well, I have some idea of how he did, actually). There’s never any benefit to 30mph crosswinds other than the fact everyone has to deal and some can cope better than others. It was somewhat fun (key word: somewhat) to battle the winds on race day, and at least it took the humidity away. Normally, I’d welcome a bit of wind, because there’s no cheating the course in crosswinds, and it takes a strong cyclist to push hard for 56 miles and not rely, purely, on momentum. However, I brought one of the worst wheel sets for the wind… A set of Zipp Firecrest 808’s, paired with the massive wind sail that is the frontend of my Shiv, made for some sketchy times. The Thursday before the race I was riding with some friends out to the Queen K from the Fairmont and got blown off the road into some Lava rocks. I was laughing as it happened because there was literally nothing I could do to avoid it. Not only leaning, but turning into it as well, I was still swept off the road like (yup) dust in the wind (thank you Kansas).

Enough wind talk, let’s get to the race.

Swim:

Not too happy here.

Slightly bummed they moved the pros to their own wave before the age groupers (thank you, Lance), we started 3 minutes behind. This made for an odd swim. I was feeling pretty confident going into Honu about my swim fitness. I’d been feeling great in the pool and was ready for a good/hard day. As the race started I quickly found myself out in front. It was nice having Chris Berg’s feet to follow for the 1^st 4-500 meters. He and one other guy eventually dropped everyone, but I had a nice 4-5-person group to work with behind them. I haven’t felt that good swimming, in a race, ever. Just as we were nearing the yellow turn buoys into the beach (1-200 yards remaining) we were stopped by a paddle boarder telling us we missed a buoy and had to go back, around 3-400meters, to this buoy that was floating out in the middle of the ocean. I floated statically in disbelief and looked at my watch. The time was somewhere around 23-24 minutes (which, if we were to have swum in and finished, would’ve put my group around 2 minutes back from the majority of the pro men (who swam a suspiciously fast time, as I’ve never seen anyone but John Flanagan swim faster than 24 minutes at Honu in the last 4 years). Ended up swimming back out and meeting a mass of AG’ers and swimming into shore in 30 minutes. I finally got to check my Garmin this morning and it said my swim was 1.57 miles… hmm, ya. I have a ton of respect for Chris who actually swam in and was on the beach, goggles off, and then told to go back out because he swam “too fast”. Chris ended up qualifying for Vegas despite that swim course blunder.

Remember how 1/2 Ironman races have a 1.2 mile swim..?

Bike:

Chillin thru T1

My transition was relatively the same pace as one would move in line at the DVM. I couldn’t get my tri top on (putting a dry tri top on when you’re wet is no picnic), so I nonchalantly walked over to a volunteer and had her help me. Strolled out of T1, past the bike mount & took a solid 1-2 minutes to finally get into my shoes and move up the hill onto the highway. 

I picked up the pace and reached the front of the Age Groupers somewhere around the 4 mile turnaround out-and-back section. The bike segment was relatively boring as far as racing goes. I never felt like I was racing, knowing that I wouldn’t be doing the run. There was never that pressing feeling to push thru the times when I felt crappy. Not saying I wasn’t going hard, but there were plenty of times where I felt tired or lethargic and didn’t bother to push thru it. A dude in a grey suit passed me just before the climb to Hawi, taking on a pace that I wanted no part of, and another strong AG’er, Reilly Smith, passed me in the last 5-10 miles when I was feeling a serious lack of water/nutrition (lost my 2nd bottle during the bike mount). When I dismounted in T2 I was bummed because me legs had a lot of racing left in them, but I’ll save it for LAKE STEVENS. Official time was 2:22 for the bike segment.

I’m extremely proud to announce that I, no doubt, won the race to the beer tent. Yes, I was the first with a cold beer in my hand. Honu 57.1 champion, right here.

This injury will be sorted soon so I can get my run game straight again. Thanks to all who help and support me, especially my family, friends, and B+L Bikes! ..Also, a huge thanks to Mitch Hall for teaching me how to go faster. “Because “hope” is not a strategy”. You’re a Boss, Mitch (capital B).

Double Guns. "The Chacon"

Hawaii Pt.1: Airplane Character Stereotypes

Just swam with some Sea Turtles.. clearly stoked. #pokerface

To be completely honest, I enjoy traveling alone. When you’re in public places and not engaged in a conversation, it provides a prime opportunity to see the world in motion; to see people and how they act in various situations. People watching is one of my favorite activities, and airports/airplanes are two of my preferred people watching locations. Everyone is under the same set of rules on an airplane. No one, but the pilots and flight attendants, has any more authority than anyone else (Ok, maybe 1^st class has a slight leg up on the back 95% of the plane). So, it’s fun to see how people act and how some attempt justify their importance during flights.

There’s always “that guy” on 6-hour flights that NEEDS to stand up 20 minutes into the flight (or as soon as the fasten seatbelt sign is turned off) and start walking around & stretching. Everyone sitting in the aisles around him starts thinking “Great, I’ll be looking, sporadically, right into this guys crotch or ass for the next 5 hours and 50 minutes”. Addendum by Ben Hobbs: he’ll stay standing a little too long during/after the seatbelt sign has been turned on for landing or turbulence, just because he feels entitled to.

The Happy Shifter: They'll be getting up frequently throughout the duration of the flight to visit friends or family sitting in various locations throughout the cabin (like a bee pollinating flowers). They are ALWAYS friends or become friends with passengers in possession of a baby/small child and talk about how cute they are.

The Grumpy Old Man: this guy has been on way too many flights in his lifetime and doesn’t look at anyone but the flight attendant- and that’s only to promptly order a Jack & Coke, or just straight whisky. (Time of day has no affect on the alcohol consumption for Grumpy Old Man; If he’s on an airplane, he’s drinking & it’s accepted). Closely related to Contented Old Man, who swiftly orders a drink, only because he’s “earned that right by age”, but is pleasant about it.

Self-aware Guy: this is the guy in his mid 20’s to early 30’s who brought his 17” Macbook pro on the plane (on occasion, may have his iPad instead). He’ll be playing his favorite tv show series but constantly & cautiously looking over his shoulder when an “inappropriate scene” comes on. Actually, he’ll be relentlessly looking around anyhow, making sure he’s not breaking any airplane taboos or norms. Addendum: Self-aware Guy ironically has no idea everyone around him can hear his dance-beat club music playing thru his massive, 60-decibel, bass-booster, noise cancelling Sony headphones.

Bathroom Lady: she may be the most well know of all airplane characters. Of course she’s got the window seat. Everyone has dealt with Bathroom Lady at some point. She’ll no doubt get up 4-5 times (sometimes more) to use the facilities at the most inconvenient time (during meals, at the twist in the movie, precisely as you actually fall asleep, right after YOU get back from the bathroom & are buckled up again).

And finally, that person who keeps making awkward eye contact with you. You stood right by them in the security check and they end up sitting in close proximity to you. You don’t know why you keep connecting & you don’t really even find them appealing/attractive; it just happens like 10-15 times and keeps getting increasingly more awkward each time.

Anyways, to set it straight for everyone who is curious, I will only be doing the swim/bike portion of the Honu 70.3 this Saturday. I’ve been dealing with a little stress pull/fracture of some sort in my shin for the last 6 weeks and feel I’m nearing the end of this injury. Because my goal race is the 70.3 World Champs in Vegas (September), I’ll forego the risk of aggravating my shin any further and play it safe (If (miraculously) by Saturday I can run pain free, I will). Apparently, around this time of year, I’m more prone to injury, & It sucks to miss the run of this race two years in a row, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles (that idiom is overused and lame, but I’m in the mood for cookies, so I used it).

Looking at the upside: I’m in Hawaii (never a bad thing) & looking forward to hanging out with friends. I feel great on the bike right now, so I’m still excited to hammer out a solid 56 mile time trial on Saturday.

More to follow soon!

2012 Oceanside 70.3

-19 minutes from the time

First off, the speedo would’ve been a great call had that race been 1/4^th of the distance, not raining, and 20 degrees warmer; However, it seems like I have the best races when I don’t take myself too seriously. So, I have absolutely no regrets (as bad as my tan lines looked) #stuffthatworks. (Side note: it was definitely mud on the back of my legs, I’m not that bad at shaving. There’s always a little part of you that imagines your dream race the night before and you’re pulling off splits 10 minutes faster than you know you’re capable of. So when I was looking at my bike and run times while racing and seeing that I was not only breaking my 70.3 PR’s, but blowing them up, I was slightly surprised but not totally. I knew going into this race there wasn’t going to be any room for lollygagging. The caliber of competition in the 25-29AG was pretty thick; I believe there were at least 5 guys racing on Saturday that were at the 2011 70.3 World Championship. I went into this race knowing it was going to be a hard day.

A big step in seeing improvement at the 70.3 level started with Mitch Hall. Mitch isn’t one to jump into the spotlight so I’m going to at least shine a flashlight on him. Mitch is one of the stronger triathletes and cyclists that I know, and being one of my good friends, I asked him a while back if he’d help advise me on my training and racing. I can’t tell you how helpful he’s been and how much I’m learning (literally, I can’t tell you, this training plan is under lock & key.. sort of). It also doesn’t hurt to train with people like Lesley Paterson and pick her brain as well!

Every time I checked my watch

The Race:

I woke up dark and early, made some coffee and ate a grip of strawberry pop-tarts. Rolled thru a vacant I-5, bumpin a bit of this. Got up to the pier slightly behind schedule (standard Keith style) but made up time on my warm up ride to T1. Lucky me, my bike rack was almost completely full by the time I got there, so I had a snug little spot near the back. I met up with my buddies Chris Berg and Charlie Karstrom and chatted for a bit before the start. I was immediately made aware of 2 large holes near the crotchal region my wetsuit as soon as I touched the water and woke up real fast.

Swim:

I don’t know why I even bothered, but I started right in the mix of Charlie, Chris and Max Biessman; all fantastic swimmers. When the gun went off I made the decision to let them go and not even try to hold on their feet. That was dumb because I hit no-man’s-land within the first minute and the few fellow green caps that were by me were quickly lost in the cluster of slow moving purple and white caps from the previous waves. I thought the conditions were pretty bad compared to years past. It was fairly choppy with a bit of swell, but nothing outrageous. I wasn’t having a good day in the water. Couldn’t find a rhythm and felt “cold” and out of breath for first half. My arms finally came around after we hit the turnaround and started on back. I definitely ran into a few people on the way back (I kid you not), straight up, floating in the water. Still trying to figure that one out. Glad I missed starting my watch for the swim because I’d have been pretty upset if I saw my time upon exit, a high 28 minutes, 12^th in my AG.

The dude behind me.. just checkin out the view

Bike:

"Is this aero,,,, or this?"

While getting out of my wetsuit, my dad told me I was a little over 2 minutes behind to the front guys. That wasn’t the end of the world, so I started off at a slightly pressing but steady and controlled pace, unlike many 70.3’s where I take off, out of control, at 20k pace. The road was pretty wet. Along with a constant spray of water and mud hitting the pistons (what guns are to arms, pistons are to legs. It sounds pretty cheese & that’s why I had to use this expression #PhilLiggett) and super soggy shoes, it felt like you were pushing thru a constant puddle. I got into a nice rhythm and didn’t even realize I’d already caught up to Max and Chris after 45 minutes, who were 2^nd & 3^rd at the time. Apparently there was some mystery dude in a blue getup (who I don’t actually remember seeing at all) along for the ride behind me. I’m guessing because I was FREEZING my bunz off, and it was raining/misting the entire time on the course, I’d hardly touched my nutrition/hydration until somewhere around miles 27-30 when I was cramping bad and slowing considerably. My rear bottle, which was 1/3 of my calories, had become victim of the notorious “mile 5 bump” along with many other water bottles. So I pounded the majority of my main nutrition and tried to “find my rhythm” again. Chris rode up to me and we chatted for a bit while climbing “the hill” (kind of comical thinking back to it) and basically talked me thru my bonk. After 15-20 minutes of staying at Chris and Max’s pace, I decided I felt good enough to pick it up again. There was a long steady grade around mile 40ish and I passed by this group of 30-40 year old AG’ers drafting like little bitches off each other. Funny… I dropped them on the climb and the rolling hills, then they somehow caught back up to my rear wheel in the slight headwind on flat sections back into town.. interesting. Those guys were real cool. With around 7ish miles to go I caught up to Charlie, who looked like he had been having a blast by himself out in front all day. We basically rode the same pace back into T2. I put a little gap on Charlie in the last 2 miles. I wanted a bit of time just incase I need to think about life a bit in T2. Bike Split: 2:24

Run:

I hit the run course feeling remarkably good despite not having my planned caloric intake on the bike. I ran out to an empty run course with only Andy Potts in sight. I quickly found out he was leading the race when people were yelling splits at me of how far back I was. I got a little enjoyment out of being in “2^nd” for the first two miles. People were so amped some kid dressed like a dork was “chasing” the leader. Anyways, when I looked at my watch after the 1^st mile I hit a 5:45. “Ah, cool” I thought, “I’m cruising, lets see how long this lasts”. 2^nd mile, still feeling good, just over 6 minutes. At this point I’m thinking to myself “I might as well start pacing better, because I’m probably not keeping a sub-6 pace for the next 11 miles today”. So I tried to shoot for 6:10’s and see how I felt. Remarkably, I made it to mile 8 feeling pretty good and still had my ideal pace going. I didn’t know how far ahead I was from Max, Chris, and Charlie. They were running within a close range of each other, and all looked strong. I have to say, I apologize if I didn’t give you a nod or wave if you gave me encouragement on the run course. The “speedo” encouragement was constant, and though I enjoyed it for the first mile or two, everything became white-noise to me, whether it was attire related or not; I hit “the zone”. Somewhere around mile 10, poor Beth Walsh made it clear to me that she was getting tired of the view she had been enduring and passed me. I don’t blame her (huge day for Beth, by the way). After I hit the turnaround and was headed home, I got a high five from Charlie and kind of put it in cruise control for a bit. Mitch and Courtney caught up on their bikes and rode next to me for a good portion of mile 12 throwing out some encouragement to push it all the way back. I could tell my gas tank was on empty and was glad I didn’t have to battle with someone in the last mile. Rolled home with a 1:22 run time.

4:20:23 overall, 1^st in the 25-29 Division, 2012 Ironman 70.3 World Championship Las Vegas spot claimed.

Max, Chris, and I at the awards

Congrats to everyone that raced. It was not the easiest course/conditions on Saturday. Good to see TCSD well represented on the course and in the crowd… by far the best aid station. The 25-29 division was, without a doubt, the most competitive division of the race, with 6 guys under 4:30. I have to echo what Chris said in his race report, racing with Charlie, Chris and Max is always fun and brings out the best.

A big thanks to my dog Kevin at B+L Solana Beach for figuring out how to safely and effectively reposition my aerobars on my Shiv to get the “preying mantis”/”Floyd Landis” position. If anyone has ever seen the front end of the 2010 Shiv, you have very little say in the aero position. Kev got creative and made it happen. I’d also like to thank my family, who are always at every big race and support me. Love you guys.

You're welcome ladies.

Next up: 

Wildflower Olympic… you’re on notice, that’s all I’m gonna say. The Encinitas Triathlon (http://encinitastriathlon.com/) on May 20, then Honu 70.3 on June 2 (Let the record show, I signed up WELL before Lance decided to race it).

Tritonman & Desert International Race Recap

I love my disc.. people hear you coming a mile away.

Tritonman (500m – 20k – 5k)

 Feb 19

1st off, I have to thank the UCSD triathlon team for putting on a great little race. It was a good early season “shake off the rust” race (even thought there was little “racing” I did). I rode down to Fiesta Island around an hour before the start (I love living a mile away from Fiesta).  Got in a quick 1 loop spin around the island with Bill Jones and got the wetsuit on.  

Unfortunately I didn’t get a warm up swim in, so when the gun went off I felt poopy for the 1^st 300-400 yards. I got stuck behind a big pack and by the time my arms came around I was rounding the buoy to head in. I then realized how slow I’d been swimming and probably passed 10+ people in the last 50 yards. Time-wise, I guess it wasn’t too bad of a swim (5:50-something)

Glad this was my 1^st race because I probably had one of the worst T1 & bike mounts ever. I, straight up, fell over while taking my wetsuit off, then, for some reason, lacked the capability of getting on my bike. I ended up running a solid 50 feet past the bike mount line before coming to a complete stop, stepping over my top tube, and very slowly/carefully sat upon my bike seat like an old lady... I wish someone caught that on video. Started charging on the bike and felt like I had a tough pace going. I noticed after the 1^st 4-mile loop that my back wheel had some close company. “Whatever” I thought, “I’ll just go harder and loose these guys”. Turns out…. that doesn’t work when there are 500ish people riding around Fiesta Island.  I’m going to stop right now and end any further whining about drafting. I should just expect it on flat courses by now; packs are unavoidable on the flats. Got off the bike in 3^rd place and noticed that Bill, and some other dude I didn’t recognize, had somewhere around 30 seconds to a minute on me. 

I slipped my shoes on and jumped out onto the run course. It was in the sand/dirt along the water’s edge on the island. I somehow misheard one of the run course directors at the 1^st U-turn and kept running up the beach. When I turned around, a dude had passed me and another caught up to me. I got in a pissy mood and stopped running hard. I “easy ran” the rest of the 5k. Realizing there wasn’t much room to catch people on this sand & dirt run course, my childish racing attitude got the better of me. I got over it pretty quick after the race and realized that my season wasn’t at all hinged on this race (& I guess 5^th place isn’t the end of the world anyways). Congrats to one of my besties, Bill Jones, for having a monster bile split and (from what I heard) towing the eventual winner around for 12 miles on the bike.

It was great to see all of my collegiate friends! I wish them all the best of luck this season & I hope the WCCTC dominates at Nationals this year. I don’t want to see the Colorado kids gloating about how good they are again ;-)

Desert International Triathlon (3/4 mile swim – 24 mile bike – 6 mile run)

March 4

Wait, isn’t it supposed to be the other way around? Finishing as the 1^st overall Male, I was actually 2^nd place overall. Let’s get it out there right away… Yes, I got chicked. I don’t have too much shame about it either. Heather Jackson had a good race and a mega fast run. Props to her for beating up everyone last Sunday.

I woke up in my own bed race morning (San Diego) at 3AM and drove out to Palm Desert instead of staying out there. A part of me hated getting up that early, but I enjoyed the time to wake up and move around before the race…. and jamming thru empty mountain roads in a sports car, blasting my new Every Time I Die cd, was fairly epic. I went on a little warm up run with Beth Walsh (who had a great 1^st race as a pro) and scouted out the first part of the run course. I made sure to get in a bit of a warm up swim this time.

The swim was a little odd. You can’t really see the 1^st buoy, it’s almost directly into the sunrise and the glare on the water makes it damn near impossible to see anything at all. When the race started, the initial swim chaos was far more chaotic than it needed to be. I didn’t need to sight on the initial 500ish meters en rout to the 1^st buoy. I was sitting comfortably in the front pack when all of a sudden everyone turned sharply right. Apparently we were swimming off course, to the left, and made a last second turn to round the buoy and make a U-turn. There was a slight break in the pack and, unfortunately, I missed the boat. I ended up swimming the rest of the course on my own, in no-man’s-land. After the U-turn at the 1^st buoy I actually started swimming back into head-on traffic. However, I fear I lead a couple people astray as well.. haha. I wasn’t having too good of a time sighting on my own for the remainder of the swim (foggy goggles). I’d have to stop completely and find where I was swimming. I don’t know exactly how long the swim was, somewhere between 1200-1300 meters I’m assuming. I exited the swim around a minute+/- behind the front guys in 17:01.

Don't know why I'm out of the saddle..

I’m glad I had such a bad transition at Tritonman, because I freaking NAILED both of my transitions. I flawlessly jumped on my bike and started cruising. I had mentioned that I was going to change my racing strategy for this race and I did. It’s textbook Keith Butsko racing to hammer the bike and see if you have anything left for the run. Today it was my goal to only go around 80-90% on the bike and save something for the run. When I caught the leader after 15-20 minutes, I had the initial “Holy crap I’m in the lead.. let’s blow the lid off this thing!!” feeling for a little bit, but in the middle of the second lap I decided to back off a bit and Alex Begg, who’s quite a strong cyclist, took over the lead and held a 10 second gap for a while. Alex and I had this piece of crap wheel sucker (who I don’t feel the least bit bad for calling out) wearing an American Interbanc kit, who shamelessly ITU-style drafted off us the whole time. I took back over the lead with 2 or 3 miles to go and got to T2 1^st feeling pretty good, with a 40k time of 57:10. It was the 1^st time I left something in the tank for the run; I definitely feel I could’ve hammered a lot more on that ultra flat bike course and it’s still kind of eating at me a bit.

I left T2 by myself and met a guy on a mountain bike to lead the run. It took a while to get my legs going.. They felt pretty heavy and didn’t have any pop. I ran at a comfortable pace until I could start pushing hard and get my heart rate up. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel that way until mile 4. Right around the start of the 2^nd lap I heard a super fast cadence approaching. I looked back and it was Heather Jackson. I thought to myself “ok, just stay calm and match her pace”. That didn’t happen, she was really booking it. I felt like I was jogging compared to her and i just couldn't get my legs to open up. Looking at my run time, it’s not like I was really running “that slow” either. She finished around a minute ahead of me. I felt pretty demoralized when I finished. It was kind of funny because there were some confused people. I finished the 6 mile run in 34:41, which is better than expected, considering my extreme lack of speed work. The next elite guys came in around 2 minutes later so I felt a bit better, but 2^nd place overall still kind of feels like 20^th place for some reason..

All in all, it was a great tune-up race for Oceanside and nothing to hang my head about or hang my hat on either.

Feeling much better after a $9 quesadilla & a couple beers

I have to say, the post-race party at the La Quinta resort was flawless. Good times were had and the Bocce Ball competition was heated. Congrats to all my friends who raced as well, a lot of them were up on their respective podiums, which was awesome!

Apparently these orange things are for dancing..

Excited to start adding some speed work into my workouts soon. SuperSEAL is next on the race schedule, and from the looks of it, should be jam packed with local fast guys. This race is always a good fitness checkpoint. I would recommend it if you haven’t done it before.

Thank you to all of those who help support me: B+L Bikes, Rutley Chiropractic, SPY Optics, and all of my family and friends!

Cherry Pop-Tarts are the Best

I also won the whitest legs division.

Let’s start this one off with the standard apologies for a lack of updating after events and races. In the last month or so, I’ve done 4 “race/events”; but to be completely honest, I’ve had no intention of actually “racing” any of them. They’ve all been incorporated as speed work into some jam-packed weeks of heavy swim/bike/running. This has been the 1^st time I’ve ever participated in single sport races (with the exception of being hungover and doing the St. Patrick’s day 10k last year). So without further ramblage, I’ll give a little recap of each race starting with my favorite one:

Parker taking some swings at me.

Petco 5k9

Seriously, I was really looking forward to doing this one. It’s no secret I love my dog like Ron Burgundy loves Baxter in Anchorman, so this race seemed to be a perfect fit. I typically run once a week with Parker; The problem is, he’s a massive Weimeraner and loves to take off at a sub- 5 minute pace, then promptly dies after 2 miles.  Stamina is not his best card. But I was confident we could pull it together on race day. Race morning, Parker was AMPED UP.. I would be too if I were a dog surrounded by 600 other dogs on leaches about to run. There were 2 categories at this race, which took place at the Del Mar Racetrack; Runners with dogs & runners without dogs. They started the runners with dogs behind the runners w/o. I don’t think they’ll do that again. When the horn went off I noticed 3 other faster runners make a break to the outside and slip around the runners w/o dogs. Parker & I didn’t have such a brilliant strategy. We got caught behind what seemed like endless packs of old ladies speedwalking. Parker was so excited to run but he/we were engulfed in the crowd and ended up completely knocking over two or three old ladies and tripping up countless others. I stopped to help one angry lady up who only yelled and swore at me. What do you expect?? You’re running in a race with 600 dogs, how angry can you get? At this point I was content with just finishing the race via jogging. However, when we got outside of the race grounds and onto the road Parker wanted to bolt. I’ve never been so proud, honestly, he wanted to be in the front. So we wound up essentially running a ridiculous & unsustainable pace to catch up to the front 3 guys. I overheard people murmuring to others as we sprinted past, things like “come on, really?” or “that’s just stupid”. I had a smile on my face the whole time. 

Deep in the heart of the pack at the start...

We eventually caught the lead guys a bit before the 1^st mile & I’ll never forget the confused looks on their faces as if to say: “where did you come from?” One of the runners faded out shortly after that as the pace picked up slightly. A man with a cocker-spaniel mix (yes, really), another dude with a German Shepherd and Parker and I were all taking turns leading for the next mile. As we hit a downhill back towards the racetrack I wanted to make a move but Parker started to fade a bit, so we held back. The other two guys put a 5 second gap on us on that downhill and unfortunately it stuck the rest of the run. Parker actually wanted to go faster in the last half mile but I didn’t have the legs. I feel like I let my dog down (I’m serious, he wanted to be in the front). We ended up finishing 3^rd overall in 16:49 (10 seconds back from the winner). Not a bad 5k time considering how much time we wasted at the beginning of the race- and a 5:26 pace is nothing to be upset about this early in the season. My mom took video of us tripping over people and trying to meander thru the masses of speed walkers. My dog was the happiest I’ve ever seen him during and after that race J

TCSD Duathlon 1-28

I won’t say a ton about this but the TCSD race series is quite possibly the greatest race series ever.... 1. They’re free 2. All the local fast guys/girls come out to race these 3. They’re close by & convenient 4. Mega breakfast/buffet after 5. They have electronic timing 6. They’re free.

I probably work harder in these races than I do in races that I pay a ton of money to do. It’s fun to race your friends, It brings out the better athlete inside of you.

Not going to give a huge recap of this race but, like most people that do this, it wasn’t tapered for, so most have tired legs, which makes it all the more challenging. This was the 1^st TCSD Duathlon of the year and it was out next to the Olympic Training Center. It consisted of a 2 mile run on a dirt path, 12 mile bike and the 2 mile run again. Loved this rolling bike course and it was clear that the cyclists owned the day here. Daniel Heineck, Matthew Dixon and myself basically pulled away (clean & no drafting) and put around 3 minutes on everyone else and ran away with the race. I ended up having a decent run and took 1^st with Matt in 2^nd and Daniel in 3^rd. Oh ya, our times were in the low 50 minute range.. do the math on that one.. #fast. It was a fun morning and afterwards we had a nice little group together for a ride out to Honey Springs in some gnarley headwind. I’m eager to see my finishing video as I did my best karate kick/ hi-ya thru the finish line.

Fiesta Island Time Trial 20k

I was really stoked for this, I’ve never really done a pure solo TT before. I did take the day off of running and cycling the day before and only swam. Race day, I needed to make sure I had a huge warm up in beforehand, as most of my cycling buddies will attest, I’m a definite 2^nd half performer in cycling and take a ridiculously long time to get warmed up. So I started riding well over an hour before the race to make sure my legs were good and ready. Rolled up to the start line barely on time and let her rip. It was 3 big loops around Fiesta Island (4.1 mile loops). As I figured I would do, I took out the 1^st lap much too hard, spent the 2^nd lap worried and being way to conservative and probably made up everything I’d lost on the 2^nd lap in the final lap. I was never really in the “hurt locker” & I couldn’t get myself to that level for some reason; I was just pushing a hard pace. The moment I finished, I sat up and thought: “damn, I could do that again right now, probably faster”, which isn’t the feeling you want to have in such a short hard effort. I was probably saving energy, subconsciously, for the run ;-) Finish time of 27:29, which was good enough to win the 19+ open division and a Personal Record for me. I was fairly happy with this time; and to me it means I’m slowly getting better in the flats and not just in climbing. Now I've got the hunger to do this again soon and break 27 minutes. 

It's dirt not a cat-5'er

Coronado Valentine’s Day 10k

Winter Tan

I was NOT stoked for this race. On the morning, I woke up feeling pretty crummy & with heavy legs, having been sick and over-trained all last week. I would’ve gone back to bed and ditched this, but I would’ve never heard the end of it from Mike Clinch. When I arrived, my warm up was the run from my car to pick up my timing chip and number. That was a bad call. I was blown away with how many fast dudes came out for this one!! If anything, I learned more about how to run a 10k (or how not to run a 10k) rather than having a “good race”. I didn’t really know how to seed myself with all of these fast guys on the start line. I figured I’d just go out with the front group. That was all ‘well and good’ until we hit 2 miles and I wanted to die. Somewhere, maybe a minute or two before the 5k timing mat, I hit the wall and wanted to call it quits on this stupid thing. I then ran into my good buddy Mitch Hall crusin around on his bike and he gave me a bit of motivation to get moving again. My pacing goal was to stay somewhere around Lesely Paterson. She had been running in a little group 30+ seconds ahead of me for the last couple of minutes. My legs finally came back around somewhere between mile 3-4 and I found a suitable pace. Caught back up to Lesely and a few others and felt “alright enough”. I’d have had a really strong last ½ mile finish but I took a wrong turn and started running down a rain gutter path on the wrong side of a fence. Looking kind of embarrassed I turned around and ran back. I finished with a much slower time than expected in 35:18. I came in 25^th place overall. Ya, wow, that’s demoralizing. I know it’s a PR and still really early in the season, but for some reason 25^th place doesn’t sit too well with me. Lessons Learned, 10ks are hard, don’t go out blazing a fast 5k and leave nothing for the way home, don’t run the wrong way, there’s no “cheating” a 10k (like you can with a 5k).

My first Triathlon of the season is Tritonman, next Sunday. I’m always excited for this little Collegiate race, since it was the 1^st race I ever took part in back in 2009. Also really looking forward to the Desert International and SUPERSEAL in early March before Oceanside! Eager to add the swim... Fun times ahoy.

I promise updates soon!

Time to get faster. 

Turn the Party Up - 2012 Race Schedule

Sorry for the delay in blogging, though, I doubt anyone was fiending for any of my written nonsense. Nonetheless, I feel like throwing out a little update on my sporting life after a brief blogging hiatus. After my last race in October, I had every intention of “shutting it down” for a solid couple of weeks and slowly building back up (as if my body is like an old car or something). Well, I think I made it four or five days without doing much other than surfing and hustling to class late; then I couldn’t help myself but to start doing what I love again. I traded in my old road bike and got a shiny (or matt-black) new Specialized sl4, which has only fueled my desire to ride as much as I possibly can without falling over. Instead of doing 4 or 5 smaller runs in a week I’ve been really enjoying piling all my mileage into 3 longer runs every week. I’m loving long trail runs at the moment; it keeps me engaged in what I’m doing, kind of like riding hills when cycling. It’s quite a bit more fun to me. Actually, looking back at all of November and the bulk of December, thus far, I’ve been training significantly more than when I was “in season” and racing. I haven’t been doing much speed work, which is lovely. I’m positive it’s completely mental, really. I don’t love training (or doing anything for that matter) when I have to do it or am forced to, but if I’m free to do whatever I’d like, then I’ll do the exact same thing just as long as it’s my choice. A great example of this is reading. A lot of kids don’t want to read in school because it’s considered homework. I despised reading growing up, purely because it was forced in school. But in 5^th grade I decided to read (yes…) Harry Potter, on my own, and all of a sudden, reading was awesome. By the time High School rolled around, I’d already read most of what we would be reading in our English and Lit classes anyways. It’s not my intention to brag about reading. I'm very aware that there are serious readers and then people who read periodically for fun- I’m definitely the latter of the two.

The Speedy Bill Jones & I doing some work at the cliffs. 

School metaphors aside (pretty sure this is the second I’ve used in my race blog now. Time to pick a different example), I’ve recently discovered the benefits of going to bed a little early and not feeling the need to sleep in till noon. It’s mind blowing to me how much time I have in my day when I wake up at 6:45am feeling fresh and go ride for 3-4 hours, then come home and encounter the realization that I still have the entire day to be productive (or work). This may be the biggest correlating factor to why my training volume has shot thru the roof.. more available time. It’s important to note that I’m in no way claiming to be faster right now; Maybe I can claim that after I throw down some decent results in races next year tho.. ;-) Speaking of which, this is my tentative race schedule for next year (as of now, I’m sure I’ll be sprinkling in smaller local races here and there)

1/29/12 – Dirt Devil Trail ½ Marathon

2/20/12 – Tritonman

3/4/12 – Desert International Triathlon

3/18/12 – Superseal Olympic Triathlon

3/31/12 – Oceanside 70.3

5/6/12 – Wildflower Olympic

6/2/12 – Honu 70.3

7/15/12 – Lake Stevens 70.3

9/2/12 – Hy-Vee 5150 World Championship

9/9/12 – Ironman 70.3 World Championship Las Vegas*

After an extremely disappointing collegiate season last year, a big part of me wants to take enough units off campus and race collegiately again this year. I definitely want to race Wildflower again, and as much as I want a “do-over” at Collegiate Nationals in Alabama …say, maybe when I haven’t raced a miserable 70.3 six days prior, I really don’t like the CNC bike course, so I’m debating whether or not it’s worth it to go thru all of the WCCTC jazz by myself again.

However, I’m definitely looking forward to aging up into the 25-29AG. It should be a fun filled year racing against the faster guys in 70.3’s.

I applaud anyone who takes this picture seriously.

As for now, I’m going to keep having fun, work hard as long as I can, and continue getting ready for next year. I’m excited, to say the least, and feel the itch to race more everyday. On a side note, I feel a sense of satisfaction in the “weed-like” growth of my hair this month; I’m making serious progress in growing back the bushy wig, so that’s definitely something to look forward to.