Saturday morning Steph and I drove up to PA with Noble trailing in his car. After dropping our gear off at Liz's parents we drove the hour up to the race course to check in (no Sunday check in or else we would have just done it the next morning). It did give us a chance to check out the venue and drive the course. We had some idea about what it would look like from the elevation profile, but I don't think any of us realized how relentless the hills would be. It was a dose of reality to see the climbs, but I'm glad I could prepare myself mentally as opposed to going in blind.
After driving the hour back to Wayne we tuned up our bikes, got dinner and went to bed. Liz took the train up from D.C. after her graduation duties and got in sometime after I fell asleep. Up at 4:00 to load up and out the door at 4:45. Traffic was light so we made good time up to the race venue getting there around 5:45. Transition was set to close at 7:00 so we racked bikes and headed down to the beach. The lake was nice and calm, 72 degrees, and clear. The 4 sprint waves went off from 7:30-7:45 and the 1/2 waves started at 8:00. I figured they would have preferred it the other way around since they were out on the course at least 4 times as long as we were, but the logistics of having the shorter swim leg start second prevent that. Noble and I were both in the first wave at 7:30 and headed into the water at about 7:20.
I had some real trouble getting my swim cap on for some reason; it kept flying off my head. Once we were in there was time to warm up for a bit. About 2 minutes before the gun was supposed to go off the race director got on the loudspeaker; the buoy marking the second turn had come loose and was floating off. That would have made it a much longer swim! Since it was so close to the start he told us to scrap that corner and just make it a diagonal between the two closest buoys. It probably cut 150 meters off of an already short swim.Once the gun went off I started well, but got out of breath really quickly. For some reason when I'm in a wetsuit my legs have a mind of their own.
I've developed a nice 6-beat kick that doesn't tire me out at all in the pool, but in this swim and at St A's I've had to really concentrate on kicking because I was all over the place and out of synch with what the rest of my body wanted to do. At all other times that's become automatic. Anyway, I was reduced to breathing every stroke instead of alternate sides. I slowed down to get my kicking sorted out and catch my breath. By the time that happened I was almost back at the beach! I figure it took me about 600 meters to get to that point at St A's, but I'll need to adapt better for New Jersey or just ditch the suit entirely. About 20 yards out I stood up to wade in; I maybe should have swum a little more, but at that point I was frustrated and just wanted to be out of water. I came out pretty much by myself well behind the lead pack but in front of the main pack.The run to transition was kind of ridiculous: 1/4 mile uphill from the beach. I got passed by lots of guys trucking up the hill, but I took my time and kept my heartrate down. A few people took their suits off on the beach and ran with them; that might have been a good idea. One guy put his flip flops back on and slapped his way back up the pavement. The timing mat was at the entrance to transition, not the water's edge, so swim times are pretty inflated. I forgot to start my stopwatch in all of the confusion during the buoy fiasco so I have no idea what my out-of-water time was. It worked out to 200/minute with the probably 3 minute run so it couldn't have been horrible, but probably not that great.
Transition was good this time. I had an end spot right near the bike exit and had no trouble gearing up. The wetsuit got stuck on my chip strap and that took me a few seconds to resolve, but otherwise it went well. I decided to put socks on for the bike to give my feet some extra cushioning pushing the pedals on those hills. I would have put them on for the run anyway so there was no net loss there.
The exit from transition was a slight uphill, one little roller, and then a huge climb/descent. I was trying my best to spin out at a higher cadence, but I just didn't have the gearing to do that at my current level. I hit my highest gear in the middle of that hill and just started mashing. I was out of the saddle for a few meters towards the top as my momentum started to die. Over the crest of the hill then clunk, clunk, clunk into 50x12 and push until I started spinning out. I hit 43 on that first downhill with enough momentum to keep myself in the big ring until about 1/3 up the next climb. Mash, tuck, repeat. There was a small section towards the end where it was rolling leading into the biggest descent of the day. I had been trading places with this one guy on the previous couple of hills: he would pass me on the way up, I would hit terminal velocity faster on the way down. As we were heading down the hill the road got a little rough and the handling twitchy. I was building more than enough speed to pass him but didn't want to risk taking both of us out at 40+ MPH for maybe a 10 second advantage. I alternated between sitting up and letting my body act as an air brake and actually hitting the brakes when I got too close. The last hill right after that was the almost vertical line in the elevation profile. It was brief but nasty starting out as a short climb into a 90 degree corner and just kept on going. I was glad I at least knew it was coming from the previous day's ride through. I heard one of the guys behind me say "You've got to be f*@&in' kidding me!!" as he rounded the bend and saw that slope. It was rolling for the last 1.5 into transition. I was off the bike at 1:02 which was good for 17.2 MPH average. Overall I'm thrilled with that; I was expecting much worse.
T2 was again pretty good. I had dropped one gel out of my pocket exiting the watter and had nothing but HEED on the bike. That was a mistake. I downed my only remaining gel while getting my shoes on and headed out on the run. The course was a trail run through the woods alternating between crushed gravel, grass, and actual dirt singletrack. I remembered to start my watch to check my mile splits. I was really hoping to be able to average sub-9:00 miles for the run. I started out mostly downhill, and my quads were aching from the bike. The first mile split came up at it was 8:48. Great! I felt like I could hold that pace until a nasty short little climb in the woods that had me wanting to walk. I didn't, driving my knees up the hill, but I probably would have done it faster it I had just walked! The second mile came right after a long slight downhill and across a concrete section of the dam to the second aid station. Mile 2: 8:15! "Wow", I thought, "I'm cruising pretty well!". I backed off slightly since I knew we had to climb back to through to mile 3. Mile 3 split was 9:38. Not unexpected since I was starting to cramp a bit from lack of fuel, but still on track to hit sub-9:00. I felt I had some kick left in me. There was a sign somewhere announcing 1/2 mile to go, and looking back I didn't give it a second thought; there were different signs for the 1/2 Iron course and maybe I thought that was it. For a 3.3 mile run it was awfully close to the 3 mile sign, though, and it seemed like it was a lot longer. I chalked it up to just being tired and wanting the run to be over.
The last little bit was uphill, crossing an old covered bridge and a jump over a 4 foot wide culvert. They had to make the finish that much more challenging! That last "0.3" miles? 4:58! That's a 15+ minute/mile pace, with a final kick! I think I could have walked that fast if the distance was right. Something was clearly off on the mile splits out on the course; 1 and 2 were short, 3 might have been about right, but the last 0.3 was definitely off. After having seen great splits in my first two miles I held back to conserve myself. I definitely could have pushed harder had I seen the actual, slower pace. Oh, well. I at least felt good on the run. I haven't learned to judge my speed based on perceived effort. I should have guessed by all the guys flying past me!My final time was 1:51:05 - 95/277 Overall, 72/180 Male, 12/22 30-34 AG. I thought I had a top ten in my AG, but #1 and #3 overall were 30-34 so they didn't count towards our official ranking. Still, pretty pleased with that, although my run obviously didn't do me any good. It was a beautiful course and a perfect overcast morning with little wind. Plus we got shirts with black bear logos on them. Can't complain about that.
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