The Saturday before the race I did a 4:15 ride with 4x20 min intervals at above race pace mixed in. During the ride, I started to feel “something” in my throat…not a good sign! I tried to ignore it… Sunday, I woke up and did a hard run with intervals in the rain…my throat hurt, I felt stuffed up. I was getting sick! Running that morning in a monsoon was probably not the best decision, but it went well. I went to work and the throat got worse. I NEVER get sick! Oh well…never say never! I chilled out for the rest of the week in New York and by my flight out Wednesday afternoon, I wasn't 100%, but I was feeling MUCH better!
I flew into San Diego late Wednesday night and slept for over 10 hours. The next day I met up with a friend Haley Cooper (fellow Zoot Team member and TALENTED triathlete who I KNOW you will hear a lot about in the near future) and her friends Shelby Madden and Phaedra (both of whom I now consider friends as well). Not only was I fortunate to spend the weekend with these girls, but I was fortunate to be spending some of the weekend at the Jones house, a family that I had been hooked up with by Haley and Shelby. The Jones family (Sally, Ron, Carrie, Ginny, Stacey and their two dogs Molly and Cinders) are a sweet family that I considered myself lucky to be staying with during my weekend in San Diego. I have had such great opportunities to meet fantastic people on my travels and this trip was one of the best examples of that. I felt at home with the family and was honored to be able to spend some time talking with their daughter Carrie who is a two-time Olympian at the age of 25! Carrie Jones is America’s top woman kayaker and an incredible person to have met! She races the Women’s “K-1” in the 500 meter race and I was in awe of her and her accomplishments as she showed me her scrapbook from the Beijing Olympics!
As for the race: California 70.3 was Saturday and I was most nervous for the cold water and air that awaited me in the morning! I picked Haley up at 4:30 AM and we headed to the race. With MOST of my stuffiness and cold behind me, I felt pretty good! The morning of the race flew by! I was “body marked” by the legendary Bill Bell (In case you don’t know, Bill Bell once held the record for the oldest person to finish an Ironman!), I got my bike together, put my wetsuit on and before I knew it, we were lined up to enter the harbor water! It was the quietest start that I can remember being a part of. The pro women entered the water with about 5 min till race start, but no one was talking like usual. Everyone entered the water in an almost “eerie silence”….maybe we were all nervous for the anticipation of the cold water. The air was about 50 degrees and the water was 58 degrees, but to my surprise it felt OK! I was psyched! After a few minutes of warm-up and with the men underway, it was now our turn. The gun went off and I found that I got stuck behind a few girls. After clawing my way around them, I was on my way swimming steadily. I actually thought I was having a great swim, with the main pack just ahead, but as I exited the water and headed into transition, I realized that I was wrong. I must have been following the second pack of women as there were not many bikes left on the racks by the time I got there. Opps! So much for “thinking” I was having a great swim! I didn’t get upset about it though as I have done in races in the past. This was a triathlon, not a swim. I headed on my bike and figured I would do my best on the bike and try for a great run.
So my legs didn’t feel great on the bike. In fact, they felt pretty bad. This wasn’t what I had hoped for, but it’s what I got on that day, so I did the best I could. I saw a few other girls out there that were having bad days as well and I just forged ahead. It is a lonely bike when you exit the swim in the back. Nothing like my age group days… As an aside: This is the biggest difference racing as a pro. It is lonely out there and it is tough! As an amateur, I remember always being surrounded by other athletes. Men encouraged you as the first, or one of the first, age-group women as you biked along. I remember feeling the excitement as I passed people along the course. It was a BLAST! This is not the case as a pro, ESPECIALLY if you have a poor swim. You bike alone. Top men age groupers pass you and are gone. You may pass a woman, or be passed, but then you are alone again. There is no cheering. You usually pass silent. Being out there on the bike is the greatest example of self-motivation and digging deep that I have had to experience while racing. As I promised myself, I wouldn’t let the negative outlook overtake me during the bike or any part of the race. I wasn’t going to let the pressure of a “great result” take over either. “What if I don’t have a great race” did not exist in my mind on this day. I was going to do the best I could ON THAT DAY and wherever I ended up with that effort on that day would be all that I could do.
The bike course was pretty epic! I went through Camp Pendleton and the climbs inland were pretty wicked! The scenery was absolutely stunning and eventually the long hard effort came to an end. In my head I expected to bike somewhere in the 2:40’s on that course THIS EARLY in the season. I biked 2:47. Honestly, it was slower than I had hoped for, but I was happy to keep it under 2:50! I headed out on the run on a mission. “I’m going to catch as many women as possible!” My “mission” faded as the run went on. As I saw the many other women far ahead, my motivation to “catch as many as possible” faded. Also, my breathing was more labored than usual (lingering effects from the cold?) so I toned the effort down to more of a “comfortable” level of exertion and more of an “ease of breathing”. There was 1 quarter mile section of sand that we had to run over 4x throughout the race. I was absolutely PATHETIC on this section! I was literally falling all over the place! I wish I had video tape of the whole thing as I could probably be entertained for hours watching my pathetic self trying to “run” on the sand! This made the run split that Miranda Carfrae posted (1:20!!!) THAT much more impressive after my ill-attempt to run on that section!
So long story longer, I finished toward the back, with an unimpressive 4:58, but I finished feeling HUNGRY to race again! This is something that has escaped me since the beginning of last season. My “negative self-talk” was non-existent as well, which was a battle in itself. I was mediocre across the board, but it helped me to realize what I need to work on and how much more I have in me. The feeling that I had with my race results was what many of the other women that I had spoken to who raced that day had as well. This is the beauty of an early-season race, I think, and I highly recommend it. After the race Haley, Phaedra, Shelby and Ben Harper (our Zoot Team leader from 2008) celebrated with shots of Sake (OK…Haley and I didn’t have any shots after our race) but I did have a great time watching the 3 others do shot after shot at 2 O’clock in the afternoon! Shortly after that Haley and I were off to our hotel that Zoot had put us up in for the 2009 Zoot Camp. That night we went to the Timex party nearby. The Zoot camp continued on Sunday and was a fantastic time! More on that later as I’ve already written a novel, but I can say that the race, the Zoot Camp and the week in general was one to remember!
…OH! CONGRATULATIONS to JACQUI GORDON for her 4TH PLACE FINISH at IRONMAN SOUTH AFRICA this past weekend!!!! WAY TO GO JACQUI!! :-)
No comments:
Post a Comment