Ding dong, Geelong

Yesterday I participated in the Geelong Olympic Distance triathlon. I say participated deliberately, because with the benefit of reflection and analysis of data, I don't feel like I can say I "raced".  But more on that soon.

I was really excited for this race. It would be triathlon # 5, Olympic Distance # 2 in my very short triathlon career and I was very keen to see how I would fare compared to Noosa three months earlier and - most importantly - how all this half ironman training would translate into a race.

Naturally, because I was signed up for a triathlon, the skies opened and proceeded to bucket down the most insane amount of rain from Saturday afternoon until roughly Sunday morning. So commenced the dreaded question of "will the swim be cancelled" and would I now be signed up to do the most torturous Olympic distance duathlon. I manically monitored the EPA website, USM's twitter feed and stared out the window willing the rain to stop. There was nothing else for it but to sleep and hope for the best.

Sunday morning I was greeted with.....pouring rain. Great. Official word was for a swim start, but I began to be more concerned with the road conditions. This amount of rain meant super slippery surface, bad visibility, stacks, crashes, punctures and - slower times. Then there was the wind. Strong and lots of it.  Was going to be a long day at the office.

The swim
There's nothing really positive to say about the swim. I was like an injured seal, struggling through the water, begging to be put out of her misery. First dive in and goggles came off (good start) and from then on I lost my chance to be in a group and swam the very long 1.5km on my own with no feet and miserable thoughts in my head. Was a solid 5 minutes slower then my 1.4k Australia Day swim. So yep, this was bloody dreadful.

The bike
My poor bike was hanging out on the rack by itself by this stage. I had to laugh at myself as this was definitely not something I expected. I grabbed my gear and had a pretty seamless transition. Running past the Tri Alliance tent, with lots of cheering, I admit I felt embarrassed. I have always felt proud of my swimming competence and today's swim put me way back in the field and I felt flat that this was so public. I pushed these thoughts to the side and tried to navigate around the slow pokes, the mud and to get on with it.

We (me and coach) agreed I wouldn't kill myself on the bike this time and that I'd focus on having a strong run. Given my lack of race experience, I wasn't sure where this would leave me speed wise - how fast I should push to still have run legs. Add in the pouring rain and block headwind, I was in all sorts about how to ride this race. I was also acutely aware of being in no man's land with no girls around me - I had no idea if that meant I was riding incredibly slow, them fast or what was going on. This mental roller coaster went on for much of the ride. Lesson - to chill out and focus on the task at hand.

Coming back into town, there was a lot of slow cautious riding through the park which was annoying but necessary. Case proved when a girl in front of me took the last corner too fast and her bike slid straight out from under her, resulting in her landing flat on her back and sliding 5 metres across the gravel. This lead another guy to lock his brakes and fly over the top of his handle bars, face planting quite hard into a median strip bush. I said a silent prayer that I was lucky to get off this bike with no punctures and no spills.

I got off the bike in 1.20 which I was pretty disappointed with. I knew I had a lot more in me but I wasn't sure how much to give in order to save my run - it was only my second OD and I'm still learning my limits. As soon as I came off the bike and started running, this answered my question - legs fresh as a daisy. Definitely should have pushed harder on the bike.

The run
The main goal of this race was to have a strong run off the bike. Its no secret that the run is my weakest leg and I've been working pretty hard over the past 3 month build to work this up.  I wasn't familiar with the course so I was a bit conservative with pacing - I didn't want to blow at the 5km mark and then drag my feet home.

Lucky for this as the course was pretty hilly - sharp uphill plus rolling undulations made for a challenging 10km. Seriously, I finished one hill and felt like there was another one just to replace it. Definitely was not prepared for that! But sometimes its better not to know what you're getting yourself in for as it meant that I just got on with it and tried to stay consistent.

This strategy still paid off as I crossed the line in 50.47 - a 5min improvement on my Noosa time and still with plenty of gas in the tank. To say that I was pumped is an understatement. I was so close to my sub 50m goal that I know, in hindsight, I could have gotten there. The confidence boost in how my run is tracking is incredible - I never EVER thought I would be someone who could even think she could run sub 5min/km, but now this is looking perfectly achievable. Excited to see how much more I can juice from these legs in the next ~80 days before Busso :)

Post race review
I didn't feel tired after the race and handled recovery as well as I could without having my usual nutrition with me (ok, it was basically a Coke fuelled recovery). Stretched for about 30min after the race and got in as much water as I could. Drove home from Geelong feeling good, didn't need a sleep which is a first - so something's definitely going right.

I downloaded my Garmin data to see if my heart rate averages backed up my post race thoughts on pacing efforts. And, as expected, they did.
- For the bike, my average heart rate was in my tested T2 heart rate zone.
- For the run, my average heart rate was in my tested T3 heart rate zone.
- For the swim - who knows (rubbish)

What this tells me is that I basically "raced" this as a training session. For an Olympic Distance race, I would expect these heart rates to be much higher (the red line effect that I hear about). No wonder I came off the bike with legs feeling fine and finished the run with gas. The data shows I wasn't pushing my body hard enough for this style of racing.

I was disappointed initially with what "could have been". Ahh yes, the old coulda/woulda/shoulda. But I didn't so I've got to look at what I got out of this race:

• I've learnt some valuable lessons about my own personal pacing that I can test out in the next OD race in 4 weeks time. 
• I nailed down my nutrition with no problems. 
• I woke up with no muscle aches or pains, which means training this week won't be compromised (important given the overall focus of the season). 
• And, even with my pacing miscalculations, I still had a respectable finish in the top half and got a run PB. 

But more important then all of this, I got the answer I was looking for - my endurance training is working. I was out there moving for 2.47 and finished feeling fine. This gives me a big confidence boost going into the next block of half IM training and was exactly what I needed at this point. My focus is on getting my body race fit for a ~5hour endurance event. This weekend gave me a big tick that this is tracking along perfectly.