The Plan:
- To spice things up, do the Palo Alto Moonlight 10K on Friday night as my "long" run for the week (i.e., run it very slowly).
- Do the Pacific Grove Sprint Triathlon as an all out brick (Note that the swim is 1/4 mile and the run is 2 miles)
The weather reports said chance of lighting in the east bay and in the Sierras. It said nothing about all of the bay area. Grumpy did the 5k walk and then it was my turn to do the run. It was pretty crowded so I stayed toward the back since I was going to run slowly.
The first 2 miles went as planned and there were lots of people around. As soon as we were committed to running the levees, the lightening started and the crowd thinned. The ground was surprisingly secure. I had plenty of light between my headlamp and my little flashlight. So, I was off. At some point out around mile 4, I found my rhythm - that point when your form is correct so you're not expending as much energy. Unfortunately, I don't have the leg to keep that -- but I felt it FINALLY!
It was around the 4.5 mile mark when the rain started. I LOVE running in the rain, but lighting when I'm the tallest thing out on the levee wasn't too appealing. Once back on to the asphalt, the course goes to a stupid little out and back to make the mileage. As I got to the turnaround, this most amazing gust of wind hit me. I was almost at the turnaround so hoped to use it as a tail wind as I turned. Unfortunately, it died as soon as I needed it.
I finished the run at 1:10:36 Garmin said 6.37 miles which wasn't bad for starting really slowly and having to wade through the crowd. But had I done too much? Quick - Protein, E21, Ice Bath. Compression Tights. Bed.
Pacific Grove Sprint Triathlon
Amended Plan - Survive the swim. Bike like hell. Do what you can on the run.
Although I got to bed by 9:30pm, something had me up every 2 hours - Shelby wanted something. I had to pee. Grumpy came home and the grrls had to let me know... on and on. Finally, 3:45am arrived, things were loaded into the car, and we took off for Pacific Grove (roughly 1 1/2 hour drive). After a little back and forth, we found a great place to park and began unloading my stuff.
I had Grumpy pump my tires because the last time I did it, I tore the stem off. No sooner had he put the pump on and the air fizzed out that he realized that the pump was broken. CRAP! By the light of the Pilot's hatch and my cell phone, he actually fixed it! I got to transition by 6:20. We had assigned spots. I got set-up, got my body markings, and made a note of where the various ins/outs of transition were before heading down to the water.
OH MY GOD that water was cold. It was colder than Santa Cruz last month. I made sure to get my face in the water and get over the shock. The swim was only 1/4 mile and you had to crawl over kelp. Turns out all my fretting about the kelp was over nothing. What I should have been concerned about was that people would bunch together to stay in the channels that the previous waves had made. This was the most physical swim I've had yet. I got kicked twice and twacked on my goggles once -- none hard and none hurt. Just enough for me to get out of there.
Swim: 11:22 - I survived
I tottered out of the water and started up to stairs to transition. By the time I reached my bike rack (which was the farthest away from swim entry), I had my legs back. Quick change... oops put my helmet on backwards but fixed it before I left transition.
T1: 3:53
The bike course was 2 loops of 3 miles out and back along the coast. This is where the lack of recent riding hurt. I concentrated on pumping, pumping, pumping (and not drafting) but I wasn't getting much. This course had a short hill that I lost a lot of speed on, but I made sure that I pumped hard on the way back down to regain what I lost. As I came in to make the turn for my second loop, I made sure to get to the left early -- but no too early. Seemed like there were a lot of people that didn't do their second loop because on this time there wasn't any one out there for a long time. I caught some one at the turn around point and she promptly fell in front of me... YIKES! UNCLIP UNCLIP UNCLIP. I DID IT!!!! So, off I went back to transition -- making sure to dismount BEFORE the dismount line.
Bike: 46:56 (if you believe their mileage is 15.80 if you believe Garmin 310XT mileage, it is 16.29)
So, off to the other side of transition to change and then back to the other side for the run out.
T2: 3:12 (pretty impressive considering where my spot was!)
The run course was 2 loops 1/2 mile along a trail that follows the coast and then cuts back on Ocean View to Lover's Point. It started off as painful as usual. I thought that it was because my legs were still sore from Friday night's race. My calves were SKA-REEMIN' but I ignored them. I glanced at my Garmin to see my pace was 13.89 -- shit, this is going to be a long 2 miles! I made it around the first loop and I noticed my legs weren't hurting any more. I started to push harder and glanced at my Garmin -- huh? 14.56???? Whatever, it doesn't hurt so just go. At the final turn, I looked at the Garmin again --WTF?! 14.89!!! Then it hit me. That wasn't pace -- it was the total mileage for the WHOLE race! I had no clue how fast I was going!
Run: 21:11
No PRs this weekend. In all, not bad for a training run and a brick. I know the lack of riding mileage in August and early September has hurt me. I hope I can get some of that back for Mermaids.
P.S. Grumpy ran his first ever race - 5k for a whopping 26:04! So proud of him. Imagine what he could do if he trained.
You did great! What a good weekend of train-racing for you :)
ReplyDeleteIf you just "page down" (down arrow) on your Garmin when you're in Multisport mode, you can get it to show your normal run screen, if that has your pace on it. I made all sorts of wacky adjustments to my settings for this last race (alarm every 15 min on the bike to remind me to eat, etc) and now I have to figure out how to get it all back the way I had it :)