Race Recap #2: my first first place!!

and as always, i am late in writing a post, mainly because i am too busy to have any real thoughts about anything. that said, i had my olympic distance race in Grand Haven MIchigan this past weekend so its time for a little recap.

I reccomend the race highly. grand haven is a beautiful beach town with restaurants and clean beaches and a quaint small town feel. We stayed at the kardomah lounge, which was beyond comfortable and put me in a great location for the race. my one caution about this particular race though is that the weather seems to be unpredictable.

my olympic distance tri was converted into a duathlon when the morning of the race yielded 35 mile per hour winds with 5 foot breakers in lake michigan. so, the race became a 5K run, 40 K bike and 10 K run. not happy news to anyone... except of course, the duathletes in the group who all of a sudden had a much larger, but much less experienced pool of competators.

upon talking to some other athletes from the area, this change in the course was not a surprise. the year before, the swim had been converted to a 300 meter out and back that almost consumed every single swimmer in the water.

i didnt really have a great feeling going into the race. it was very very windy, and i was not mentally prepared for a duathlon(despite the distances not being much of a challenge, the run bike run format is something my body is not used to)

i decided to call this race a throw away and just see what happens, so i hit the ground running, literally. I kept a 7 minute mile pace for the first 5 k, which to be honest, i have NO idea where it came from. i knew this put the rest of my race in jeopardy, but it was a risk i was willing to take.

i got on the bike and started to feel better immediatly. my pace was good, but my body was definatly recovering. I had finished the run strong, and only spotted a handful of women (none in my age division) in front of me, and no one passed me on the bike. so my position going into the last run was really great. i kept a great pace the first 4 miles, and I thought I was getting adequate nutrition through my gel packs. However, i guess i needed a little bit more because i had my first "bonking" experience 2 miles from the finish line

my legs felt heavy, and i have never actually felt that tired, during a workout, or during a race. i dont feel like it effeced my pace THAT much because no one passed me during that point but i really felt awful. it was definatly not the distance that was the issue, since i run 10 Ks in my sleep. I think it was my major push on the first 5 k, and the fact that my body expected one thing, and got another.

all this said though, i managed to finish FIRST in my age group, AND 9th in women over all. it was a great race and it was wonderful to break my 4th place curse. now, onto this years half ironman....