Race Report - Philadelphia Triathlon

RACE REPORT – PHILADELPHIA TRIATHLON

The Philadelphia Triathlon was a great race. Three years ago I did the sprint distance and really enjoyed it. I missed registration in ’06, and then came the wreck and rehab, so this was the first chance I had to do this race again. This time I raced the Olympic distance and had a pretty good race. I haven’t done this distance in over two years.

Speaking of the wreck, I had a bad stretch of luck leading up to that, which is pertinent to this race. Two years ago, I had a race on a Saturday – and during the bike leg I had the first flat during a race that I’d ever had. The next day I was in a 65 mile bike race for a charity event. I had two flats during that race. The following Wednesday, I was hit while out riding – training for another race.

So, fast forward almost two years exactly. I am normally extremely (if not anal-retentively) organized in my race prep. I have checklists, I lay everything out – yes, it’s very Sleeping With the Enemy. Anyway, I noticed that somewhere between the Expo and last night I somehow lost my swim cap. The race rules are very strict about that – no cap, no race. I figured I’d get there early and hopefully get a new one. I also decided to change my tires the night before. Usually, it’s a bad idea to try any kind of new equipment right before a race, but in this case my old tires had some cuts and splits. This morning as I was going through my final pre-race routine (for all you military types – think: PCI’s/PCC’s) I noticed that my front tire was flat. Dammit! I must have pinched the tube last night and caused a small tear which leaked out overnight. After changing that, I was running late, and as I stepped out into the street to ride to the race (I only live about 2 mi from the start/finish) my chain bound up because it came out of the derailleurs when I was putting my wheels back on. At this point, I was thinking that something really bad was coming. I figured since I already stressed my chain, with my luck going the way it was I would break the chain while I was pushing it up one of the many hills on the course. Oh – and I’m not a superstitious person but my race number was 337…..add that up…..

On to the race:

OFFICIAL RESULTS:

Overall Place 356 / 1892
Age Group (M30-34) 54 / 180
Male 300th

Race Time 2:32:58

1600m Swim 28:35 539th
Trans #1 2:53
40k Bike 1:10:35 274th 21.0 mph
Trans #2 1:42
10k Run 49:12 500th 7:56/mi

Swim:

This was my first wetsuit swim in a while…and the first in this new wetsuit. Again – not something you usually want to try out on race day. But, I figured it couldn’t be that bad. Once I started, I had a typical “panic attacks” set in: I came close to hyperventilating, as I started way too fast and then I had thoughts running through my head that I should have trained in the wetsuit more because it was to constrictive on my lungs, etc. Not the way you want to spend your first 300m on a 1600m swim! I tried to just think of the pool, and swim the same way I usually do during training. This worked like a charm. I quickly got my breathing under control and ended up with a better swim time than I planned. The only bad part was that I really started to feel the shoulder injury towards the end. I think a lot of it had to do with the wetsuit, as they are a bit constrictive in the shoulders. No matter, it wasn’t slowing me down – just noticeable.

Transition #1:

As I mentioned in the pictures yesterday, the transition area is HUGE. With almost 2000 riders, it has to be. Anyway, it took a while to run from the swim-out to my bike and that ate up a lot of time. The worst part was pulling off the wetsuit (as usual) and getting the damn thing over my timing chip. Otherwise, a smooth transition

Bike:

For those that usually train on hills, this course wouldn’t be that bad. On each loop there are 4 hills – short but pretty steep. As I’m someone who does not usually train on hills…these were pretty tough. I just threw it into a really low gear and took the Lance Armstrong approach of high cadence – I wanted to save my legs a little bit for the run. It is a two-loop course and goes around the Schuylkill River and passes in front of the Art Museum. Very nice course. There were of course some good downhills and a lot of flat-riding, so I was able to make up a lot of the time I lost on the hills. For my first 40k race-pace and including the hills (which also had some decent technical turns), I was pretty happy with my time. The legs felt great, even after the hills. I was afraid that I would be really smoked on the second lap, but I think I was actually a little faster. After looking at the Pros’ times, I feel pretty slow (27 mph vs. my 21 mph!), but maybe I’ll get close to that one of these days. I don’t think I could have done much better on the bike but I do need to work on my hill training!

Transition #2:

Good transition. I even put on socks this time for the run and I still think I made pretty good time. Plus the long transition area gave the legs a little more time to adjust from the bike.

Run:

Wow, definitely need to work longer brick workouts! Legs felt tired and tight for about the first 2 miles. Around mile 2-3, things started to loosen up and I felt a lot better. Towards the end, the hamstrings started to really tighten up and I was a little worried about cramping. Then, a little past mile 5, the knee (the one that kept me partially out of last season) started to hurt quite a bit and I had some real concerns about the last mile! Fortunately, neither of these slowed me down or became too painful. My Garmin/HRM time is all screwed up because after I finished, I forgot to turn the thing off, but when I saw my pace and time for the official results I was actually pretty happy. Normally I would expect my 10k race pace to be a little faster, but at the end of a triathlon, I was definitely satisfied with that pace. I was able to finish strong, and noticed the crowds. It’s nice to have a bunch of people cheering you on, even if it’s not specifically for you. Makes you want to run even harder! The best thing I can say about the run is that I definitely left it all on the course – I was smoked at the end of this race!

Post Race:

I met up with the Philly Tri Club that I recently joined. Burgers, beers, hanging out talking about the race, training, upcoming races, etc. Good people – I think I’m going to make a lot of friends with this club. Finally I’ll find some training partners! I also ran into a guy I went to IOBC with! I couldn’t believe it – of all the places! Small world.

I think this is going to be a great tri season. Can’t wait for more races!

Once photos are published, I’ll post those as well.