Race Report: St. Patrick's Sprint Tri

Yesterday I participated in Dallas Athletes Racing's St. Patrick's Sprint Tri, consisting of a 300-meter pool swim with live bagpiping; a hilly, 3-loop, 12- to 14-mile bike course; and a really short 5k run. Sponsored by Shannon Brewery, they ran out of beer before I and at least fifty other participants finished.

Training and challenges:
Since January, I have been consistently swimming several times a week and have knocked a minute and a half off my 300m, which is a hell of a lot, even though I'm still slow. I'm also a lot stronger and finally at a point where I don't feel like I'm going to die after I get out of the pool and don't need to go back to bed for another hour to recover. However, I've barely spent 3 hours on my bike since my race in September because I hated it so much and cried through almost the entirety of the bike course. At least I've finally gotten a bike fitting, so I shouldn't be crying over my aching vulva anymore. And my running is stronger, if not faster. So I had a few things going for me going into this race and hoped to finish in less than 2 and a half hours.

Race morning:
Transition was only open one hour, so there was a line of a hundred people before it even opened. Once I finally got in and got my gear set up, I got in the long-ass line to pick up chip timers. As advised at every race clinic I've been to, I put my number on my bike the night before, but this day I lost it somewhere on the 25 miles of highway between home and the event. So after getting my chip, I asked what to do about the number and was told I'd have to get a new number entirely. I changed out my numbers, scrambled to move all my bike and gear to a new rack after the transition area was supposed to have closed, and pretty much just threw all my gear down in a random lumpy pile. Then I had to get in line again for a new chip; the line had tripled by this point. The announcer kept announcing every few minutes that we were on-track for a 7:30 start. I laughed every time I heard it.

Swim:
I got my new chip and after having spent the whole hour rushing to get ready, I settled in for an hour-long wait from the first swimmer until my turn to enter the pool. The good thing about this is that I get to use the restroom as many times as I need, and a woman complimented me on my new green ENELL sports bra at the sink, where the mirror showed me that I'd hilariously mismatched the hooks; the bad thing is that I don't get to warm up, and I spend an hour standing on concrete before I have to go run a fucking race. The event had a live bagpiper standing on the diving board playing for us the whole time. I really thought he'd quit long before I began.

Though in practice I can swim 300m in about 7 and a half minutes, it turns out that I really struggle without a warmup, and my race time was 9:01—an improvement of 13 seconds from this time last year.

My T1 was garbage, but it is consistently garbage, and this one was actually my second best of four races even though I put on my first sock twisted and had to take it off and do it over.

Bike:
The event page said in one place that the bike course would be 12 miles, but the linked map of the course was marked "13.8 miles," and the two mapping websites I used measured it at 14.4 and 14.45 miles. I finished it in the same amount of time as my best-ever flat course training time, so, who the hell knows?

This was a 3-lap course with two beastly hills each length: 6 fucking hills total. And really tiny, tight turnarounds. Now, I have not trained on hills . . . because I live on the great plains and there are none.

As I struggled up the slopes in the first lap, I thought, "I'm gonna die." I'd already seen at least a handful of other athletes having to walk it up the hill and worried I'd join them on the third lap. But on the second loop, I glared at the first incline and thought defiantly, "Fuck YOU, hill!" as I clicked into my hardest gear and pedaled fiercely down the preceding slope, determined to take as much speed and momentum upwards as I could possibly muster on this short, shallow downhill. And it worked. I sped past others already laboring and made it two-thirds up the slope before I was back in my easiest gear, breathing hard and pedaling slowly up the last bit. I reminded myself to just keep spinning and that no matter how slow, this was still faster than walking. I hadn't the energy to accelerate any as I reached the top, and several people I'd just passed then passed me by. But I'd catch them again on the next incline. This plan of attack worked for me and I stuck with it through the remaining laps, surprised to find my strength and energy seemed steady throughout.

Run:
T2 was not my best nor my worst as I rummaged through my messy pile for my visor, race belt, and running pouch.

As I crossed the timing mat to begin the run, I uttered aloud a relieved "Thank god." My legs felt okay and this was my favorite part. The event's webpage had promised us a "virtually flat," "beautiful, tree-lined course." I rounded the corner, rolled my eyes, and and cried out half serious, "Not more hills!" A runner near me chuckled. I ran a good bit of the course at a very slow and steady pace but took a lot of walking intervals because I was tired. I passed the mile 1 marker at about 12 minutes and grimaced in disgust; this was going to be a very short 5k. I knew I was moving at closer to a 15-minute pace. The volunteer at the turnaround was very cheerful and energetic and encouraged us with promises of beer at the finish line. I finished the run in 40 minutes and 20 seconds, which is about what I've been doing in training on FRESH legs, confirming my suspicions about the poorly measured course. My total race time was 1:57:4.7.

A friend who lives nearby came to wave at me as I finished and gave me a hug after I turned in my timing chip. I picked up a shiny new glass beer mug and asked if she had seen where the beer tent was. We made our way over there and were informed that they'd just run out of beer. I pouted and my friend said she'd buy me a beer if she could, but it was Sunday in Texas and we can't do that til noon. This is the event's 10th anniversary and its 6th or 7th year selling out; organizers know in advance exactly how many over-21 participants there are. How does this even happen?

I grabbed my stuff and left, uninterested in staying to hear the awards announcements with an empty glass. We went to a cafe and saw that it had the same Shannon beer on tap as the race was supposed to have had but were informed that they don't serve it there anymore. I had a Shiner Bock with my eggs instead.

Blackland Triathlon Race Report

I signed up for the Blackland Triathlon because the event was near my home and I really liked its charity that works to combat food scarcity for low-income families. I’d completed my first tri in March and had two more tris rained out, a 10k tornadoe-d out, and missed a duathlon due to illness and injury all within a two-month period. So I was REALLY looking forward to getting back on the horse, bike, whatever.

Two weeks before the race, I drove the bike course so I’d have an idea of what to expect. I was dismayed to find it included difficult hills compared to my usual training course around White Wock Lake. So I planned to ride it a week before the event, but my knee had been giving me trouble after an incident with a coffee table, and I knew I’d be better off resting than pushing it.

Race day dawned 80+°F and 65% humidity before even sunrise, and in the three minutes it took to air up and mount my bike on the car, I found myself melting, bug-bitten, and dreading the day.

This was my second sprint tri, and this time I took the time for warm up in the pool. Which was apparently useless since the race was delayed 15 minutes and I didn’t get in the water again until an hour after I’d been out and standing on increasingly sore calves. It was tough to watch one of the first 50ish swimmers get pulled in the first three minutes of the event; someone near me overheard her say that her shoulder had given out. Ouch.

I was really thankful that this event started in the shallow end so I could get a strong push off the wall, whereas my first race had us jump in the deep end, and I just kept sinking (literally and mentally) before I could get myself going. I paced myself well for the first time in my four swim races and felt really good about this one. I confess I took forever in T1 trying to put on sunblock and eat and hydrate. I can’t swim with anything in my stomach, which makes race-day nutrition one hell of a challenge.

That bike course was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I overheard more experienced riders telling first timers not to let this event put them off triathlon because it was rough even in their opinion. It was VERY hilly and hot. The last three miles of it, I sang the whiny “Ow” song aloud to myself because I was alone, bored out of my skull, and breathing raggedly due to the pain. I don’t think my sitz will ever forgive me.

I sniffled through T2 and openly cried through the first 3/4 mile of the “run” (I didn't run) until three women walking caught up to me, and I decided to try to keep pace with them. They were also runners new to tri who’d intended to run but just had nothing left. Our legs were OK, but the heat was killer, and I never caught my breath even walking it all. They were cheerful and welcoming and kept a better pace than I could have alone. Honestly, I’m not wholly certain I could have finished alone. There was no shade on the 5k course, and we hit it at the 11-12 hour. We were very lucky to have volunteers with ice cold water and Gatorade at every mile.

The finish line and festival took place in an open-air, unshaded amphitheater. The only good think I can say is that there was ice cold beer. I couldn't bring myself to walk the sunny half mile back to transition nor the additional half mile to my car and called Mom for rescue. As I waited for her, I kept standing with the intention to walk back to transition, but I just couldn’t do it. I felt bad leaving my bike there til almost 1 p.m., but in a surprising twist, it was not alone nor the last bike. The Blackland Tri volunteers should be SAINTED. No hyperbole.

Fortunately, my bike fit easily into Mom’s Jeep, and she and I had already made plans to meet at that location to get her signed up for a rec center membership and water aerobics classes (at the pool where the race was held and where I regularly train), so at least something good came out of all this.

Today I got my race results and compared them to my first sprint. My swim was 3 seconds slower this time, but I paced myself much better, felt better throughout, and didn’t have to take long breaks of back stroke, only one brief stretch of breast stroke. One person passed me in the water who was kicking way too hard and splashing so much that I couldn’t see anything and was scared to maintain my pace, and it took a while for that person to pull ahead, so I think that’s what got me.

As horrible, awful, miserable, wretched, and no-good as the bike portion felt, scaling my spring race’s 13-mi pace up to this one’s 15-mi distance shows that I only finished 5 minutes slower yesterday, which I’m OK with.

I couldn’t ever catch my breath enough to run at all, so I ain’t even mad about those numbers. My transitions sucked, but there was a much longer distance between transition and the timing mats. It was 98°F yesterday when I finished, and I’m not sure how I managed to race for over 2 hours outside without getting dehydrated, heat stroke, OR sunburned.

Unfortunately, this all has me re-thinking whether I want to go for an Olympic distance tri in another month and a half. I may need to wuss out and buy a padded cover for my fancy saddle, because the bike shorts just aren’t cutting it. I’d ridden longer distances before but never suffered as much as at this race, and I had to sit my butt in a bathtub with three 10-pound bags of ice after the tri so I could walk the next day.

I don’t need to decide yet. I start twice-a-week swim classes tonight for the first time ever and won’t be looking at my bike for a week. I can reassess after I’m recovered whether to register, which should be about payday anyway.

Historic McKinney Kiwanis Triathlon Race Report: Finish

I texted to ask the other woman how it went. She said she fell off her bike, broke her wrist, and didn’t finish. Holy crap. Why hadn’t she contacted me, the only person she knew in the area? She hadn’t brought her phone on the course with her and because she didn’t know anyone’s number, she refused the paramedics insistence on taking her to the hospital, accepted their painkiller cocktail, and instead gathered her things and drove herself to the ER. I felt so awful for her. If I’d known, I could have taken care of all her gear and bike, could have called my roommate to pick me up and put the bikes in either the truck or the SUV they have.

She was worried about not wanting to do the Memorial Day triathlon for which she’d won a free registration that had made me silently insanely jealous because I could never afford such a thing and it was all a random whim to her. I told her not to worry about that now but to rest and heal and think about it later, that some events allow transfers in case of severe injury, and that I might be able to pay whatever fee for it if they allowed it. Later in the day, the x-rays showed the wrist wasn’t broken. She said she didn’t realize how fast she was going and lost control on the mile 8 downhill and hit her head 3 times when she fell. Fortunately, it was right at a turnaround with volunteers and a police officer present to help her, and her helmet did its job. She got some ugly road rash on her legs and shoulder but avoided any notable bruising. She later said that she'd done the whole ride in one gear since she didn't know how to change the gears on her sweet $1200 rental.

My aforementioned fall left me with three scrapes and a goose-egg of a bruise on my knee. After eating and about halfway through the movie, I took a long, hot bath and soaked my aching back and shoulder/pec, realizing only then that I must have twisted my upper body during the fall and sprained my freaking tit. How the hell does one even do that? I took a lot of Tylenol and a 2-hour nap, woke irritated to be hungry again so soon, ate, grabbed an ice pack to hug, and went back to sleep til about 6 p.m.

I had scheduled a massage for the next morning, and though I hated waking up for it, I was SO glad to have gone. I mentioned it to my massage therapist, and he tenderly worked on the muscle, remarking on the swelling and heat that the injury produced. It really hurt to let him at it, but it felt better to be a bit looser, and I knew it would aid my healing and comfort over the next few days. It’s difficult to take it easy with daily tasks for one’s dominant arm. I was still on the fence about whether I should see my doctor for the pulled muscle. It was a weird, new pain to me and I couldn’t tell how serious it was, but I also doubted the doctor could do anything for it that I couldn’t from home. I decided not to.

I found my race results online: I finished 207 out of 209  finishers, 59/60 women, had a miserably slow 9:11 swim, just barely hit my sub-60 bike goal with a 59:22, didn’t at all believe my 39:54 3.2-mi run, and hit my total 2-hour goal with a generous 1:54:26. I am very excited to have baseline numbers for future events and have already registered for an April 14 swim + run event and an April 19 sprint tri!

Overall, it was challenging but fun and I’m glad I did it.

Historic McKinney Kiwanis Triathlon Race Report: Run

The exciting thing about the 5k course was that the first mile started on my usual trail and literally ran down my street and past my house. I took advantage of the porta-potty at the construction site across the street from my house, knowing from experience that a short pit stop could only improve my end time. My roommate was in the garage and waved as I passed. I briefly considered walking inside for a nap.

I shouldn’t have needed to pee. I needed electrolytes. The aid station only had water. I thought about the weather and the distance and figured I’d survive, but it wasn’t pleasant.

My legs didn’t seem to suffer the feelings described by other athletes as jelly or heavy. I was just so tired! I incorporated a lot of short jog/walk intervals, because all I wanted to do was walk the whole thing. But I had a time goal to meet. I didn’t know my exact swim start time, but it looked like I had about 42 minutes to finish the run. I didn’t feel like I could make that pace. I felt like molasses, like a 16+ minute mile. But I wouldn’t know until the end, so I just kept on, pushing the walks as short as I could stand to.

Around 1.5 miles, I first saw two runners behind me. Then I trudged slowly up the one big hill and told the volunteers at the aid station at the top how very happy I was to see them. One runner passed me around mile 2 and I gave him a high five. The other passed in the last half mile. I almost always “sprint” the last stretch in a race, but I had nothing left to give beyond my current pace. I asked a volunteer to point out where exactly the finish line was and was heartened to see it.

I ran to the finish, saw that the clock read 02:28 as I approached, and realized I might have actually made my 2-hour goal. I was given a finisher’s medal, water, and snack. I waited to see the friend finish, hoping to cheer her on. And waited. And waited. I had seen her bike still on the rack but not her gear. After a half hour or so, I was beginning to worry about my own post-race refueling, checking my phone, and wondering how long I should wait. When I checked again, her bike was gone. I’d been wandering the small festival area and hadn’t found her and had no missed calls or messages, so I decided to pack up and ride home.

But I couldn’t ride straight home because that was the run course for the kids triathlon immediately following the adults. I resolved to go the long way around; it was only a mile. Ouch, it hurt to sit. Luckily, I found a road that cut through and saved me a hill. I warmed up some burritos and watched some of A Knight’s Tale.

Fed, I wondered about my friend and how I’d missed seeing her at the end.

Historic McKinney Kiwanis Triathlon Race Report: Bike

Cyclists were already returning to re-rack and head out for the run. It made me chuckle. I took my time at the transition to make sure I had everything I needed and walked my bike out. I’m still a bit awkward getting my second toe into the cage, but I managed and set off. I stopped less than a mile in because I was parched and my hydration pack bite valve wasn’t working. I’d used hydration packs for foot races before and tested the new bladder at home, but it was determined not to cooperate on race day. I had to pull off the valve entirely and sip straight from the tube. Whatever.
 
On the road again . . . The course began with a slight but not unpleasant incline for most of the first 2 miles with a lane closed entirely for cyclists in the first mile and police officers at each intersection to hold traffic and wave us through. The first turn carried me out of city traffic and onto empty country roads. The weather was PERFECT: the night’s low had been 42°F and the afternoon high climbed to 82°F. leaving a perfect morning breeze once the sun came up. There were several blind turns, but few houses and zero traffic on an early Sunday morning.
 
One hill at the end of mile 4 was a bit difficult, but I made sure to take a lot of speed into it and actually passed another cyclist on the up! Badass. I maintained that lead for almost 3 more miles until a long, pleasant decline over most of mile 8. I wasn’t used to carrying a lot of speed, but I did enjoy myself. Turning around and huffing back up mile 9 was less fun, but it was all downhill from there back to the high school.
 
I had no reference to gauge my level of exertion on the bike compared to running and swimming, but it was the easiest leg for me that day. I pushed myself to comfortably middling exertion, knowing I’d need to maintain it for an hour and not wanting to kill my legs for the run.
 
At the transition area, I switched to an 8-ounce handheld water bottle since I knew there would be aid stations at every mile. I had brought toe shoes and an extra shirt to give myself the option of changing, but for a mere 5k, I can tolerate sneakers, so I wore the same shoes as I had on the bike. I walked out to the course start, which was kind of weirdly across a section of grass instead of using the existing paved trail but I suppose minimized collisions for all the fast people who’d already finished.

Historic McKinney Kiwanis Triathlon Race Report: Swim

I stuck a toe in to find the water was nearly as warm as the 85° temp of the senior pool where I trained. I opted against warming up in the pool because it was crowded with swift swimmers doing just that, and swimming really wears me out. Shimmying my hips and shoulders and swinging my arms around would have to suffice.

We were instructed to line up by the pool in numerical order by our bib numbers, which were supposedly seeded by the estimated swim times we entered at registration but became quickly apparent were not, which was confirmed by a relay participant sitting nearby who told me the relay racers had been thrown in willy nilly with the rest of the mix. We instead waited on the bleachers for 200+ athletes to go ahead of us and jumped in line with the last dozen. The race website had said swimmers would be spaced out by about 10 seconds each. I counted 5 seconds between starters. Watching the swift swimmers in the water and the traffic jams when many tried to pass the swimmers ahead of them was chaotic, a bit scary, and intimidating. Boom! Did you see that? One guy just got punched in the head while trying to pass.

Diving was forbidden and I’d never practiced a jump start. It wouldn’t have mattered because my training pool is shallow and the race started in the deep end. I jumped in, held my nose, and began kicking, disappointed to see how deep I sunk and how long it took me to recover, reach the surface, give a weak kick off the wall, and get going. I tried to remind myself to slow down and go strong and steady. I struggled to align myself in the lane with the deep end strip dropping away and spent many strokes sliding against the ropes and hoping I wouldn’t kick anyone in the next lane or get hit with a penalty for it.

I paused briefly for a breath after each length, having never learned the flip turn, and checked to see if anyone needed to pass me. For three laps the space behind me was all clear. But suddenly at the end of the third lap, four guys were piled up behind me and I stopped for several seconds to let them all pass, preferring to lose time over the thought of otherwise being kicked or elbowed.

I struggled and swam several lengths on my back, trying to catch my breath. I don’t know why I feel so good in training laps and yet flounder at races. I didn’t count the lengths, only my strokes and breath: one, two, breathe, one, two, breathe, one, two, breathe. . . . This was probably the first time my goggles didn’t fog up. Eventually I reached the end of the 12th length and pulled myself up the ladder out of the pool, slowly walking where everyone before me had jogged out, even though I would like to have enjoyed the short stretch of barefoot running if I’d had the energy for it.

What I didn’t see was the photographer shooting me on the ladder, hunched over, dead-tired, without an ounce of pep or joy. I’m pretty disappointed at how remarkably terrible these race photographers were since I happened to care about my time and didn’t stop to take any pictures at this event. Oh well, no race pictures for me.

Player two has entered the game

Before I move on to my actual race report, I should tell you about someone else. I wasn’t sure whether I should share this, but it significantly affected my race. I didn’t know how I should frame it, so I’m going to take my time, watch my language, reread, and mostly try to withhold judgment.

 

A person who runs a lot and was training for—and dropped out of—a half marathon last year decided on a whim to register for the sprint triathlon with me, thinking it would be a fun challenge like the 5k Color Run she’d be doing the day before the triathlon.

 

A week and a half before the race, she asked about transporting her rented bicycle, and I offered her the loan of my trunk-mount bike rack for the race since the event was close enough to my house to walk.

 

Four days before the race, she started asking me questions about how it would work and if there were changing rooms. I explained: No, there are no changing rooms; yes, you have to complete the whole event in wet clothes; many people wear triathlon suits, but they are expensive; here, for example, I’m going to swim in my sports bra and compression shorts and then put on padded bike shorts, technical fabric t-shirt, and tennis shoes for the bike and run; well, *I* need padded shorts because *I’m* new and still get bruised from riding; yes, you really should get goggles; well, since it’s an indoor pool, we’ll jump in one at a time and swim a snake route, up one lane and back, under the rope, up the next lane and back, and so on; no, this one is 300 meters, it said on the website; hey, there are a whole lot of articles online for novice triathletes that you could check out; here is a link to the swimming technique YouTube videos that have helped me; here is a link to my 30-item race-day prep list on Google Drive; well, you know how to ride a bike, right? so I’m sure you’ll do just fine; make sure you get some practice on your bicycle rental the day before the race, but don’t go very long because you don’t want to be sore for the race; no, they won’t close down streets for us, but it’s a Sunday morning so there won’t be much traffic, and there will be police officers at most major intersections; yeah, I scouted the run trail and it’s really nice with only one hill; and no, I haven’t had a chance yet to check out the bike trail, but it’s supposed to be on some nice country and farm roads with not many hills.

 

The race organizer was hosting dozens of clinics that week at several locations for new athletes to ask questions and learn more about the race. She did not attend any. I went to the one in my town on Saturday morning the day before the race and am SO glad I did.

 

There I learned how to rack and re-rack my bike and that there are time penalties for doing it wrongly, where the transition area’s ins and outs were, where the mount/dismount line was, to stay left on the road to avoid blocking, how to navigate the pool, the drafting rules (in a word: don’t), how many other participants would be there (200-300), not to wear earphones at all, and that no one would be allowed to retrieve their things from the transition area after finishing the race until the last bicycle was in, among a dozen other pieces of information. I felt a bad at having to text notes to her non-stop during the presentation because that’s rude to the speaker and I could not otherwise have remembered everything to relay to her. I even sent pictures of the example racked bike.

 

On the day of the race, she arrived at my place five minutes early and texted “I have a situation.” I was still gathering my things but walked out to see what was up. She’d forgotten her race bag at home 45 minutes away with her bib numbers, hair bands, bandanna, hat, water, sunblock, towel, and fuel. I told her to go ahead to the event to see if she could get a duplicate bib number, and I’d grab extra gear for her.

 

I rushed to gather my last few things and then fill water bottles and collect the other things for her and stuff them in my backpack and left several minutes later than I had planned for. I’d planned to walk to the event but instead had to ride in the dark for the first time and without yet having acquired appropriate bike lights (I know), but I run that short path all the time and know it well enough. I rolled up to the event and then panicked that I might get in trouble for a safety violation of riding my bike up to the transition area when I couldn’t see the dismount line, stopped quickly, caught my foot in the toe cage, and promptly fell on the ground from a complete stop. Scary.

 

A dozen or more people saw me and called out to ask if I was okay. “I’m good!” My hands stung from hitting the pavement but hadn’t been scraped. My knee was scraped but not bleeding. I knew it would stiffen up overnight, and I’d hate life tomorrow but would get through today. I was twice as stressed as I ought to have been going into my first outdoor tri, but I told myself that getting the fall out of the way early in the day could be a good thing for my psyche since I’d been scared and anxious and fretting about falling in the days before because I’m not as comfortable on the bike as I’d like to be and suffer anyway from anxiety and several people in my family have had severe road cycling injuries and my best friend was hit from behind by a car pretty badly and the driver didn’t even stop and I am SO scared of pain if nothing else in the world—

 

I picked myself up and found my rack and began unpacking my bag. I was concerned that I hadn’t yet seen the friend who drove here ahead of me, so I paused frequently to check my phone. She called a few minutes later to ask where I was since she’d just arrived at the transition area. I walked over to meet her and found that she was able to get the bib numbers taken care of but wasn’t ready and wasn’t coming in yet, was getting help from a volunteer in adjusting her bike seat to the correct height and needed to go ride around the parking lot for a few minutes to get some practice in because apparently she hadn’t done so the day before. After a few minutes, I was able to disengage and return to setting up my things. I saw her later walk over to her assigned rack and I showed her how to rack her bike and where to put her things. I gave her the extra sunblock and water bottles, learned then that she also needed a towel and fuel, of which I had fortunately thought to pack and purchase extra and offer to her. She mentioned that she’d not eaten breakfast.

I felt a sharp pain on the left side of my chest, high near my shoulder that spread through the entire muscle under my breast. I wondered if I’d slept badly and what the hell was going on with my body. I figured that if it were a heart attack, I probably wouldn’t feel up to starting the race, and that wasn’t the case. The pain restricted my stretches and hurt like a real motherfucker. I’d brought a tennis ball to work on a knot in my back and applied it to my pec, trying to loosen the weirdly painful cramped muscle. I ended up putting more bruises on the muscle but loosening it up enough to be able to swim.

 

We finished setting up and went inside the natatorium. She asked about my swim cap and whether it was required. No, I told her, it was only a matter of personal preference. No, I don’t use earplugs either, and so she decided not to try them out for the first time on this swim. I learned that she’d not done any swimming for this event. She knew how to swim, but she’d not gone anywhere to do any swim training and didn’t believe me that it couldn’t possibly/probably wouldn’t take more than 10 minutes for us really slow swimmers to swim 300 meters.

Stay tuned! The next post will be my race report about the race itself.

 

 

Historic McKinney Kiwanis Sprint Triathlon: Before

Historic refers to the part of McKinney near which the race was held. The Kiwanis Club is an organization that provides youth programs and community service. Sprint triathlons vary in distance but usually include a 5k run and 20k (12-mile) ride. I’ve seen these events’ swim distances vary from 275 to 500 meters, but Wikipedia lists 750 meters as standard sprint. Triathlons begin with the swim followed by bike and end with running.

My first outdoor and my first sprint triathlon was Sunday, March 29 at McKinney High School. I was really excited about this event because it was right by my house and it would be challenging but doable.

After the “evangelizing” incident, I had a bad morning at the pool with circle swimming when one of the women in my lane wouldn’t ever let me pass, so I had to stop every lap and wait for her to swim ahead, and then another woman crossed over and narrowly avoided bashing me head-on. I’m incredibly pissed off that a city as populous and rich as McKinney would have such shitty recreation facilities: 2 indoor lap lanes in the whole fucking city! The Senior Pool is also filthy and grosses me out.

So I hadn’t been swimming much this year.

We had weeks of freezing rain and ice and snow in February and twice-a-week rehearsals for The Vagina Monologues, so I hadn’t been running much either.

I’d been searching for a bicycle since last fall, but the cheapest entry-level road bike in any store was $620, the cheapest online was $500, and I couldn’t find anything secondhand in my size. Finally an acquaintance contacted me after having seen my statuses on Facebook and said he happened to have pretty much everything in his garage to build me a bike. He’s been working for a cycling shop for 15+ years and collecting parts, and he just happened to have a Moniqa-sized frame. So he offered to build me a bike from scratch.

It took some time, and I only got it a week and a half before the race. I took my first long ride around my neighborhood three days later and established a baseline of 5 miles in 30 minutes. I took my second long ride later that week and managed 9.23 miles around White Rock Lake in 50 minutes. It was just enough to get me comfortable with riding up and down small hills, changing gears, making tight turns, and navigating light traffic. And it was just enough to boost my confidence that I could, at the very least, finish the race, albeit slowly. I thought it reasonable to hope that the race day adrenaline could push me to complete the 12.5-mile bike course in an hour, based on my middling-but-comfortable cycling exertion so far.

My only brick workouts had been running the 1.75 miles out and back to and from the pool.

I was under-trained, but I could do each part.

I took advantage of the pre-race clinic offered to answer questions for first-timers. There I learned how to rack and re-rack my bike and that there are time penalties for doing it wrongly, where the transition area’s ins and outs were, where the mount/dismount line was, to stay left on the road to avoid blocking, how to navigate the pool, the drafting rules (in a word: don’t), how many other participants would be there (200-300), not to wear earphones at all, and that no one would be allowed to retrieve their things from the transition area after finishing the race until the last bicycle was in, among a dozen other pieces of necessary information.

I’ve been reading every article I can find for novice triathletes and devoured the book The Slow Fat Triathlete. But there was still so much info!

I always make a list for travel, camping, and races, and I always over-pack, preferring to have everything I could possibly want for every comfort or whim; and this event would be no exception. I put together an exhaustive list of the things I would need for race day, plus lip balm and deodorant to keep me comfortable. Seeing my pile of gear—including extra water, shoes, sunglasses, sweatband, towels, and a second shirt just in case I wanted something dry for the run—compared to the athletes near me with only a change of shoes and helmet made me smile in good-humored self-deprecation.