True Tale: The Triathlon Triple Try

The sports world is filled with “triple” accomplishments.  

Horse racing has the Triple Crown.  Basketball has the Triple Double.  Baseball has the Triple Play.  Track & Field has the Triple Jump.  And Diving has the Triple Lindy! (Rodney Dangerfield’s phenomenal final dive in Back to School)

So how can Schmeis35for35 be a legitimate athletic blog without some sort of “Triple” achievement?  It can’t.  That’s why I’m officially creating my own “triple” accomplishment:  The Triathlon Triple  

To be clear, I’m not adding new goals to my list of 35.  Instead, the Triathlon Triple is my attempt to accomplish 3 of my 35 goals in one day…in one Triathlon.  

Achieving the Triathlon Triple would propel me from my current weak performance of 10 completed goals to a much more respectable 13.  If I make this happen, Vegas odds makers would need to scramble and reassess the over/under for how many of my 35 I’ll accomplish this year. 

So what exactly is the Triathlon Triple?  It’s my attempt to check off these 3 Schmeis35for35 goals in one race:   

1. Finish top 30% in an Olympic distance Triathlon
2. Bike 1 mile in < 2:15 (26.7 mph avg)
3. Compete in 6 triathlons for the year

Let’s see how I did on Saturday in my try for the unprecedented:  The Triathlon Triple

Pre race:

Another attempt at a goal, another 3:30am wakeup call!  I never thought that 5am would be considered “sleeping in” but that’s how I feel at this point.  I texted a few friends at 3:30 and heard right back…they were still out on the town in NYC having fun.  Why am I doing this again?

On the plus side, it seems my body should be prepared for crazy wakeup times whenever the little one decides to enter this world in a few short days.  On the other hand, maybe I shouldn’t be voluntarily depriving myself of sleep when that situation is going to be forced on me in the near future.

Anyway, Sue and I made the 2 hour drive to the race site and a check of the weather showed it would be another blistering race day.  Shockingly (sarcasm), the next day was supposed to be 15 degrees cooler with very little humidity.  I’d say I can’t catch a break on the weather but that would be an understatement.

A few days before the race, I decided I should stick to my usual plan of trying to make people think I’m a good Triathlete without actually being one.  That meant I should buy fancy new Tri shorts for the event.  This technique has treated me well in the past so I assumed this would be no exception.

After setting up my transition area, I started to loosen up with some hamstring stretches.  My left one felt very tight for some reason. [HINT:  not so subtle foreshadowing of things to come]

Swim:

The start of the race was a 1500 meter (just under 1 mile) open water swim.   Before the horn, I talked strategy with my buddy Penn Holderness.  We both agreed that finishing with a fast time would be a good idea.  

Judging by my hand signals, i guess I was also saying, "go that way."

Anyway, I had my worst performance in the lake of any race so far so I guess we needed a better strategy. 

My goggles were constantly foggy which caused me to literally stop swimming several times and lift my goggles to see.  Buoys were on the lake to keep racers on the right track but I found them very difficult to spot. 

To make matters worse, I wasn’t swimming straight at all.  I was having pain in my left hamstring when kicking so I basically started to just drag that leg.  I think that contributed to me not swimming very straight and made my lack of visibility even more of an issue.

You know how the shortest distance between 2 points is a straight line?  Yeah, me too...I just didn’t take that route.   I’m surprised the race officials didn’t pull me out of the water and make me take a breathalyzer…

No joke,  my GPS watch said I went 1.07 miles which means I ended up swimming  ~200 meters further than I should have if I went in a straight line.  It literally cost me 4 minutes…ridiculous.

As a result, my time was 35 minutes which is about 15%-20% slower than I normally am at that distance…not exactly a good start.

Bike:

I was determined to make up time on the bike after my pathetic swim.  Plus, this was a portion of the race where my Triathlon Triple came into play.

I came out of transition flying with each mile getting faster than the last.  I was trying to find the perfect spot to drop the hammer and push for my goal of a 2 minute and 15 second mile.  The problem was that I didn’t know the course so wasn’t sure where the hills were, where the road conditions were bumpy, if the wind would be in my face, etc. 

After ~4 miles, I was making really good time averaging over 22 mph.  I took a look at my watch and had gone 4.3 miles when I looked ahead and saw nothing but flat road in front of me.  It felt slightly into the wind but thought this was as good a place as any to make my move.  The only problem was that I was .3 miles into the mile split so would need to really kill it over the next .7 miles to have any chance at making the goal and have it officially record on my watch.

I decided to go for it.  I shifted into my Cervelo’s hardest gear and pushed with my quads as hard as I could while pulling with my hamstrings on the way up.  My left hamstring was very tender but I went for it anyway.  I just kept pushing and pulling the pedals as quickly as possible. 

At the 5 mile mark, my watch beeped and I knew I was probably close.  Unfortunately, there was no way to tell whether I made it without flipping through the settings on my Garmin.  I had to wait for the end of the race to know whether I made the goal.  Was the Triathlon Triple still in play?  I wasn’t sure.

About 12 miles through the bike portion of the race I was averaging 22.5 mph.  The twinge in my left hamstring started getting worse and I got very nervous I was going to really pull it.  Going that hard early in the bike may have been a bad idea.  I ended up backing off substantially on the last 16 miles and only averaged ~18.5 mph for that portion.

I finished the bike in a very disappointing 1 hour, 23 minutes which was about 10 minutes slower than I was expecting…

Run:

As you can tell from the relatively empty transition area, I made it back from the bike before most of the racers.  

As it seems to happen to me every race though, the sun came absolutely pounding down during the run.  It was in the 80s officially but the heat index was well into the 90s.  

To make matters worse, the run course was on newly paved black top.  My running shoes were literally sticking to the road.  It felt like running in a steam room.  With the black top soaking in all the sun’s rays, it had to have been 100 for us along the road.

My left quad and hamstring both felt like they were close to cramping for most of the run.  I ended up sticking to a steady 9 minute pace the whole 6.2 miles.   I felt like I was a step away from tearing a muscle or having severe leg cramps again so was content with the slow pace.

I crossed the finish line and headed straight for the waterfall tent.  As its name suggests, it’s basically just a tent with some hoses along the top that spit down cold water.  Phenomenal feeling…

The Triathlon Triple Results

I finished in 2 hours, 59 minutes, and 13 seconds.  I was expecting to do 2:50 at the worst and closer to 2:40 if things went well…so much for those estimates.

Anyway, by successfully crossing the finish line I checked off one part of the Triathlon Triple and another Schmeis35for35 goal.  I had already completed 5 Triathlons before this day so this marked my 6^th…another goal done!

If you think that goal was pretty weak, you’re basically right.  My only defense is that it was far from certain at the beginning of the year given my injuries so setting the goal ensured I stuck with the Triathlon training throughout the year.  Finishing the race brings my total to 11 out of the Schmeis35for35 complete!

While I waited for overall results to be posted, I flipped through my watch statistics to see if I accomplished the 2^nd of my Triathlon Triple and 12^th goal overall…biking 1 mile at > 26.7 mph. 

I knew I would be close but this was pretty painful…I missed it by 8 seconds.  My 5^th mile split was 2 minutes and 23 seconds…just 8 seconds from making my goal of 2:15.  That was good for a 25.2 mph average but short of the 26.7 mph I needed.  Some combination of a weak hamstring, a slight headwind, and me starting my push too late cost me. 

The good news is that unlike some of my goals, attempting the fast mile on my bike can be tried anytime so I’m confident I’ll do it one of these days. 

The bad news is it killed my dreams of the Triathlon Triple!

That being said, I still had a chance for the Triathlon Double if I finished in the top 30% overall. 

On the official participant list posted online, there were 405 individuals entered.  30% of 405 is 121.5 so I needed to finish 121^st or better to make top 30%. 

A big screen TV was streaming at the finish line with results.  As I stared and watched the names scroll by, I was in awe of some of the times.  The winner did the race in 2:02 (57 minutes faster than me).  I thought that was absolutely insane but felt better when I found out he was an All-American swimmer at Auburn and an Olympian. 

Despite being impressed with others, I was really focused on seeing where I placed.  I was hoping the weather took a toll on the rest of the racers and I somehow snuck into the top 121.

The names seemed to take forever to scroll across the screen…50^th, 51^st, 52^nd…I was nowhere to be found…73^rd, 74^th, 75^th…still didn’t see my name.  108th, 109th, 110^th…still no Schmeis anywhere.  119th, 120^th, …and BOOM! 

Right there next to the #121 was my name.  I finished 121st which was exactly top 30% to the number.  

When do I ever have any luck?  Finally I was on the right side of a good break.  12^th goal achieved! 

Or was it?

Later that day, official results were posted online.  As I was going through the numbers I clicked and saw that 93 out of 214 men and 27 out of 158 women beat me.  This was consistent with the previous results I saw that I was 121^st overall.

But wait a minute?  The official results showed only 214 men and 158 women.  Adding those together means there were only 372 participants instead of 405 as the official participant list indicates. 

Why does this matter?  Because top 30% of 372 means I needed to finish 111^th instead of 121^st! 

So here’s the question?  Did I actually achieve the goal or not?  On the one hand, I could argue that if a team is supposed to play a game and doesn’t show up they forfeit.  When there is a forfeit, the other team gets the victory.  On the other hand, it’s tough for me to keep a straight face by saying I beat people who didn’t even start the race.

As always, the final judge is me.  Looking at all the evidence, I have no choice but to rule the goal of finishing top 30% in an Olympic Triathlon NOT complete.  I’m not counting it. 

Painful.  Even worse is when I saw I needed to be only 39 seconds faster over the 3 hours and I would have checked it off with no caveats.  Brutal.

So Where Does This Leave Me?

My Triathlon Triple didn’t exactly go as planned.  I got 1 goal out of this race but missed the other 2.   I moved from 10 Schmeis35for35 goals complete to 11, but my potential for step function change ended with only incremental improvement.

In any event, I’ve knocked off 2 of my 5 Triathlon goals from the list and still have 3 remaining:

·         -  Top 30% in Olympic Distance Tri  (~1500 meter swim, ~25 mile bike, ~6.2 mile run)

·        -   Finish Half Ironman (1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 mile run) in < 6 hours

·        -   Finish Full Ironman (2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, 26.2 mile run)

I’ve looked at the calendar and have 1 more shot in 2012 for each of the three and have registered for all of them.  Here are the dates and my upcoming schedule:

·      

             - September 23 – Half Iron Distance at Jordan Lake (Finish Strong Half)

·         - October 6 – Olympic Tri in Pinehurst (Pinehurst International)

·         - October 20 – Full Iron Distance in Wilmington, NC (Beach2Battleship)

Wow, that means I have to do an Olympic, a Half, and a Full (3 major triathlons) in < 1 month with each being incredibly important for my goals. 

3 Triathlons in < 1 month?  That’s a feat crazy enough to need a name.  

I think I’ll call it The Triathlon Triple.  Maybe we can pretend the first version didn’t exist.

Busy Notepads,

Schmeis