2012 National Championships: Race Report

Welcome to my first triathlon race report this year! Hooray!

Where to begin?
It all starts when I realized my ipod had finally abandoned ship and given up on me. As anyone who has ever raced with me knows, pre-race I am in my own little world. I do many of my workouts with music and pre-race (when I can't jump in the race with music - almost all my running races I do with music). Getting to the amphitheater I had to rely on the 10 songs on my phone which was... a little rough. Then setting up transition, I was completely not focused. I ran out for my run warm-up, did a few drills, then realized I had completely forgotten to fill up my water bottles. I filled up my empty 32oz. gatorade bottle with water and ran back to transition. Thank God it was enough with the ice I had put in that morning. Then I left my running shoes and headed over to our tent.

After suiting up in my wetsuit, I jumped in the water for a little warm up, but had enough time to swim out about 25 yards, then turn around and get out. I spent the entire start of the race as other waves went off just mentally freaking out about the swim. I had also left the watch I was going to wear in my bag under the tent. There was no time to go back, so I accepted that I would not know my swim time once I got out of the water... for the first time ever. Once I got in the water, I was shivering next to my teammate Erin. She assured me I was just cold. The air horn sounded and for the first time, I set off with my wave - thrashing and everything. No waiting around for everyone else to leave ahead of me. I stuck with my wave for a REALLY LONG TIME! I was so excited. Then I spent the whole swim with other girls in my wave and my sighting was going really well - I swam straight to every buoy. No zig-zagging.

I ran out of the water and unzipped my wetsuit like a pro, pulling my goggles and cap into the arm, and running JUST behind my teammate Claire. On the long run to transition, Claire dropped her goggles and looked down. I told her to keep going, that I'd grab them (which I did) and continued to our transition area next to each other. I tore off my suit, grabbed my bike and went. I had trouble getting on my bike with my shoes already on the bike (this was my first time doing this) and my rubber band holding my right shoe up immediately snapped. I had to start again and some female spectator next to me yelled something along the lines of "calm down and just focus on what you're doing." She was right, and when I did, I got on my bike - pedaling up the hill until I was at a good speed to put my shoes on ... only to realize I had COMPLETELY forgotten to unvelcro my shoes when I set up transition. You can see this clearly in the picture of transition I posted RIGHT before the race:

Beautiful, VELCROED shoes. *headdesk*

I felt like crying. My teammate Rich ran up to me. "I'm just not focused. My shoes are velcroed," I told him. "All right, just focus he said." I got back on the bike, slipped my feet in, and started working, but the course was hard and my quads were killing me. Then I realized the second stupid thing I did - left my garmin on my bike thinking it would be easy to put it on my wrist while biking. Silly Andrea, biking with no hands is DIFFICULT and you need TWO HANDS to put on a watch. Then I sat there messing with my watch, while in aero. I finally got it on to see one of my teammates who had been having problems with her bike seat on the side of the road - with no bike seat. I was worried and sad, but knew all I could do was focus on my race and a huge climb was coming up. After that rough climb I managed to get back in the race. Granted, this was about mile 4. I finally got back to my zone, passing more and more girls - the bike is my strength, but I quickly saw that all my goals for this bike leg were NOT going to happen. As I came in to finish the first lap I saw my watch indicating that I was looking at at least 80 min for a bike leg I wanted to complete in 73. GREAT. All I could do was make up as much time as possible on the second lap.

coming up on the second lap

The way out on this bike course is about 3 decent hills, one of which is rather remarkably difficult. The only thing that kept me pushing up that hill was thinking "this is the last time in my life I will EVER have to do this hill" so I gave it everything I had. I think I made up at least 2 minutes on my second lap of that course. I took my feet out of my shoes at a great time, and was looking to pass another girl just before transition, until she blocked me by hanging too far left. I gave up on it, but got a little frustrated and distracted... so instead I forgot to get off BEFORE the dismount line. Not one of my best moments. At least this year, over the course of the bike leg I drank nearly 40 oz of water. I finished my 32 oz aerobottle and grabbed the bottle from my top tube and up-ended it into my aero bottle. I felt great heading out on the run. Unfortunately, as I ran out with my sports beans attached to my race belt, they fell at the timing mat. A volunteer yelled "your sports beans!" and I said "eh, whatever." I knew I wouldn't need the extra nutrition this year and I didn't want to turn around to grab them. 

just before a right turn to the big hill

I headed out on the run, up a little hill, feeling tired and getting my legs under me. I knew what was ahead was not easy. Then I hit the monster hill. I couldn't help thinking of the hills in France this fall and the hills on the Rockdale Ramblin' Run I did last April. If I could do those, I could do this ONE very large beast. I knew I felt good and I didn't need to walk. Again, my thought process was "you never have to run this hill again in your life and you already had a rough bike" so I pushed myself. It was nice finishing that hill, but I knew I had another, much smaller, but still another. A bit of the way in, I looked down and realized I didn't start my garmin so I'd lost the beginning of the run - oh well. As I got through about 3/4 of the mile I started realizing I did not remember ANY of this part of the course from last year (this was when I started blacking out last year). I thought I had it pretty clearly in my mind, but emerging from the short bit in the park, I did not have any recollection of doing it the year before. As I hit the first aid station - after mile 1, it all came back to me. No walking or blacking out this year. I spent miles 3-5 just thinking "WHERE IS THE TURN AROUND!" though I saw many of my teammates in earlier waves coming in opposite directions. Once I did see my coach, who convinced me to go catch the girl in front of me. It took about a mile... but I did. 

On my way in I chatter with a Texas A&M girl which amused me because last year I was cursing an Aggie during the whole bike leg who kept playing the passing game. It's funny how by the run I feel the girls get less aggressive. We're all so focused on the pain we are suffering through together that everyone just wants you to finish. During the run I saw two girls walking and I remembered thinking "Man, if I don't absolutely HAVE to walk there is no reason I would ever want to prolong this." I kicked my butt to just keep running and ended up holding 9:06 pace or something like that for the run. I really wanted to keep sub-9, but now that I realize the hills on the course... I feel pretty okay with that run. It is the same pace as my 10k PR (which is, admittedly, off a bike) from a much easier run course.

I came in to see the clock said 3:17, but I had only started 15 minutes back. I was COMPLETELY bummed. I knew my bike was lackluster, and my run was about 55 minutes, but I didn't think my swim was that awful. Turns out with the long runs into transition and a pretty bad swim, I ended up really racking up the minutes. Unfortunately, that is actually my second worst time ever in an olympic-distance triathlon (as compared to last year's nationals, in which I almost died - at 3:42). In the end, I had some big goals which I just couldn't meet on this course. Thankfully, at least my run was pretty solid and that gives me something to celebrate - consistency.

Now I've got my mind set on some bigger fish to fry. I'm thinking I'll be doing the amateur challenge at Memphis in May (sprint one day, olympic the next day) and seriously considering a half iron man this summer. Until then...

NU TRI! What a day!