Annie and I headed out to Vancouver Island for the 2010 Oly Tri @ Shawnigan Lake – May 30, 2010. This was the kickoff to the 2010 Western Triathlon Series, of which I am a Season’s Pass holder. Wahoo! This was also part a 1-week 10th anniversary get-away for us, so definitely had extra special meaning. In addition, this was one of the very few events that we get to do together due to having two little ankle biters to worry about!
This race is both Olympic and Triathlon (in general) number 2. The first/last one was Black Diamond, last September. I knew that I was in a pretty different position this time around, having: bought a new bike, nearly a year of solid pool swimming under my belt (as opposed to 2 months), 3 road-races (cycling) in 2010, 1 super-solid 16km trail race in 2010, solid training at the Vo2 Performance Center, and just having a much higher fitness level. Sweet!
We arrived a few days before. We were able to ride around the bike course a number of times, run the run course, and swim in the general vicinity of the swim course. If you ever wanted a swim course where you could subject yourself to water better suited to penguins and polar bears, then this was it. Ouch! The water was *really* cold – apparently 15C or 59F. Double ouch! Isn’t that temperature outlawed by the Geneva Convention?
We did the normal race morning stuff. Got to the course about 15mins before the half-iron folks took off at 7AM, allowing us to get marked and chipped before watching the show. Canadians apparently do it in style. The Navy was there with a Howitzter, with a 3M+ gun. Damn! It was LOUD, and provided the half-iron folks with every indication that they should start moving.
Annie and I did a quick jog on the run course. We were familiar with it, and our legs seemed to be in working order. We returned to transition, got our B70 suits on, and headed to the water. The start was 1M out, so we hopped right in. Unfortunately, we hadn’t counted down our time too well, as we had just 5mins left before our show time. Oh well. I let some water into my suit, did some arm movements vaguely resembling a swim stroke and waited for the gun to go off. And, it went off!
Annie and I had decided to do the swim leg together. I swam in front, and periodically watched for and waited for her. I would then start swimming again, placing my feet in front of her, for her to draft from. This worked pretty well, except for the 90% of the time that she seemed to pick someone else’s feet to follow. In any case, the goal was to make sure that she was comfortable in the frigid water at the Olympic distance, and we achieved our goal. As many people as there were and the similarity of the caps, I was able to spot Annie w/o much trouble; I know her stroke pretty well, too. We completed two laps (1500M) in 66 and 67th place. I felt *a lot* better than I did in Black Diamond. I had a lot of gas left in the tank, and felt very comfortable with the water this time. Clearly, Ben (my swim coach) has been doing good things! 3 open water swims in 2010 also helped.
We headed to transition, touched hands, and then split up for our separate races. I’m still definitely not efficient in transition. I need to shave off some time there. I got my bike and me ready, and headed up to the road (up a carpeted dirt path). I got on the bike, started moving and quickly popped in some GU chomps for nutrition. I was quite familiar with the bike course by this point, and knew exactly what to expect, which was really nice. My legs screamed for the first lap, not due to exertion, but due to cold. My toes were also very unhappy. Ouch! I passed a ton of people on the ride. Other than by some super-fast Half-Iron guys, I never got passed on the ride. Turns out that the Specialized Tarmac is a fast (road) bike. I’ll eventually hit a glass ceiling with that, but I’ve still got a healthy serving of other fish to fry. I completed the 44KM ride in 43rd place. I wasn’t too happy with that. There was no T1 time, so that’s part of the bike split. The 29th place, for example, was just 2mins faster, which I could have had with a more efficient T1. Next time.
I futzed in T2 too, due to forgetting a race belt. Fortunately, this time wasn’t added to either the run or bike time. I felt good off the bike and wanted to finish this thing strongly. After getting my legs firmly under me (~1KM; much of which was climbing), I transitioned into a strong tempo. I picked up a lot more people, and was passed just by 1 or 2 half-iron guys. As we neared the turnaround point for the 10km route, I noticed a guy that I’d passed on the bike. Another indicator of bad transitions for me. I passed him 100M before the turnaround point, and then stepped up the pace. I hit the turnaround at 22 something and then finished in 43:09. Nice.
Being the first one in, I had the distinct pleasure of cheering Annie into the finish. She finished really strong, and looked good. In talking about it afterwards, she really struggled with the cold. Apparently, she’s not made up for life as either a penguin or a polar bear. I’m not sure I am either.
Another highlight for us is that we saw some Canadian Olympic/ITU Triathletes competing in the race. It was pretty obvious given that their names were printed on their one-piece custom uniforms, just above “CAN”. Wow! No Simon Whitfield, however. Given the lake temperature, he was definitely smart to stay south, in balmy Victoria.
Shawnigan represents a very strong start to the season, for me. The half-iron distance for the Victoria New Balance race seems like a pretty strong challenge, however, with a little extra training, I’m feeling confident. The swim, anyway, isn’t going to be an interesting component. Maybe it will just be the transitions ;)
My splits (best overall time was 2:10):
OA Place * Place In Sex * Place in Division * Participant Name * City * Prov * Final Rank/Time * 1.5 km Swim Rank/Time *Pace/100M * Bike Rank/Time * KM/H * Run Rank/Time * KM pace
40 * 33/103 M * 7/17 M3034 * Richard Lander * Bellevue WA * 40 2:39:41 * 66 29:24 1:58 * 43 1:27:08 * 30.3 * 20 0:43:09 * 4:19
Full results: here.
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