Friday, May 11, 2007
Wildflower Race report
Wildflower long course is billed as the most difficult long course in the world (as listed in the brochure, not sure I believe that but it is definitely up there). Add to that the worst winds that any one can remember and you get a VERY difficult ride!! My goal for the day was to try to keep as positive an attitude as i had during practice weekend. It was really amazing to me how much more enjoyable to whole experience was if i didn't let it get me upset. Ignore the bad stuff and just keep going really makes it a better day. After all, what's the worst that can happen? DNF? Like I haven't done that before :-)
My day started bright and early at about 5:30 when i got up to start getting my stuff together and to ride down to the lake to prep my transition. Any long time readers will know how really bad I am in the water and also realize that I have a really bad history in this lake from last year. I was starting to get some butterflies even though I know that I am so much better prepared for the swim and even had a good swim here practice weekend in March. Even so, I was getting a little worked up and it took me several minutes to calm myself down and get my wetsuit on. Wandering around the start area waiting for my wave to go, I realized how much I use humor as a calming mechanism. All of my stupid little training jokes help to keep my nerves settled, but here I was ready to go and I didn't know anyone in my wave and everyone around me was too focused to interrupt! Just as my nerves were starting to get the better of me, Tyler found me. Tyler was starting a waver or two ahead of me and somehow found me in the crowds and came over to wish me luck. I don't know if he knew I was nervous or not, but just seeing a familiar face and a couple of encouraging words really helped me out a lot. I settled down and waited.
8:30AM Gun goes off and I am in the water. I only got hit and kicked like 4 or 5 times before we got a little bit of separation. I was still feeling a little bit uneasy but was able to work into a little bit of a flow and just focus on going forward. I got to the first buoy and realized that I was actually ahead of some of the people in my wave :-0 That never happens!! I didn't have a stellar first 1/2 swim but I was getting more comfortable and was feeling that I still had a good shot at my goal time of right around 60 minutes (not a good time by any stretch but a great time for me). About 3/4 of the way to the turn around is when the wind picked up and the water starting getting rough. Some of these waves hit me and it felt like a swimmer had just kicked me in the face but there was no swimmer there to have kicked me. Not good, but surprisingly, not that bad. I just tried to maintain form and go and I did. I managed to fight through the waves and a couple of invisible metal buoys that I crashed into (small unmarked buoys that look like propane cylinders floating in the water that I crashed into head first, ouch!) to finally reach the water exit and get out at 65 minutes!! Not bad and I can get even better with some straighter swimming and no crashing into buoys :-)
the 65 minute 1.2 mile swim sets me up for a good IM swim in August -paced to make the cutoff with 10 minutes to spare :-) Now I just had to get on the bike and conquer the hills (and, little known to me at this time, a killer head wind).
I'll write up on the bike later in part 2!
My day started bright and early at about 5:30 when i got up to start getting my stuff together and to ride down to the lake to prep my transition. Any long time readers will know how really bad I am in the water and also realize that I have a really bad history in this lake from last year. I was starting to get some butterflies even though I know that I am so much better prepared for the swim and even had a good swim here practice weekend in March. Even so, I was getting a little worked up and it took me several minutes to calm myself down and get my wetsuit on. Wandering around the start area waiting for my wave to go, I realized how much I use humor as a calming mechanism. All of my stupid little training jokes help to keep my nerves settled, but here I was ready to go and I didn't know anyone in my wave and everyone around me was too focused to interrupt! Just as my nerves were starting to get the better of me, Tyler found me. Tyler was starting a waver or two ahead of me and somehow found me in the crowds and came over to wish me luck. I don't know if he knew I was nervous or not, but just seeing a familiar face and a couple of encouraging words really helped me out a lot. I settled down and waited.
8:30AM Gun goes off and I am in the water. I only got hit and kicked like 4 or 5 times before we got a little bit of separation. I was still feeling a little bit uneasy but was able to work into a little bit of a flow and just focus on going forward. I got to the first buoy and realized that I was actually ahead of some of the people in my wave :-0 That never happens!! I didn't have a stellar first 1/2 swim but I was getting more comfortable and was feeling that I still had a good shot at my goal time of right around 60 minutes (not a good time by any stretch but a great time for me). About 3/4 of the way to the turn around is when the wind picked up and the water starting getting rough. Some of these waves hit me and it felt like a swimmer had just kicked me in the face but there was no swimmer there to have kicked me. Not good, but surprisingly, not that bad. I just tried to maintain form and go and I did. I managed to fight through the waves and a couple of invisible metal buoys that I crashed into (small unmarked buoys that look like propane cylinders floating in the water that I crashed into head first, ouch!) to finally reach the water exit and get out at 65 minutes!! Not bad and I can get even better with some straighter swimming and no crashing into buoys :-)
the 65 minute 1.2 mile swim sets me up for a good IM swim in August -paced to make the cutoff with 10 minutes to spare :-) Now I just had to get on the bike and conquer the hills (and, little known to me at this time, a killer head wind).
I'll write up on the bike later in part 2!
