[I posted this on my facebook page. I ran the Chicago FleetFeet Sports SuperSprint Triathlon, which was 375 meter swim, 10k bike ride, 2.5k run]
I was not as dedicated to my training as I should have been for this event. Having said that, because it was a short distance, it wasn’t terribly challenging. I’m not saying it was easy, but after I finished I wasn’t exhausted.
Things were not looking good for me on Friday before the race. There were so many things that went wrong on Friday that I honestly thought that I wasn’t going to be able to race. Besides my leg being so tight I couldn’t straighten it, I discovered that my rented bike was missing a handlebar end cap – a strictly enforced rule that could result in disqualification.
I only got about 2 hours sleep but I used that time wisely making an end cap out of a plastic bottle cap and duct tape so that if I didn’t race, at least it wouldn’t be due to an equipment issue (it worked and I was not disqualified). I grabbed all my gear and my bike and clumsily made my way towards the race. Somewhere on the way, I forgot about the tightness in my leg, or it eased up but I was no longer fearing my leg would keep me from racing.
When I got to transition, I found myself looking at other people’s set ups to make sure I was doing it right. I also walked from my bike to the swim exit several times with and without my glasses so I could find my bike easily after the swim. After that I headed to the beach to try and figure out the swim course.
The announcer’s directions on the swim route did not make sense (partly because I’m blind and partly because he was not describing it well) but I figured I wouldn’t be in the lead so I would just follow the person in front of me. The water was so shallow that I would guess everyone ran for the first 50-100 meters. At some point I started to actually swim, but my lack of training – especailly in open water – was beginning to show. I was stopping and starting a lot. Even though I decided to switch to backstroke, I still found myself only going 10 or so strokes before I tried to figure out how far I’d gone. My only accomplishment here is that I was not the last swimmer from my wave. My swim time was 17:58.
The ramp from the beach to transition was a long way and people were running like they were in a hurry or something. I tried running but I felt I was using up too much energy and a 13:00 minute mile jog was not going to save much more time than a 15:00 minute mile walk to transition. So I took it easy and let my body figure out I wasn’t in the water anymore. The one thing I was nervous about in transition was getting a leg cramp putting on my shoes, but thankfully since I did more non-swimming than swimming my legs were not putting up a fight.
The bike leg of the race started off pretty well except that it was uphill. Don’t laugh, but I had literally never ridden the bike I rented and was still figuring out how to change gears. I got the hang of it pretty quick though and was using the gears to go super fast on the downhills. By the last of three laps, my rear end was pretty tired of sitting on the bike. I finished the bike portion in 30:03.
I didn’t need to do much on the last transition except rack my bike and take off my helmet. It was extremely hard to run at this point. My legs didn’t hurt, but I was telling them to go faster and they thought it meant slower. And as much as I tried to stay hydrated, I was having the worst cramps. Since running made it worse, I walked for a good while before I did any running. It wasn’t until I was almost at the finish that I finally felt like running. I’m not proud of my run time (23:28), but I knew I wouldn’t be able to run as well as I did in the half marathon.
When I got to the finish, I saw Brian and I started to tear up. I was glad it was over. My official time was 1:11:28. Overall, I think I’ve decided that I’d rather swim and bike recreationally than in a race. That and there is far too much gear for a triathlon. I like just being able to grab my running shoes on a moments notice. With swimming and biking, there is a lot more planning involved. Having said that, I will still swim and bike recreationally once I figure out the venue and equipment logistics.
I think there is a possibility I might run one more race this year (somewhere between 5-10 miles) but in the meantime I’m going to let my legs take a vacation for a little while. Thanks everyone for the support and well wishes!!
