This isn't an "A" race for me, more of an early season "B+" training outing, but I am determined to take revenge on the course this year after the debacle at the same event last year. For those of you who haven't been reading my blog for long, I was kicked in the nose within about 75 yards of the start of the swim; got a nose bleed; suffered a minor panic attack; felt horribly restricted by my wetsuit; had trouble breathing and them swam breast stroke much of the way in for an absolutely horrible swim time of somewhere around 20 minutes - not good! From there I picked it up a bit on the bike, but was pretty slow on the run to finish 20th in my age group at 1:34:02. This was especially galling as it was my first race under the Puppeteer's evil reign as Queen Nasty Coach.... This year things will be different!
I feel as if my training has been going reasonably well and that I am getting faster in all three disciplines. My swim is definitely improving and, after taking a short while to get comfortable, I enjoyed a good open water swim session at Jordan Lake last week and am looking forward to another one tomorrow. The mantra is "loooong and sloooow" while maintaining a strong catch and long, strong pull. Surely it can't be any worse than last year and hopefully I will be much closer to 15 minutes than 20!
The bike is a relatively short and flat 14 miler and the plan is to basically hammer it on The Slut. I dropped her off with Matt Lodder, the wonderful Cary Cycle Surgeon today for a tune-up with race wheels and cassette fitted. This will be her first race, so I want to do her proud! Last year was 37:51 and I would like to be closer to 35 minutes.
Finally, of course, the run..... My running has suffered a little because of the calf injury I suffered at the end of last year, but I feel that it's finally coming back. The plan here is fast cadence, a good toe-off and finish the stride. It won't be very scientific beyong that - give it all I have, chase everything in sight and collapse over the line! Slow last year at 27 mins plus. Surely I have 25 minutes in me? We'll see.
Somewhere around 1 hour 25 mins total would be a good outcome, but the weather may become a wild card. It is forecast to be in the 90s every day between now and Sunday. The low on Saturday night is forecast to be 66 F, so it could already be pretty toasty by the time we get to the run, especially if I'm in one of the later start waves - going to need lots of fluids to avoid this!...........
No comments:
Post a Comment