Westlake

40 miler. Tuesday was a good race for the team. We were aggressive and in all the breaks and the chases. Brian, Chris, Derek and Tony were in early breaks and Tony landed a sprint prime after a long solo break. I managed to solo off the front just past turn 1 on a prime lap. My teammates rode tempo out front and I was able to get a prime myself with a hard charging Spin rider and Chris right on his wheel. With about 6 laps left to go, Rudy and Derek got in the main break, Tris jumped and sprinted to the line for the win, Derek led Rudy out and Rudy got 2nd. and Derek finished 7th. Scott Carter was active and rode near the front the whole race.
I think Tony and I might have been the first father and son to each get a prime in the same race at Westlake. Pretty cool!

Nice racin' everyone.

P.S. I have to throw the Happy Birthday Honey in here too. It's Lynn's B-day today.
Happy Birthday Hon, should I mention how old you are??? :-)

Happy belated anniversary

To my Mother-in Law and Father-in Law, a.k.a. Lynn's Parents.

Pat and Chuck have been married for 44 years as of last Friday, so that somewhat gives their age away, (sorry mom and dad!)wink

Congratulations for sticking it out for all these years and we hope you have many more to come!

LMP Lighthouse Triathlon

Great day today. Again, about 260 racers showed up today to race in the Lake Metroparks Lighthouse Triathlon held at Lakefront Park in Fairport. They added a kayak division this year and that was the first wave to go off. Instead of the swim, athletes that wanted to kayak, could, and then did the bike and run. 5 minute intervals separated all the divisions. I think they announced that there were like 30 kayakers that entered.

Tony was in the 34 and under wave that went off after the kayakers. He had a pretty decent swim and was out of the water with the leaders and after a quick T-1, headed out on the 13 mile bike and soon was in the overall lead. He finished the bike and was 1st back into T-2 and headed out on the 3.3 mile run. He had the run lead until Kevin Park caught and passed him at about mile 1.5. Kevin started in the 35 and over wave and eventually won overall. Tony ended up finishing strong, running a 21 minute 3.3 mile run and winning his 19 and under age group and was 5th overall. The new Scott TT bike is making ALOT of difference in his bike leg. (Rudy)
Strong race today Tony, you were awesome!

I was in the 35 and over age group that started 10 minutes back. I had a good swim again this race, but I have to say that this was probably the roughest swim that I have had in many races. I don't know if it was due to the amount of racers in our group, but I was getting banged around pretty good for probably 100 yds. until I was able to break away. I exited the water and immediately took off my wetsuit. I thought it might help the run up the beach and into transition to not have to run with the water soaked wetsuit on. I was soon covered with sand and spent the whole bike and run with sand all over my tri suit. It was on the bars on my bike, on my face and arms....I won't try that again.

Entered T-1, good transition and off on the bike. Same as last week, the bike on the way out wasn't good. My legs were screaming! I got to mile 5 and they started to come around, I found a rhythym and felt fine there after. I finished the bike strong and had a good T-2. Short climb up the hill after transition and down the other side and it was out on the run course and I knew immediately my running legs were up to the task today. I was marking a few runners that I wanted to catch that started in the wave before me. I caught a few and was passed only by Brian Stern. My good friend and brother Doug Sedivy caught me near the 1/2 way point and we matched each other stride for stride all the way to the finish, both pushing each other. We came to the finish line together and I told him to go ahead of me and he said no you first, so I graciously obliged! Doug had a great race today after suffering a pulled groin muscle about a month ago and not being able to run like he's used to.

I took 2nd in my age group and was 3rd overall. Actually I was 3rd. in my age group but Kevin Park was the overall winner and Brian Stern was 2nd. then me. They didn't count Kevin in the age group but instead the overall winner. Great race Kevin and Brian!! It's hard to match your 5'20" - 5'30" miles off the bike.

Top 5 results were.

Kevin Park
Brian Stern
Bill Marut
Doug Sedivy
Tony Marut

This is an awesome local race that seems to draw more and more racers each year. Lots of fast guys and women come out for this one.

Congrats to all that raced today, everyone did great!

Bill

Thursday night

LeRoy TT. Good turnout tonight, 11 racers showed, pretty fast times posted tonight too. Wind was from the North-West, so we had a tail wind on the start and it kind of pushed us up the hill, Seemed windier on the way back in, always does though when your pushing hard. Tony and I both pr'd tonight, Tony had a 17:50, I had a 17:59 without aero helmets and shoe covers. Could go a few seconds faster maybe with all the gear, maybe next time. Kevin Park had a 17:28 for fast time of the night.
Thanks Jim!

Lighthouse Tri on Sunday.

Peace

Kinda reminds

me of the Chippewa Creek Road Race!

I bet Chippewa is harder though.

Huntington

Triathlon Sunday. Over 250 racers just in the triathlon alone! Rick from NCN said that was a record for this race and I can believe it. I'm not sure how many were in the duathlon but there were lots in that race too.

Tony and I had a pretty decent week leading up to this event. We tapered a little by just doing a hard bike race at Westlake on Tuesday and a semi hard bike on Saturday for some openers at the Cleveland Triathlon Club training day and one long swim and one easy run during the week.

Tony's group hit the water just shortly after 8 am followed by my group which started 8 minutes later. We both had decent swims. I felt awesome and was out of the water 3rd. in my group, I think Tony said he was 10th. I had actually caught quite a few of the 30 something age groupers that were in the group before me. I exited the water and began the long run through the sand and up the hill that goes under Lake Rd, to transition.

Transition went well and out on the bike for 14 miles. The bike on the way out was a zig zag 7 miles and I didn't care for it at all. It was pretty windy heading west, but all the zig zagging sure did take the rhythm out of the first 7 or so miles. On the way back it was straight and flat with a nice tailwind. On the way out I was going between 22-24 mph occasionally hitting 25, On the way back it was steady 25-26 sometimes hitting 29 mph., that was nice, I wish the whole bike could have been like that.
Got back to transition and Tony was long gone. He did have 8 minutes on me and I didn't expect to see him at all the whole race. Not too many bikes in transition either, especially after seeing over 250 bikes there before the swim.

T-2 was a little slower than I would have liked. I normally pull my feet out of the shoes before transition, but this time I didn't because Brian Stern and I came into transition together and I figured I had a chance to stay with him for a short distance on the run and I didn't want to jepordize catching a shoe strap in the chain and going down on the bike. Anyway I should have pulled my feet out of the shoes because I don't know what I was thinking about trying to stay with Brian anyway, he run's 5:20's off the bike and I run like 6:30's, just caught up in the moment I guess.

I started off on the run and felt pretty good and held a constant pace throughout. I felt pretty good at the finish and ended up sprinting it out sort of with a guy that was trying to catch me on the uphill before the finish. That last surge on the final hill really hurt, the picture explains! Eric, nice job on the run too by the way! I tried to keep your pace for the last bit but my hr was over 175 and I knew I had to save some for the run up the last hill, your running well my friend.

Anyway, Tony had an excellent race to finish 8th overall and 2nd in his age group with a 1:01:47, I on the other hand didn't fare so well with a 4th in my age group and 16th overall with a 1:03:23. Lots of fast old guys showed up. I raced my butt off, I know it was very humid on the run and I don't do very well in the humidity, but everyone raced in the same conditions so no excuses on my part. If I could only run 6:00 minute miles off the bike................

Congratulations to Mike and Christina for both winning their respective age groups in the duathlon and Christina was 2nd woman overall! Western States (Colorado) team mate Steve Heibel showed up and raced the duathlon on only 1 run in the last month and did very well, nice living in that high altitude huh Steve? Great to see you again too.

Congratulations to all that raced, there were ALOT of fast times at this race.

Le Tour

Boneheads! Again, after all the doping scandals over the past years in the Pro and domestic tour, there are still some that think that they can slip through the cracks and go undetected. How much longer is this going to continue until professional cycling will no longer be able to get any type of sponsorships? There are alot of very talented young riders out there that would love to be able to possibly fulfill a dream of one day becoming a professional bike racer, maybe it would only be for a few years, but to say later in life that they had the opportunity and went for it and became. This doping stuff is doing nothing positive for the sport or for the young up and comers. How can a clean young rider compete with a doped rider and be competitive? They simply can't, so they start doping as well, it's the ole' snowball effect. Oh sure there are many clean riders, and most of them are, but I say no matter who you are or how influential you are in the cycling community, if you are caught, you serve a lifetime ban in the pro ranks. Then let em go to school, work a full time job, live like a normal human being instead of a pampered little baby and see how hard it is to balance a life and continue to train and participate in a sport that you love to only be mediocre!

Zipp night

at Westlake. Race started fast with attack after attack. I was in an early break with Rudy, Brian Batke, and a Stark Velo rider that was reeled in after about 2 miles. Tony was in a break with Dave Chernosky, Paul M., and a few others. At about the halfway point Rudy and Andy Moskal snuck off and opened up a gap then Paul chased and caught on and that was the break that stuck. The three of them later sprinted to the finish with Andy taking the win over Paul and Rudy nailing 3rd. in a very fast paced break. Lake Effect did well with many team members taking primes, mostly Zipp merch. Nice stuff too by the way! The main group was very active with a lot of hard surges and attacks. My average speed for the 44 miles of racing was 27.2 mph.
Lots of carbon wheels last night, way cool sound too. It really makes me cringe though when I hear those carbon wheels hitting holes in the road...Kinda like watching a movie and there's a really nice car that you'd love to have, and next thing you see is it getting blown to smithereens or somebody smashes the crap out of it and it's pretty much worthless. I hit one last night coming through the chicane area and thought my front wheel was a gonner. I have the Cosmic Carbones, when I finished the race I looked to see if the wheel went out of true and it was perfectly straight. Nice!
Nice racing last night everyone.

No racing

this weekend, just some training. Friday we did an Olympic distance tri workout. Swam open water at Fairport for 25 minutes, pretty much the equivalant of 1 mile. Transitioned and did a 26 mile bike into Grand River and out Lakeshore Blvd. into Willoughby and back. Pretty decent ride too. Got back and took off on a 6.3 mile run from Fairport into Painesville and back. All went well and the concession stand was open at the Fairport Beach when we got back and we got us a couple o large blueberry slushies, perfect ending to any workout!

Saturday was a 25 mile recovery spin on the road bikes in the small ring, not much pressure on the pedals at all and today was a fast 3.2 mile run with an easy swim.

Felt pretty good this weekend and we're looking forward to Zipp demo night at Westlake on Tuesday and the Huntington Beach Triathlon this Sunday.

Hope everyone had a good weekend!

Later

Viva

Le Tour! Oh Yea!

Not that I was really looking or anything, but look how short the podium dude is compared to the girls.....

Intervals on the bike

tonight and running intervals last night in the rain. I love running in the rain. It wasn't raining that bad last night when I was out, just basically a light rain, but don't you just love running in the rain? Tonight was 5x5k TT build sets with 5 minute rests between sets for a total of 2 hrs on the bike. Pretty hard and it was windy. Going with the wind doing these intervals I was doing about 31-33 mph, it sure would be nice to TT like that all the time, and to think that Lance used to be able to do that most of the time, wow!
Stefan Shumacher averaged almost 31 mph for the 18 mile TT at yesterdays 4th stage of the Tour, incredible, that's some serious wattage being put out.
Friday will be a Olympic distance workout for me at Headlands. Gettin' ready for Greater Cleveland in August.

Catch ya later.

NCN Lorain Triathlon

Pretty decent race this morning. Got to the venue at about 6:30 for the 8:00 start. Got everything into transition, signed in, donned the wetsuits and jumped in the lake for a good warm-up swim. We were going to swim a few openers yesterday, but we got pretty busy doing other stuff and couldn't make it to Headlands for an open water swim. Fairport has the Mardis Gras going on this weekend so we couldn't make it there either. The water this morning was quite a bit colder than it has been lately, maybe due to some north winds and the rain that we got last Thursday. We were contemplating bringing our wetsuits because it's such a short swim, but now we're glad we did. Anyway, we got a good warm-up in and it was time for the wave starts to go off.

Tony was in the 1st wave, 34 and under. The group went off and Tony fell flat on his face into the water before he even had a chance to swim a stroke, said he tripped over the sand....How the heck do you do that I ask? Kinda funny actually :-) He had a pretty good swim though and made up for the miscalculation and came out of the water 12th, so he made up pretty good time. T-1 went smooth and he made up time on the bike and entered T-2 in 3rd. spot. Got out of transition fast and about 1.3 miles into the run, he and some others took a wrong turn and ran off course. Don't ask me how, he tried to tell me but I was very confused, obviously he was too at the time. Seems some others made the same error as well, so I can't pick on him for that one as much as falling down in the water......hehehe. He said that the adrenaline really kicked in after he found his way back onto the course and dug deep all the way to the finish. He finished 8th overall out of 120 and 1st in the 16-19 yo age group.

After Tony's wave went off, 4 minutes later the old timer guys went off, that would be the 35+ and me. I had a good 1/4 mile swim, 3rd out of the water, ran up the hill to transition, peeled the wetsuit off and took off on the 15 mile bike. Pretty decent course with some rollers, but mainly flat. Legs were totally filled with lactic acid by mile 2, by mile 3 I felt much better and settled into a good rhythm and pretty fast pace. Came back into transition with my feet out of the shoes, did a cyclocross dismount before the timing mats, racked the bike, slid the flats on and ran a 19:15 5k, good for 7th overall and 2nd in the 40-44 ag.

My time was 1:06:20
Tony's time was 1:08:18

If my coordinately AND directionally challenged son had not made a couple crucial mistakes in this race I'm "ASSUMING" that his time would have been better than mine, or close to it anyway, but I have been known to be wrong on occasions, we were both feeling pretty good today. Don't worry Tone, you'll get another crack at me soon enough.

Here's a picture of us laughing at you know who.

Great night

last night at LeRoy. Rudy and Robert made the trip out and when Tony and I arrived, The silver Honda Fit was already there! What?, Rudy and Robert beat us to a race venue? Not only do they beat us in the race, they are now taking away what little thunder we do have and are beating us to the race itself....

When we pulled into the parking lot, they were coming back from a short warm up, Tony and I finished getting ready and off we all went to pre-ride the whole course, since Robert had not ridden it before. The conditions were pretty nice last night for the course. The wind was in the direction that was favorable for the ride up the hill and on the finishing stretch and the roads were dry after all the rain we had earlier in the day.

We saw a few more riders warming up when we were on the way back in to get ready for the start. After the sticks were drawn, I was first up and ready to go with Rudy next, Chris, Tony, Robert and rider #6. I went off and was feeling pretty good. My hr wasn't through the roof like it normally is on the start due to the slight uphill and once I crested it I settled into a nice rythym and was feeling good. Rode the hill section strong and came back down feeling good. Rounded the left hander and onto the finishing stretch and about 1.5 miles left and Rudy came by just haulin' a**, he looked very smooth and strong (as always) I tried to up the pace just a bit to keep him in sight til the finish and also motivate me to dig just a little bit deeper. The finishing stretch is basically flat with just a few small risers in it but for the most part, if the wind is right it is fast. Last night was pretty fast. I came across the finishing line at 33 mph. for an 18:16, 25.9 mph avg.

Rudy had the 3rd. fastest time ever on the course with a 16:53 and the fastest of the year so far! Robert went almost 1 mph. avg faster than he did at states and averaged 22.6 mph with a 20:46. Tony pr'd and said that his legs didn't feel all that well with an 18:13 for an avg. of 26 mph. I think the TT's are going to be a little different for Tony now with his new machine thanks to Rudy :-) THANK YOU AGAIN, your a great guy Rudy and we're proud to have you as our friend.

Thanks again as always to Jim Behrens for coming out every week and holding the race for us. He's always there despite the weather conditions. Jim's very committed and loves to see everyone have a good race. Thanks Jim.

A few pics.

Later