Last tri of 2011

Today was HFP Portage Lakes and our last triathlon of the season. I haven't raced here in over 10 years and forgot how hard this course is. I did the Sprint race as was the distance for all of my tri's this season. Next season, if I stay running healthy this winter I will race some Olympic races again with maybe another 70.3. We've already decided that we're going to open the 2012 season in May with the Rev 3 Knoxville, the race we were going to do this spring but couldn't due to my jacked up knee, but that's still a way off and I have a full cyclocross season to contend with.

The temperature at race time was 47 degrees, we got a nice run in to warm things up a bit then put on the wetsuits to get in a swim warm up. The water was pretty nice, maybe in the high 60's which felt nice compared to the cold air temp. I was in the third wave going off so I had to contend with lots of people in the water and just weave my way in and out. I think I tacked on another couple of tenths to my swim by trying to swim around people. I had a decent swim and exited the water strong, not having a clue where I was in my group.
Ran up the steep long climb to transition, exited and started off on one of the hilliest bike courses I have ever did on a Sprint race. There was around 800' of climbing on this course with some very steep climbs and some really nice 37 mph downhills. I had one of my strongest bikes despite all the climbing and my heart rate was very steady in the aerobic zone.

Came into T-2 feeling good, started running out and my feet were numb, it took maybe about a 1/4 mile to finally get feeling back into them. The run was all uphill to the turn around and I was running strong. Ran around the turn and it was all downhill, that was way nice. My heart rate was actually higher on the return because I was really pushing the pace since it was free speed. The only uphill on the way back was a short side section off the main loop that we did that had a nice little kicker in it but the return was nice. Turned up the speed to anerobic on the last finishing section and came through the finishing chute 6th overall and 2nd in my age group, averaging 6:42's per mile.

Tony WON  OVERALL and Doug was 4th overall and 1st. in his age group and all of my BAFF Teammates did a helluva job today as well, congratulations!

For thinking I wasn't going to be able to race triathlon this year I raced 7 triathlons, I say raced because I was in a race in each of them battling for a top age group spot and mostly top 10 positions. I finished up with 4 age group wins and 3 2nd's. Hopefully if I stay healthy this winter and do things differently than last year I can better that.

Stay healthy, enjoy your training and racing and we'll see you at the cross races.