Millenium Triathlon Results
Last Saturday, I competed in the inaugural Millenium Triathlon in Grand Rapids, MI.
I got in relatively late Friday night and went to bed immediately after putting my bike together. After some alarm drama (woke up an hour early - ugh!), I got up, got dressed, and tried to eat an uncrustable. No go. Still no appetite in the early morning. Oh well. My dad drove me over to the race site since it was still pretty pitch black out. I picked up my packet and headed over to transition.
My rack was on the far end of the transition area from the bike in/out. This is unfortunate because it meant I would have to run the whole length of transition in my bike shoes both in and out. Not too fun with clunky cleats. Oh well, all the other girls in my age group were in the same situation. Fortunately, I was at the end of the rack, which means more space to spread out. I got set up and called my mom and Mindy to see how close they were. I hit the port-a-potty shortly before transition closed and forced myself to eat a banana. Mindy and my mom showed up as I was grabbing my goggles and swim cap and getting ready to head to the beach.
The water was nice and warm and it was a really small, clean, calm lake. There were a ton of volunteers - scuba divers, kayakers, life guards, sheriff's boat, so they really had this covered. I was in the third wave of four, and ended up seeding myself too far back in the pack. I had to wait to start swimming because of some slower girls in front of me. That was a bit frustrating, but by the first buoy I was able to get out of some of the congestion. My navigation was good and I felt strong and fast. I had no idea what my split was because I forgot to start my watch. Ooops! I got out of the water and jogged the whole way to transition - never felt good enough to do that before, so that was nice.
Got on the bike and felt good pretty much right away. Got into the big ring and was able to push pretty easily without feeling like I was going to blow up. My bike computer is acting up lately, so I knew my cadence, but not my speed. I knew I was pushing a bigger gear than usual, so that was good. I let up a bit on the back stretch to eat a gel, but othewise pushed well for the duration.
I felt terrible in T2. Probably because of the pushing so hard on the bike without doing many (any) bricks lately. I took my time to compose myself, drink, and put shoes on slowly. I kind of felt like quitting in the first quarter mile, but made myself go on. I loosened up at around mile 1 and noticed my pace was good - mid 9's. I felt like I was going at 12 min/mi, so that really perked me up and gave me some energy. I ran the entire rest of the course, and finished with 9:26/mi pace. Not bad for me, but in the grand scheme, I'm a very weak runner. I've got to run more than once a week...
Below is a table of my results. You can see by the percentiles that running is definitely the weak spot in this race. My shakiness in T2 is also evident. I was in the top 10% overall for T1, but in the bottom 20% for T2. Yikes! (Click for a larger version.)
The race was really well run and the course flat, smooth, and well marked. The weather couldn't have been better and they had watermelon afterwards!! I was happy with my performance. My age group was a tough one, though, with people in my group going 1st & 2nd for female finishers and 7th & 8th place overall!
