A
Arpy
G'Day all.
I must admit I have been remiss and have not logged on for a while. I have not been completely slack though and have been doing the odd lap in the pool and on the bike - although not much in the way of running. I did however finally enter and, more importantly, complete my first full triathlon so here goes my attempt at a semi humourous first timers look at a triathlon report...please excuse the colloquialisms (sp?) / slang.
Australia Day Triathlon
400m Swim / 20 km ride / 4km run
Well after saying for a while I would get to do a full triathlon I finally entered a Sprint Triathlon ? appropriately run on Australia Day Jan 26th 2006.
An early start (4:30am) to get there with family in tow / support was a major adventure in itself ( so tell me again why I picked one about as afar away as posssible from home???) but we did arrive on time to register, rack the bike, layout towels, shoes, bike gloves, socks etc (do I need all this stuff? Shall I put on socks? Do I need bike gloves? Should I clip my shoes in my pedals ? lots of questions ?.
)
Looked around at all the very flash looking gear, $10,000 bikes with all the whiz bang go fast bits hanging off them ? must be playing for sheep stations here ! (read : stakes are high obviously) I reckon I might have been one of the rare few with the ?go fast stripe? down the middle of my chest though and that cost more than any fan dangled bit of gear bought from a shop though
Race was delayed as someone doing their cycle warm up went out prior to the road being closed and U- turned in front of an oncoming vehicle. Hearing an ambulance during the race briefing is NOT good incentive / motivation or ideal preparation for a novice triathlete! Still life goes on and the details of the race were delivered, caps handed out and we were ready to move to the swim start.
The propensity of wetsuits worried me a bit ? I began to think I must be missing something here standing there in a pair of humble ol budgie smugglers / speedo?s compared to wetsuits or tri suits. In water that was warm and for a 400m swim I couldn?t see that a wetsuit would give that great an advantage ? certainly not for me anyway. But as the saying goes ?if you cant be professional you might as well look professional? !
I was allocated into the second wave of male swimmers so at least there wasn?t a mass start to limit the washing machine effect. The swim was parallel to the beach in very calm water so it was a bit of a 400m sprint to the one buoy and into the beach. I was pretty happy (albeit somewhat surprised ) at coming in at the pointy end of the pack and ran toward transition thinking oops have I gone out to fast ?. when will I hit the lactic acid wall?.). I took a little more time in transition than I probably would have liked but then I thought I might as well be a little more comfortable (ie put socks on for the ride but primarily for the run later) and lose 20 seconds rather than speed thru transition and be uncomfortable.
The ride was a hot dog lap with only a turn at either end along a closed road made primarily of very coarse chip (typical Aussie road) and variably bumpy with one leg into a moderate but consistent breeze and the other with the said breeze in your back. 5 laps were the order of the day with the course containing only small undulations but essentially flat. With the wave starts there were people at all points on the course so the drafting / blocking issue was ever present. Given cycling is probably my strong point I spent the majority of the time passing a lot of people with only a few of the big guns passing me ?so I was pretty happy with that. Pace was reasonable given the wind conditions but I decided on dropping 1- 2 km off the pace into the wind and conserving some energy. I was working on the theory that a reasonable pace into the wind which was a bit slower than you could feasibly do would save a fair bit of energy for the run later on.
Accordingly, I found that for me on the day a good pace into the wind was at about 28.5 ? 30 kmh. The return leg was a time to gain some of that time back and so it was easy (? - maybe manageable would be a better choice of words) to maintain a 36 -37 kmh pace on the return leg and rehydrate as well. I seemed to leapfrog a guy every lap when he would push into the wind and pass me halfway up and then I would catch him a third of the way down. Yet again there were some luscious looking females to chase around the course!!! [hmmm a bit of a trend happening here in my reporting of races?.?]
Finished the bike leg wishing that I could swap 4km of running with a doubling of the cycle leg but running it was to be?. Racked the bike, bike shoes off, wasted a lot of time fumbling around trying to do up laces (ahh so that?s why they have those things on their shoes..! ) and nearly took off on the run with my bike helmet still firmly ensconsed on my noggin . No worries about being DQ?d for taking helmet off before racking the bike here. Sunnies and cap on and with the wobbly legs off I went.
Now this is where the story starts to s l o w w w w w down a bit because running is my nemesis. Admittedly my training for running has consisted of about 4 * 5 km runs in the last few months as Ive concentrated on swimming for the Rottnest Channel Swim in Feb 18th. So it was not altogether unexpected that the run leg was going to prove to be a tad more difficult than the other two legs. I ended up having to do a few 15 sec fast walk sections just to get the breath back and to ensure I didn?t start to fall apart style wise. Although in hindsight I didn?t get passed by that many people when I think back on it so maybe the run wasn?t as bad as I originally felt. Unfortunately we didn?t have split timing so Ill never know at what pace/km I was able to achieve. The last 800m along the beach wasn?t tooooo bad but the little run back up the beach up and over the small sandhill must be a result of a sick mind ? and no Mr Organiser I am not worried about the view running along the beach at that point other than seeing a sign saying FINISH !!! The redeeming feature was that you knew you only had a few hundred metres after that until the finish chute and the ubiquitous banana and Gatorade refresher.
Forgot to stop my own watch at the finish line until I remembered several minutes later (official times come out early next week) but I reckon on having done the whole thing in about 1 hr and 10 mins ? give or take.
I know I did the cycle leg in about 41 mins including transition time and I reckon on probably doing 1min 40 ish for each 100m of the swim which would then put my run at about 22mins for the 4km or 5 min 30 sec / km pace ? take away transition time and the running pace is reasonable but with a whole heap of room for improvement there for sure.
All in all excellent fun (well ok maybe the run leg wasn?t fun per se!) and now looking forward to some more in late Feb and March. Don?t know about the chaffing though - maybe an investment in some proper tri gear might be the go methinks?
Swimming training is taking priority at the moment though with the Rottnest Channel Swim on in Feb 18th which I am doing with some guys from work. 19. 2km across open water ? the worlds largest open water event (Maestro roll on the Jaws music please? [ last shark attack was a couple of weeks back about 3km off the coast]) I?ll keep you informed of how we do but hopefully inside 8 hours and preferably closer to 6.5hrs but time will tell.
Regards
Russell
PS: Sorry forgot to take the camera so no photos
I must admit I have been remiss and have not logged on for a while. I have not been completely slack though and have been doing the odd lap in the pool and on the bike - although not much in the way of running. I did however finally enter and, more importantly, complete my first full triathlon so here goes my attempt at a semi humourous first timers look at a triathlon report...please excuse the colloquialisms (sp?) / slang.
Australia Day Triathlon
400m Swim / 20 km ride / 4km run
Well after saying for a while I would get to do a full triathlon I finally entered a Sprint Triathlon ? appropriately run on Australia Day Jan 26th 2006.
An early start (4:30am) to get there with family in tow / support was a major adventure in itself ( so tell me again why I picked one about as afar away as posssible from home???) but we did arrive on time to register, rack the bike, layout towels, shoes, bike gloves, socks etc (do I need all this stuff? Shall I put on socks? Do I need bike gloves? Should I clip my shoes in my pedals ? lots of questions ?.
)Looked around at all the very flash looking gear, $10,000 bikes with all the whiz bang go fast bits hanging off them ? must be playing for sheep stations here ! (read : stakes are high obviously) I reckon I might have been one of the rare few with the ?go fast stripe? down the middle of my chest though and that cost more than any fan dangled bit of gear bought from a shop though
Race was delayed as someone doing their cycle warm up went out prior to the road being closed and U- turned in front of an oncoming vehicle. Hearing an ambulance during the race briefing is NOT good incentive / motivation or ideal preparation for a novice triathlete! Still life goes on and the details of the race were delivered, caps handed out and we were ready to move to the swim start.
The propensity of wetsuits worried me a bit ? I began to think I must be missing something here standing there in a pair of humble ol budgie smugglers / speedo?s compared to wetsuits or tri suits. In water that was warm and for a 400m swim I couldn?t see that a wetsuit would give that great an advantage ? certainly not for me anyway. But as the saying goes ?if you cant be professional you might as well look professional?
!I was allocated into the second wave of male swimmers so at least there wasn?t a mass start to limit the washing machine effect. The swim was parallel to the beach in very calm water so it was a bit of a 400m sprint to the one buoy and into the beach. I was pretty happy (albeit somewhat surprised
) at coming in at the pointy end of the pack and ran toward transition thinking oops have I gone out to fast ?. when will I hit the lactic acid wall?.). I took a little more time in transition than I probably would have liked but then I thought I might as well be a little more comfortable (ie put socks on for the ride but primarily for the run later) and lose 20 seconds rather than speed thru transition and be uncomfortable.The ride was a hot dog lap with only a turn at either end along a closed road made primarily of very coarse chip (typical Aussie road) and variably bumpy with one leg into a moderate but consistent breeze and the other with the said breeze in your back. 5 laps were the order of the day with the course containing only small undulations but essentially flat. With the wave starts there were people at all points on the course so the drafting / blocking issue was ever present. Given cycling is probably my strong point I spent the majority of the time passing a lot of people with only a few of the big guns passing me ?so I was pretty happy with that. Pace was reasonable given the wind conditions but I decided on dropping 1- 2 km off the pace into the wind and conserving some energy. I was working on the theory that a reasonable pace into the wind which was a bit slower than you could feasibly do would save a fair bit of energy for the run later on.
Accordingly, I found that for me on the day a good pace into the wind was at about 28.5 ? 30 kmh. The return leg was a time to gain some of that time back and so it was easy (? - maybe manageable would be a better choice of words) to maintain a 36 -37 kmh pace on the return leg and rehydrate as well. I seemed to leapfrog a guy every lap when he would push into the wind and pass me halfway up and then I would catch him a third of the way down. Yet again there were some luscious looking females to chase around the course!!! [hmmm a bit of a trend happening here in my reporting of races?.?]
Finished the bike leg wishing that I could swap 4km of running with a doubling of the cycle leg but running it was to be?. Racked the bike, bike shoes off, wasted a lot of time fumbling around trying to do up laces (ahh so that?s why they have those things on their shoes..!
) and nearly took off on the run with my bike helmet still firmly ensconsed on my noggin . No worries about being DQ?d for taking helmet off before racking the bike here. Sunnies and cap on and with the wobbly legs off I went.Now this is where the story starts to s l o w w w w w down a bit because running is my nemesis. Admittedly my training for running has consisted of about 4 * 5 km runs in the last few months as Ive concentrated on swimming for the Rottnest Channel Swim in Feb 18th. So it was not altogether unexpected that the run leg was going to prove to be a tad more difficult than the other two legs. I ended up having to do a few 15 sec fast walk sections just to get the breath back and to ensure I didn?t start to fall apart style wise. Although in hindsight I didn?t get passed by that many people when I think back on it so maybe the run wasn?t as bad as I originally felt. Unfortunately we didn?t have split timing so Ill never know at what pace/km I was able to achieve. The last 800m along the beach wasn?t tooooo bad but the little run back up the beach up and over the small sandhill must be a result of a sick mind ? and no Mr Organiser I am not worried about the view running along the beach at that point other than seeing a sign saying FINISH !!! The redeeming feature was that you knew you only had a few hundred metres after that until the finish chute and the ubiquitous banana and Gatorade refresher.
Forgot to stop my own watch at the finish line until I remembered several minutes later (official times come out early next week) but I reckon on having done the whole thing in about 1 hr and 10 mins ? give or take.
I know I did the cycle leg in about 41 mins including transition time and I reckon on probably doing 1min 40 ish for each 100m of the swim which would then put my run at about 22mins for the 4km or 5 min 30 sec / km pace ? take away transition time and the running pace is reasonable but with a whole heap of room for improvement there for sure.
All in all excellent fun (well ok maybe the run leg wasn?t fun per se!) and now looking forward to some more in late Feb and March. Don?t know about the chaffing though
- maybe an investment in some proper tri gear might be the go methinks?Swimming training is taking priority at the moment though with the Rottnest Channel Swim on in Feb 18th which I am doing with some guys from work. 19. 2km across open water ? the worlds largest open water event (Maestro roll on the Jaws music please? [ last shark attack was a couple of weeks back about 3km off the coast]) I?ll keep you informed of how we do but hopefully inside 8 hours and preferably closer to 6.5hrs but time will tell.
Regards
Russell
PS: Sorry forgot to take the camera so no photos
