Tumble Dry Low

I wonder if it's ever possible to wake up on race day and thoroughly believe that "today is going to be perfect". Theoretically, you want to do this - you want to wake up and visualize everything in your race going perfectly, and you want to believe in this and execute it accordingly. But there's always a sticking point, always something that makes this process more of a challenge than it should be. As I sat in front of the television at 5:30 eating my pre-race breakfast, the headline news of the day was on the heat and humidity, and how the good people of the capital district should do everything they can to keep in the air-conditioning. Pondering the statements of Mr. Weatherman over my cup of Verona, I couldn't help but recall how horribly I've been performing in the recent heat during training. As best I could though, I reviewed my goals for the day and began to draw my focus. Simply enough, a perfect race today would be defined as one in which I finally combined my skills as a pool-swimmer and as a duathlon competitor. Just remove the first run of a duathlon, and replace it with a swim.

"Get through the heat, and finish, and you'll officially be a triathlete." I told myself.

The course consisted of a 300m open water swim followed by a 10k mountain bike and ending with a 4k trail run. Surprises of the day, other than the heat, included starting the race with a 500m running sprint along the beach to the swim start and a longer-than-advertised trail run of 6k.

At the sound of the gun, the pack of around 75 competitors took off along the sandy beach of Grafton Lakes state park. Just as my heart rate was throttling above LT, the pack made it's entry into the cold, soothing waters where the race officially began. My strategy for the swim consisted of 3 primary objectives: (a) take in more oxygen than water, (b) avoid any underwater sea creatures that may try and pull me under and (c) not lose any positions in the group - that is, exit the water at or ahead of the position in which I entered. As it turns out, the swim was not nearly as intimidating as I thought it would be. Yes, there was the bumping and the kicking and the shoulder rubbing that has been said to freak people out - but I honestly didn't find it all that distracting, perhaps due to the years I spent learning to ride calmly in a peloton. It was odd, however, to feel my hand enter the water and touch people's feet, as was it odd to watch the expressions of exhaustion on neighboring swimmer's faces every time I'd turn to breathe. But before I knew it, I could see the ground and feel the disruption in the pack as people transitioned from swimming to walking in the shallow depths of the water. I too rose from the water at this point, reached over my shoulder to grab my wetsuit zipper leash and confidently entered T1.

Out of T1, the mountain bike portion of the race started with a long stretch of riding along the loose sand of the beach which was quite a little thief of my energy reserves. Onto a wide-open fire-road, I must have passed 15 people as I found my riding legs and started to feel the flow. For the first 10 minutes or so, the heat wasn't a factor, primarily because I was still wet from the swim. But soon after we entered the singletrack portion of the course (and the real technical climbing began) it felt like I was riding on a dilapidated trainer in a sauna. To complicate matters, it had rained heavily the night before making all the rocks and roots on the course terribly difficult to get purchase on. There were many sections where I would lose traction and be forced off the bike due to my loss of momentum. And of course every time I'd get off the bike I'd be reminded of the pain that was yet to come on the run, as the lactic acid in my legs was accumulating faster than snow in Syracuse. Between the heat, my burning legs and the frustrating riding conditions, T2 could not come fast enough for me.

Yet, when T2 finally did arrive, I counted only a handful of bikes in the transition racks. This meant only one of two things. Either a significant number of competitors whom I thought were ahead of me on the mountain bike course decided to carry their bikes along on the trail run, or I was much further ahead in the race than I thought. Keeping the push on throughout Dante's trail run from hell, I kept the cadence high and the legs light until I rounded the last corner of the run course. With the announcer calling my name and number and with the sound of clapping hands from my official fan club, I came across the line officially placing 9th overall, and 4th in my age group.

Glancing down now, as I write this, at my fading body-marked race numbers from this morning, I realize that I've finally, officially made the transformation from cyclist to triathlete, and reflecting on my results, I couldn't be happier with today's performance.

Thanks for reading.