Going to the Race Without My Sherpa...Not Advised

 

Athens

 

March 11, 2006

Athens, Texas

300-yard pool swim - 12-mile bike - 5K run

 

My wife had to take care of some medical issues with my aging mother and could not go with me this time.  It put a cloud on this event, a kind of strange, silent emptiness.

 

 I did fine on the pool swim (never liked pool swims), and the bike was going well, though the wind was in our face going out on the out-and-back course.  That was when  I really began to miss my Pat.  I reached down for a drink from my water bottle only to find that instead of mixing my sports drink powder in the bottle, I had poured in salt. In the dark of that morning, fixing my drinks, somehow, I had picked up a plastic bag of salt rather than one containing my recovery drink.  My wife would have never let that happen.  

Now I was really thirsty.  The turnaround had an aid station, but all they had was a shot of water in those ridiculously small cone cups.   Thank God, the wind was at my back going in because, after that shot, I was quite thirsty.   It could be that some might have been in my head just knowing I did not have any water.  Maybe I was being a baby?   After drinking copious amounts of water at transition, I had a fairly good run, though I did slosh in my stomach quite a bit while running.    I did not stay for the awards ceremony as I was anxious to get home.    I think I placed in my age group, but I cannot remember what.  I just know it was not the first and I was ready to be home.

 

A Bike Event One Day and a Triathlon the Next

 

Burnet Tri-Hard

 Sept 16, 2007

Burnet, Texas

 800 Meter Swim-16 Mile Bike-5K Run

 The day before this event, I did a 64-mile bike event in the hill country (The Hill Country Century Challenge).  The swim was marked too long as usual, but I didn’t feel any effects yet of 4 hours in the sun, riding the hills the day before.  Even on the bike, I did OK, but toward the last, I did feel a little undue fatigue. It was surprising that I felt this good after the event the day before.  

Even on the run, it was OK until the turnaround to come back to the finish.  The bottom fell out, and the effects of the ride the day before settled in on me hard. I had to walk/run, but I got through it and was proud that I could do back-to-back events like that…and I even got 3^rd place in my age group…Can you imagine? A great day.  My wife’s orthopedic surgeon and his two sons did this one with me, and that was fun.  A good day.  Thanks God

 

 

 

A Good Sprint Triathlon But No Trophy

 

CB & I Triathlon

 

Woodlands, Texas----May 5, 2007

 

(500-meter swim-15-mile bike-5K run)

 For some reason, I had reservations about the event and prayed a lot pre-event about the outcome.  However, once that was done and my mind and spirit put at ease, I gained a sense of calm.  And when I did the practice swim, the anxiety seemed to dissipate. 

 It was an unspectacular, uneventful swim and perhaps that is the best kind.  But those kinds of swims do not make for many look back and smile memories.

 

The bike was a different matter.  The pavement is smooth in the Woodlands and the terrain is flat.  It was soaring time.  I passed so many riders I worried that I was going to bonk somewhere down the road, but I didn’t.

 

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 The run was as unspectacular as the swim but hotter and more boring.  The course had lots of turns in and around the mall area.  There was an area of sidewalk running that left me wondering where I was.  Finally, I heard the finish line. Finally, I could see it.  Thankfully, this treadmill with curbs was about over. 

My bike split became my PR for average speed at that time.  For that, I was proud.  However, there were a lot of tough old triathletes there, and though I had a good overall time, I was still only fifth out of seven participants.  A good experience, especially on the bike. A good day overall.

 

A Really Tough Event

 

Wool Capitol

 August 12, 2007

San Angelo, Texas

 1500 Meter Swim-40K Bike-10K Run

 This was a hard event for some reason, and my time reflected that.  It was hot; miserably hot. The swims were getting easier in my triathlon career by now, and not much is remembered about the swim up and down the Concho River.

 

 

The bike was the same out and back with little or no traffic and I believe this is the bike ride where I saw the large rattlesnake on the road.  Thankfully, it had been just recently run over and was dead.  The run was the killer.  I had to walk early. 

 

 The Marines at the aid stations were most friendly and accommodating.  Ambulances came on the “dirt road from hell” running course to pick up a man who got crazy in the heat and just went off the course and fell.  I believe quick action by the Marines saved this man’s life. I had worn this cap with a neck protecting flap on the back:  bad idea.  It was miserably hot on my head. Wetting it down at the aid stations was the only way I could tolerate wearing that thing.  My time was a full seventeen minutes slower than the first time I did this one five years before and the difference was in the run.  I was spent when this was done.  One of the toughest I have ever done.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My First Half Ironman Attempt

 

Ironstar Half Ironman

 Montgomery Texas Lake Conroe

October 24, 2004

 ½ Ironman Distance 1.2-mile swim-56-mile bike-13.1-mile run

 

 

I was worried about the swim.  I was worried I would have to wear my too-tight wetsuit.  I surely hoped I would not have to.  I didn’t.  The swim took us down the boat canal, then out into the open lake.  There were some serious prayers before this swim.

  Once out in the open lake, I felt my timing chip strap on my ankle coming loose.   I stopped and reattached the strap, dog-paddling all the time.  When I looked up from all this, my crowd of swimmers was gone, and   I was alone in the middle of Lake Conroe. 

That was when I started talking to myself.  Peace be still! The verse of scripture came back to me.  My stroke lengthened as a firm calm settled in. I passed buoys on my right one after another.  I was on course.  A fisherman in a small aluminum boat puttered by without seeing me.  Now the strokes were feeling powerful, and after a couple more buoy passes, I overtook some swimmers.  Pulling through my group of swimmers, I began to catch some of the slower ones from the previous wave.  This was one great swim.  Getting out, though, was a deep landing in a very muddy area. Thank God I had help. 

I was pumped from the great swim and had a fast transition besides.  Out on the bike right away, I started passing folks, but I could only get one gear.  The shifters on my bike were not working.  The next few miles consisted of passing people and then stopping to try to fix my shifter. I could not shift from the small to the big front chainring.   Finally, I gave up and decided to just do the bike course in one gear, the big gear, my favorite. So, let’s go.  I was really into it; taking the hills, passing everyone I came to, I was on fire.   Soon, I had passed everyone I could see and found myself all alone on the course.  After a couple more miles, I still had not seen another rider.  Did I pass everybody?  I doubted it.  Am I lost?  Maybe.  Did I take a wrong turn?  Did I miss a turn?  Where am I? Then I fought my way up some hard hills, which I didn’t think were supposed to be on this part of the course.   My legs and my body were starting to feel the effects of “too much too soon.”  I was getting tired.

I climbed one last bad hill, then the road dead-ended into a major highway. Definitely, this was not on the course map.  I was done.  Down on the right, I could see a convenience store.  These were the days before the ubiquitous cell phones, so I would need to go to the convenience store, borrow a phone, and call my Pat.  

 It was Sunday morning and I created quite a stir when I entered the country store dressed in spandex, race number hanging from my waist, and numbers painted on my arms and legs: not your usual Sunday morning country store weirdo.  Once they realized I was harmless, the folks there were nice.  I guess they humored me some. 

 My zeal for the bike had obviously caused me to miss a turn somewhere, and I had gotten several miles off course.  The race was over for me, and my half Ironman attempt was aborted for that day.

 

 

 

 

Yet Another early Triathlon.

 

BTU Triathlon

 April 30, 2006

Lake Bryan, Bryan, Texas

 

500-yard swim-14.5 bike-3.2-mile run

 

This was not the most well-organized event I had been to, but they did have carpet laid in the entire transition area – looking for a positive.   The swim was uneventful, other than the usual jump starters swimming like fury only to end up dog paddling and gasping for breath two hundred yards out.

 

One thing I was truly impressed with was a young man who walked up to the edge of the lake for a swim warm-up before the race.  He reached down and took off a leg, then stood on one leg before he entered the water.  The next time I saw him was halfway through the run.  It had taken me that long to catch him, and I probably would not have caught him at all if he had not had to deal with that prosthesis hurting the stump of his leg (see photo)

 

It was hard to get the momentum up on the bike, but once I did, I began to roll pretty well.  I can remember coasting down a hill tucked low in the drops, gaining speed all the way down, zipping by another rider who was peddling like crazy.

 The run was a maze of off-road trails- not my favorite type of run course.  The winding weaving nature of it all left me without a sense of how far I had gone or had to go.  There were no mileage markers out.

 

Finally, the course went onto the earthen lake dam and we ran on that.  A man in my age group passed me.  I thought of making a race of it, but I just did not have a race left in me. In the last part of the run, we had to get off the earthen dam by coming down a slippery clay hill, then crawl over a log.  This was not my favorite part of the event.  But once the log crawling was done, there was pavement, and I finished with a clop-clop from my mud-weighted shoes. 

They had the age groups messed up. Somehow, they got me in a younger age group, and I did not place.  I would have been second in my correct age group. 

It was still a good experience.  A friend of mine got out of the swim, went to her bike, only to find she had a flat right there in transition.  So, I was thankful for a good race.

Another Early Triathlon- Good Days

 

Metroplex

 

June 10, 2007

Joe Poole Lake-Grand Prairie, Texas

 

800 Meter Swim-15 Mile Bike-5K Run

 

This was the last time I did this event.  I love the venue, but it has since been reduced to a mini-sprint.  This would be great for first-timers and one-timers who want to say they did a triathlon, but it no longer suited my purpose as far as event distances.

 

The swim had to accommodate choppy waters.  In the belly of some of the waves, the swimmer would often encounter water grasses.  Some got pretty terrified with stuff touching them all the time.  I did hear someone asking for help there.  After stopping my swim, I tried to see where the voice was coming from but could not. Bobbing so in the waves made good vision difficult.  However, I did see a kayak come over to the area from which I had heard the call for help.  So, I felt good enough to swim on.  However, another kayak sort of ran over me out there in the waves. 

 

 

 

And saving the best for last, I had my best bike leg ever here on this date averaging over twenty miles per hour.  This could hold up as my lifetime PR bike split.

 

 

 

 

The run was the usual out and back on a flat, hot course.  I finished strong and was third in my age group.  Good event; good performance.