First class race with more than enough police support, organization, volunteers, aid, instructions, and I NEVER saw a line for the port-o-lets. After the race there was gumbo, red beans, and jambalaya with rice, along with all the normal fruits, cookies, soda, and sports drinks. Also an Abita trailer with plenty of cups and about 8 taps for serving your own beverage. Never saw a line there either! ...if you are into that sorta thing.
About my race... The day started with finding out that the water temp dropped enough over night to be wet suite legal for age groupers, but not for the pro's. That news was followed by notifying us they were delaying the start 30 minutes to allow placement of a buoy in a different location. They were planning on shortening the swim from 1500m to 200m due to the rough conditions now allowing kayaks to get in the water. Finally, they decided we would run 2 miles instead of swimming at all.
This swim was supposed to be a test for me. Since I don't swim in a pool, it's difficult to judge my performance. Guess I'll find out next week when I do the 5k swim.
I wouldn't say I was excited to run 2 miles, but I was a little curious. It's been a long time since I ran that distance, and I started to wonder how fast I could be. Despite my improvements in longer distances over the last 10 years, it appears I won't be posting a 2 mile PR. That might be obvious to everyone but me that knows I haven't done crap for speed work in about 10 years. It surprised me. It wasn't until today that I realized I shouldn't start a 2 hour race with an all out 2 mile pace. Newbie mistake.
Bike was painful, windy, and slower than I expected. The course had ideal out and backs to see who was close to you, which was nice for both seeing the competition, and for checking out the pro's. Athletes doing the race are able to see the pro's more times than spectators.
What I never realized about a duathlon is that as people pass you on the bike, you have a really good idea how good of runner they are. In a triathlon, if someone blows by me a mile into the bike, I know he was right behind me on the swim, but I have no idea how good of a runner they are. In a duathlon, you can run slower than your ability, but it's really tough to run faster than you are capable of.
My main goal for the entire race was a sub 40 minute 10k. In the first mile I ran about 10 seconds slower than my goal pace, which was the plan. It was not the plan to keep going that pace the entire run. Ended up running 6:35 to 6:40 every single mile.
Stats:
May 15th, 2011
Low of 63 and high of 75 with 15MPH winds and gust up to 25
40/321 overall (12th age grouper)
4/24 in age group
2 mile run - 11:59
T1 - 1:38
40k bike - 1:08:12 (21.8mph)
T2 - 1:07
10k run - 40:48
