Big day followed by triathlon...ouch!

I'm still trying to recover from this past weekend! I may have dug a little too deep, but had fun and got in some great work. This week is my "rest" week before my first big 3 week block...so I have to make sure to recover this week.

Lacie's Place
Anyhow, on Saturday Gregg Carr and I headed out on a non-drafting 5 hour ride on Saturday. We did our normal Georgia ride to a store named "Lacie's Place". It was my second ride on my new Cervelo P3C (very fast bike!), so I was still trying to get adjusted. The position is much more forward than on a stardard road bike. The thinking is that you can generate more power in that position, and use more of your quads and save your hamstrings for the run. Either way, riding it for 5 hours takes some getting used to. We had a head/cross wind on the way out and were looking forward to tailwind on the way back...yeah, right...the wind changed, so we rode back into a headwind (isn't that how it always works out?). Once back I did a quick change and ran for 45 minutes. I felt pretty good, just fatigued from the distance.

Lake Alto Winter Triathlon
Sunday a group of us from Jacksonville went down to Waldo, FL for a small training triathlon put on my State of Mind Sports. The race was slated to be a 1.5k swim, 40k bike, and 10k run. It was a good way to practice in a low key race situation.

We had a good group with Kevin "5 Ironman's in one year" Neil, Casey "2nd in Exterra World Championships" Fannin, Doctor's Lyndon & Lesleigh Box, Chris "I now live in Gainesville" Tippin, Greg "Gills" Carr, and Danny "Double D" Domingo. A good representatino of Jackson-burgh. Everyone "promised" to ride low tech stuff, but everyone had disk wheels and other "go fast" bike equipment...I left my disk at home, but brough my Zipp 404's just in case...and I'm glad I did.

Lyndon and Leslie

This was my first triathlon since I was about 15 (hmmm, 23 or 24 years...am I really that old?!?)...so I setup my transition area the best I could. I wanted to make sure that I did everything I would do in the Ironman that I wouldn't normally do in a race of this distance (e.g. Put on socks, etc.)...although it would cost me some time.

Greg's "Hi-Tech" setup...notice the rear Armadillo tire!


Double D with his setup (you can just make out his his UGLY blue and green helmet in the left side of his car!)

Ok...the water was COLD ("I had shrinkage..."), especially at the start...even in a wetsuit. We took off and I couldn't get my breath for 3/4 of the first lap (2 loop course), but then got in the groove. But, by that time the lead pack had a big gap...so I just brought it home the best I could. I ended up losing over 3 minutes to the leaders on the swim (which turned out to be very short), and about another 1 1/2 minutes in the transition area...jeesh.

Once on the bike I decided to try to go hard and make up some time. It was a 20k out and back course, so we did it 2 times for 40k. This would allow me time checks on Danny and Greg who were about 4 - 4 1/2 minutes up on me. By the end I gained back about 2 minutes and moved into 3rd overall.

On the run my quads were cramping a bit as my legs were getting used to that forward bike position. Danny and Greg were able to cruise in for 1st and 2nd respectively, while I held on for 3rd. I planned on doing a run afterwards, but chose to bag it after the hard weekend.

RESULTS

We all had fun, and Danny and Greg proved once again why they are two of the top triathletes in Florida...and the rest of us are a level below.

I've got more work to do on my open water swimming, especially with a wetsuit!

Sween