Guelph Lake race report - life lessons

Did you ever have a day when you felt like Ben Stiller? Not the dorky one in Meet the Fockers, or the mildly androgynous one in Zoolander. Thank the lord, definitely not the "franks and beans" Ben Stiller in There's something about Mary.

No, I mean the security guard in A Night at the Museum, the one referred to as "Dum-Dum". That more or less describes how my day went at Guelph Lake this weekend, but let's get on to the race report.

The day opened cold and raining. It wasn't very cold, and the rain was intermittent, but it was definitely enough to affect your thinking on the bike course. It was essential to slow down on the turns and the corners to stay vertical and keep the rubber on the road. I didn't have any big plans for the day. I wanted to pay specific attention to my transitions to try and get some free time back there.

Swim - 750m - 15:40 (2:06/100m)
The first clue here should be this - 14th in age group and 90th overall at that snail-like pace. The sprint was on Saturday - the "headliner", the Olympic distance was on Sunday. And I was out of the water in 14 minutes flat - still not fast but better than 15:40 - the difference is in running up the hill and all the way around the transition area to the timing mat at the back (?!) but a 1:19 in T1 is not bad at all, for me.

Bike - 20km - 33:52 (33.7 km/hr) 6th ag, 29th overall
Here's where the weather definitely slowed this race down. First of all Guelph Lake is a short course with a switchback out of the park and a bike course that is a three-sided square after that. With all the cornering in that weather the times really drop as taking a corner too fast can result in a nasty spill. I know - I saw one, and was very nearly involved in it. The guy in front of me slowed down (I thought appropriately) at the 10k turnaround and went horizontal. Now, you'd be thinking a scuffed leg and maybe a forearm, but it wasn't just that. He shredded his back all the way across both shoulders. I know this because he rode mad after that and we leap-frogged each other most of the way back to T2, until he dropped me when I made noob mistake #2 - shifting to the small chainring on an uphill. Drop goes the chain, costing me probably a minute of chain repair and ramp back up time. Didn't help at all that I had to restart on an uphill. 0:46 in T2, though. I will definitely take that.

Run - 21:12 (4:15/km) 5th in ag, 24th overall.
Again with most of the big guns holding out for the better weather on Sunday this wasn't bad. I got out on the run, felt good and proceeded to pick people off including Mr. Road Rash (#37 Andrew Appleton, whose hand I shook afterward for gutting it out). Here's where noob mistake #1, the key mistake of the day bit me in the butt. I got passed by exactly one guy on the run at about the 4k mark. I decided to let him go. After all, I had plenty of time to reel him in. I was feeling good and I had another 3.5km to go get him, only here's the thing. I didn't have another 3.5km. I had one more km. The run course was 5km. I had some thought that this was a 7.5km run, or at least that I had to hold something back. I do remember running this course one year where the run used to pass transition and the finishing chute going the other way, then loop around another little footpath down in the valley. That year I came up the hill going full guns, then saw the run kept on going. That year I blew up early, so deep down my memory didn't want to let me do that again. So when this guy went by, I let him go - he happened to be the guy who finished 5th in my age group, a scant 20 seconds ahead. Hence, dum-dum.

Final: 1:12:46, 6/44 ag, 24th overall - missed the podium by 20 seconds.

I had no vision of making a podium beforehand so no worries there. And the transition times look much better so at least that's progress. Due to the couple of noob mistakes, I probably left 60-90 seconds out on the course.

Here's the worrying part: there's this nagging little problem in my right calf. It started a couple weeks ago running hills in Neyagawa (I blame Tyler for this :) ). I thought it had quieted down, but it came back with a vengeance on the weekend, to the point where a flight of stairs was an adventure. It's better today, but I think I'm going to have to go get it checked out. Peterborough is two weeks away and I'm not looking to set any records, least of all a "personal worst".

PS. I still love this game. Even in the rain, cold and mud there's something about hanging around transition, or the finish line and watching the long-timers and first-timers come rolling in- soaked to the skin, covered in mud (or blood) but grinning from ear to ear and their cheering sections go nuts. Just something about that.

Peace.