Nowadays I don’t swim, not sure why because it would make for some great cross training in the winter. Anymore, when I try to run, I can’t do it without throwin’ a rod or blowin’ a gasket. I guess my old body is a little too frail to handle the constant pounding that one’s body is subjected to when running. So how does one participate in a triathlon when the threat of drowning or a blown out calf muscle seems imminent? Find a couple of peeps that like to run and swim and do the team competition!
At last years Big Creek Tri, my friend Terri asked if I would be interested in doing the bike leg for her team. The weekend was open and I was in need of a good, high intensity workout, so I accepted the invite. She’d also asked another friend, Kristy Feldman, to do the run. In short, we ended up winning the coed team competition and agreed to defend in 2007. We ended up getting the same team together and even though I had a mountain bike race the day before, I was still hoping to crack 25mph for an average speed.
The race started and Terri came out of the water in just under 35 minutes in around 140th place, strapped the timing chip to my ankle and I was off like a scalded dog. I don’t have a tri bike so I borrowed some jammers from my buddy Michelle and clamped them onto my handlebars. I did a short trial run with them and didn’t feel all that comfortable when I was in the aero position. Once I got onto the open road of the bike leg, I dropped into the aero position and felt really comfortable right away, sweet! I was really surprised at how good my legs felt and was able to peg my HR into the mid 170’s. I held the effort throughout the ride and finished with a time of 57:17, good for a 26 mph average over 40k and ended up being the 2nd fastest bike split behind TJ’s smokin’ fast 53:41. I managed to pass a lot of peeps on course and brought our overall placing up to around 10th overall. I passed the chip off to Kristy and she left the transition area with smoke comin’ of her shoes. Kristy clocked a 41:31 10k split, which ended up being the 11th fastest split of all of the men and women! The end result, not only did we win the coed division, but we were the fastest team overall!
K-Dawg bringin' home the bacon.
Team Vitruvian Triad on the podium.
A lot of work went into putting on the event. My good friends Craig and Jenny are the race organizers and relied heavily on a lot of volunteer support. I helped out a little a couple of days before the event and also helped out after I finished the bike leg. Volunteering was a lot of fun, it’s a great way to spend time with good friends and meet new people. It’s also nice to know that I helped in the success of the event and the event was just that, a huge success!
Next up is the season finale of the Psycowpath series which also doubles as the Nebraska state mountain biking championships on August 25. I won the race last year and look to do the same this time. I’m in the drivers seat for the series title, all I need to do is win the race or finish one place behind Aaron Grady. Stay tuned for a full race report.
Thanks for reading,
CK
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