(Us after we finished on Saturday, photo by Greg)
On August 27th, we celebrated August 28th, which was our 29th wedding anniversary, by completing the Lake Cascade Sprint Triathlon. The weekend was off to a rousing start as I picked up my husband from the Boise airport after a two weeks for him in Shanghai (yes, China), followed by delayed flights that barely got him to back in time for Transition Nampa-Lake Cascade, which is triathlon code-talk for, well, transitioning to the next phase of action. Timing amazingly allowed for a quick stop to watch one daughter’s cross country race, then we were off to check in at Cascade Vacation Rentals’ Blue Skys Cottage.
We arrived at Van Wyck Park at just the last possible moment, 8 PM, to pick up our race packets that night. It was helpful to see how everything was set up and would look in the morning. We found our cabin at the end of a narrow dirt lane, in the dark, on the side of West Mountain. A schedule was agreed on for the morning and somehow we managed to sleep.
In the morning, I made my favorite breakfast of malt-o-meal and chocolate chips and shared it with Greg. Then I mixed up my version of a RealLemon lemonade sports drink, which means following the directions and adding a bit of salt, and put it in my new Camelbak Fairfax hydration backpack (mine is yellow). I dressed in my tri-suit, topped by a sweat suit and a polar fleece poncho to keep my core heated until the swim since I wasn’t going to wear a wet suit. We double checked for transition supplies and headed back down the mountain.
Greg had graciously agreed to take us in earlier than he would have liked to, knowing that I would be more relaxed that way. There were only a handful of 150 racers (for 5 different events) there before us, but the volunteers were active, cheerful, and helpful. We got our race numbers (left back of hand and left upper arm), race code (back of left calf), and ages (back of right calf) written on us in big, black permanent marker. The bikes were placed in the rack, the timing chips were attached to our ankles, and we did a bit of stretching and deep breathing while waiting for the pre-race briefing. There was friendly chatting and sharing of information between the athletes.
Waiting for the starting horn, we dipped our toes in the water and discovered that there are advantages to the water temperature being warmer than the air temperature. It felt like getting in a lukewarm bathtub. Then we had to move back and wait for three minutes after the Olympic distance racers began their race. In some trepidation of getting trampled during the run into the water, I hung back in the second row. Then our horn blew and the lake was filled with splashing bodies, including mine.
Having recently read some specific advice about triathlon swimming on swimsmooth.com had helped calm my nerves. In fact, in spite of bursts of adrenaline earlier throughout the week, I never had an adrenaline rush during the race. This was very helpful during the swim. I couldn’t concentrate on my form the same way as swimming in the lap pool, but I was able to relax into my stroke, which was predominantly crawl, only needing to use the breast stroke for a couple of short intervals to get my bearings. I did swim off course one time on the first stretch, heading towards the center of the encircled area, which probably cost me about 20 seconds. There was a bit of bumping and kicking, but everyone was very pleasant about it all.
Imagine my surprise when I exited the water and saw Greg sitting there getting help removing his wetsuit! He has never been able to swim faster than me. He says he just wanted to be out of there so fast that he powered through. Plus, he had the wetsuit for buoyancy. He also started in the first row. So, I passed him sitting there helplessly wrapped in neoprene, but he passed me right away again because he actually got on his bike faster. I was concentrating so hard on what I was doing, that I don’t even remember him coming and going right beside me at the bike rack! He did wave at me when he passed me going the opposite way on the mountain…
From the moment I entered the water, I had no sense of where my standing was in the race. So, as multiple racers on road bikes passed me on my mountain bike, I got a little depressed. However, that meant I had at least done decently in the swim. Also, I had known that the heavier mountain bike would make things comparatively harder for me. Over 90% of the other racers had light weight road bikes. There was nothing to do but keep plugging along, smiling at the volunteers along the course. There was never a group riding near me. They would pass me and go off into the horizon over a hill. The course was a combination of rolling hills, a middle section up West Mountain, down the mountain in fear of crashing, rolling hills again, then it ended with a side trip through a neighborhood with a couple of killer hills that I had to pedal standing up. Yikes. That was an unexpected course change. At one turn, I asked if I was the last one, but the volunteer responded in a surprised voice saying, “Not even close!” so that encouraged me.
I had started my own watch at the beginning of the race, so was happy to see that my total swim-bike time was just over an hour. That was 15 – 30 minutes better than my estimate! Whoot! But now my legs were feeling uncooperative and though I had had every intention of enjoying my run through the back roads and along a lakeside trail, it took a great deal of effort to keep those legs moving.
Since I am only up to running 2 miles barefoot, I had chosen to purchase a pair of Soft Star Moc3’s in order to make the transition from biking to running more manageable, since I wanted to wear regular tennis shoes on the bike. I had only run in them two times before the actual triathlon and had gotten a couple of blisters then, but, being concerned about overdoing it with my barefoot distance, I still wore them. During the race, I was quite comfortable, except for one tiny little blister that I barely noticed in the last half mile.
The best part of the run was that I began to pass people!!! I had apparently paced myself well. I just thought about relaxing into my barefoot form and my legs began to loosen up some after a mile, even if I still felt like I was going slowly along. I was very happy to find that I had actually run at an average 9 1/2 minute mile pace!
I still had no idea what my overall standing was in the race. Greg came back to run with me after he had finished and told me I was doing well, but I didn’t know what that meant. As it turns out, I was 14th out of 27 women and first in my age group (!). I was 35th out of 53 when the men are included in the results.
That’s the first individual blue ribbon I’ve had since junior high, I think. I beat several women younger than me, and had a better time than about a third of the age group winners younger than me. A little more comparison statistics showed me to be 17.5 minutes behind the winner, but 24.5 minutes ahead of the second to last place. (Last place was far enough behind that I didn’t want to use that. I’m certainly not discounting anyone’s effort. It was simply a matter of statistics.)
Greg was amazing, as usual. After not being able to run for a few weeks due to a stress fracture, he managed to take eighth place overall, as well as first place in his age group! That gives us matching blue ribbons to celebrate our wedding anniversary. Very satisfactory.
A perfect ending to the event was a trip to some hot springs with good friends. One of them had run the Olympic distance triathlon, so, being a little light headed after the race, we were quite humored to see that our legs spelled:
SOS (on the left calves)
Okay, it’s corny, but what a day.