Leading to the race, I had some trepidation about the unusual format of the course and transitions. Due to low water levels in Lake San Antonio the swim leg was moved to Harris Creek, which is 2.3 miles from Lynch ramp, the usual swim location and transition area. Furthermore, the word going around the town was that the water is extremely murky and barely passing the purity levels needed for safe swimming. Because of these reasons, several people had bailed out of WF this year and personally, I wasn't really looking forward to it either. With Oceanside still fresh in my memory, and IM CdA being my "A" race, I was treating WF more like a weekend of intense training. In hindsight, I am extremely glad I did the race, as it was awesome fun and the best WF experience thus far. And Jesse Thomas won again this year! What a comeback after a 1 year hiatus.
Race morning was usual, with a feeling of anxiety and excitement. I beat the alarm by 15 minutes but still lied in the bed waiting for it to go off. The hotel room coffee, the "Dark Rust", tasted awful as usual but it helped with potty round 1. For breakfast, I had the tried and tested Chobani + Granola and sipped on 16oz of Osmo on the way to the race. It was almost 6 AM when I reached at packet pickup. I took my own sweet time to set up T1 before taking the bus to the swim start at Harris Creek. The format of the race was going to be as follows:
1.2 mile swim @ Harris Creek
2.3 miles transition run from T1A (at Harris creek ramp) to T1B (at Lynch ramp)
56 miles bike (same course)
10.8 miles run (The "pit" was cut out, thank God!)
I was happy that the final run leg was only 10.8 miles, but I had my qualms about the long transition from swim to bike. The plan was to take it easy on this part. In hind sight, I may have gone a bit too easy, but considering my final time I have nothing to complain.
At 7:30AM I paid a second visit to the port-a-potty and then setup my spot on the Harris ramp. I had a pair of old running shoes for the long transition run and a couple of bags to stuff my swim and morning gear in. After washing down a gulp of gel with water at 8:00 AM, I waited intently for the race to begin.
Total Time: 5:25:15
Age group rank: 25
Overall Rank: 141
Overall I am pretty happy with how WF went and I am so glad I decided to do this race in spite of the looming cloud of uncertainly about the modified course. It was a big confidence booster for IMCdA, with several take-aways:
Race morning was usual, with a feeling of anxiety and excitement. I beat the alarm by 15 minutes but still lied in the bed waiting for it to go off. The hotel room coffee, the "Dark Rust", tasted awful as usual but it helped with potty round 1. For breakfast, I had the tried and tested Chobani + Granola and sipped on 16oz of Osmo on the way to the race. It was almost 6 AM when I reached at packet pickup. I took my own sweet time to set up T1 before taking the bus to the swim start at Harris Creek. The format of the race was going to be as follows:
1.2 mile swim @ Harris Creek
2.3 miles transition run from T1A (at Harris creek ramp) to T1B (at Lynch ramp)
56 miles bike (same course)
10.8 miles run (The "pit" was cut out, thank God!)
I was happy that the final run leg was only 10.8 miles, but I had my qualms about the long transition from swim to bike. The plan was to take it easy on this part. In hind sight, I may have gone a bit too easy, but considering my final time I have nothing to complain.
At 7:30AM I paid a second visit to the port-a-potty and then setup my spot on the Harris ramp. I had a pair of old running shoes for the long transition run and a couple of bags to stuff my swim and morning gear in. After washing down a gulp of gel with water at 8:00 AM, I waited intently for the race to begin.
Swim
As usual, I started on the far right-front of my wave. I had to make special efforts to not swallow any of the nasty murky water closer to the shore. Usually even murky water is diffusely lit by sunlight, but here, the water was black, and looking under the water was like staring into deep, dark nothingness. Luckily, it cleared up as we headed inward. It was one of the worst swims I've had. For some reason I kept zigzagging a LOT, which I never usually do. Shoulders were also hurting probably because there was no chance to warmup. I tried to follow a pair of feet for 5 minutes, but mostly swam by myself. As I exited, I was pleasantly surprised to see a time of 29:xx, only to find out later that the swim times were low overall and that I had swum ~150 yards extra due to all the zigzagging and swimming a wider loop (leaving a lot of space between me and buoys.)T1-A
Stripped off the wetsuit, stuffed the swim gear in the bag, put on socks and shoes and started walking up the long boat ramp while gulping down another gel with water at the aid station at the top of the ramp. I am glad I walked up and saved the legs, and also glad that I decided to put on socks. The 2.3 miles run was basically through the dry lake bed, with parts of it through loose sand. To add to it, the run was not exactly flat. There were two steep and long boat ramps to climb in addition to a few smaller climbs along the way. I kept it real easy in order to not negatively affect the bike leg. Switching into biking gear felt quick and easy since the wetsuit was already off, but looking at the time, I was slow as a tortoise. What the heck was I doing for 8 minutes!? Maybe I took a nap and forgot about it. But seriously, I need to work on my transitions. Even the slower transitions were around 5 minutes, so clearly I did something wrong. Nothing obvious comes to mind, but I think it is combination of small things that add up - jogging vs. walking to the bike out, applying TriSlide and changing socks in the transition, verifying twice that I have all the nutrition, etc.Bike
I think I pretty much nailed the bike leg. Lots of coasting helped save the legs for the climbs later on. Capped power at 180W as planned, and at 225W on hills. Nutrition consisted of 1 gel + salt tab every 20 minutes, which comes to ~300 cals/hr. I was drinking more since it was hot, with temps reaching 85+F toward the end of the ride. At each aid station, I'd refill the aero bottle and pick a second bottle to douse myself. Unlike Oceanside, I knew was processing the fluids well as I never felt full/bloated and I peed 3 times on the bike. That's got to be a TriForce record! Since I was passing a lot of people, it was easier to find opportunities to safely pee on the bike when nobody was approaching me from behind. Compared to last year, the nasty grade seemed to get over very quickly and I was passing people there as well. I was feeling pretty strong throughout and felt like I got off the bike with fresh running legs.T2
It went pretty well with the flying dismount and jogging to my transition spot. But right after that, I got into this laid back routine where I put on all the running gear right there at my spot instead of grabbing everything and working it on while jogging out. Also wasted a minute to pee in the port-a-potty at the run out. Again, a very slow transition compared to even some of the slower ones out there.Run
Not as fast as I’d have liked it to be, but felt good throughout without experiencing any cramping. Was able to hammer down Lynch hill at sub-6 pace and finish strong just like I had hoped. I was having a gel every 30 minutes and a salt tab a little more frequently. The only issue I had on the run was with gels - seems like solid food does not suit me for running. After an hour or so, I was having trouble keeping the gels down. Using gels for running nutrition during the IM might not be such a good idea. Unfortunately, liquid calories (e.g. Coke, Perform) result into bloating, especially if the temps are on the cooler side. Something to figure out before IMCdA.Total Time: 5:25:15
Age group rank: 25
Overall Rank: 141
Overall I am pretty happy with how WF went and I am so glad I decided to do this race in spite of the looming cloud of uncertainly about the modified course. It was a big confidence booster for IMCdA, with several take-aways:
- Need to do longer and more frequent OW swims in wetsuit.
- Need to work on transitions.
- OSMO preload works wonders for me; allows me to drink and pee more during the race.
- Aggressive coasting on the bike is a no-brainer
- Mixing my own gel instead of carrying separate packets would be more convenient. Maybe this won’t be an issue for an IM since they have gels at the aid stations.
- Need to figure out a nutrition strategy for the run.
- Peeing on the bike saves a LOT of time, especially if you are outputting 1 pee/hr.
