When I left my job at Target I
dedicated everything I had to training and racing and spent the last
two years relying on the help of friends and family to chase after
the foolhardy dream of being a professional triathlete. Most of the
time my life feels like a bi-polar disorder. Sometimes I'm training
completely alone in the freezing cold pitch black of a Minnesota
winter and sometimes I'm spending Monday afternoon riding my road
bike on gorgeous rural roads with great friends. Sometimes I'm
dropping huge chunks of time in training and doing workouts I
couldn't have seriously considered just a few weeks earlier and
sometimes I'm irrevocably stuck in the same place I've been in
training for the last 6 months, no matter how many hours I spend
staring at the black line at the bottom of the pool. The time has
been everything from immensely rewarding to painfully frustrating.
But this weekend made me appreciate every moment of it. After all of
the hardship and focus I had a breakthrough race at the biggest race
of my life, Hy-Vee. I won a car and a $6,000 gift certificate which
is obviously huge from the financial side of my life. But the win
also validated everything that I've done so far and given me
confidence to keep plugging away even when it seems like winter will
never end or I'll never swim fast enough or not feel an exhausted
zombie. So right now I'm stuck with a huge smile on my face, but I'm
not finished. It's really just getting started, and I'm looking
forward to all the highs, but I'm also looking forward to all the
lows.
The race this weekend was set-up
starting two weeks ago at Age Group Nationals in Burlington VT. I had
a pretty mediocre race there that I kicked off with a painfully slow
swim. I had the 134th fastest swim, which brought me out
of the water a full 4 minutes and 40 seconds behind Adam Webber...
ouch. After that I pulled myself together and finished 3rd
overall behind Brian Duffy and Drew Scott. I wanted to be in top
form, but in reality the race was still a tune-up. Hy-Vee and
Duathlon Worlds are the peak for my season, and because Du Worlds is
3 weeks after Hy-Vee I couldn't taper at all for Age Groups. If I
had, I wouldn't be able to hold that top form for another 5 full
weeks and would probably suffer for it at Du Worlds. So instead I
used the race to “shake out” the legs and have some fun in
Vermont. Claire and I stayed in a B&B 40 minutes outside of town
to save some money on a hotel and it turned out great. The house had
a big deck with a great view of the Green Mountains. We got to enjoy
homecooked breakfast and coffee while taking in the sights. I always
thought Missouri and Minnesota were as green and lush as it gets, but
it turns out there's a reason they call them the Green Mountains.
Even driving back and forth between the B&B and Burlington was
nice because there are no billboards in Vermont.
After getting back from Age Groups I
started cutting back mileage and resting up for Hy-Vee. It was
finally go time. I left last year's race focused on coming back and
winning. There's no race with richer prizes than Hy-Vee. Because
it's the biggest dance of all the big dances I knew I'd have to be
perfect on race day to have a chance to win. So last winter I planned
my whole year with this race in mind. In April when a few small
things started bothering me and I wanted to race fast in all of the
early season races here in Minnesota I thought about Hy-Vee and took
a step back. It was hard to not start a few races and to step back
from training to fix imbalances, but it payed off.
Race day started off with a 4:30
alarm. I could barely fall asleep the night before because I was so
excited for the race. I felt ready and knew that I had a chance to
win. Pre race was a blur like always and I spent extra time trying to
loosen and warm up my arms. No one was allowed in the water before
the race, and I don't think I've done a good job factoring that into
my warm-up in previous races. In no time the starting horn sounded
and 60 of us dove into the water. I knew that I absolutely had to
swim better than I have been or I would lose too much time to make up
on the bike and run. But I also knew that I couldn't force it. I
tried to visualize important technique cues in the swim and keep my
stroke as smooth and strong as I could. It was still a mediocre swim
in the spectrum of elite swimmers, but things finally clicked enough
that I came out of the water only 2:28 down on Adam Webber.
I got out on the bike course and
that's where everything really started to come together. This was my
best bike ever and it felt like it. The first 5 or so miles are very
technical with many successive 90 and 180 degree turns. I always
focus on cornering and bike handling and even if I hadn't been
pushing my fastest pace ever would have made up ground on most
people. I still can't believe how many people I saw breaking all the
way through turns, sitting up when they didn't need to and generally
just giving away huge chunks of time. On a course like this, with 25
or so turns of 90 degrees or greater, if you give up a couple seconds
at each turn by cornering poorly you could easily lose over a full
minute. After riding the turns aggressively we got out on the open
road and I put my head down and cranked it out as hard as I could.
Last year my best race was about 283 watts average. Yesterday was 287
watts. But last year I weighed 156 pounds and slimmed down to 151
this year. So my watts/kg improved from 3.99w/kg to 4.18w/kg, about a
4.7% improvement. In comparision a top tier fast biking pro like Cam
Dye might put out up to 4.83w/kg. I have also been able to get into a
more aggressive aero position this year by working on flexibility,
with a lower front end and tighter elbow pad placement along with a
closer fitting aero helmet. All in all it paid off, I biked 2 minutes
faster than Adam and 1:15 faster than Drew Scott.
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| Other misfortunes of the race include Claire Bootsma and Jake Rhyner violently puking at the finish line. Jake got most of his in a bucket, Claire got ALL of hers all over the nice blue finishing carpet. |
Unfortunately Adam and I both crashed
on the bike. Adam crashed on a very tight 270ish degree turn with
some loose debris and I crashed coming back into transition because I
wasn't paying attention and almost run straight into a barrier in a
little S-bend. I already had my feet out of my shoes to dismount and
almost made the turn, but I was going full speed, locked up my brakes
and when my back wheel slid sideways my forward momentum literally
threw me off my bike. Since it was right in front of transition
everyone was watching, and the shock of it left me all jittery. I
picked up my bike and tried to get back on, but my chain had fallen
off and I didn't realize it, so everytime I stepped on my pedals my
crank would just spin around. There was a really young volunteer next
to me telling me over and over that it was alright which almost made
me laugh. After standing there for 10 seconds looking foolish I
finally thought, forget it, I'll just run it in. Of course, I was
only 20 yards from the dismount line and should have just run it in
right after I got back up. Luckily for me I landed right on my ass
and only got a tiny spot of road rash. My glute is so sore today I
can barely walk, but I'm sure it'll loosen up. Adam on the other hand
got the short end of the stick. His entire shoulder/upper arm/hip/leg
got torn up and he lost a big gouge out of his elbow. He is by the
way incredibly nice. During the race his wife, who I had never met
before, was cheering for me like we were family. I remember thinking
on the run, “who is that incredibly nice woman who's cheering for
me?” I chatted with Adam after the race and he told me that he only
trains 7 hours a week because he has a full time job and a baby. I
can't believe how fast the guy is with that much on his plate.
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| Photo taken by Nick Morales of Trijuice.com |
After the bike it was a hard, hot 10k
to the finish, but I loved every minute of it. I was off the bike 30
or so seconds behind, which was a new experience and with my strength
in running I started to really think that I could actually pull it
all off. David and Hannah were downtown taking pictures and told me I
had a minute buffer. I still couldn't help looking over my shoulder
at every turn though to see if anybody was behind me. Finally I
crossed the finish line and it was all smiles and relief.
The rest of the day was filled with
watching the best pro's in the world race for a million dollars,
almost getting heatstroke from the blinding sun, hanging out with
friends at some house party where we got free food and booze, letting
off steam at a bar... generally a lot of “merrymaking”. And now
it's back to resting and getting fast. France is less than 3 weeks
away and I plan on making the 4,000 mile trip worth it.
As always, I couldn't have done it
without lots of help. Thank you everyone, especially Kevin at Gear
West for keeping me in the best gear for racing and my dad for the
free rent.
Wish me luck and have fun training!
