Wildflower... weak... end

I had a pretty fun weekend up at Wildflower but any fun is quickly overshadowed by a really weak result in the Oly race on sunday. Wildflower is a perfect training race to not care how you do because there is so much distraction, so much time to kill and trips up and down Lynch Hill that you could easily blow your gig somewhere along the way. Even the whole camping gig can cause problems after the third night of sleeping on a 5 degree slope in two directions. Unfortunately, this was my A race and I came to kick some ass and I was ready, so I thought.

My finish time was 2:37:45. 35th place. This is SEVEN minutes slower than my goal. That's a big discrepancy that I have to reconcile. Last year was 2:39:56 for 44th which is a marked improvement for 07 but not nearly the BT that I had trained for and consequently expecting.
It's time for a little Thursday morning quarterback so sit back and enjoy the excuses.

Here's the splits:

26:45 S 1:39 T1 1:19:16 B 1:38 T2 48:27 R

Sunday Race Day

I woke up race morning around 6:00 (hungry) with my back actually feeling pretty good compared to the last few days. My bike and gear was ready so all I had to do was get it together
eat breakfast and head down the hill. I stretched a little, ate my meager 450 calorie breakfast
and tried to hydrate as much as possible. Breakfast included 1 pure fit bar, 1 banana, 1 small box choco-soymilk, 20 oz w/ 1 motor tab, and 1 liter H20. I headed down the hill to arrive at transition 1 hour before my wave. I also took 1 scoop Carbopro 1 motortab in 20 oz bottle to finish before the race. I really wanted to concentrate on hydration and salt as I cramped up bad last year. I had a good transition spot next to the bike out. I took 5 Vantage tabs (45 minutes prior) and continued to sip water as I headed out for warm up. 10 mins of light jogging with some 20 second surges to race pace. I also got in about 10 mins of swim warmup including 4-5 1 minute surges to race start pace. I was happy to sneak in this swim away from the staging area as there is only about 3 minutes to get in before each wave. I felt this was a pretty complete warm-up and was ready to go.

SWIM

I joined my wave and negotiated my position at the start. I started second row on the left side. I wanted to keep most of the pack to my right side so I could limit my sighting and keep an eye on the pack while breathing. I took several calming breaths and the gun sounded. Two steps then dive. My plan was to stay pretty conservative but I had to power to maintain my postition and kick like hell to keep the zombies off my backside. It was going pretty well until my legs went dead and were burning for O2. That familiar feeling came on about 3/4 to the turn buoy which was about 250 meters out. Like being smothered by a pillow and desperate for an extra long breath. Don't stop, stay steady I repeated. I took the first buoy a little wide and edged back toward the pack to pick up some feet. I was comfortable with a pair as I recovered a little and then started hitting the pink caps from the previous wave. I bounced off several vertical bodies while I was trying to pick up the trail of bubbles. Sighting was difficult with the sun right in my face. The best I did was pick up some hips to my right and quickly realized I needed to move on. The water was a little choppy so I just focused on getting in a rhythm. still no solid draft. The first leg seemed like forever. Pile ups at each buoy so I stayed conservative and headed for home. The waves were really mixed now and I swam the shortest course where I was able to pick up some intermittent drafts. I was in the groove but not swimming as fast as I could. I decided to use any increase in my speed to moderate intensity (mistake) and came out of the water around 26 minutes. 2 minutes slower than planned. Damn. At least my HR was moderate and I wasn't dizzy. I took my wetsuit off immediately as my spot was on the other side of Transition (smart).

BIKE

The hill out of transition is about 1.5 mile 8-10% grade. I saw Jim before the start and I took his advice of not hammering this one. I averaged a steady 280W in the 27. Perceived effort was high still but I knew 310W was an upper limit so I was OK in terms of not going too anaerobic. I passed quite a few people struggling in 25's going in and out of the saddle. I was seated. I got to the top a little beat (It was clear my legs were not completely there) and started on my nutrition. One bottle with 1 MotorTab and one with 2 scoop carbopro and 1 motor tab. My plan was to take in H20 and electrolytes for the first half and calories on the way home. This would be a critical flaw in my plan. Since I was racing w/power meter I knew I could stay above 220W and count on some solid surges to 245-260 to get me to my bike goal. Wasn't happening. I struggled to stay above 200W. WTF? I was struggling to get power to the pedals even though my HR was moderate. I was constantly on the shifters to find a groove and deal with the constantly changing grades. I finally started to feel better when my back started to tighten up. I'd had some issues all week and was hoping to avoid too much sitting up. (I even dropped the seat about 7-8mm to see if it helped.) This was the beginning of the end. I was not comfortable and lost power all the way through the pedal stroke, especially through the bottom. I had some solid surges on the flats but the climbs killed my back. I was also slightly bonking. with every sip of calories I felt better then dead. My nutrition plan should have been either reversed or calories the whole way. At no time was I feeling full or over-fed. I only had 280 calories on the bike. This was so called "expert advice". Kim...YOUR FIRED! I was glad to get off the bike and see how the run would go. My back tightness usually doesn't bother me on the run so I could look forward to getting on my feet.

This is peak average power from the race.

Peak average power from 3/13/07 training ride:

Of note is the flatness of the graph from training vs. the huge drop from 5 min to 20 min on the race graph plus the power through 30 min to 60 min is much higher. Almost two months prior and non race situation. Something went wrong on race day!

RUN

I took some time to put socks on and headed out. Right out of T2 there is a flight of 20 stairs and then sharply rolling terrain for the first 2 miles. Once again my legs were toast. The slightest incline sent me into sharp burning pain in my quads with no pop. No cramping though...yet.
I was clearly starting to bonk even harder and made the decision to walk through the first two aid stations to get full cups of gatorade down and water. Mile three brought the big Hills and I just was not digging this at all. I felt like a snail. I shortened up the stride and focused on technique but I was still slow and starting to get some twitching in the quads. I continued to get in as much gatorade as I could take and started feeling better on the flats half way up the hill. I was lost on the course and was just focusing on pushing and trying to run hard...struggling. I trained harder on hills this season than ever. EVER. and still was not feeling the benefit at all. I made it up the second half of this 2 mile stepped hill by just latching on to someones feet. I'd battled with this guy on the bike so I didn't want to lose him even though he was 27. It was really hot by this point and was glad I had a white singlet and hat. At mile four I knew there was just one more mile till the big downhill and tried to increase my push off but the hamstrings were not having it. back to turnover. I was actually feeling better at this point and finally felt my HR starting to rise. I hit the top and hammered down hill. My legs were behaving at this point and I made up a lot of time passing everybody. I hit the chute at 2:36:30 and knew it was about 300m to finish. I felt great at the finish 2:37:45 but still shaking my head with disappointment. What happened. My training went so well 20-30W improvement in 30 min peak AvgPower and 12 minute 1/2 marathon PR and all I get is 2 minutes and change. Something went wrong.

ANALYSIS

I was a little overconfident. I was a little complacent on the swim and was relying on my training to get me the speed I needed. I also didn't eat enough carbs in the days leading up to the race and even went to bed a little hungry the night before. This was all the advice I was given. I was even feeling a little flat the days before. Over rested. I had three days of skeleton training leading up to the race. Maybe one day off or with easy 20 min jog would have done it. I think I could have done better to train right through this race. I should have had my back adjusted before I went. Even if this meant arriving a day late to the lake. That was a judgement call that only time could tell. Finally NOT ENOUGH CALORIES ON THE BIKE. My stomach was nowhere near backing up on me and could have easily taken in 200 more calories. Or at least reverse the protocol with calories first then fluids. I had a gel but was sticking to the plan. I did not want to risk cramping, like last year, at all costs. Fun race but definitely more questions now than answers

Time now to focus on Xterra West which will be a far more difficult race. I'm fearing it a little and definitely not over confident. I hope to fix the nutrition and taper issues as I will again trust Jim to get me through it. He has me carbo loading three days out and I think I'll see better energy levels because of it. I'll post my recent training later.