Ironhead Triathlon, Grand Prairie, Texas (July 16, 2006)
Triathlon in Grand Prairie, Texas, Sunday July 16, 2006.
1.5 K swim, 26.0 mile bike, 10K run.
The 9th annual Ironhead triathlon was yesterday. Lisa and I drove up on Saturday, and stopped in to visit Lisa's grandmother in Irving Texas, which was pretty much on the way. We went out for lunch, and had a little visit at her house. Lisa's grandmother is almost 92, and seems to be in excellent health, and gets around very well.
We then drove to pickup my race packet, and then to the Days Inn in Arlington where we stayed. The Days Inn was OK. Adequate and inexpensive, but with a bit too much furniture in the room for easily storing the bikes. I rode my bike around the parking lot a little, and then finished organizing my stuff for race. We watched the end of "Shrek 2" on TV. Took ambien and went to sleep around 11 pm.
I got up at 3:45 am and loaded the bikes (my racing bike and Lisa's trail bike) onto the car, and drank my usual race morning diet coke (a coffee substitute). Lisa was up at 4:30, and we were off to the Lynn Creek Park race site at about 5:10 am. I am very grateful that Lisa so cheerfully tolerates this craziness. Lisa helped me pump up my bike tires. Got my transition area set up, got my timing chip, and waited for the start.
It was a pretty big race with about 450 competitors. We started in 4 approximately equal waves (divided up by age), with the waves starting the swim 4 minutes apart. I was in the first wave, with the males over 45 and the 20-24 year olds. I have no idea how they decide to divide these things up. I have mixed feelings about these staggered starts. Its good that it reduces the crowding at the start a bit, but its annoying not knowing what place you are in the overall ranking. But since the groups are divided by age, at least I know how I'm doing in my age division. The 4 minute gap between the start of each wave is small enough that the fast people in the later waves catch up pretty quickly anyway.
I almost did something pretty stupid - I was not paying attention to where the swim start line was, and was cheerfully talking to someone about nothing much when I heard Lisa yell from a distance "Hey David!!!" I looked around and realized that if I didn't move, I'd be starting at the back of the pack, and I had only a few seconds to move to the front. I just barely made it! Actually, I was a little out of the best position for someone of my swimming speed, but it probably only cost me a couple of seconds. If Lisa hadn't yelled to wake me up, I would have had to swim through the whole pack and it would have been a mess.
Once I got started, the swim went pretty well. I got to the first turn in the triangular course in probably about 8th place, and moved up a couple more places before the second turn. The water was warm, and not very clear, so it was difficult to see underwater to find feet to follow. It got pretty choppy when we were farthest from shore, but that was OK, since if it bothered me, it would probably bother most people even worse. I made the last turn in about 6th place. After making the last turn, we had to look directly into the sun (which was still very low over the water) toward the finish line, and I couldn't see a thing. So I flipped my goggles up on top of my head, and found this was much better for sighting over the water. So I swam the last 500 meters without goggles, and went straight for the finish line. I moved all the way up to second place at the swim finish. Lisa took a video of the last few minutes of the swim, where you can see several of the swimmers in front of me zig-zagging in wrong directions, while I passed them by, being the only one without goggles and can see when looking into the sun. Pretty clever of me, I think! I didn't even lose my goggles, they stayed stuck on my cap.
I did my usual not-particularly-fast transition, and started the 26 mile bike in 4th place, but not far behind at all. I passed Lael Martin right at the bike start while he was still messing with his cycling shoes; he's a very strong cyclist and was one of the zig-zag swimmers. I figured he'd be coming up behind me again soon. After about 2 miles on the bike, I moved into second place, and could see the first guy about a quarter mile in front of me. By mile 5, I was shocked to find that no one had passed me yet, and I was gaining on first place, which made me worry that I had started too fast. Then it occured to me that I would see Lisa at mile 13 when the the course looped back near the start, and I thought it would really impress her if I was near the lead, even though I'd probably regret it later on the run. So I picked up the pace, and really concentrated on keeping my head down as low as I could. I caught the first guy at about the 8 mile mark. Being in the lead, I then got to have a personal police motorcycle escort, which was really cool. I zoomed by Lisa at the 13 mile (halfway) mark, first cyclist. Very exciting! At my age, I don't expect I'll get too many more chances to lead a race. I think I slowed down a little at this point, figuring that I was about to get caught anyway (the fast cyclists must be somewhere, I thought). Drank my water bottle, and my diet coke bottle. Kept on pedaling, and no one was coming behind me. After a few more miles, it occurred to me that I might be able to hold onto the lead until the 26 mile mark, where I could impress Lisa yet again. So I decided to ride hard until I got caught. But I didn't get caught, and I came back into the park first, with no one close behind me. Later I found out that I had been the fastest cyclist in my age group, and I had the 5th fastest cycling time of everyone in the race.
The run didn't go as badly as I had feared. Between the 1 and 2 mile mark I got caught by the eventual race winner, who was just a 30 year old, so I was still leading my age division. It was sunny, hot (already in the 90s) and almost no shade. But it felt very much like running on the track on a hot afternooon, which is something that I'm familiar with. The best parts of the run were seeing Lisa at the 2 and 5 mile marks. The mile markers were pretty funny, and appropriate for the weather. I checked my watch at every mile marker - a little over 7 minutes for the first mile (drinking a lot), and the rest of them under 7 minutes. I ran the last 3 miles a little faster than the first 3, and was the second person to cross the finish line. When the final results were posted I was 6th overall; a few of the younger people starting in the later waves had faster times than me. There were 417 finishers. I was the first over-45-year-old by about 10 minutes.
It was terribly hot waiting around after the race, but I finally got a "first in age division" award. Lots of people commented that they liked the "sunflower" wheel on my bike. Lisa got some good movies, which were fun to watch later. Lisa said she liked riding around on her trail bike while I was doing the race. The trip home was uneventful, but hot. The high temperature that day was 101 in Austin, and 102 at the race site in Grand Prairie.
Overall, a big improvement over my previous triathlons, especially on the bike.
Total time: 2:14:48
Swim: 24:04
Bike: 1:04:48 (24.1 mph average)
10K Run: 43:24 (6:59 per mile)
Overall results: 6th of 416 finishers, including relays
Age division: 1st place
Here's a link to the complete results (I'm 6th):
Ironhead triathlon complete results
1.5 K swim, 26.0 mile bike, 10K run.
The 9th annual Ironhead triathlon was yesterday. Lisa and I drove up on Saturday, and stopped in to visit Lisa's grandmother in Irving Texas, which was pretty much on the way. We went out for lunch, and had a little visit at her house. Lisa's grandmother is almost 92, and seems to be in excellent health, and gets around very well.
We then drove to pickup my race packet, and then to the Days Inn in Arlington where we stayed. The Days Inn was OK. Adequate and inexpensive, but with a bit too much furniture in the room for easily storing the bikes. I rode my bike around the parking lot a little, and then finished organizing my stuff for race. We watched the end of "Shrek 2" on TV. Took ambien and went to sleep around 11 pm.
I got up at 3:45 am and loaded the bikes (my racing bike and Lisa's trail bike) onto the car, and drank my usual race morning diet coke (a coffee substitute). Lisa was up at 4:30, and we were off to the Lynn Creek Park race site at about 5:10 am. I am very grateful that Lisa so cheerfully tolerates this craziness. Lisa helped me pump up my bike tires. Got my transition area set up, got my timing chip, and waited for the start.
It was a pretty big race with about 450 competitors. We started in 4 approximately equal waves (divided up by age), with the waves starting the swim 4 minutes apart. I was in the first wave, with the males over 45 and the 20-24 year olds. I have no idea how they decide to divide these things up. I have mixed feelings about these staggered starts. Its good that it reduces the crowding at the start a bit, but its annoying not knowing what place you are in the overall ranking. But since the groups are divided by age, at least I know how I'm doing in my age division. The 4 minute gap between the start of each wave is small enough that the fast people in the later waves catch up pretty quickly anyway.
I almost did something pretty stupid - I was not paying attention to where the swim start line was, and was cheerfully talking to someone about nothing much when I heard Lisa yell from a distance "Hey David!!!" I looked around and realized that if I didn't move, I'd be starting at the back of the pack, and I had only a few seconds to move to the front. I just barely made it! Actually, I was a little out of the best position for someone of my swimming speed, but it probably only cost me a couple of seconds. If Lisa hadn't yelled to wake me up, I would have had to swim through the whole pack and it would have been a mess.
Once I got started, the swim went pretty well. I got to the first turn in the triangular course in probably about 8th place, and moved up a couple more places before the second turn. The water was warm, and not very clear, so it was difficult to see underwater to find feet to follow. It got pretty choppy when we were farthest from shore, but that was OK, since if it bothered me, it would probably bother most people even worse. I made the last turn in about 6th place. After making the last turn, we had to look directly into the sun (which was still very low over the water) toward the finish line, and I couldn't see a thing. So I flipped my goggles up on top of my head, and found this was much better for sighting over the water. So I swam the last 500 meters without goggles, and went straight for the finish line. I moved all the way up to second place at the swim finish. Lisa took a video of the last few minutes of the swim, where you can see several of the swimmers in front of me zig-zagging in wrong directions, while I passed them by, being the only one without goggles and can see when looking into the sun. Pretty clever of me, I think! I didn't even lose my goggles, they stayed stuck on my cap.
I did my usual not-particularly-fast transition, and started the 26 mile bike in 4th place, but not far behind at all. I passed Lael Martin right at the bike start while he was still messing with his cycling shoes; he's a very strong cyclist and was one of the zig-zag swimmers. I figured he'd be coming up behind me again soon. After about 2 miles on the bike, I moved into second place, and could see the first guy about a quarter mile in front of me. By mile 5, I was shocked to find that no one had passed me yet, and I was gaining on first place, which made me worry that I had started too fast. Then it occured to me that I would see Lisa at mile 13 when the the course looped back near the start, and I thought it would really impress her if I was near the lead, even though I'd probably regret it later on the run. So I picked up the pace, and really concentrated on keeping my head down as low as I could. I caught the first guy at about the 8 mile mark. Being in the lead, I then got to have a personal police motorcycle escort, which was really cool. I zoomed by Lisa at the 13 mile (halfway) mark, first cyclist. Very exciting! At my age, I don't expect I'll get too many more chances to lead a race. I think I slowed down a little at this point, figuring that I was about to get caught anyway (the fast cyclists must be somewhere, I thought). Drank my water bottle, and my diet coke bottle. Kept on pedaling, and no one was coming behind me. After a few more miles, it occurred to me that I might be able to hold onto the lead until the 26 mile mark, where I could impress Lisa yet again. So I decided to ride hard until I got caught. But I didn't get caught, and I came back into the park first, with no one close behind me. Later I found out that I had been the fastest cyclist in my age group, and I had the 5th fastest cycling time of everyone in the race.
The run didn't go as badly as I had feared. Between the 1 and 2 mile mark I got caught by the eventual race winner, who was just a 30 year old, so I was still leading my age division. It was sunny, hot (already in the 90s) and almost no shade. But it felt very much like running on the track on a hot afternooon, which is something that I'm familiar with. The best parts of the run were seeing Lisa at the 2 and 5 mile marks. The mile markers were pretty funny, and appropriate for the weather. I checked my watch at every mile marker - a little over 7 minutes for the first mile (drinking a lot), and the rest of them under 7 minutes. I ran the last 3 miles a little faster than the first 3, and was the second person to cross the finish line. When the final results were posted I was 6th overall; a few of the younger people starting in the later waves had faster times than me. There were 417 finishers. I was the first over-45-year-old by about 10 minutes.
It was terribly hot waiting around after the race, but I finally got a "first in age division" award. Lots of people commented that they liked the "sunflower" wheel on my bike. Lisa got some good movies, which were fun to watch later. Lisa said she liked riding around on her trail bike while I was doing the race. The trip home was uneventful, but hot. The high temperature that day was 101 in Austin, and 102 at the race site in Grand Prairie.
Overall, a big improvement over my previous triathlons, especially on the bike.
Total time: 2:14:48
Swim: 24:04
Bike: 1:04:48 (24.1 mph average)
10K Run: 43:24 (6:59 per mile)
Overall results: 6th of 416 finishers, including relays
Age division: 1st place
Here's a link to the complete results (I'm 6th):
Ironhead triathlon complete results
posted by David Hoffman at 7:51 PM
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