Race Report: Self-Transcendence

Goal: I wanted to finish this race in less than 2 hours 10 min.

I planned to swim as close to 25 min as I could making up any lost time on the bike such that I was entering T2 after 1 hour 30 min. I hoped that between T2 and my run I would take less than 40 min.

New for this race: I have been swimming 3 times a week, which is much more than previously and I hope this will be enough to hit my race goals. In order to speed first transition I decided to try using elastics to hold my bike shoes in place on my bike (I have not previously tried starting the bike with shoes already clipped in). I used no tri-top, instead opting to put on my riding jersey with race number attached in T1 as the race was non-wetsuit and I find that my tri-top produces some drag in the water.

Swim 1500m:
I barely made it to the water before my swim start, I was just edging my way into the water as the 10 second count was being made (Must remember to go to the washroom earlier). I had no time for a warm up, not that I usually do much of one, but... I was just able to get in position when the race started. It was a non-wetsuit swim which is a big detriment to me as I find my swimming is vastly better with being buoyant. The start was very rough and I was kicked several times as well as kicking several people. The group that I was swimming with did not break up much until about 500 meters into the swim, and it was only until after rounding the first buoy that I was not in contact with one swimmer or another. I am normally not very comfortable in the water, but I think that the contact did not make me any more uncomfortable, where it probably had more of an effect on the other swimmers. All the same it was nice to not feel as if I were doing battle as opposed to racing and I was able to slip in behind another swimmer who I drafted to the second buoy. I made a sharper turn at the second buoy and stayed to the inside of the triangle loop allowing me to swim unimpeded. The rest of the swim went well except that I need to work on swimming in a straighter path as I got off course a couple of times.
Swim time: 27:03

T1:
I stood up a little early in the water, but was feeling good and had a strong run out, but once I got to my bike I had a lot of trouble with getting my riding jersey on with being wet (I did this in my first triathlon and do not remember it being such a problem). It took a long time to get the jersey on, and in the process I ripped my race number which was attached to it. I put my helmet on and grabbed my bike, but as I started to run out of transition my goggles managed to catch in my wheel and I had to stop to remove them. In stopping I noticed that my elastic had broken that was holding one of my shoes causing it to drag on the ground. When I finally got on my bike this proved to be a problem as my shoes were in difficult positions to get my feet in and I took a long time until I was able to get to peddling smoothly.
T1 time: 1:11

Bike 40km:
Once I was got going I had to deal with my race number which was flapping in the wind from having been broken in transition. I tried to re-pin it while riding and not stab myself. Fortunately I was able to not pierce myself, but once re-pinned the pin quickly became undone again as it had been bent when I had forced the jersey on and again my race number was flapping in the wind. I angrily tore the number off, stuffed it along with its pins in my jersey and zipped up the jersey. At last I was able to concentrate on the bike ride. However, for some reason or another I was feeling off and could not get up to pace. This feeling eventually went away by the time I got to the Indian reserve which was about 10km into the ride and after a gel and a little water. At this point I started to look for people I recognised to get a sense of where I was in the race. I didn't see anyone I knew, so I just tried to make as good time as I could assuming that I was likely a little behind where I would like to be. The next 20 km seemed to be ok, and I was able to get in some more water and another gel. The last part of the ride was all rolling hills which went very well, I was able to maintain speed, and I believe that I made up some time here.
Bike time: 1:06:01

T2:
I removed my bike shoes a little early, but I was very prepared to run off the bike. I had a short run to transition, and after quickly putting on my shoes was off on the run.
T2 time: 0:31

Run 10km:
I never felt great on the run. I don't think that I ever got up to speed, however with that being said, I don't think that I was ever running terribly slowly either. I would have loved to have had a watch on, or even better, my garmin to get my pace times, but I don't think that I ever ran much under 4:00/km or much more than 4:10/km.
Run time: 40:38

Overall:
I have come to realise that I love my wetsuit, and that it was sorely missed on this swim. My swim time considering the lack of wetsuit was a little slower than I would have liked, but nothing to be too disappointed about. T1 was absolutely terrible and I will never again try to put on tight clothing in transition. Also I need to practice getting into shoes while on the bike. My bike was far slower than I would have liked, some of that can be attributed to poor transitioning, but the rest I can only hope that it can just be chalked up to having a bad race. T2 was really the only good part of my race. My run despite being better than my previous 2 years still fell a long way short of being good. I have not been doing much run training and it shows.

This race I had hoped was going to give me a good idea of how Worlds is going to go... I really hope that will not be the case. The only good that I can take from this is that this is that it has given me more drive to train harder.

Overall time: 2:15:23(PB)