Jake and I arrived the day before the race because of the late star,t so after athlete check in we went straight to the bike check in and back to the hotel. As I was waiting for Jake in the lobby while he was parking the car, I was approached by a person asking if I had some extra salt tabs. I turned around and it was Craig Alexander!!! Wow.. I tried to play but cool and only had my liquid Elete Electrolytes on me, so I offered that. Craig said it would be great, and the other fellow with him informed me that it wasn't for him.. It was for Apollo Ohno who would be racing the next day! I was super happy to help Apollo out especially for his first triathlon. Jake and I then hopped in the elevator and had a laugh about the fact that Craig Alexander had just asked me for a favor for Apollo Ohno.. Two amazing athletes!!
| So back to the race.. Race morning it was beautiful out, sunny skies and it seemed very little wind. Jake left me at the buses and I headed up to the start. I had plenty of time to get myself ready because of the late start so once I reached transition it was business as usual. Fuel, pump tires, last minute check of gear and off to put my wetsuit on. While standing in my swim wave I met up with Tom, Mike and John which was a great distraction while waiting. Jake ended up finding us once he reached the reservoir and I was so excited to see him before I took off, I gave him a kiss and headed on my way . |
I was just fine. After wading in the water for a couple of minutes the cannon went off and I saw one girl get out way fast.. I tried to follow her but she was too far ahead. There was not much of a cluster and I broke away quite fast. Off the bat I had space but no feet and it was pretty choppy. I reminded myself that it was the same last year and I swam just fine. I just kept focusing in strong but relaxed, powerful strokes trying not to lose form. I was all alone and as the swim went on, the chop was increasing. Every breath to the right was a mouth full if water but I just kept focusing on form. We
made the last turn around and I headed toward the finish. It wasn't until very close that I noticed I was heading too far right and I couldn't really make out the finish, couple breaststroke pulls and I corrected. I came running in to T1 where Jake was yelling "great swim! " I knew it wouldn't be a fast swim day, but I was looking for placement, not time. Turns out I was second out of the water.
Time: 31:40
The Bike: I got out of T1 fairly fast , hopped on the bike and immediately, BAM! It was going to be a windy day. I made it down the descent pretty quick and not long after reaching the bottom, I got
passed by a girl in my age, who I would later find out was Sonja, wow that girl can bike! I passed
her up a short hill, she quickly came back and re passed me. She was off and their was no chasing her.
"Just let it go and focus on you're race" I told myself, and that is exactly how I played the rest of the day. It was time to settle in and focus on what coach AJ had told me.. "Push hard and do not hold back, your bike fitness is there." I don't have a power meter so kind of look at heart rate, speed etc., but really I base off of feel.. Basically every time I would want to back off, I would push harder and really put power to the pedal as coach would say. I played the whole bike this way, really pushing out of my comfort zone. I tried to keep positive and had no idea what my time would be when I pulled into T2 . All I heard was Jake screaming " you're doing awesome, I think you're 2nd overall amateur.. 1st (Sonja) is 5 and a half minutes ahead!" "Well, "I thought", that's a lot of time", but anything is possible so let's just run and see what I can do. I am a fighter and a dreamer at the same time so I was going to put up a good strong run and see where it would get me. My bike time 2:37.28 a pr for my Half Ironman bike split:) woohoo!!!
The Run: Right off the bat I felt strong and although my watch wasn't locating the satellites quite yet I just tried to run what I thought was about a 6:40 pace. At around mile 2, I saw Paula Newby Fraser!!! Really? triathlon royalty... She was cheering everyone on and told me my stride looked awesome:) that really lifted me and soon after my watch began working, so it was time to put the
head down and play catch up. The Bosie run course is fun and fast.. And everything was feeling strong.. My stomach had no issues and I had plenty of energy, I neared mile 5 and there I saw Jake telling me I looked awesome and had made some headway. This was a huge lift and I kept trucking along, I came up to the turn around and noticed Apollo Ohno coming in the other direction with a camera following. Great! just the boost I needed! I spent the next mile trying to catch up to him:) Once I finally reached him I yelled "hey you're doing great! how's the Elete working? I am the gal that gave you the electrolytes, " he seemd very surprised and yelled " life saver! Thank you!" With that I moved on beaming at the fact that I was getting to compete in the same event of such an amazing athlete, an Olympian! How cool!!Now I was about half way through the run, and my focus was still on catching first, even though it was probably not going to happen, I passed by Jake again and he was still encouraging the chase.. I was on about mile 10 when he told me she was about 3 minutes ahead and after hearing this I knew I wouldn't catch up unless something went wrong on her end, but I didn't give up. I kept pushing through trying to maintain about a 6:40 something until the very end. When I crossed he finish line I was elated, and deflated . I was way more wiped out then at St George and I knew I had fought hard, raced smart and did the best I could:) Jake told me, I had the second fastest run split overall the women including the Pros. This made me super stoked and instilled that I did all I could do:) my run time was a 1:28.29.
Total time: 4:42.53, 2nd in age, 2nd overall female amateur, 7 th overall female out of amateurs and pros. I was content.
Up next ... Ironman Whistler on July 27th!
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