Ironman 70.3 Miami Race Report - Part 2 - Swim

I  slept pretty well and nearly made it all the way to the alarm clock at 5:00am.  After finally deciding to race with the two piece outfit, I finished mixing my nutrition.  We had no refrigerators in the room – so I had filled my sink with ice and stuffed some water bottles in the night before.  I also had my prerace breakfast which has been working well for me recently – 2 pop tarts.  After getting my gear together it was time for the short walk to transition.

 

On the walk over, got a nice picture of the bridge we’d be running on 8 times:

Once in transition, I first had to locate my bike as the previous night I had to leave it hanging against a wall.  I found it right in the middle rack, pretty close to the “swim in”.  That meant it was a long run with the bike to “bike out”.  I arranged my stuff and had plenty of room as it seemed both the competitors on either side of me were no-shows.  Then I had to pump up my tires.  I wasn’t really prepared for how difficult it was to get a pump that fit my wheels.  My pump at home fits, but it apparently has an abnormally small head.  In the end a trip to the Specialized tent resolved the issue, but I had to bring my bike out of transition for the inflation.

 

After that I was done setting up, I went back out and sat with the family for a little bit.  I had my prerace energy gel.  I wandered back to the hotel once to use the bathroom and then watched the pro men finishing their swim.  The rest of my family showed up right before I went to the swim corral.  I tried to stay off my feet and out of the crowd until the last minute.  I did see Ronel and Valerio before the start, but not once we got closer to the start.  We were  the second to last wave to start.  First we got into a holding pen, then after the previous wave started we had to all jump off a 10 foot pier and swim about 100 yards to the starting line.  All in 4 minutes.  Obviously another organizational blunder.  The most dangerous part was the guy pushing people literally on top of another into the water. 

 

Jumping Being pushed off the pier:

I hung back after getting in the water, as I didn’t want to get involved in an aggressive swim.  I knew it was going to be a long day and I figured if I hung back a little at the start I would be able to keep relaxed.  I also knew there was likely to be unfavorable tide and I thought I could make up time when things opened up later on the swim.

 

Some final adjustments with the goggles:

And pretty quickly we were off.  That's me in the middle.

I had a pretty clean start with a minimum of jostling.  It was crowded to the first buoy, but I took it plenty wide and then settled in on the long backstretch.  This was the section that was into the tide.  I pretty quickly had a lot of space to just put my head down and swim.  It was great to know that there was no wave coming up from behind that was going to swim over me and that the fast guys in my wave were out front.  I was getting into a good rhythm and was soon passing people from the previous wave.  There were a couple of guys nearby swimming the same speed, so I could look at them rather than sighting.  This leg seemed to last forever, but I was mentally expecting a long swim.  I kept seeing more and more cap colors so I knew I was moving at a decent pace.  As we turned the next buoy I glanced at my watch and knew that the swim was going to be really long.  I was only 5 minutes from my the time I could do in a pool and had nearly 2 legs still to do. 

 

It was more of the same on this leg, just kept seeing more and more new cap colors.  Rounding the last buoy the lead wetsuit guy caught me and there was a bit of traffic, so again I went wide.  You’ll have to take my word for it, but the arm at the extreme right - next to the buoy - is me heading around the crowd.

My support crew had set up shop on a dock that was located about 200 yards from the above turn and 400 yards from the finish.  Although I was breathing away from them toward the sun, I could see them when I sighted and hear their cowbells.  This direction was tough, as every breath meant staring into the sun.  You get an idea from this camera shot.  That's me in the foreground.

Here I am in the gold cap passing someone:

Heading for some clear water with about 400 yards to go:

Just keeping it going.  In the middle on the bottom, next to the wetsuit.

Here is a view from where my support crew was standing to the end of the swim.

Interestingly, my support crew was captured by the official race photographers:

It was a long swim, but I was still feeling pretty fresh.  Then came the next debacle.  The swim exit was a bunch of stairs which ended literally at water level.  No steps below the water.  I saw a bunch of people who couldn’t actually get on them just clogging the exit.  I made it to the side and worked my way on.  The dock was slippery and I walked across that section.

 

Here is the race video of me coming out of the water (at the 12 second mark)

http://www.asiorders.com/view_user_event_video.asp?EVENTID=59856&BIB=1122&VLOC=Swim%20Exit

 

Then it was the long run through transition to my bike.  You get a sense of the length of the run in the below picture.  The swim exit was further to the right along the shore, but you ran down the path, then around the fountain, and finally into transition.

 

I had an average transition.  I knew it would be slow as I was wrestling on a tri top which I had never done in a race before.  I also had to stuff my pockets with nutrition.

 

Nutrition before the swim:

2 Pop Tarts – 400 calories, 76g carbs

1 Gu – 100 calories, 25g carbs

 

Time/Placing:

Swim - 45:38, 2:10/100yard pace, 108/187 AG, 680/1929 OA

T1 – 4:37, 135/187 AG, 1120/1920 OA

 

After the swim I was 680th and after T1 I was 690th, so I lost 10 spots in T1.  You’ll note the denominator changing for the overall, this is accounting for people dropping out throughout the race (so 9 people finished the swim but not T1).

 

Up next the bike.

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Ironman 70.3 Miami Race Report – Part I – Before The Race

This race report is going to be a long one, so I’ll split it up into a few parts.  The last triathlon of the year was 70.3 Miami on October 30.  Being in Miami, I extended the trip on both sides of the race so it could be a vacation as well.

 

We flew out early on the Wednesday before the race and were treated to a nice sunrise on the flight down:

Once in Miami, we connected with my parents who drove us to our first hotel of the trip, The Palms on Miami Beach.  The plan was basically to just relax for 2 days and spend some time outside to acclimate to the heat and humidity and load up on calories at the hotel restaurant.  Wednesday I went for a short run in the late afternoon.  It was certainly hot, but I felt good on the run – holding sub 8 min pace comfortably.  I ran up the boardwalk along the beach and back down A1A.

After a great dinner at the hotel, got to bed early again with a plan to get up early for some sunrise pictures and a wetsuit test the following morning.  There was a rainstorm just offshore, so we got some interesting shots.

It was still unclear at this point whether wetsuits would be allowed, so I needed to try out my new sleeveless wetsuit before the race.  I also had brand new goggles to try out as well. 

Here I am trying to get in a swim.  As you can see the onshore breeze was creating quite a bit of swell which made swimming parallel to shore pretty difficult but it was good enough for a quick 20 minute test.

As the day went on it cleared up and we got in some quality poolside time and a nice lunch with the parents.

Later that afternoon my parents drove me into downtown to handle packet pick-up and the athlete meeting on Thursday, before the masses on Friday.  The packet pick-up was a mess with no indication of which line to stand in.  Most people were needlessly standing in the USAT one day registration line (presumably because they were internationals who don’t have a US license).  I was able to bypass that and get the packet quickly.  The race swag was disappointing with a cheap sling bag that broke almost instantly and a bunch of coupons.  Next up was the race meeting which was even more embarrassing for the organization.  The speaker led off with “I don’t know anything that isn’t on the website”.  Brilliant.  He had no answers to anything specific that people were asking questions about.  Another red flag indicating the serious disorganization of the race.  I was pretty much expecting this though as the race had been blasted online for a lack of communication and changing the race course multiple times prior to the race.  The only valuable thing we learned was that the race would not be wetsuit legal.  After this it was back to Miami Beach for 1 more night and another great dinner.

 

The next day we packed up and moved to the host hotel at the Intercontinental.  The first order of business was putting the bike together.  After some initial frustrations I got it together.  I had Marc make a safety check before we headed out for a short ride.  Good thing I did – I had forgotten to clamp the stem to the steerer tube!  That would have been an ugly fall.  Once everyone was ready, it was time to head out for a brief ride and then drop the bikes at transition before the cutoff.

On our way to the Specialized tent to inflate tires.

Our ride was cut short by a thunderstorm which materialized out of nowhere.  We made it into transition when we discovered the next race miscue.  Not enough transition racks.  They were short several hundred racks so we had to leave our bikes on the side of the transition leaning on the fence and other bikes.  This wasn’t particularly comforting as it seemed all too easy for anyone to walk up and lift bikes over the fence.  Not much we could do about it and the thunder was getting louder so I made a run for the hotel.

I made it back to the hotel with only a minute to spare before the sky opened and a torrential rain fell.   After a quick shower, it was time to meet the rest of the crew for the pasta dinner (L to R Valerio, me, Rico, Marc, Mike).

The pasta dinner was about as bad as expected, but it was quick and right downstairs.  They showed a video about John Blaze and his parents were there to acknowledge the money raised for their foundation.

After that it was immediately off to try to get some sleep before the 5am wakeup call the next morning.

 

Up next – the prerace and the swim.

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Grand Prix Montreal Pro Tour Race

After my race in Montreal, the next day it was time to watch the UCI pros race.  This race was held in Montreal and included 15 laps which climbed Mont Royal each lap.  You can click on any of these pics to enlarge.

 

We arrived early to catch some casual pictures as the riders prepared for the start.

 

Bbox Team loosening up and filling up feed bags:

Thomas Voeckler had his name stitched on his socks:

George Hincapie:

Levi Leipheimer:

Damiano Cunego:

Jens Voigt:

Sammie Sanchez:

Matti Breschel and Chris Sorensen:

Many riders sent their staff for espresso shots:

 

We stayed in the same general spot, right around the 1km to go banner, which was nearly opposite the start finish line on the other side of the road.

 

The inevitable early breakaway went and it contained: (L to R) Gorka Izagirre, Angel Madrazo, Maarten Tjallingii, and Kevin Seeldraeyers.

Spanish national champion Jose Ivan Gutierrez chasing back on after a mechanical.

The peloton chasing the break:

Sammie Sanchez riding in the field:

Sergio Paulinho and Yaroslav Popovych for RadioShack:

Damiano Cunego chatting with a teammate in the bunch:

Some shots looking down the hill towards the 500m to go mark:

And heading back up with 300m to go to the end of the lap:

 

Then it was time to get on the road home, so we wandered down to the u-turn at 500m to go.  The breakaway making the turn:

And the main field approaching:

Levi Leipheimer:

Eventual winner Robert Gesink:

And away they go, and for us it was time to hit the road back to the States!

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