So, at this very same race last year is where I blew up my calf and ended my season.... I'm happy to report that this season I was able to make it through and still place in the middle! Yes, my run sucked, but I made it through and without pain! Here's the race report:
Swim: The water was a balmy 62 degrees. I say balmy because when it was 54 at the race in 2011 I got hypothermia. So 62 felt downright nice in comparison. The water was a bit, well, wavy, it is the Pacific Ocean after all, and the course was a bit longer than last year, but considering how much I hate full wet suit swims, I actually had a decent one and came out of the water in 5th. I actually passed the girl that came out 4th in transition and it was off to the next leg...
Bike: The course is flat and fast, although a bit windy. I almost immediately caught up to one of the Canadian girls (they aren't scored against us, so this particular girl did beat me, but I when I talk about what place I was, I'm only counting US armed forces, in exchange for the 2 Canadians that beat me, I did pass 2 open men if that makes any difference for a trade :) and we ended up riding together for the entire time. Canadians rock btw. We caught up to a Marine and for about a lap were a group of 3, then one of the Navy girls caught us and we were now a foursome for a bit until we dropped the Marine despite my best efforts to keep the group together. Fortunately, we soon gained 2 fellow Air Force triathletes (one is a former pro, the other recently got 2nd in her age group at Kona) and were a relatively large pack for the women's race, until we unfortunately dropped our recently commissioned 2LT (although if she just starts doing group rides regularly she'll be kicking our ass next year) and spent the last of the 4 laps as a group of 4, until the 2 stronger girls took off (might I add that one of them was a mere 1, yes 1 second off of Chrissie Wellington's bike split at Timberman in 2011) leaving me and my new Canadian friend as a twosome for the last half lap. As one of the Navy women was off the front from the start, I was in 4th after the bike.
Run: Ah the run. Thanks to the aforementioned calf injury, to date I had only run 4.5 miles. Which, as anyone who has ever trained for a 10k knows, is not quite enough if you are expecting a "good" result. So... 47 (ridiculously slow) minutes later I finished in 12th. I was happy with this though given the circumstances. A little bummed that in the process enough Navy girls passed me that the Air Force women's team took 2nd as a result, but just happy to actually be walking after the race, instead of being carried to the medical clinic and then spending the next 9 days on crutches like last year.
For more on the race, check out these posts:
http://racechase.weebly.com/ (June 3rd)
http://forum.slowtwitch.com/gforum.cgi?post=4598188%3Bsb%3Dpost_latest_reply%3Bso%3DASC%3Bforum_view%3Dforum_view_collapsed%3B%3Bpage%3Dunread#unread
