Monday, June 7, 2010

The good and the ugly-Rev 3

First off - I am so proud of the TriMax team!! It was a tough course and so many of you did well! While we all think we could have done better (see Martin/Dan's blogs), be content with yourselves for getting to the finish line of this race! Great job.

So - my blog: my time was slower than last year and while it was a tough race for me yesterday, I am glad to have done it before Lake Placid. Overall, where I went down hill was the run and in retrospect, I think I mentally defeated myself.

The swim felt okay. I felt like my stroke was strong and consistent through the dodging of folks...I made it through fine until the 2nd to last buoy where someone hit me in the face and my goggles came off. The one thing I noticed about wearing a wetsuit was that my arms filled with water quickly, so I felt as if I had water sloshing in there the whole time making me feel like I had to work a little harder. This will be resolved.

The bike - the first 15 miles were tough in terms of just getting my heart rate in check, but then I felt like I had found a groove. The pluses were that my legs felt strong throughout the entire bike - I never felt any tiredness in my quads - well maybe when I stood up on that last hill - but other than that all was good. 2 things learned: 1 ) from talking to Max I probably took in too much water. I ended up drinking almost 120 oz (hard to believe, but I'm pretty sure I went through 5 bottles and even if it was 4, it would have still been too much). I thought I appropriately salted and gu'ed but perhaps I could have flushed out the electrolytes. 2. Possibly need to check out my bike position, my back/shoulders were hurting. Overall, the bike felt good - I lost my odometer at 2 hours 10 min due to the salt/water corrosion that occurred, so that was a bummer, but made it in fine.

The run: this is always a challenge! I'm not going to complain about the hills. I was okay up until mile 3/4 and as I started climbing, felt my heart rate sky rocketing, so I chose to walk many of those hills. I made sure to get water, pepsi and salt throughout. I would run/walk to get to the aid stations. Had I run more, I would have had a much faster time, but I felt overheated and swollen and I had every intention of finishing the race. I was disappointed in myself for not mentally breaking through it, but it will not defeat me.

The race is over - today, my quads feel great (thank you squats), my shoulders are a bit sore, but overall, I feel pretty good for having raced 6 1/2 hours. I will take what I've learned and use it to fuel my spirit for IMLP - here I come!!

7 comments:

  1. Too much water? I never thought about that before, but I may have done the same thing as you did - took 2 whole water bottles at 2nd and 3rd aid stations. All good learnings as we get to do it all over - twice - in 7 weeks. Nice race!

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  2. This was the most challenging course I ever raced - makes Litchfield hills look like a sissy race. Finishing was an accomplishment - you did great! I understand about second guessing whether or not you mentally pushed hard enough - I am there right now.

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  3. Like you said in the opening sentence. I am so proud of everyone. It would have been easy for you to stop with the way you were feeling. This seems like it was a great way to work out the kinks for Lake Placid. Thanks for always being so supportive!

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  4. I'm so proud of you and all TriMax Team.

    Way to go Christina!

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  5. Well done Christina, too much water for you not enough for me, hopefully we both get it right for our next race :)

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  6. Great job Christina! Agree with Martin that this is the most challenging course I've ever ridden/run too. Many are tough — but only in places. This one was a battle every step of the way. I'm pretty sure even the swim was uphill!

    I'm excited for all of you doing LP because this race has set you up perfectly. I could only think as I was out there on the REV3 run that LP was not nearly this difficult. If you fuel right and keep you head in it, you are going to do really great!

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