Central Park Triathlon Race Report

I registered for this race way before finding out that I had gotten into the NYC Triathlon next week. I figured I could do it anyway, despite the NYC tri being a week away, and also despite the fact that I did the Queens Half Marathon yesterday. Ultimately, I'm training for the Poconos Half Ironman and I need to be able to handle this amount of physical activity.

The Central Park Triathlon is a 1/4 mile swim in a pool; 12 miles of biking and 3 miles of running. I did not obsess over this triathlon as I had for the Black Bear, in some ways this is good, although last night I was wondering if I had not gotten enough obsessing time in and that I would forget something important.
SWIM: 3 loops of the pool, 5 people to each lane. I think there were 4 in mine. I was in the last wave. The women in my lane decided that we would all just start at the same time and then arrange ourselves according to speed. Upon starting, one woman just jetted off and was halfway down the pool. I had considered drafting behind someone, but she was not going to be it. As the rest of us swam the first length, I ended up second. By the end of the first loop, another woman passed me, and when starting my third loop, I noticed that the fourth woman was right behind me. I figured since I had not felt her, nor had she touched my feet, I would just keep going. On the way back from that last loop, she passed me. I was wondering whether I had been holding her back, that maybe I should have stopped and let her pass. I also felt bad that I ended up being the last one to finish in my lane, but let it go. I later found out that this woman had been 'drafting' behind me! I don't consider my swimming speed to be draftable; but it certainly made me feel better that someone was drafting behind me rather than I was holding them back.
GARMIN swim time: 10 minutes 50 seconds

T1: As I ran to T1, I passed a bicyclist that was finishing his bike leg. I was stunned. I think I audibly gasped when I saw him. I know that if he was in the first swim wave, he started around 45 minutes before me, but still...
I have found that the fastest way for me to put my socks and shoes on is to sit down right away. I have tried doing it standing up, and it just slows me down. Sat down, put my damp socks on and bicycle shoes. Helmet, sunglasses, race belt and I was off!
GARMIN T1 time: 2 minutes 5 seconds

BIKE: The bike leg consisted of 2 loops of Central Park. It started out going up the steepest hill in Central Park going from the northen part of the park counterclockwise. At this point I had the thought, which I also had at the Black Bear "Now why precisely am I doing this?". I'm not sure what the answer is to this, but I know I enjoy it before and then afterwards, but there is that brain fart when I wonder why.
So by this time of the morning, there were already hundreds of people in Central Park - runners, bikers, walkers, horse-drawn carriages. As the race director stressed, we don't have priority in the park. It's also good that I know this park because they do not put markers out for the bike route. You are expected to know the loop and which are the exits to the park. For me this was not an issue, but I did speak to someone who said she had never ridden in the park, so it could potentially be confusing. The only problem on the bike leg was that my odometer did not work so I did not know my speed. So all I can say about this is that I went as fast as I could. I thought on the downhills that it was good I did not know my speed because I get nervous sometimes when I see a high number. There were a couple of times that I got nervous due to people meandering while walking or biking. Most times, I can call out 'on your left' or 'coming through' but when especially nervous, or when it becomes a close call I can only yell 'aagh' much the same way as if I was in pain in a dentist's chair with my mouth clamped open and me shaking my head 'aagh!'. It works. The only time I had to slow down against my will was at the end of my first loop, where I was finishing the fast downhill, hoping to use my momentum to begin the climb up the big hill. I was too close on the left, and got to a bottleneck of several riders, so I had to slow down and go around them. Ultimately, no big deal, but it did come at the worst possible time, just as I was starting the biggest hill. Although there were hundreds of cyclists riding, I only saw a couple of racers during the whole time I was out there.

Nutrition: I had a broken up Clif bar in a bento box and took several pieces during the ride. I ended up drinking half of my Gatorade bottle during the ride as well.

GARMIN Bike time: 46:50; average speed 16mph. This includes some of my T2 time since I forgot to click it in time.

T2: I forgot about my resolution to sit and did a balancing act to get my bike shoes off and running sneakers on.

GARMIN T2 time: 10 seconds. Like I said, most of my transition time is included in the bike time. I realized this as I was leaving the T2 transition.

RUN: This was a 3 mile run, out and back; up the same big hill in the northern part of Central Park. This was a tough run. One long big hill and and a bunch of shorter hills. I felt I was doing hill repeats. I was surprised, looking at my Garmin after the race, to see that my heart rate was not up as high as I thought it was. Could I have gone faster? My legs felt like two pieces of iron. I focused on keeping a high cadence, especially going up the hills. Overall, I was happy with my run pace. It was better than the Black Bear run; and also given the fact that I did a half marathon yesterday made it even more reasonable that I would feel a little stiff.

GARMIN Run time: 36:29 11:17 pace

Nutrition: I had a Clif Shot Blox in my race belt and had a few of the squares during the run. At the turnaround, they had water, some of which I sipped, and most of which I poured over my head.

Lessons learned:
1) I assumed that I would get a swim cap for the race and almost did not bring my own. Fortunately I did bring it anyway, otherwise I would have had a way more difficult swim with all the hair in my face! Now I know that I will always have a cap with me no matter what.

2) Don't store your frozen water bottles in the same area as your clothes. My socks got wet and remained wet from the start.

Queens Half Marathon

Today I completed the Queens Half Marathon in Flushing Meadows Park.  It was a great day, and although I ran slower than I would have liked to, I ran better than I did in the Black Bear.  It's all relative.

I planned to walk during each water station for this race.  In the past, I have worn my water bottles so as not to lose precious seconds slowing down to drink water.  I thought about how ultimately, as in life, I have to slow down/rest/take care of myself, in order to be able to go faster.

First 60 mile ride

Today I went on my first 60 mile ride in years.  I went from home in Park Slope /Windsor Terrace, over the Brooklyn Bridge, up the West side bike path; over the George Washington Bridge, up 9W and stopped just about 3 miles short of Piermont, at a market/cafe that was right there on 9W.  Right before getting to this market, I had started going down these seriously steep hills, and thought with much trepidation that I was going to have to come up them very shortly.  I was not looking forward to it after seeing someone walking up the hill.  Fortunately though, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, coming back up the hill.  This is a good thing.

Here is a link to my Garmin map, showing the route:
60 mile ride

I can't imagine running 13.1 miles after a ride of this distance, yet this is what I will be doing on October 2nd, at the Pocono Half Ironman.  I'm just taking it a day at a time, if I am diligent, I will get there.  I suppose.

I have been working my training schedule differently these last few weeks.  Originally, I had made a very detailed, 6 month long training schedule that I agonized for a long while, looked at it for 1 week and then never looked at it again after that.  These past few weeks I have been making a weekly plan.  On Sundays, I make my plan for the following week, based on any particular events going on that week and also influenced by my experience of the week(s) before.  This process helps, because then I can remember why I didn't do a particular workout - the weather; a work event that I have to attend, whatever.  Otherwise, if I look at it weeks later, I just see that I didn't follow through and get down on myself.

bad girls bad girls, watcha gonna do when they come for you

Today, I went open water swimming with Theresa.  We swam just outside the roped off area.  I forgot my goggles and was pretty upset about this, but as I started swimming and saw that I could do it fairly easily by keeping my eyes closed, I felt better about it.  I also was thinking that if ever my goggles break or get knocked off my head, I know that I can swim without them.  It's easier to swim without