Race Recap: Wildflower Long Course 2012

Well, I made it through another Wildflower. This was a bitter sweet experience for me since I improved my time, but complications and possibly poor planning cost me even more time and suffering.

Heading into this year's race, I was feeling strong until I overdid it two weeks out.  A long weekend of panic training brought out the slight pain in my knee again.  At that point, I stopped running entirely and limited my last two weeks of training to swimming and easy, flat bike rides.  This knee has been a bit of a headache, and I thought it was behind me.  I was being cautious with my running volume and actually never ran more than 7 miles training for Wildflower.

My home for the weekend

This year, I carpooled out with some fellow Orange County Triathlon Club members. We headed out Thursday morning, which is early enough to not have to search too hard to find camping.  The club actually had a few members get out there as early as Tuesday to help claim some territory for us.

Pre-Race:

Me and 2012 Wildflower
Champion Heather Jackson

Getting there Thursday afternoon, allowed me to get registered and settled in before dark.  On the walk to the expo/registration area, we saw 2011 (and eventual 2012) male winner, Jesse Thomas, out on his bike.  I'm a big fan of Jesse (and his blog), so it was cool to see him out training.  And just a few minutes down the road, I spotted Sean "Wattie" Watkins and eventual 2012 Wildflower winner, Heather Jackson, out on a run together.  I'm not sure if I can take complete credit for their wins this weekend, but crossing my path must be like the total opposite of crossing the path of a black cat.

Home base: Harris Creek camp

Friday was another relaxing day.  After a nice breakfast, a group of about 10 from the club walked down to the water for a swim.  It was a good chance to get a feel for the water and even do a little swimming in a pack.  The water temperature couldn't have been more perfect, someone said it was 68.  Three years ago, I never would have imagined that I'd enjoy open water swims like this, almost as much as heading out on a trail run or out on the mountain bike ride.  Friday afternoon and evening was time to tinker with the bike and get the transition bag ready.  The evening was capped off with the tri club's pot luck dinner.  As usual, lot's of great tasting, healthy, carbo-loading before the race.

Race Morning (Saturday):
I woke up around 4:45am, well before my alarm clock.  I knew I wasn't going back to sleep, so I took this as an opportunity to get a head start on the day.  I think it was around 5:00am when the "alarm clock" for the CalPoly students goes off.  Many of them camp on a beach about a mile away from us.  The CalPoly student volunteers are part of the great spirit and character of Wildflower.  The plan was to start walking to the race area around 7am. The race started at 8am and my wave went out at 8:40am. Our camp-site was two miles away, so the early morning walk helped get me warmed up.

An empty transition area

The transition area is huge, and organized by race numbers, so it was pretty easy to find where I set up. This year, I was a little closer to the bike in and bike out, so I knew that would help with transition times since I typically run through transition in my bike shoes.  Anyway, after setting up my transition area, I headed down to the swim start area, about 15 minutes early, which allowed me to watch the pro men and women exit the water.  I spotted Heather Jackson heading to T1, and I'm sure it was my "Go Heather!" that helped put her into the Wildflower record book this year.

1.2 Mile SWIM (32:46! or 1:41/100m):
Wow, I'm still a bit shocked about this.  This year, I was 20 seconds/100m faster than last year.  I'm so glad that my extra time in the pool is really starting to pay off.

The starting waves were 5 minutes apart, so there was plenty of time to get in and out of the water to get wet before the swim. The horn went off, and my long day started. The start was pretty smooth, no major collisions.  With each race, I'm getting more comfortable with the initial scrum of the swim start. The 1.2 mile swim is basically a long, skinny rectangle after you make it to the first buoy.  A couple times during the swim, I was able to get in behind other swimmers.  I haven't done a lot of drafting on the swim in the past, but I'm hoping that as I get faster, I'll be able to get in behind some stronger swimmers.  One small hiccup on the swim was a lifeguard on a kayak that cut me off.  He must have been heading over to help someone, but it caught me by surprise and forced me to stop for a moment.  The quick stop triggered a cramp in my right calf, so I spent the last 200+ yards swimming with no kick, hoping to allow my calf to relax.  The swim exit is easy to spot, and as you get closer to shore, you can hear the announcer and the music. 

T1 (3:49)
Out of the water, and on to find my gear. The water exit is maybe 50 yards from the transition area.  I was a little quicker this year with my transitions.  Since last year was my first 70.3 race, I was more concerned with forgetting something.  This year, I had more faith in my prep, so I knew what I had to do.  I am learning that any time you have to make a decision, such as 'do I wear arm warmers?', this costs wasted time.  

56 Mile BIKE (3:00.01 @ 18.6 mph)
This is just over 11 minutes quicker than last year, at about 1mph faster.  If you're anything like me, that 1 second is really bothering me.  A bike split of 2:59.59 just seems so much faster.  As I've had more time on my Kestrel 4000, I'm feeling more comfortable in the aero position, and even more comfortable down steeper descents.  I think my max speed was 36 last year, and I maxed out at 43.5 this year.  I also need to give thanks to Jim Manton at Final Fit.  He has helped me get into a comfortable, and hopefully more powerful position on "Special K."  We dropped my stem about an inch only one week out from the race, but I was able to get a couple short rides in to adjust to this new position.

As if I needed a reminder

The start of the bike is relatively flat, but curvy and a little slow, until you get to the first hill, Beach Hill, aka "Bitch" Hill. I think this is the steepest climb of the course, and it's about a mile.  I had to remind myself that it's a long day, so I didn't need to push it.  Like last year, I could tell the bike was going to be rough, because of the winds. Again, the rollers on Interlake road were mixed with crosswinds and a headwind.  I happened to spot my distance at the end of one hour, 18 miles.  I don't know how this compared to last year, but it felt a little faster.

Next was the right turn onto Jolon Rd., another 2-lane country road, now the wind was coming hard from the left.  This is a long stretch, maybe 20 miles, of flat road with some rolling hills.  I believe the last half of this stretch actually has a net decline in elevation.  The bad part about Jolon Road is the rough patches of asphalt.  Every once in a while there's a smooth patch, giving occasional relief, but otherwise, it's not my favorite stretch of road.  At the end of two hours, my distance was 39.7 miles, so I was close to a 20mph average, with the toughest miles ahead.  As the miles piled up, I knew Nasty Grade was coming. The core of Nasty Grade is a two mile climb that starts at about mile 42.  This was the first time I started to feel the heat of the day, which I think was about 80. On the way up, I came up on one of our camping buddies Roy. Along this stretch, I also caught up with fellow Wattie Ink Teammate, Chris Alejos.  Since he lives in NoCal, we had actually never met until now.

Beach Hill

I feel like I'm forgetting something important here...oh yes, cramps.  It was heading up Nasty Grade that I started to feel cramping in my quads.  With ever pedal stroke, they would twitch and tighten up.  This is when 'nervous time' set in.  Was I drinking enough?  Was I eating enough? Was I pushing it too hard on the bike?  I have a feeling, I wasn't drinking enough, along with a shortage of electrolytes and salt.  I've never had to deal with this issue before, so the cramps were a bit of a surprise.  At this point, I crammed down another Gu and started to increase my water intake.  I was using Nuun tablets with my water, but I may need to supplement that with salt tablets in the future.

Ready to head down Lynch

After Nasty Grade, it's 10 miles of rollers with one last climb coming into the park.  At this point, I'm still dealing with the muscle cramps, so I spend the last few miles holding back as much as I could.  The last decent down Lynch Hill was fun and fast.  I was passing the male pros coming in on their final run to the finish line.  I recognized Matt Lieto in his Trek/K-Swiss gear, but I had no idea what place he was in at that time.

T2 (2:50)
Again, a little faster here, compared to last year.  I grabbed an extra Gu from my bag and headed out to run.  At this point, my legs were really tightening up, so even in transition, I was having to 'run' with short choppy steps.

13.1 Mile "RUN" (2:15.26 @10:20/mi pace)

Again, I know, thanks anyway

This is the part of my day that I just did not enjoy.  My legs were cramping, and I could just feel the inevitable coming.  The stairs at the beginning of the run course didn't help my situation.  The first half mile of the run was my worst experience running.  Ultimately, I had to stop.  In the past, I've had thoughts of walking during a race, but never quitting, until now.  I could still hear the music of the expo area, and it would have been so much easier to just walk back to the medical tent.  All I could do was stand there and try to massage my quads in hopes that they'd loosen up enough for me to get moving again.  During this time, of the 2,000+ people racing, someone I knew happened to be running by me.  I don't remember exactly what I said, but I do remember him coming back and giving me one of his two salt tablets.  Thanks again Brian.  I've never used salt tablets, but I've heard they can help prevent and even get rid of muscle cramps.  Honestly, I don't know if this was the magic pill that helped me get moving again, or if it just had some placebo effect on me, but whatever it was, I was moving again.

We've all battled the mental demons that tell us to quit or slow down, but I wasn't quitting.  Today was my own personal HTFU experience, and I reminded myself of the phrase on my RoadID, "Pain is temporary, quitting is forever."  This was never more true for me than it was today.  Seriously, how could I just turn around and quit when I have a brother at home that deals with worse pain and even paralysis on a daily basis?  He probably doesn't know how much motivation he gave me, even while he was hundreds of miles away. Thank you Toby.

Around Mile 3 on the Run

From here on out, I made sure I stopped for Gatorade and water at every aid station, which is basically every mile.  The remainder of the day was a mix of jog/walk.  The middle miles, 5 to 10 are the easiest.  It was during these miles that I saw Brian again, and we stayed together for a while running the flats and walking the hills.  There's great crowd support in this portion of the course, plenty of aid stations, and the energy level in the campground section is contagious.  Along the way, I filled up with bananas, oranges, and even made a stop at the infamous lube station, where they only have Vaseline and flat Coca-Cola.  That was the best tasting soda ever.

does this make
my butt look fat?

Running downhill towards the turnaround near mile 10, aka "the pit", I was starting to do the math.  If I can run X, than I can still salvage this race and at least break 6 hours.  6 hours was my goal last year when Wildflower was my first 70.3 distance race, but since then, I've been training better and faster.  Oh yeah, and in case you didn't know, last year I did 6:00:42. Yep, 42 seconds over.  Coming off a PR at a local Olympic distance race, I felt I could get my time down to 5:40 this year.  Anyway, I knew that I didn't want to turn down the finisher's chute and not break 6 this year too.  So, I pushed my way to the finish line with my updated goal.

Just as I got to the finishers chute, more cramping set in, this time my right calf and my left foot.  It felt like my toes were actually curling up underneath the ball of my foot.  Noooo! Only 50 yards to go.  The volunteers there were cheering me on, but I had to stop about every 10 steps to let the cramps pass.  I was able to stumble my way to the finish line, with what felt more like an awkward gallop than running.

This is me being
 so happy it's over

"Dead Man Walking"

I ended up at 5:54:52, 95th out of 278 in my AG. Wow, these 40-44 year old dudes are fast.  I actually improved my time by 6 minutes, but didn't rank any higher.

This is the bitter sweet ending to a lot of training and a long day.  The Sweet: I'm proud to say that with everything that happened, I improved by 6 minutes.  I'm also very pleased to know that outside of my rough run, I improved on every single portion of the race, including transitions. Plus, I proved to myself that I could battle through some tough physical and mental obstacles. The Bitter: I know that I had the fitness in me to run somewhere in the mid 1:50's, but it just wasn't my day.  Well, there's always next year....

Saturday night recovery,
Wildflower style

Special thanks to all the OC Tri Club members, their friends and family, that came out for such a great weekend. It was great having such a good crowd of friends around, and it was especially nice that Stan and his wife Nancy got there early to claim some camping real estate for all of us.

And of course, huge thanks to Sean Watkins and the entire Wattie Ink team.  I am proud to be part of such a quality group of people and athletes.

No, I didn't forget my three favorite ladies, Shannon, Megan and Peyton.  They put up with a lot from me while I'm training and racing.  I picked up this crazy addiction three years ago, and sometimes find that they are sharing me with my mistress, "Miss Triathlon."

And, a quick plug for some of the products I used and definitely recommend:
K-Swiss Blade Max Glide running shoes
Kestrel 4000 carbon triathlon bike (11 minutes faster this year!)
Speedfil A2 - It was my first race using this bottle, and it worked great
XEndurance - I just recently started using this, and have noticed improved recovery times after hard workouts.
Challenge Tires - I switched to their Open Tubulars and they felt great.