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| He's clearly running the tangents...smart reptile. |
On to some details about my race. It was a good day and everything pretty much came together. I'm knocking on the door of sub-4:20 and if it had been a bit warmer early in the morning I would have had it. I've always heard good things about B2B but never been able to work it into my schedule until this season. The swim is a point-to-point that typically has a tidal current pushing you but by all accounts this year it was basically a slack tide swim. Still, I felt pretty smooth and going off in the first wave meant mostly clear water ahead aside from a few stragglers from the Full. There is a long run to T1 where the timing mat is so I don't have a good split on my actual swim but it had to take me at least 60sec to strip my wetsuit and run there. That means I actually got under 30min on the swim which is good for me.
Enter the time-suck transition. Riding 25mph soaking wet in 40 degree temps sounded like a bad idea so I planned to put on a long-sleeve thermal jersey and full gloves in T1. I toweled off quickly and managed to get the jersey on without much trouble. The gloves on the other hand were extremely frustrating and probably cost me at least 60sec. Eventually I won the battle and headed out on the bike. Most of the athletes doing the Full were already out on the course ahead of me so I did a lot of riding on the left passing an endless string of bikers. The road surface was very nice for the most part and the wind wasn't too bad although it could have been better. I was averaging a bit over where I thought I should have been on my power meter but gradually brought it down 2-3% by the time I was off the bike so I thought I was probably okay.
Garmin data on TrainingPeaks
2:21:44 (23.7mph)
238W NP, 1.01 VI
I came into T2 all alone and initially thought I was leading but someone told me a guy was out ahead after I got about a mile into the run. I was told everything from 1/2 mile to 10min but I wasn't going to know for sure until I pass him on the out-back. [insert alligator sighting here] Eventually I saw him coming with a bike lead and noted the time. Turns out he was 9min up on me with only 5 miles to go. It didn't really matter because I knew what pace I should be running anyway and couldn't do anything about him unless he had a melt down. I really enjoyed the run course but with about 3 miles left I got a bit of head wind and the pace started to get challenging to hold. I got focused, tried to stay relaxed and smooth and made the turn down the only hill on the course just before the final 400m to the finish. I managed a 10sec/mile negative split and finally had a good run off the bike to end the season. The Garmin didn't link up immediately so I missed the first .75 miles of distance even though the timer was running in the data file.
Garmin data on TrainingPeaks
1:21:34 (6:13/mile)
After the later waves had finished I ended up 3rd overall (4:21:16) with over a 2min PR. If it were 10 degrees warmer in the morning I wouldn't have needed gloves and been at least 1min faster on the day. Still, I can't complain about a nice PR. I know I have sub-4:20 in me but that will have to wait until next year. Oddly enough, the guy who was way out ahead of me didn't end up in the overall results, or at least not in the top 5. I need to figure out his name and find out what happened. I know he finished but maybe got DQ'd for some reason?
ADDENDUM - apparently they got the results screwed up at the awards ceremony. The finally had the official results posted on Monday and the guy who was running in front of me had resurfaced and was 3rd, which bumped me down to 4th.
Full results here
My award was a cool plank with the race logo and my finisher position engraved in it. Apparently it was made from reclaimed deck boards from the USS North Carolina. Here's a nice montage of my celebration dance.
