Thursday, August 29, 2013

IMC by the numbers

Saturday went smooth. Early dinner. Slept 6-7 hours, fairly relaxed. Woke at 3:15 ahead of alarm. Had my breakfast, we left for T2 at 4:20 as planned. Dropped bags, got marked, took shuttle to start arriving about 5am. Had lots of time.



I did a pre-race 10-15 min run and I felt good. Wave of nerves hit me about half hour before the start - same as last year in Penticton. I was keen to get in the water and settle my mind. I entered the water at 6:35, 25 mins before the start. I was warm but in hindsight, I went in a bit too early as I swam or treaded water until the start gun. I did though find a great starting spot.

Swim   1:09:41
- 1:50 per 100m pace, I was 34th in age group after swim

Two new swim experiences for me. First, I had my goggles knocked off my face not once but twice. First time I took it in stride, second time was annoying to say the least. Second new experience was fairly intense cramping in my left calf; I stopped once to massage it - I think too long in water before the start. Overall, I felt I was swimming well but time clearly shows I swam far slower than I thought and far slower than I have been in the pool. I felt I should have been at least 5 minutes faster.



T1  5:07

Because of concern about cold in the Callaghan, I swam without a top as I didn't want to start the ride soaking wet. So I put two dry tops on after the swim, arm warmers, garden gloves, helmet, sunnies and carried my shoes to the road. Crikey! Slowest T1 I've ever had I think. Threw away one minute here.

Bike  5:50:59
- a pace of 30.77 km/hr, I was 36th in age group after bike

I felt I rode conservatively but strong through 100k - as I had in training - but then I slowed. Stopped for special needs and then was swamped by several packs in the meadows. I chose not to ride with them. Right decision? Interesting post-race discussion about that. The splits along the bike course, when compared with some others I know, suggest I rode conservatively the whole day but not overly so. Perhaps I was holding back a bit too much for the run. It's a balance. I struggled to take in nutrition from about 120k but averaged a little more than 300 cals per hour - slightly below my target. I'm confident in saying that I gave away at least 10 minutes here.



T2 3:30

Shoes left on bike. Helmet off. Socks on, shoes on, hat on and one gel. Not a super fast transition but I did what I needed.

Run  3:49:54
- a pace of 5:26 per km, which lifted me to 20th overall in age group

I ran the first 6.9km at a pace of 4:54 per km and I ran the final 6.4km at a pace of 4:40. As I knew during the race, I was shuffling from about 26k through 35k - nutrition failure. I felt good after the initial 1-3k and I felt really good leading into the second lap and starting it. I was passing a lot of people. In fact, I ran past 151 people during the run. Nutrition issues: drip, drip, drip for the first 10-15k but then struggled to keep taking and opted not to get my special needs for the second lap. In hindsight, a mistake. I need to learn to 'force' in calories because without them ...

Margreet saw me with about 3 miles to go and told me to hammer it and it helped immensely as I ran as hard as I could to the finish. I felt that I should have been able to run the marathon at a pace closer to 5 minute kilometres, with some drift. I know that I left 10-15 minutes on the run course.

10:59:11

Seventh Sub 11 finish

******************

If I'd been more on target, then I think I would have been about half an hour faster. I would have finished top 10 in my age group and I'd now be looking for flights and accommodation on the Big Island. I still think 10:30 was a reasonable pre-race expectation based on my training. I wasn't ever going to go Sub 10 here.

In the end, it wasn't the day I had visualized. And while I'm not unhappy with my race as I gave it what I had on the day - and I made some mistakes too, I'm not happy with the result because I had much higher expectations in terms of performance in the swim, bike and run.

That's the challenge with 'big' races. There's a huge build and then they are over. I'm not done racing yet and will take a few weeks to look ahead to next season.

I'm still optimistic about what lies ahead. I'm keen to find a way to go faster. I will go faster. Being fast is important to me. I will continue to train 'hard' and look for a way to race 'harder'.

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Whistler - official photos

Climbing in the Callaghan





Hammering home

Seventh Sub 11 finish 

20th in my new age group

Forward momentum

A well-timed comment from Lucy Smith:

Racing well is about forward momentum:  physically and emotionally being both focussed on what you can do well right now, while keeping your path in a straight line to your goal. 

A small window for success will appear before us one day and whether we jump through that window or not is what makes the difference. 

Do you take that small step forward at the unplanned moment? Do you embrace moving out of your comfort zone without a second thought, without the 'what if'?  

Taking the third step requires us to overcome a fear or a doubt about our ability to reach our goal. The third step is saying 'Yes' and not 'No', leaping at a challenge and not shutting down. Do this and the chances are that when the big opportunities present themselves, you will be ready and able to head into the unknown with all your power. 

Thursday, August 22, 2013

Half a century



Five decades. Fifty years. 18,250 days.*

It seems like a long time and yet it continues to fly past, and at times I sense it is accelerating. There’s no doubt that I’m introspective. I see it as a positive. I think a lot, about a lot of different things. It’s simply part of who I am.

I am fortunate. Fortunate to have had the parents I have - Aileen and John, to have the three siblings I have - Marcelline, Nancy and John and their spouses/families - and to have found my Margreet. 

Family is far more important to me than anything.

I also have my health. I am more fit than I’ve ever been. I’m as determined as ever to take care of myself and I’m optimistic about what lies ahead.

Every day I learn something new - mostly about myself and how I want to interact with those around me and the world at large. Never stop learning - great advice that I have heeded.

Turning 50 seems surreal in the sense that I don’t think much about my actual age. There are two major reasons for this: Margreet and embracing an active lifestyle.

It’s important to find someone with whom to share your life. It’s not easy. And it’s as much a journey as any other aspect of life. When the person appears, you know.

As for being active, that is a conscious decision. At first it had little to do with performance per se and it was far more about being. As a kid I played road/ice hockey, baseball and tennis - in particular. I scored many Stanley Cup winning goals, had a few World Series winning at bats and final out catches on the wall and even managed to out hit Bjorn Borg - I had a huge poster of him on my wall.

I credit my initial move to Vancouver for opening the door to a range of new sports including skiing, mountain biking, road cycling and triathlon. I found great inspiration in the ocean and mountains here on the West Coast and the people I met who challenged me to seize the day. I did, I have and I hope I always will.

I ran my first marathon 15 years ago. I finished my first Ironman 12 years ago. I was in Kona - for the first time as an athlete - six years ago. I am in my fourth age-group - and that's a huge positive. I am young again every five years, though I seek to be young at heart every day.

I was born in Toronto and lived there for the first 19 years. Toronto will always be home to me. I spent four years - mostly - in Ottawa at university. I spent almost a year in France, also at university and wandered around Europe. Highly recommended. And I spent the better part of seven years in Australia: working and at the same time becoming a triathlete.

I’ve now been back on the West Coast for almost six years. (I'm still a Maple Leaf, always will be.)

I’m a numbers guy, though my high school calculus teacher would perhaps challenge that assertion. He just didn’t get me.

I’ve been a journalist/editor for 25 years. It's all I've ever wanted to do. The career that I've had so far is vastly different than I expected and yet the essence of what I do is exactly what I love. I graduated from Carleton, where I met some superb individuals, with a degree in journalism and political science in 1986. 

I dreamt of going to graduate school - the London School of Economics was atop my list - but when I was done with a formal education, I was done. I wanted to be ‘in’ the world, studying it as a participant. I wanted to work and jumped at the opportunity at a failing UPI and then leapt at the one from a nascent Bloomberg. I had no idea where I would end up but I was confident it was a step forward.

Being creative is something nurtured deep within, daily, and I credit my parents for instilling this gift in me. My love of reading and writing comes from my Mom, my love of photography and visual art from my Dad. They also taught me the importance of family, integrity and respecting others.

I write, paint and take photos - primarily for me. Each is a form of expression and I think my ‘work’ so to speak reflects who I am. But it’s mostly for me.

Yes, I have a blog and this post will appear on it as have hundreds of others. It's one way that I can collect my thoughts. I have many blogs, a mix of writing and photos and paintings. A digital collection of me.

Half a century. Thousands of words written, thousands of photos taken. Thousands more of both to follow. Random - and not so random - thoughts and images.

Words and photos help to capture the relationships I have with family, friends and the world - both local and global.

I am very happy with my life. Being content is a good place to be. That doesn’t mean I’m planning to slow down anytime soon. Far, far from it. I do believe that what you get in life is directly related to what you put in.

This past week I learned the meaning of Namaste - the greeting I hear at the end of every yoga session - and it strikes me as an appropriate way to conclude my first half century: The spirit in me, honours the spirit in you.

*A friend noted that I've been around longer than I realize when one takes into consideration leap years! 

Monday, August 12, 2013

Is Ironman Canada a fast course?


Square peg, round hole. 

Sometimes you simply can’t know and that’s a good thing. 

I have been shrugging my shoulders a lot recently when asked how fast I will go in two weeks at Ironman Canada in Whistler.

Of course I have my own personal times from previous Ironmans as a point of reference, and those help because they have been accomplished on a range of different courses over the past decade. But each year is unique even on the same course. My two fastest times were on courses on two different continents!

Of the three disciplines, the swim seems the most predictable. Short of a weather ‘situation’, the lake will be calm and relatively warm on race morning. What we do know is that it’s going to be two laps. 

I think there’s the potential for some whirlpool momentum but as I haven’t swum in the lake yet, not to mention with 2500 others, I’ll have to find out on August 25th.

That said I expect to swim strong. I have had a great swim season and I am confident that I am now the best swimmer that I’ve ever been, both technically and in terms of speed. Executing on race day is the key.

On Saturday Volker and I spun on the course for about 100kms - easy. We talked about bike splits and both of us reached the same conclusion - there’s no definitive way to know in advance.

I think it’s fair to say the bike course is the toughest one I’ve ever prepared for. I’ve had some tough training days on it and some superb ones too. The difference between these days, I think, is a reflection of nutrition as well as the wind. (And there was that one day that I experienced hypothermia too.)

As we cycled from Pemberton back to where we parked in Whistler, we made the decision to spin, as in easy. And we flew up the hills. Ok, flew here is relative. But we completed the segment far faster than expected. A key reason: perfect weather - no wind, slightly overcast and not too hot.

Earlier we had experienced a head wind going into the Meadows and back. I’ll write more about my strategy for the bike course in the days ahead. 

In short, the bike course in my opinion will smash a lot of people. And if it’s windy - as it was at Nexen with Luka after we returned home late Saturday afternoon - it will be a smashfest. (I’d be OK with wind. It’s a fact of life here in the Sea to Sky corridor.)

Still, don’t despair. All will not be lost if the wind is howling on race day.

There are opportunities to fly on the bike course and both Volker and I have spent weekend after weekend these last three months determining where speed awaits to be found.

And yet as the first line of this post says, after several thousand kms on Highway 99 and the course itself, I still have no real idea what sort of split is a reasonable target.

A little over a month ago now, Macca was quoted in an article talking about how he thinks age group athletes are too focused on time and instead should be focused on competing on ‘challenging’ courses.

I get what he’s talking about and yet time is very important to me as it is for many other athletes. I want to go fast and I want a fast time. 

Time targets help motivate me. Whether I achieve the time I would like is less relevant the longer I race - though its importance doesn’t diminish. 

I’m not racing to go slower - though sometimes it may seem like it :) And it’s because no one can go faster race after race that I have found other reasons to want to be Iron-fit and these reasons are far more important.

In a way a fast time is like getting a great grade in high school or university. Its importance fades dramatically over time.

In that sense Macca is right, I suppose. Time isn’t relevant and we put far too much emphasis on it. Its relevancy fades far faster than we appreciate in the moment. But I still want to be as fast as I can for as long as I can and I make no apologies for that.

Back to the bike course! Is Whistler a 5 hour bike? I don’t think so. Would 5:30 be a good time? I think so. 5:45? 6? I would expect to be in T2 within six hours.

Being fast in the water and on two wheels - as long as I haven’t hammered myself - would be ideal. I’ll have banked both time and energy for the marathon. Two huge positives. That will be part of my race strategy - as it is for every triathlon. Easier said than done as I’ve found out. Race execution is an art.

For those who choose to hammer or try to hammer on the bike, into a head wind, prepare to walk a lot. That would be unfortunate in part because the run course is beautiful and is open to being fast.

All that said, I don’t have any real feel for a time target heading into the race. My focus is on being focused from start to finish. My objective is to be steady and strong and to take advantage of the weather and the course.

Ten-something always has a positive attraction. Time resists control. But one can master time - from time to time.