Alfaj0r.com

As promised, here’s the recap of my first ever Olympic / International triathlon.

• Pre-race
  Kelly and I left for San Jose the day before the race, Saturday. We stayed in the very nice Dolce-Hayes mansion, getting a chance to enjoy the great weather and their swimming pool.
  I went to pick up my packet and to also take part of the course description talk, where I found out all the small details about the race. It wasn’t anything major; the highlight was when the guy said that Almaden Lake was at its best this year, with the lowest levels of E. Coli on record. GREAT!
  I tried to go to bed at 9pm on Saturday, but I wasn’t able to fall asleep anytime near that. I woke up once in the middle of the night, at around 1am. Just as I was starting to fall asleep again at 2am, my phone rang, apparently because someone in India pocket dialed my Google Voice number. Super strange, and very annoying timing.
• Race-day
  The alarm was set for 4:45am, and by then I was already awake and ready to go. I wanted to make it to the race site by 5:30, so I could set up my transition and not freak out about not being there on time.
  We made it there a little bit before 6, but this was still plenty of time, and everything worked out perfectly, with a good parking spot and all! It was quite the juxtaposition of energy levels, with me ready to bounce off a wall and Kelly fighting off her instincts to sleep for a few more hours. I set up my transition area, and did some warm up running drills, while Kelly sat on a chair and watched hundreds of people at least as crazy as I was.
  I was going to be in the 2nd wave, which started at 7:04am. I was able to do a little warm-up in the lake, which was also my first ever swim in a wetsuit. The warm-up swim felt pretty easy, which was probably because of the extra buoyancy from the wetsuit, but I also felt like a million bucks. I was just happy that I felt ready for what was to come!
• Swim – 1.5km
  The swim started right on time, and I tried to stay at the back of the group. There were about 60 people in my wave, and I wasn’t planning on racing anyone but myself.
  I got passed a couple of times, but I also passed a couple of guys. Mostly, I remember getting grabbed, hit and climbed on. I can’t complain, because I did a little bit of that myself! The water was pretty murky, and it was impossible to see through the water more than a couple of feet in front of me.
  The biggest issue was swimming in a straight line, which didn’t really happen. Every now and then I looked ahead to find the buoy that I was supposed to pass, and it turned out that I was swimming a little too much to one side or another. Whatever, it happened, and I corrected my trajectory without thinking about it too much.
  I ended up finishing the swim portion in 34 minutes. That was a LOT faster than I had predicted, I was expecting to finish anywhere between 40 and 45 minutes!
• Transition 1
  From the time I got out of the water and the time I got on my bike, 2:43 minutes flew by. In what now seems a blur of jittery legs, excitement and going through a mental checklist; I got out of my wetsuit, half-assed dried off, put on my helmet, sunglasses, jersey, bike shoes and ran from the beach to the start of the bike portion. I do however remember seeing Kelly as I was changing, and giving her a sloppy and wet kiss before taking off with my bicycle!
• Bike – 24.9 miles
  The bike was sadly my big let down. I expected a lot more out of me, but make no mistake in thinking I’m not proud of what I did – because I am.
  Since I started on the 2nd wave, a lot of the extremely in shape people from waves behind me started catching up with me, and passing me. I only passed a couple of people, but I’m sure I got passed by about a hundred people.
  I focused on keeping my cadence in the 90s and staying hydrated, and letting my speed fall into whatever that meant. I enjoyed the bike course a lot, it was flat for most of the first two thirds, and there was a small climb with some nice downhills to pay off after it. (I got up to 35mph in one section!)
  I ended up averaging 18.2mph, which is not too bad, but I wish I’d been a bit faster. I took me 1 hour and 22 minutes to finish the bike course.
• Transition 2 – 1:19
  I speedily ran my bike into transition, took off my helmet, glasses, bike shoes and my jersey. It was getting nice and hot out there, so I was going to do the run shirtless. I had some trouble putting on my socks because my legs were a bit shaky, but I was overall pretty speedy about getting out of there ready to go on my run.
• Run – 6.2 miles
  The first thing I remember about the run section was looking up as soon as I left transition to see Kelly smiling at me and taking some pictures. I was very happy that she was there cheering me on, it made me feel very special and gave me some much needed warm fuzzies to embark on what was to come.
  Immediately after that, my quads started cramping. Ouch! I guess I should have done a few more brick workouts! I didn’t walk, I instead took very small steps and kept on jogging. I knew my legs would transition from bike mode to run mode eventually, so I just had to get my legs to know that with some high cadence running.
  Some guy ran past me and suggested I punch my legs to get them to cooperate, so I did. Placebo or actual remedy, it kind of worked and I was able to speed up a little bit more.
  For the first couple of miles, I nursed my aching quads with a slow run. I was probably doing 6mph, and getting passed left and right all over again. I didn’t care, my goals were to never stop, never walk unless it was at a water station, and to keep pushing until my legs responded like I knew they should.
  At mile marker 3, I was running. It felt awesome. I set my sights on a couple of people in front of me, and made it a point to catch up to them and pass them. I did just that.
  Mile marker 4 came and went, and I stepped it up to what I was going to consider “giving it all I’ve got left”. I got passed by a dude with long gray hair. On his calf was written his age with sharpie: 61. Hot damn. That was some pretty strong motivation to keep pushing, I knew it was almost over, and that the faster I went, the sooner it’d all be over!
  When I got in the last mile, it was basically time to go a half loop around the lake. I could see the finish line from across the lake. My heart started beating faster, even though I wasn’t running faster. It was asking me to push harder, and it took me a while to figure that out, but when I did, I went as fast as I could.
  I finished the last hundred yards in a full-out sprint – the kind of run that I did in the past when a dog was chasing me or when I was trying to catch a bus to get home because the next bus wasn’t coming for another 30 more minutes.
  The finish line was there! There was music, there were tons of people cheering. I couldn’t hear or see anything, I was just focused on every step I took and every breath I took…. until I looked up and saw the clock by the finish line. It said 2:58, and I was suddenly overcome by a feeling unlike any other: I had made it, and I had beat my goal! I unconsciously punched the sky as I ran past the finish line.
  I finished my run in a 54:22. I could have done that a lot faster if I hadn’t cramped up at the beginning, but I finished as strong as I could, and I have no complaints about that!
• Total time: 2:54:26
  Right after finishing, I stopped running. My legs were about to give out, and cramping pretty hard. Or at least I think so.
  I can’t remember what they were doing, because what I do remember is how damn good it felt to have made my goal, to have finished strongly and how much fun it all had been. I tried to focus on my breathing so that I could catch my breath, and noticed that I was smiling. I couldn’t even control it!
  A small moment later, Kelly came out from within the crowd, and that completed what ended up being an extremely wonderful experience for me. She saw me running, she saw me doing my thing -and even got some great pictures of it all- and I could feel how happy she was for me.

I’m extremely grateful to all those who have shared encouragement and shown support to me. Even if I’ll never be a triathlon superstar, the gratification that the whole experience yields is indescribable, and a lot of that has to do with all the people that helped me get there. You know who you are: Thank you!

Above all, I’m endlessly grateful to Kelly. She gave away her first weekend in her summer break to spend it with me, driving 10 hours, waking up at a strange hour on a Sunday, standing around for 3 and putting up with all the shenanigans of my training. I couldn’t have done it without her, that’s for sure!

Punch the sky! Finished in less than 3 hours!

The rest of the pictures are here, on Flickr.

5 days until I get to swim for almost a mile, ride my bike for about 25 miles and run 6 miles, all after one another!!

I’m really excited about all this. For the last week I’ve been waking up from my sleep with thoughts related to the event on Sunday: Do I have everything on my checklist? Am I going to be in shape enough to not bonk half-way through? Am I going to make it to the venue on time? Thankfully, I’m feeling pretty well prepared, so I can answer: Yes, I have everything; no, I’m not going to bonk in the middle of it; and maybe, but who cares if an old lady passes me.

I’m sure I could have trained harder and longer, but I’m pretty satisfied with what I’ve done, so I’m not regretting anything. The hardest part of all the training has been the time juggling, because time I spent sweating was time I spent away from Kelly.
Regardless, she’s been super supportive and encouraging, and I couldn’t have gotten to where I am if it wasn’t for her.

She’s so awesome that she’ll be traveling all the way to Silicon Valley with me (a total of about 8 hours traveling, round-trip) just to see me get in a wetsuit, disappear for about 45 minutes, get on my bike, disappear for an hour or more, come back to leave the bike and disappear for another hour, while I run. Triathlons are not a very good spectator sport (unless it’s on TV!), so I’ll be owing Kelly a big one for being there for me.
But in truth, I’m very excited that she’ll be there, even if I’ll only see her for a few minutes while the race is actually on. I’m sure that seeing her as I go through my transitions will give me a much needed morale boost, and knowing that she’s waiting for me at the finish line will make me want to finish faster!

I really had no idea where this blog post was going to go, but I wanted to mention how excited I am about what’s in store for me this coming Sunday, and to also give a shout-out to my BB for being so wonderful.

Wish me luck! I’ll post results and stories after Sunday.

If you remember, I did a Sprint Triathlon last year, and I loved it. Since I won’t be able to make it to this year’s edition of the Pyramid Lake triathlon (I’ll be honeymooning in Australia and Fiji), I’ve decided to instead take part of another tri… and because I think being exhausted is fun, I’m doing a longer distance one, an Olympic distance one!

The event of choice is the Silicon Valley International Triathlon, which will be just south of San Jose in Californi on June 13th (just a month and a half from now!). Kelly and I will make a weekend-trip out of the thing, but Sunday morning I’ll be sweating amongst hundreds of other people.

The event consists of:

• 1500 meter swim. This is almost a mile!
• 24.9 miles (40 Kilometers) on the bike.
• 6.2 miles running – a full 10k.

Now, I’ve got a goal time to finish in. Considering that I finished the sprint Tri of last year in 1 hour and 41 minutes and all of the following things…

• The Olympic/International distance is double the distance of a Sprint.
• I have a better bike!
• I weigh at least 15lbs less than last year.
• I’ve been swimming at least once a week, and will continue to do so to be ready for this race.
• I’ll have a wetsuit, either borrowed or rented, but some buoyancy help for sure!
• The race is at sea level, which should give me a small oxygen advantage.
• The longer distance means that I’ll be going slower, so as to not burn out.
• I haven’t been running as much as last year.

My realistic goal time is then exactly the double of the sprint: 3 hours and 20 minutes. But I’ll be pushing myself to finish in under 3 hours. I think it’s doable, and I’m going to be training hard to try to make it happen.

If anything, all the training I’m doing will help me accomplish my goals of being in shape and looking good for the summer!

My new year’s resolution has been fulfilled! I wanted to do a triathlon, and I now have done so!

It happened on Saturday, August 1st 2009. The event was put on by the Reno Area Triathletes group, and it was a great experience for my first triathlon ever.

The race started at 8:30am, and the first stage was a half mile swim on Pyramid lake. The water was not cold at all, and it took me 18:30 minutes to finish it. I took it easy on this part, since I hadn’t really trained for swimming, and there were people that were going to swim all over me if I dared to pass someone. I attempted to freestyle, but the adrenaline and the inability to see exactly where I was going made it feel futile. I swam most of the time in a very peaceful breast stroke. By the end of the swim, my arms were quite tired.

Right after that, I had to get on my bicycle to ride for 14 miles. The course was on the road that goes around the lake, with a few rolling hills but nothing impossible. I managed to finish in 50:28 minutes, with an average speed of 16.6mph.
Quite a few people passed me on this stage, particularly on the uphill sections. I made myself not think about that, and I set my sights on a guy who was in front of me. My goal was to pass him by the half-way point, and to never see him again. And I did that.
It was hard for me to put a lot of weight on my hands because my triceps were burning. But I HTFU‘d  and kept on trucking. The second half of the ride I apparently found my spot, because I only passed a handful of people, and I only got passed by two.

The last part of the Tri was the run, so I rode my bike into the transition area, changed into my running shoes and headed out to the trail.
My legs felt like potato bags. I listened to my body and jogged. I didn’t run, but I certainly didn’t walk (because of HTFU, you know).
Slowly, my legs came back to me, and less than a mile in, I was feeling like I could run again. And run I did! I picked up the pace, and before I knew it I was catching up to people -and passing them.
The circuit was a little dirt trail that looped around. It was around 10am and the sun was already making things very hot. I was thirsty, I was sweaty and I was tired. But there was only a little bit more to go.
At the very end, just yards before the finish line, a lady was sprinting up to pass me. I wouldn’t have it, and I literally finished the race running as fast as I could, on a full-on sprint. The lady didn’t catch me, but neither did my breath, and I finished with a major side ache.
Oh well, that didn’t matter. I was done! After wiping some sweat of my brow, I looked up and found my time. I had beat my goal of finishing under 2 hours, and the pain was immediately replaced by feelings of accomplishment and self-pride.
The run course was 3 miles long, and I finished in 28:52 minutes. Not bad for having swam and ridden my bike earlier.

My official total time was 1:41:57.2. I finished 142^nd (all the results are here), and I felt damn good doing it.

Some things to note for the next one:

• I really should train in swimming. It had probably been years since I’d swam for more than 15 minutes without stopping.
• I should invest in a wetsuit. The extra buoyancy would make the swim easier, and it’d keep me warm if I were to participate in Tris in places like Donner or Tahoe.
• My bike sucks. I recently discovered that it’s not a “custom bike” as I was sold, but it’s instead a GMC Denali. My bike limited me, and it’s time for me to upgrade to a real road bike.

Notice that I said “the next one”. I decided I’d be doing this again right after finishing this Triathlon. I loved the feeling, the challenge and the adventure. And now, I have a time to beat!