Tupper Lake, New York hosted the long course Nationals for the second year. For those interested in such things, Tupper Lake is located in the Adirondacks and at one time was the center of the big logging drives prior to the National Park designation. Instead of loggers, 600 triathletes started in 64-degree weather for the 1.2 mile swim, 56.1 mile bike and 13.1 mile run.
My wife Janet and I were attempting this half Ironman for the second year. I competed in the 55-59 age group while my younger, and all would agree, better looking half, competed in the 35-39 age group. Both of us have been coached by Gale Bernhardt of Ultrafit for the last 2 years. Tupper Lake was used to pick the World Cup Team for Long Course and as a qualifier for Ironman, North America at Lake Placid. The competition was very fast. We had raced Eagleman 3 weeks before and thought that race was stacked, but Tupper Lake was worse.
For some reason, the age groups above 35 were very competitive. I
think this may have been due to the fact many athletes were using the race
as part of a family vacation. It is a pretty place. At any rate,
I was second in my age group out of the water and 6th off the bike. Those
guys shredded me on the bike. The course was very windy and hilly. I had
the best run to date at the half marathon distance and held on to 6th place.
The run was deluged with a severe thunderstorm at the 5 mile mark. Part
of the run went through a forest path. I , and 2 other guys, stepped on
what we thought was the path and went up to our hips in water. Naturally,
I fell first and they landed on top of me. Finishing the run covered in
mud and bodily fluids added a certain ambience to the whole experience.
Janet and I finished 10 seconds apart. She was 21st in a very tough
age group with a lot of depth. Her swim was excellent. Being an All American
distance swimmer for Emory does give one a certain ability to move
through the water. Her bike was good but not in the league with some of
those big gear pounders in her age group. Her run was very good and
kept her in the upper echelon of her age group.
To my knowledge, no one else from ATC competed in the race. Lisa and Bob Browning passed up the race to concentrate on Lake Placid. Karen Buxton from Greensboro, another Ultrafit coach, competed in the 35-39 animal age group and finished 10th. Jon Farber from Durham finished 7th in his age group (40-44). We had a nice visit with both Karen and Jon with plenty of war stories being told by all.
All in all a positive experience. Not being a true athlete, I am
pleased with the steady improvement this year. That is due to good coaching
and not any genetic makeup on my part.
Next year, the Long Course Nationals will be in Muncie Indiana.
This race in the heart of the heavily forested Adirondacks was again the National Long Course Championship. I was in a peculiar age group situation: still with the 40-44s for awards for this race, but for the national rankings, which use age on 12/31, I was competing against 45-49s. Everyone over 39 went off in same wave, and I recognized nobody else in the race except the Greens from Asheville. Check -in the previous night had gone smoothly at a country club high above the lake, my bike in its box had survived abuse I had the misfortune to witness out the airport window (literally dropped out the fuselage onto the conveyor 5 feet below, a guy on the ground just stepped aside and watched it hit), and the water was 72 degrees, ideal wetsuit temperature. The was a little chop, wind off the port bow on the way out of the inverted V shaped course, and I felt pretty well rested, and eager to redeem myself after my meltdown at Eagleman (same Half-Iron distance) 4 weeks before. Air temperatures had been cool all week, but were forecast to rise raceday, and at the 8 AM start it was already 70. I had been trying to train all month in NC in the hottest part of the day, so I had hopes I could tolerate heat now, but who could tell? Above all, I was resolved to pace myself so I could finish strongly, for a change: I think that at my last couple of Halfs, a 3-minutes faster bike might well have cost me 6 or 8 minutes on the run, when I'd really been hurting.
The start waves were under 200 racers per, and things weren't too crazy, but I stayed way wide of the mass taking the shortest route. The water was clear enough to watch the feet of the person your were drafting, and even see their bubbles if you lost their toes, from 3 or 4 feet behind. I had some significant periods of drafting easily at a good clip, even out on the fringes of the pack, though I kept drifting to the left, curiously INTO the wind. ( I think Dave's latest modifications to my stroke haven't had enough pool time yet to be quite symmetrical). I received a kick given out of pure anger, for the first time I think, when I accidentally followed one swimmer over the legs of another. Sorry. I came out of the water at 33 minutes flat, which turned out to be quite respectable (most of the top twenty were 28-32) and I hadn't wasted myself, and had kept my breathing at about what it would be running 7 or 7:30 miles on the track.
The transition area was a dirge for me at T1. It was my favorite kind of layout, with widely separated bike and run exits, so that everybody has to do the same distance. Except for one sorry group that were way off to the side. Where I was, naturally. I had the very farthest spot of all (they were assigned). I had to squat to reach my shoes under a sapling that tried to poke out my eyes. It was 11 seconds jogging each way, just to get to everyone else, times two round trips. Forty-four seconds extra, which I suspected wouldn't make much difference, and in the end, it didn't. My socks were mysteriously missing, however. I lost time digging in my bag for my damp and smelly spares (I always have spares of everything, but they aren't always top quality). I lost more time when I couldn't get my shoes on: the missing socks were jammed up into the toes, where I had cleverly stuffed them, in case of rain. The bike was a joy. Wide shoulder where most people rode, so I could pass at speed while hugging the white line. Smooth surface, long hills, not too steep. Even so, , my low gear wasn't really low enough, so since I was a little overgeared on the climbs, I compensated by undergearing a little and spinning faster the rest of the time, which worked: my quads never locked up or burned. I tried to eat and drink liberally, and keep my breathing under control, which worked pretty well. Two hours into the bike, I felt a lot better than I had at Eagleman, but still not great. I was slowing down, but I figured (correctly) that I'd caught all but 2 or 3 of the uncatchable masters, and nobody passed me the entire bike.
Now we've heard some whining about the need for thickly padded bike
shorts from certain members of this team, and I must say that that's not
one of my needs: I can't get CLOSE enough to my Body Geometry saddle. I'd
go naked if they'd let me. But a few gelpacks came off
at once from my bike and there was no way to reattach them.
Now, I didn't need them (I always have spares) so I was about to chuck
them on the shoulder when I felt a burdnesome twinge of environmental conscience.
Damn. I tucked them into the band of my swimsuit. Gel,
like water, seems to seek the lowest level, and within a few miles I was
experiencing the dubious benefits of gel padding. I don't recommend
it, and the chocolate has other social implications I won't go into. My
Spinergy front has always gotten a little weird over 35, and on the last,
steepest descent I hit 43. It was vibrating and fluttering and my
heartrate was higher, with terror, than it had been climbing.
Check out http://home.interlynx.net/~pjdu/
for some harder data: I'm done with Spinergies. But I made
it, 26th bike split overall.
Running was bad for the first five miles or so. It had just gotten too warm for me, or else I'd still gone too hard. I was passing the kids, but not too fast, a few for the benefit of Nancy and Ari jumping up and down on the lawn in front of our motel, shouting "Go Daddy Go, Go Daddy Go!" Three masters passed me on the way out, and I couldn't respond. Most of the way out was uphill, and my Achilles hates long uninterrupted climbs more than it hates anything (its' still bad 10 days later) but the route was gorgeous, and includes this long off-road stretch, where runners were calling out deerfly locations to each other - "on the left side of your neck - you got it" -.And then the storm hit.
Drenching buckets of water, lightening overhead, and thunder that lifted you off your feet. I'd have quit if there was anywhere safer to go, but there wasn't. So we kept running. Within two miles I was ripping along. Cooler temperature I guess, or I just had hand enough rest. And I kept accelerating the rest of the race. I stopped once to tighten my shoe (I'd shed a large callous a few days before) and I averaged 6:50, so the way back was under 6:30, easily. Passed a few more people, and finished 30th overall, not too shabby. I never caught those three guys, and wow what a master's day it was. Two of the top three overall. 4 of the top 10. If there are 15 guys in the country over 40 who can beat me at this distance, half of them showed for this national championship. And the awards were done in that stupid way that the top masters got their overall awards, masters award and age group award: no pass-downs. So I got nothing tangible. But the food was good, and everybody was happy. As a 45 year old, I would have been 3rd, and one of those was the legendary Mac Martin (fastest bike split of the day), so things look good for my ranking.
I think I finally understand the pacing one needs for this distance,
and how I'd need to train for it. I could do better if I stopped
training for these Setup sprints, and had more energy for edging up my
long-distance speed.
And it was a great course: I'd go back.