Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Tri-U-Mah indoor triathlon

I signed up for Tri-U-Mah because I wanted to race a triathlon! With the 2008 season ruined, I just had to race because it had been since August of 2008! It was an itch and not your typical itch and scratch and then it's all better. I mean a psoriasis itch, an "it won't go away until I do something about it" itch.

So I signed up for it.

Then I found out that I was going on a school trip for 4 days with my daughters 5th grade class. This trip was Monday through Friday during a week that my schedule was, you guessed it, Monday through Friday. Well I didn't want to use 40 hours of vacation so I exchanged hours with a coworker (and friend) that included her working my 12 hour shifts on Monday and Tuesday and then I work for for on Saturday and Sunday. Sunday was Tri-U-Mah!

Whoops!

Fortunately, Lisa (said coworker) agreed to work for me 4 hours that Sunday morning. My time slot for the race was at 8:30 and work was at 11:00. Sweet, I was able to participate and not lose too many vacation hours.

Do you think I regretted switching hours once the weekend was coming up? (Hint: I'm nodding my head up and down)

What is done, is done!

The timing of the race was perfect. It was at the end of my 8th week of marathon training, which is a taper week and my taper week was during the school trip, so I only ran once 5 miles and did some cross country skiing. Apparently, I take tapering rather seriously.

So I went into this with base training done and the results show it perfectly. It was my favorite triathlon so far as far as my performance. Then again, it was only my 3rd triathlon, so maybe that's not saying much.

The swim: 0.758 miles in 30 minutes

It was my first time at the Aquatic Center at the "U" (University of Minnesota)! It has a 50 meter pool (of course)! I have wanted to swim in a 50 meter pool for quite some time now and I guess technically I did swim in a 50 meter pool! Unfortunately we swam the 25 something yard width of the pool (which is at the far end of this picture, the pool was "cut" in half by a floatable walkway at the 25 meter mark). I am still a s...l...o...w... swimmer, but this time things were still different. I DID swim and a swam this technique call freestyle! Pretty good thinking huh? It felt great! I swam 25 laps which makes sense in that is how many laps I would swim in 30 minutes while training, except that 30 minutes did not count breaks. Meaning I swam for 30 minutes straight, without stopping, for the first time ever. And there were times in the swim that I felt like I could just keep swimming and swimming, which is a first. I did have to take breaths with just about every stroke though! I still have lot's of work to do!

Apparently the width of this pool is greater than 25 yards because I received credit for swimming 0.758 miles while 1250 yards is more like 0.71 miles.

There is one thing that surprises me though. According to results I swam faster at my last triathlon in August of 2007 which was mostly a side stroke swim! What is that all about? I guarantee you that as slow as I swim, there is no way I could swim just as fast with the sidestroke. The only thing I can think of is that I had the benefit of draft and the lake taking me back to shore on the open swim as opposed to the pool with no draft and I still do not know how to turn a lap like others. I get to the wall, stop momentarily, take a breath and then push off. That is my next project, flip turns. I bet the lack of flip turns really slow down my lap times.

The Bike: 9.120 miles in 30 minutes

How hard do I push and still have legs for the run? The bike kind of amused me, I could barely fit my big shoes into the toe dealio on the bike and I'm still not sure if I adjusted the seat to the best height and it certainly isn't anything like being on my trainer. Overall I am happy with the results. Yes, if I had biked more often (my own fault) the past month, I could have been stronger and faster. But I had focused on running so it is what it is. Still only 1 guy in my age group (of 14) biked for a longer distance and he only beat me by .05 miles.

The Run: 3.4 miles in 30 minutes.

Ok, I'm tired now, my legs feel used and I was hot (no, not THAT kind of hot unfortunately). My treadmill was in front of a glass window, no fan, no wind and I think that I had trouble with the fact that I knew I had to be at work in less than an hour. (Why do I have to be on my feet the whole shift, saving lives, can't I save lives from a desk, on my butt?)
So, I really feel that I could have easily run 4 miles if I put my heart to it. But I am not disappointed, I ran faster throughout the whole 30 minutes, running @ 7.6 mph when finished.

Total distance was 13.278 miles. The results are not ranked except for winners but taking a quick look reveals 5th place of 14 in my age group! But mostly happy about it because it was just solid, I kept swimming and feeling good, I kept biking and speeding up and I kept running faster throughout the whole run. Although I was happy to be done, I know that I could have done much more!

Next year, I may just plan this as a more important race!



Tri-U-Mah was on February 8th, yesterday was February 17th. I was just suppose to run a base run which should be no faster than a 9:04 pace! In other words, take it easy, not recovery easy, but easy! Well anyway, I didn't feel like running outside so I went to lifetime, thinking maybe 4 miles on the track and 3 on the treadmill. Now, I am actually pretty good at going slow, when I need to go slow, but my body would not respond. I kept telling myself to slow down, frequently seeing an 8 mile pace and managing to slow to an 8:30! Finally, I looked at my heart rate and saw that I was running an 8:15ish pace at my usual heart rate of @9:15 pace. So I just shrugged my shoulders (metaphorically) and ran. Finished with an 8:18 pace for 7 miles. We shall see if that has any affect on my 10 quarter mile intervals today (7:18 pace).

6 comments:

  1. Way to go on the tri! What a great way to start the year! :)

    And you are getting mighty speedy. To be able to run faster with a slower heart rate means you are doing something right! Good for you!

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  2. You did great! I didn't know you were doing the Tri U Mah?! A bunch of us did the 1:15 slot. It is such a fun event and I love the vests they gave out this year!

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  3. I am on FB...are you? ndelse at yahoo . com

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  4. Way to go Jumper!! Congrats all around! Especially on that swim!!!

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