Good Things Come in Threes: The 2013 Edition

Yesterday was the last race in my triple header and, much like my 2011 version, I came away with 3 podium finishes in three weeks.  The only difference between the two was that the 2011 version was 2 running races with a triathlon in the middle whereas this years version was two triathlons with a running race in the middle. 

Gotta say, the running race was the hardest.  I hurt way more after that race than I did after either triathlon.    Must be the really good warm up I get before I hit the run portion of the race, ha ha.

To say that I'm thrilled would be an understatement.  I'm PUMPED.  Yesterday's race was a little longer than the previous one I did in Woodstock.  The swim was the same distance, the bike was an additional 10km (30km instead of 20) and the run was 7.5km instead of 5.   That extra 10km on the bike totally put a beating on my legs.  The little work I've been doing on my cycling seems to have paid off though.  I managed to average just over 33km per hour on the bike, which I've never been able to do so I must be doing something right. 

I got through the swim with only one minor panic episode which was HUGE for me.  I swam off course multiple times which probably added about 50m to my swim but whatever.   This time around I situated myself at the front off to the side and I think that was a good option for me.  I'll do that again next time. 

It was my first time doing this particular race so there will be a separate race report hopefully in the next couple of days.   Suffice to say I'm pretty tired.  I opted to take today off and just be lazy.  I'll pick things up again tomorrow at the pool.  I'm also looking forward to not having to get up at some ungodly hour of the morning next weekend to race.  As much as I love to race, I need a bit of down time as well.  G and I will be back at it the following weekend (June 22) to race another triathlon in Welland.  Apparently that one is very flat and fast so I'm looking forward to seeing what I'm capable of with few more weeks of cycling as well as some good solid rest.

Did you race this weekend? 

The Meat in My Triple Header Sandwich: The Bread & Honey 15km

The last time I did this race was in 2011.  And much like this time around, it was also the middle race in a triple header  for me.   The week before I had just run the Toronto Women's Half and the week after I was scheduled to do the Woodstock Sprint Triathlon.   MSC shuffled the date of Woodstock around last year so now it's the last weekend in May which made that the first race of this year's triple header.  Good thing as my legs felt a whole lot fresher today than they did the last time I did the race. 

This is not a big race by any stretch.  I think there were just under 400 people that ran the 15km.  That doesn't mean there aren't some seriously amazing runners that come out to race.  It seems to be very popular with a lot of run clubs so there's always a good turn out of very strong runners.  This year was no exception.

In the days leading up to the race, I was feeling a bit run down, almost like I was fighting a cold.  The Friday before the race I woke up with a sore throat, headache and slightly stuffy head.  I thought oh no, here we go.  G had been really sick a couple of weeks before so I figured it was just a matter of time before I got it.  I started in with the "hard stuff' right away.  Advil Cold & Flu to the rescue.  I took a couple of those over the course of the day.  I left work early, went home and fell asleep on the couch for a couple of hours.  I got up, ate something, watched a bit of TV and then was in bed asleep by 9:30 pm.  I slept right through till 7:00 am.  Whoa.  I felt better when I got up.  Not 100% but close.  I took another Advil Cold and Flu and got on with my day.  By the end of the day on Saturday I felt good enough to race. 

Sunday morning I got up to the sound of rain.  Awesome.  It was also incredibly muggy.  Double awesome.  On my way to the race site, the skies opened up and it started pouring HARD.  I thought about turning around and heading back home but I kept going and shortly after I turned off the highway onto Mississauga Road, the rain stopped.  Thank goodness.  I got up to the race site nice and early, found parking very close by, picked up my race kit, dropped everything off in the car and proceeded to do a warm up.  I had a lot of time to kill.  G was going to ride his bike up to the start so he could get a ride in while cheering me on.  Smart fella.  I sat in the car for a bit after my warm up and debated about what socks to wear.  I had my injinji's on but my calves were feeling a bit fatigued so I thought maybe I should switch to my compression socks.  I wavered back and forth and finally opted for the compression socks.  In hindsight it was totally the wrong call but whatever.

G arrived and I hung out with him for a bit.  At that point I was kinda wishing I hadn't signed up for this.  I wasn't really feeling it.  But, I was there so I figured I was just going to make the the best of it. I then ran into another friend of mine, David, who was just coming off a bad case of the flu but opted to race anyway as he's training for a late summer marathon to try and qualify for Boston.   I said goodbye to G and David and I made our way over to the start line.  I muscled my way through the crowd towards the front.  There is a 5km that starts at the same time as the 15km so the start line of this race can get pretty congested. 

I didn't really have a race plan, all I knew was that I hoped to come in around 1:05:00 or so.   I hoped that was possible given my lack of speed work over the last few weeks.  The gun went off and we all shuffled across the start line.  All the really speedy ladies took off.  I figured there was no way I could hang with any of them and I wasn't about to try.  Of course I started out way too fast.  My first two km were both 4:04's.  Then I dropped to 4:13 and hovered between 4:12-4:18's for the next 4km.  Then we hit the rollers.  It was at that point that the sun started to poke through the clouds and the temperature felt like it doubled.  I could feel myself totally overheating.  My shins were hot and I cursed myself for changing my socks at the last minute.  Nothing I could do about it at that point.  This was the first race I did without my fuel belt as well so to say I was dying for a drink of something was an understatement.  I was parched.  I grabbed at least 3 cups of fluid at each aid station.  2 to drink and one to pour over my head.  That offered a temporary respite from the humidity for about 5 minutes.

As I headed into the rollers, a course marshal told me I was the 5th place woman on the course.  What what??  I found that hard to believe.  I figured I'd find out at the RBC turnaround.   My km's through the rollers dropped to 4:24-4:30's.  Solid evidence of my complete lack of hill training as of late.  It was around the 6km mark that I noticed I had company.  I glanced to my right only to see my buddy from Around the Bay.  Small world!  Once again he paced me.  He'd pull in front and check over his shoulder to see that I was still there.  Amazing.  Between the heat and my effort level, I couldn't really get any words out but on hung on to him for as long as I could.

Me and my ATB Buddy!

This course is not easy by any stretch.  The first 4km or so is fairly flat but then you hit a series of climbs, some short and steep, some long and gradual.  It can also get really windy, which it happened to be.  So after you finish climbing you usually get slammed with a headwind.  At this point I was totally dying.  For once my legs actually felt ok, it was my lungs that were suffering.  This was new for me!  I was heading towards the turnaround so I figured I'd have a chance to see where I really sat position wise.  As I turned onto Financial Drive and headed towards the turnaround I got the first glimpse of the woman's leader.  A short woman with an awesome mohawk-ish hair cut.  She was cookin.  Right behind her was a woman that had passed me early on in the race and right behind her was speedy Michelle Clarke.  Those were the top 3.  I counted 3 more women after they passed, which meant that I was in 7th.  Two positions ahead of where I was 2 years ago.  Not bad.  I wasn't sure if I'd be able to catch anyone but we still had 6km left so anything was possible.

Shortly after I made the turnaround, I saw my friend David.  He was looking pretty strong.  We exchanged a wave and a few words of encouragement.  I took advantage of the slight downhill and picked up the pace.  I figured once I got back out onto Creditview, I'd have wind at my back and that would help.  It didn't.  All it made me feel was hot.  As I ran towards the overpass, I could see a woman about 500m in front of me.  Sweet, a bunny to try and catch!  I needed some kind of motivation because I was completely dying and I could feel myself easing up so it wouldn't hurt so much.  I climbed the overpass, pacing off my Around the Bay friend and hammered down the other side with a new found determination.  I was going to catch her.  We turned off Creditview and on to Argentia, heading into the wind once again as well as a long gradual climb.  I inched closer and closer to her.   Just past the 11km mark, I caught her.  She stayed with me for a bit and then I pulled away.  At 12km we hit and aid station and I actually stopped to grab 2 cups of Gatorade and drink them.  She caught me and passed me and the chase was on again.  I reeled her in again and passed her on the downhill on Kitimat just before we turned onto Mississauga Road.  She ran with me for a bit and then I started to pull away.  It was flat here so I felt like I could push it.  My ATB friend was still out in front of me a bit but he started to pull away.  He glanced back over his shoulder and slowed up a bit.  We were coming up on the turn onto Brittania and I knew we'd have to climb another hill before we hit the turn onto Joymar and the last 500m of the race.  He started to pull away from me on the climb.  I didn't have anything left.  I struggled up that climb and turned onto Joymar.  I was afraid to look back, I didn't want to know if anyone was coming up behind me so I just ran for all I was worth.  I glanced at my Garmin and saw that it had just ticked over to 1:04.  I figured I'd break 1:05 but that it would be close.  I finally got close enough to see the finish line clock as it counted down.  It was at 1:04:20 and counting.  18 seconds later I crossed the finish line, completed soaked and totally spent.  In hindsight that was not the best way to race that day given the humid conditions.  It took me longer to recover from that effort, which in turn affected my training this week.  Hindsight is always 20 / 20 and all I can do is learn from my mistakes.

I knew I was the 6th place woman over all but I wasn't sure where I ended up in my AG.  This race usually has a lot of fast "old broads" so who knew where I'd end up.  G and I wandered into the school gym so I could get some post race food.   My feet were cramping like crazy so we went back to the car so I could get out of my compression socks and my running shoes.  I wished I had brought a pair of flip flops.   I wriggled into my injini's and slipped on my Zoot Ultras.  I had a massive blister from my compression socks too so walking was not easy.  Shoulda stuck with the Injini's.

By the time we had gotten back to the gym, the results were up so I went to check.  To my surprise I was first in my AG.  I then though that perhaps I might get first place Masters female because the second place woman over all was 45-49.  I somehow missed the 4th place woman who was also in the 45-49 year old age category.  She ended up getting first in the Masters category and I got second.   First or second, didn't matter to me.  The fact that I placed over all was awesome.  I knew it was a course PB for me as well but I didn't know by how much.  Turns out I took over 8 minutes off my time from the last time I did it.  Yowza.

I'll probably be back again to do this race again.  It's a good little race to help keep your training sharp after a spring marathon / half marathon. 

You know I'm dying when I'm looking down at the ground.  My face is also a nice shade of red.

Good Things Come in Threes

And since I consider 3 to be my lucky number, mainly because I was born on the 3rd day of the 3rd month, I thought that getting a bib number with 333 on it might just be a sign of good things to come.

I spent the latter half of this week kicking myself for registering for this race.  It was one week after I ran the T.O. Women's Half and I thought it might just be too much for me to handle.  Once again, the Specter of Self Doubt nagged at me all day Friday and Saturday.  My friend Linnea, who always manages to look at the positive side things said to me "Who cares, do what you can, go out burn some calories and get a tan."   Perfect advice.  

I had taken it relatively easy all week.  No weight workouts and just short intense runs (2 to be exact) a couple of short bike rides and a couple of swims.  All total I don't think I worked out more than a total of 4 hours.  Which for me is not a lot.  Normally I'm up around the 8 hour mark for a week.  But I figured my body needed the rest.  It didn't help that this week was also quite busy at work and that I either worked late or was out late every night this week.  For a creature of habit, this was not ideal.  But, there was nothing I could do about any of it.  I took it very easy on Saturday and kept off my feet for most of the afternoon. 

We got to the race site with 40 minutes to spare so I went out and did a short warm up run (8 minutes) and then waited in line for the loo.  I had a bit of time after to do another 2 minutes of pick ups.  My legs didn't feel great, but they didn't feel horrible either.   The temperature had risen to about 18 degrees at 7:30 am which meant that this was going to be a hot one.  Oh well, nothing I could do about that either. 

I said goodbye to Gary and wove my way up into the crowd to get as close to the start line as possible.  Which was a little challenging given that they narrowed it down with gates so it created a bit of a bottleneck.  Oh well.  As I stood there waiting, I felt a sense of calm wash over me.  This race didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things.  It wasn't my A race.  It was a training race.  I wanted to see what I could do on tired legs.  Just how much I'd hurt and how I'd deal with that when that time came.

The gun went off and I shuffled my way through the starting gate.  There was a 5km that started at the same time as the 15km so it was a bit hairy for the first few km.  Of course, I flew out of the gate and started running 4:15 km's.  Ummm....yikes.  That hurt and I was gasping for air.  I finally managed to slow myself down and settle into some kind of rhythm by the 3km mark.  I felt crappy though.  Really really crappy.  I toyed with the idea of turning off at the 5km turn off but opted not to.  That would defeat the purpose of this race.


Just before 4km in I had my first bit of Roctane.  I had brought 2 with me and wasn't sure if I'd use both.  The way my legs were feeling at that point, I wish I had brought 3.  But alas.  I was going to have to make do with that I had.  Somewhere around the 7km mark, I actually started to feel good.  I had been trading spaces with another woman for about 2km.  I'd pass her a bit and then she'd surge ahead.  I'd catch her again and then she'd surge ahead again.  I wasn't going to play that game so I tucked in behind her as we climbed one of the many rollers on this course and stuck behind her until we hit the 8km mark.  I started to pick it up a bit here as I was feeling really good. 

It was at this point that I saw the first place woman heading back.  She had a HUGE lead.  I also thought this would be the perfect opportunity to see where I was in the pack.  Eventually I saw the second place woman.  Then the 3rd.  The 4th, 5th and 6th all ran by in a small pack and then I saw the 7th who was not too far ahead of me.  SWEET!  I was in 8th place.  I had no idea how close any of the other women were but I figured I'd catch a glimpse of them at the turnaround.  Sure enough, the woman I had dropped was there but she had fallen back a fair bit.  I noticed a few other ladies but no one really seemed to be gaining.  YEAH.

Until I hit the 10km mark and this little Asian woman passed me like I was standing still.  Holy smokes.  I'm not sure were she came from but I didn't have an answer for her.  At this point my legs were starting to scream at me.  I had slowed down a fair bit as well.  I had one Roctane left.  I decided to down the entire thing.  I figured worst case scenario I had 25 minutes left (if I slowed down to 5 minute kms).  I seriously thought about that.  I thought about stopping and walking.  I thought about giving up.  But...giving up is not my style.  I finish what I start.  I just had to suck it up and give 'er.

At 11km the course started to climb a bit and I struggled to keep going.  I shortened my stride a bit and pushed my shoulders back and lifted my head to look "up" the road.  This seemed to help somewhat.  I made it to 12km and grabbed some gatorade at the aid station.  Only 3 more km.  Less than 15 minutes.  Run through the pain.   Stay in the top 10.  Stay in the top 10.  That was my mantra. 

Just past 13km, the course goes uphill again.  I pushed hard going uphill.  I could feel that last big surge of adrenaline building in me.  If my legs had lungs, they would have been howling in pain.  They felt numb.  I was huffing and puffing.  I got to the top of that hill and turned the corner, knowing that I was on the road that went down to the finish line.  I could see the woman that passed me earlier up ahead.  I pushed a little harder.  I was spent.   I got close to her but ran out of real estate.   Oh well.  At least I was still in the top 10!

I found Gary and we wandered into the school to get some food, stretch and check the results.  I have a tough time guessing anyone's age just by looking at them but several of the women in the lead pack looked young.  The rest of them were probably around my age or older at least.   Turns out that only 3 of the women in the lead pack were younger than me.  The rest were my age or older.  Talk about a tough field.  Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised when Gary told me I was third in my age group!  333 race bib and a third place finish.  SWEET!  Gary went back and looked at the results again to see where the first, second and third overall women's finishers were and because one of them was in my age group, I got bumped up to second place as the race policy was that they didn't duplicate categories.  So since this woman got second overall, that took her out of first place in my age group and bumped the second place female up to first and me into second.  WOOOHOO!  My second podium of the season.  And on tired legs to boot.

Maybe there is something to all this racing after all.....

Me with my second place finisher's plaque.

Cute finisher's medal.

Stay tuned for next week's Woodstock Tri race report.  Or the Big Kennedy Showdown as I'm calling it.  Who will have the better run split?  Me or G?

Boogity Boogity Boogity, Let's Go Racin'!

Call me crazy.  Or maybe just passionate....but I'm racing every weekend for the next three weeks!  This weekend is the Toronto Women's Half which is half marathon number two for me this year.  Stop number 2 on the Half Marathon Hat-trick Train! 

I'm looking forward to it but I am somewhat apprehensive because my training has not been up to par (at least for me).  I also changed my strength training routine.  Well more like eliminated it.  I decided to do a boot camp instead.  Not sure how much that helped me as much fun as the workouts were, I think I am better off actually lifting.  But that's ok, I'll just start back up with that again after this race.  I know I've gotten faster, the question is (once again), just how much.  I'm hoping to go sub 1:45, which I think should be doable.  If I'm feeling REALLY good, maybe a 1:43.  We shall see.

Next weekend I'll be racing the Bread and Honey 15k in Streetsville.   Not sure how wise that is but it was only $40 to enter, there are some amazing draw prizes and it's close to home.    Plus a bunch of folks from my run club are probably doing to be doing it.

The following weekend, I'll be doing my first tri in 3 years.  The Woodstock Triathlon is the season opener for the Recharge With Milk Triathlon series.    It's a 500m swim, 20km bike and 4km run.   Separately I can do all of those distances.  Together, well, we shall see.  The really tough part is going to be the run off the bike.    I have done 2 bricks so far this year and both of them were awful.  So I now need to somehow manage to get those in on a regular basis over the next 3 weeks.   Especially since there has been a bit of a throw down between me and the G-Man.  I've basically told him I think I'll beat him in the run.  Not that I'll beat him in overall time, just that I'll have a better run split that him.  Being the stubborn old goat that he is (he is a Capricorn after all) he refused to concede to that.  Ok then, it's on.  It's ON LIKE DONKEY KONG.  I only hope that I'm not eating my words. But a little friendly competition never hurts. 

After all of this, I think I'm going to take a well needed break.