Respect the 70.3, pretty shorts won't help you.
Honestly, I did not enjoy my race yesterday. I am glad that is done. Yeah yeah, I dug deep, I sucked it up, I left it all on the course blah blah blah. Today I am feeling equal measures of pride and fear. Pride; I finished my 2nd 70.3 on a more challenging course than my 1st one and I came 6th in my age group. I overcame the the voice inside that kept telling me that it would be OK to take it easier. I signed up for Calgary Ironman 70.3 because I did not want my 2nd effort at this distance to be at the Age group world championships in Mt Tremblant. I have also been worrying that my race last year in Augusta was a fluke and I did not really deserve my slot. Well I can put that feeling to bed because I earned another slot yesterday. Fear; the course yesterday had a 600m elevation gain on the bike and some nasty sharp inclines on the run that had me almost slipping out of the back of my shoes. It was unpleasant. For a lot of the race I felt like I was just hanging on and really battling with myself to suck it up etc. The Mt Tremblant course has more elevation! That feeling I had yesterday was horrible but I always knew I was in contention for a place and I had something to prove. I won't have those motivations in Tremblant, so I am not sure what will motivate me to hang on. The race: The swim was OK, it was a huge swim wave, 400 I heard. I got into a good position on the beach and had a good start. I was tangling up with others for almost the whole swim but managed OK. The course was ANNOYING! Lots of turning around buoys and glaring sun made sighting difficult. I think my wetsuit is too big for me, when I stood up to run up the beach I felt like a walrus. Funny cause I feel like a shark when I put it on. I was the 1st bike off my rack, but that good feeling fades as girl after girl after girl overtook me on the bike. Girls sound different when they come up behind you, the breathing sounds different, this I know from my experience yesterday. Because all the women swam together I was looking for ages on the backs of calves to see how I was going. Ugh, not good. I was trying to tell myself that I was going to pick them up in the second half of the ride when the elevation dropped off or that I would find them in the run. Pretty pink and grey shorts rode past with a big 40 on the back of her leg. Nice kit I thought to myself. Speaking of pretty shorts, my own pretty shorts were bothering me in places I don't need to mention. I found myself having to stand up to smooth out wrinkles (in my shorts.) I may need to put a few Kgs back on so all my gear fits properly. (Probably the cheapest option!) All the overtaking took place in the first half of the ride, on the hills, the second half flattened out and was better but I did not catch Pretty shorts or any others in my age on the ride. I was working at keeping my power even but I think I failed miserably, I will upload when I get home but I think it will show too much effort on the hills. This was a point to point race, our running gear was transported to T2 the day before from T1, so it was sight unseen. I was slightly worried about this but volunteers were there to direct us and it did not delay me at all. I was tired after the bike but not wasted. I ran past the toilet in transition determined to ignore the sloshing in my bladder; but gave up on that when I realised that it was stopping me from taking on more fluid and distracting me too much. I stopped to pee at the 1st water station, oh man, pulling up sweaty shorts is hard. We were running on a path through a park still open to cyclists, runners, baby carriages and dog walkers, it was busy! There were some hills on the course that were so nasty that most people seemed to be walking them. I was not going to give in and I was rewarded with extra cheering from spectators, thank you strangers, you made my day! I was keeping tidy on the run, I think my splits were pretty even but this was getting harder and harder to maintain. I did see a number of my new friends from the day before including Heather with her awesome hair still in place. I started picking up girls in my age group and did not get over taken by any so even though I was feeling rubbish, this was a huge boost. I could see Pretty pink shorts ahead at about the 11k point, I knew she was In my age so I went after her, I may not have worked so hard if I had not been so sure she was one of my competitors, but I had fallen in love with those shorts and would recognise them anywhere! With 2km to go I took another one of my age groupers. I was nearly sick with the idea that she would recognise my own pretty shorts and come after me, I would not have been able to do a thing about it, I was close to my limit. I had no kick, no sprint to the finish, I just hung on and got there. 5:13. I sat for a while after the race feeling like I had been run over by a heard of cows, (I could say a train but we are in Calgary.) I didn't have to stick around for the podium, alas trophies only for top 5. I will be content with my finishers medal, it is custom made for the Calgary race to convert to a belt buckle, yee-haw! I am feeling OK today, not sore, just tired. Going to wear my hard earned T-shirt home today.
