richmond is one of america's most obese cities, with 1 in 4 of its population being overweight. and it's no wonder. the only dining options that i could find were fast food chains with menus that consisted entirely of deep fried and battered garbage. if salad was an option it was smothered in ranch dressing or bacon. even the breakfast at my hotel was terrible. the only non-fried option was some fresh fruit. the whole weekend i struggled to eat well and turned to chowhound to try to find some local restaurants that offered lighter, healthier options, but every place that i drove to was either closed or boarded up. richmond was rocked by the recession and a lot of businesses shut down, and downtown was completely deserted. anyways, the only reason that i mention all of this is because food became a real factor for me. i'd packed everything that i needed for race day, but my stomach was turning the entire weekend leading up to the race because i don't ever eat the food that i had to eat this weekend. i was on the lookout for a grocery store saturday afternoon because i wanted to get something healthy and light that i could make for myself. i had to ask a local for some advice and it turned out i had to get on the freeway and drive 30 minutes outside of town to get to a whole foods market. i was like a kid in a candy store and i picked up some healthy food to get me through the rest of the day and sunday's drive home.
most of saturday was spent sorting out food, but i did head over to the race site early in the morning to register and check out the venue. the bike was three 13k laps on a course that consisted of a mix of some fast straight sections and some super technical sections. for the most part it was flat but there were a few hills here and there, and the most technical part of the ride wound its way through an up and down residential street. i rode the course with a dude from boulder, colorado to get familiar with it because it was the sort of course you could only wrap your head around by riding. looking at it on a map was like trying to read a foreign language. although i didn't get a chance to get out on the run course on saturday, it carved its way throughout downtown richmond on cobblestone streets, pedestrian pathways and roads. like the bike course the run was fairly flat, the only significant climbs coming just as you head into transition.
sunday morning began with the first part of my warm up at the hotel. i sat in the hot tub for awhile to warm up my legs, then headed to the gym to do 15 minutes of spinning and 15 minutes on the treadmill. once i'd arrived at race site, picked up my chip and got my body marking done, i completed my warm up near the start line and was ready to race. it was at some point during my warm up that i lost my chip, panicked when i realized it was gone, and began my race about 15 seconds behind everyone else. my focus vanished during my little panic attack but quickly returned as i started to chase down the athletes in my wave. pumped up on adrenaline i went out much harder than i should have, but my original plan was to stay with the lead pack and i wanted to catch them. after the first several hundred metres i realized that there was no way i was going to catch them so i just settled into my own race and managed to move up the pack quickly. there was only one point on the run course that allowed you to see the athletes ahead as they looped back towards transition. this was the only time that i got a look at who exactly i was competing against, but even then it was difficult to know who was in my age group because we'd caught other athletes from the previous waves. not only was i was running this race without a timing chip, but i was also running it blind.
although i'd burnt a bit too much at the start of the race, i left t1 strong and ready to ride. this would be my first opportunity to put several months of serious cycling training to work. the bike started with an immediate short, steep climb towards the run start, quickly dove to a sharp descent, then flattened out for the first flat straightaway. i left t1 with a couple of other athletes in my age group but quickly dropped them. i was tearing it up out there and picked off several athletes on the first two flats before hitting some slower technical areas. two of my age groupers caught me on the first lap in the residential part, but i dropped them before getting back to the flats. for the most part i was by myself for the first half of the ride, but in a headwind on the way out on the second lap the lead group from the wave behind me caught me and i rode with them in a pack for an entire lap. i knew i was a stronger rider than all of these athletes but i used them to help me out in the headwinds. it's too hard to move quickly when you're out there by yourself in such a strong wind, so i let them take the brunt of it but tried to stay up front so that i could break away when i was ready. on my last lap, just as we were getting out of the technical residential area and heading back to the flats, i made my move and dropped the pack.
on the second run i settled into a pace that i thought i could hold for the last 5k. in an attempt to conserve energy i'd been pushing a big gear at a low cadence while riding but found that this had hurt my running legs. i felt strong coming off the bike but as the race wore on my legs started feeling heavy. i didn't realize it at the time but it was a hot, humid morning and i'd been sweating quite a bit. i'd only drank half of my water on the bike so dehydration was becoming a factor. i'd made up a lot of ground on the bike but was still far enough behind the lead athletes that i couldn't see them. i had no one to use a pace guide or to chase down. i was also pretty far ahead of the athletes behind me so there was no one on my heels. there wasn't too much incentive to go any harder because where i was now in the field was where i was probably going to finish. was i 10th? 20th? would pushing it get me into 2nd? not having much incentive to dig deep and move faster was an odd feeling. as i finally approached the little turnaround point that allowed me to get a look at who was ahead of me, i counted about 10 athletes that looked like they were in my age group. i'd wanted to make the top 10 today but it looked like that wasn't going to happen. there were just too many people ahead of me. feeling even more discouraged, i hit the most difficult section of the run as i came up the two big climbs towards the end. i crossed the finish line in little more than a jog, stopped my watch, walked right over to my bag and downed a litre of coconut water. i was parched.
a finishing time of 1.36.00 was also my goal for today. i wanted two sub-18 5ks and 1 hour on the bike. i didn't quite get that but my time was 1.37.55, good enough for a 5th place age group finish and 35th overall. as expected, my running has become my weakest discipline; whereas my run times put me at about 65th overall, my bike time was 24th overall, and i was one of only a small number of people to do the bike course in less than an hour. i'd had a great race and was really happy with my results, but knew that it would have been a completely different race for me had i started with my wave and been running and riding with the lead pack.
i rehydrated, stretched and packed my bike into the car and headed home almost immediately. i knew that 12 hours of sitting in a car was going to wreak havoc on my recovery, which it did. i wore my compression socks on my calves for the entire ride home which helped out a lot, but my quads and hamstrings were aching for days. every time i stopped for food or gas i took some time to do some stretching and rolled around on my foam roller. all that helped but my legs were still tight all week.
traveling to richmond is a long way to go to make such a huge mistake like losing your timing chip and not realizing it until seconds before your race begins. but that aside i did have a great race. once back in toronto i sat down with my coach to talk about what worked and what didn't, and am treating this race as nothing more than another learning experience. moving forward i'll be focusing on settling into a cadence on the bike that will allow me to have strong legs on my second run. this race was a real test in mental focus and my coach assured me that i passed with flying colours. he was pleased to hear that i was able to snap out of a foggy confusion and start my race and get right back into it.
all my stupid mistakes aside i'm thrilled i got to race at the US nationals. the field was dense and talented and i hope there's an opportunity for me to do this race again. but next time i'll duct tape my timing chip onto my face so there's no confusion as to where exactly i've put it.
