It’s been a long time since I’ve actually raced hence it’s been a long time since my last race report.  Last season ended on a sour note with an injury the day before Buffalo Springs Half Ironman (yep, I said the day before the race) and then losing my job in late September.  Not exactly the way you want to go out in 2012 but as the old saying goes, “It is what it is”.  So, onward and upward into 2013.  My first race in almost eight months happened two (2) weeks earlier in New Orleans.  It wasn’t a bad effort down in NOLA but it certainly wasn’t a great one.  Ended up in the top 50 overall and second in the 45-49 age group.  More importantly I earned my slot for WTC 70.3 World Championships in Las Vegas, Nevada.  Really looking forward to getting back to that race and exacting some revenge based on my last performance there!   My time was, for me, a pedestrian 4:27:35.  Decent swim, terrible bike and a salvageable run.  I’ll concentrate on racing Half Ironmans in the second half of this season.

The race in Knoxville, Tennessee was, in one word, wet!  I drove over on Friday with a friend of mine, David Callahan, to take part in the fund-raiser for Nicole and Michael Gross and Erika Brannock.    All three (3) of these individuals were injured during the Boston Marathon bombing.  Nicole Gross was a former UT swimmer.  Now, as all of you know, I am no fan of the University of Tennessee.  But, I will put my differences aside to aid one of my fallen swimming/triathlon friends in a heartbeat.  The fund-raiser was a 5k run with all proceeds going to the family to help with their mounting medical expenses.  I believe I heard after the event that $25,000.00 was raised.  If you’re interested in helping the family out you can do so at http://www.bestrongstaystrong.net/.

Now, of course, the weather on Friday was absolutely beautiful!  Nice and sunny with the temps a bit cooler than normal but certainly not cold.  That would all change over the next 24 hours.  By race day a cold front had moved in and brought with it cooler temperatures and a lot, and I mean a lot, of rain.  Race day saw temps in the low 50′s, a steady rain and not even a hint of sunshine.  Fun! Fun! Fun!  To add insult in injury the river we’d be swimming in was hovering between 57-59 degrees.  As Tallahassee(Woody Harrelson) would so often say in ZombieLand, “Time to Nut Up or Shut Up”.

For me the race was all about getting to the finish line as fast as I could without incident.  There would be no chances taken on the bike today.  The bike course at REV3 Knoxville is a legitimate course.  Lots and lots of climbs with either sharp left or right turns at the bottom of hills.  Add to that a couple of off- camber turns at the end of long hills and, if you weren’t paying attention, your day would be cut short.  So, keeping the “rubber side down” on the bike was paramount for me on race day.  I wasn’t going to risk my entire season on one Olympic Distance race in early May.

So, how did my race play out?  Well, I had a cold and uneventful swim.  16:45 for a 1.5k swim that saw the major part of it swimming with the current of the river.  I wore my neoprene cap under my swim cap so I didn’t really feel cold in the water.  Well, let me rephrase that, because of my awesome Blue Seventy Helix wetsuit and my neoprene cap my body and head weren’t cold.  My face, hands and feet were frozen.  Which made the long run into T1 very interesting.  Not being able to feel your feet running to T1 felt like I had two (2) porkchops tied to the bottom of my feet.  Reached my rack, threw on my Bell helmet (thankfully with a visor in front), grabbed my bike and away I went.  I was able to get my feet into my shoes after the dismount line fairly easily when riding my bike.  I was pretty happy with this as I hadn’t done it in quite some time.

The bike ride for me was also (and thankfully) uneventful.  Trust me when I say I rode like an “old lady”.  My QR CD0.1 was loaded up for speed but I wasn’t turning it loose.  For the first time this season I was rocking the new Shimano C75′s.  I can’t really give you a great synopsis of how the wheels fared because riding like an “old lady” wouldn’t allow me to give a fair representation of how they did.  I’m sure they were but I just couldn’t tell.  Throughout the entire bike I was very cautious.  People were flying by me on the downhills but I’d catch back up to them on the straight-aways and the climbs.  Again, I concentrated more on not going down than going fast.  I know, I know, that’s a rather wimpy way to ride but I’m getting old and evidently soft in my old age.  Overall bike time was a smoking 1:05:11 for a blazing average speed of 22.2 mph.  But, more importantly I didn’t go down.  Which is more than I can say for a lot of the other riders on the course.  Total carnage!  During the latter part of the bike I could feel both my arms and legs locking up because of the cold temps.  At one point in time on the bike I was shivering enough to make a pretty good martini (shaken, not stirred) for James Bond.  I was also starting to yawn like there was no tomorrow so I knew I was probably in the initial stages of hypothermia.  I couldn’t wait to get off the bike.  Well, that was until I got off the bike.  Here’s a pic of me heading out on the bike.  Notice that awesome position!  :-)

Coming back into T2 I jumped off my bike, dropped my bike because I was so cold, picked up my bike and then lumbered to where my rack was.  For the next 30-45 seconds I fumbled with getting my helmet strap disconnected so I could take my helmet off.  I couldn’t do it.  My hands were so cold that I couldn’t get my strap disconnected.  Finally I just pulled the strap forward and shimmied underneath it and got my helmet off.  Next came the shoes, which I’m hear to tell you, were just as hard to get on with frozen, shaking hands.  I was finally able to get my shoes on and headed out on the run.  Because the transition area was in a parking lot (thank goodness) all of your gear to start out with was dry.  It stayed that way for .2 seconds once you got out from under the parking deck.  So, with frozen feet soaking feet I lumbered through a blazing 41:52 1ok.  I can’t remember when I ran that slow.  My legs felt like someone had poured concrete in them.  Trust me when I say I was glad to finish the race and be done.  Here’s a couple of running pics and finisher pics for your viewing pleasure:

Overall time was 2:09:40.  Not particularly fast but I finished.  I did manage to eek out a win in my age group and, I believe was 16th amateur overall.

Cam Dye laid down a blazing fast 1:47:53 for the overall win.  Considering the conditions that is amazing!  Former Timex team mate Lauren Goss was able to earn her first pro victory on the women’s side in 2:03:55.  Way to go Lauren!

All-in-all I had a good time and finished the race unscathed.  Next up, Leon’s Triathlon in Hammond, IN.  I’ll be representing Tennessee in the Best of the US competition there.  I’m just hoping that the weather cooperates a bit more than it did in Knoxville.

Until that time, Train smart, Train safe and Race fast!

Busy, busy, busy!  That’s how things have been for me over the past couple of weekends.  I don’t want to bore you all too much with my blog entry so I’ll stick to the facts and throw in a couple of picture to show that I actually did race.  Remember, pictures or it didn’t happen.  The first race of my 2012 season was Gulf Coast Half Ironman down in Panama City Beach, Florida.  I’ve done this race several times and like the course and, normally, the conditions.  This year would be a bit different.  The days leading up to the race saw plenty of sunshine and a completely flat ocean.  Well, on race day this would all change.

Race day, Saturday, May 12th, came and not only was the sun not out but the winds were up and the seas were getting rough.  Polar opposite of what had been happening the previous days.  I was so hoping for light winds but it didn’t look like that was going to happen today.  I got down to the race sight, prepped my gear in transition and set off to the beach to wait.  My wave (45-49) was the second to last wave to take off.  The first wave went off at 6:15.  I didn’t leave until about an hour later.  And as luck (or no luck) would have it, the conditions changed a lot in that hour.  The winds increased as did the waves and chop out in the water.  I was beginning to wonder, with all the “error on the side of caution” direction triathlon has been going, if we’d have a swim.  Thankfully we did.

When the horn went off I ran into the water and ran as far as I could.  When I couldn’t run anymore I threw in a couple of dolphin dives and then started swimming.  Well, I don’t think you can construe what I was doing as swimming.  The water was so choppy it felt more like flailing than swimming.  I was finally able to get past the shore break and get out into deeper water.  Things improved but only slightly.  The swells were taking me up and down, up and down which made sighting very, very difficult.  To make a long story short, I shortened up my stroke, concentrated on over-reaching underwater and making sure I was getting the most out of my pull.  This seemed to work and I exited the water in 25 minutes and some change.  I didn’t feel all that great when I planted my feet on solid ground and actually felt a bit queasy when I started to run up the beach.

T1 was what you’d expect.  Shed the wetsuit, throw on the helmet and off I went.  I was able to get into my shoes once on the bike fairly easily and started my 56 mile trek.  At this point the wind was howling at our backs which made for a fast first 8 miles of the bike.  Needless to say I wasn’t pedaling all that hard and was consistently going 30-31 mph.  This all changed once we left Front Beach Road and hit Highway 79.  The ride out on 79 wasn’t too bad.  The crosswind slowed us down a bit but it wasn’t killing us.  I did see a bunch of people getting sick out on their bikes from all the salt water they ingested on the swim.  So glad that wasn’t me.  I was able to get into a fairly good rhythm on the bike and hammered the out and back sections on the course.  I knew that coming back on Front Beach Road was going to be no picnic.  When I finally got there the wind was absolutely nuts.  Plus, it started to rain.  To make matters even worse sand was not being blown on the course.  Add in all those factors and it made for a nasty, difficult last 8 miles on the bike.  My speed was almost 12 mph slower going back into T2.  I was being blown all over the place.  It was absolutely crazy.  I could wait to get off my bike.  And for those of you who know who well I run, that’s saying something!  Overall bike time was 2 hours 16 minutes and change.  I’ll take it.

The run, my absolute favorite part about triathlon.  I hope you’re noting a bit of sarcasm there.  Nothing too special about the run.  The wind was in our face for the first 3 miles.  The sun came out during the last 6 miles and I started to fall apart at about mile 10.  My overall run time for the day was one hour, thirty – five minutes, and you guessed it, some change.  I crossed the finish line in 4:19:52.  I was glad I was done and couldn’t wait to get to the massage room for some much needed work on my legs.

All in all it was a good day.  My family enjoyed their time down on the beach and I got to put in a solid race.  I especially enjoy all the friends I get to see at this race.  There is always a large contingent of people that continue to come back to this race year-after-year that makes this race special.  I thank each and every one of you for the encouragement that you shouted to me during the run.  It helps more than you know.

Here are a couple of pictures (just to prove I actually raced):

Here are a couple of pictures of the Timex Ford Edge in Nashville, TN (a.k.a. Music City USA).  This was before the Music City Triathlon.  Believe it or not, the Music City Triathlon is one of the oldest triathlons in the country.  Back in the day guys like Mark Allen, Dave Scott and Brad Beven used to come and compete in it.  I’ll post more on the race in a later post.

The whole focus this season was to to back to Hawaii.  I haven’t done the race since 1999.  Well, as luck would have it, I won’t be going back in 2011 either.  You know the old saying, If it weren’t for bad luck I’d have no luck at all, well, that’s the story of my life.  Here’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

One week prior to Eagleman 70.3 I was out on my last long ride when the unthinkable happened.  Remember what I said about luck. Well, I didn’t have any on this day.  I was attempting to get to my son’s ballgame at 9:30 and riding on roads that I hardly ride on.  On a down hill section of the road I hit the deck at approximately 34.1 mph.  How do I know this?  I downloaded the ride later on in the day and could see EXACTLY where I went down.  I could also see the deceleration of my body after I hit the asphalt.  Honestly, I don’t remember any of the accident.  One minute I was riding and the next I was being helped by complete strangers asking me if I was OK.  Well, I was alive, so yes, I was OK.  If there’s a poster boy for why you should wear a helmet when riding I am him.  There’s no doubt that my helmet saved my life.  The rest of the carnage can be described like this:

Broken nose with three (stitches) on the bridge of my nose.  Four (4) stitches on my shoulder-blade/back where  a hole had been torn (where you could actually see my bone) by my sliding.  Road rash on both knee caps, right forearm, left elbow and right and left side/butt cheek.  Yep, I was a mess.  Being the stubborn guy that I am I tried to ride my bike home.  One legged mind you as my right pedal hit the ground so hard that I bent it.  I didn’t get very far as my vision started to get blurry almost to the point that I couldn’t see.  I thought this would be a good time to call my wife and have her take me to the ER.  Three (3) hours later I was out and all bandaged up.  I was a mess but I was alive.

Eagleman 70.3 was the following Sunday and I didn’t know if I would be able to race.  The ER doc didn’t even want me on my bike the entire week.  Afraid I would rip out the stitches I guess.  I wanted to see if I would be able to race so I covered up all my wounds with water-proof bandages and jumped in the pool, rode my trainer and ran on my treadmill.  Things weren’t falling off of me and the pain was manageable so I made the decision on Wednesday that I would go ahead and fly up to Cambridge, toe the line and see what happens.  Doing the race probably wasn’t one of the smartest decisions I’ve made.

I had some friends of mine set up a home stay in Cambridge.  Blane and Jeannie Weitzel took me in and treated me like royalty. I had a room and a bathroom all to myself the entire time I was up there.  They were awesome!  Not only did they house me but they also fed me as well. Not a small feat by any stretch of the imagination.  Plus, where they were located was less than 1.5 miles from the race.  I could have walked to the race if necessary.  I also got to hang out with the Cambridge MultiSport (CMS) team for the weekend and that was also a lot of fun.  They took me in and made me an honorary member for the weekend.  This was awesome as they had a tent close to the starting line of the race.  Speaking of the race, here’s a brief synopsis of how it unfolded:

Swim hurt, bike hurt and the run hurt. Here’s a couple of pictures of the carnage that was Eagleman 70.3:

Swim was decent.  27 minutes and some change.  Don’t know if it was long or if we were swimming into some currents going out but that’s a bit slow for a 1.2 mile swim.  The Orca Speed Suit felt amazing.  I know that wasn’t the problem.  My right shoulder was hurting with every stroke I took.  I actually had to bilateral breath just to take some pressure off of it by breathing to my right side.  An MRI will be performed soon to see if any structural damage happened when I hit the deck.

The bike for the first 30 miles were into some headwinds.  Nothing too crazy but just enough that you could feel you were working.  I believe I bike around 2:19 and some change.  The road rash on my left elbow was a serious reminder of what happened the week before.  As luck (or no luck) would have it the elbow road rash lined up perfectly with my pad and rubbed the entire ride.  Fun, fun, fun!

Lastly, the run.  Uggggg…the run.  By the time I got out on the run it was HOT!  I didn’t start the race until 8:06.  As a matter of fact Andrew Hodges was already done with his race and I hadn’t even started the run yet.  Again, fun, fun, fun!  The road rash on my knee caps starting hurting me about four (4) miles into the run.  That with the heat and humidity made the run a not so enjoyable time for me.  I was passed by two (2) of my 45-49 year old competitors in the last couple of miles, thus, I thought, ending my chance at a Kona slot.  That wouldn’t be the case as I would later find out.  Anyway, I finished the race in 4:30:  .

So, here’s the story on the Kona slot. Evidently you had to have either $650.00 in cash or a check to take your slot. I had neither.  It’s 2011 and I was under the impression that I would be able to use a debit card to pay for any slots (Kona or Las Vegas) that were  earned.  Boy was I wrong.  Lesson learned.  What did happen (while I was back at the house packing) was that the Kona slot rolled down to me. I wasn’t there to get it and somebody else took it.  End of story, cut and dry.  Easy come, easy go.  I wouldn’t have had the money to pay for it anyway. I did, however, get lucky and nabbed a Las Vegas slot. I had the great fortune of having a friend front me with $325.00.  So, Vegas it is!  Kona can wait.  I’ll get there one of these years.  I’m looking forward to spending some quality time with my Timex Teammates in Las Vegas. It’s not Kona but it’ll do.  Considering all I’ve been through over the past two (2) weeks.  I’ll bet on Vegas every single time.  Also, remember, WHAT HAPPENS IN VEGAS….STAYS IN VEGAS!

This is a video of an F4 tornado that hit the University of Alabama yesterday.  The tornado then proceeded to track east and then hit Birmingham where my Mom and all my brothers and sisters live.  Thankfully all of them are OK.  Yesterday was a scary, scary day.

Tuscaloosa – Birmingham Tornado