"Stage Triathlon"

I had a busy weekend, and sort of did a triathlon in stages, although in the wrong order. Saturday morning I ran a 5K, in the afternoon I raced in a swim meet, and Sunday morning I rode 65 miles in the LiveStrong ride (not a race). Even though I didn't win anything or break 20 minutes in the 5K, it was still a really good weekend. I reset my 5K PR to 20:34, I set PRs for the 100 freestyle (1:27) and 100 breast stroke (1:49), and I got to ride almost 30 miles with popular professional cyclist Jens Voigt.

IBM Uptown Classic 10K

Thanks to a cold front coming in yesterday, it was nice and cool this morning for the IBM Uptown Classic 10K. The cool 50-degree air played a big part in my setting a new 10K PR of 44:47, almost 4 minutes off of last year's time. I don't know what possessed me to wear a tri-top and arm warmers instead of a long-sleeve t-shirt, but I'm pretty sure I looked ridiculous, especially with gloves and a headband.
I maintained a fairly even pace, in the 7:10 range, despite the elevation going up and down a little here and there. Either they changed to course from last year or my memory of it is off, because I don't remember mile six being mostly uphill. I might have tried to pick up my pace for the last mile, but it took extra effort just to maintain pace. I didn't pick up my pace until pretty much the last turn toward the finish line. It wasn't really that much faster, about 6:40 pace, and it seemed slow as people who had saved more energy sprinted past me. I had been sweating heavily, despite the cold, so once I stopped it wasn't long before I started to feel chilled. I didn't stick around the vendor area long before going back to my car to put more clothes on and head on my way.

Kerrville Triathlon Fest 70.3

Third time's the charm, I guess. In my third 70.3, I finally broke 6 hours. I could try to attribute it to training and preparation, but while those helped, it was probably mostly because of the great weather. With a mostly overcast sky, a high around 70 degrees, and a mostly beneficial wind, it was truly a "chamber of commerce" day. While my swim time wasn't quite as good as Buffalo Springs, my bike and run splits were my best yet. My run split was even better than the Corpus "53.1" in April, for my best half marathon off the bike. While I probably could have pushed the run and/or bike a little harder, my effort was enough to meet my goal, and still left room for improvement next time. If I had gone 5:30, it might have seemed impossible to beat, but beating 5:54:24 seems doable.

Run With The Heroes 5k

In my pursuit of a sub-20-minute 5k, I somehow managed to run two this weekend. If the second, a timed race, hadn't been short, I would have reset my PR twice, while still being short of my goal. The Saturday run was a fun run, mostly people in the running group I run with Tuesdays and Thursdays, except the fast people didn't show up for whatever reason, and I wound up "winning." Sunday's result was even more shocking: Out of 57 people in my age group, I finished first, and I was 21 out of 700 total. While I'm pleased with my time of 20:13 (for just under 3 miles by my watch), I have more work to do to reach my goal.

Ironman Louisville: The Race

Well, I did it. It didn't go as well as I had hoped, but it didn't go nearly as badly as it could have. While the swim and bike went pretty much as I had expected, the run came down to just keeping putting one foot in front of the other. With an overall time of 15:30:16 and splits of 1:37:00, 6:16:23, and 7:11:07 (swim, bike, run), I hardly set the world on fire, but I did accomplish my main goal of finishing without seriously injuring myself. I had hoped to finish under 15 hours, and I thought sub-14 might have been possible. If I had been able to improve on my marathon PR (I walked the only full marathon I had done previously), my total time would have been under 15 hours. For my first full Ironman, I don't think it's that terrible of a time. Also, while this is by far the most epic one day I've ever had, I haven't quite decided if, overall, it's quite as epic as climbing Gannett Peak solo last July (summit day on that expedition has now been bumped down to second most epic day ever).