I woke up for my race at 5 am wake-up after about 6 -7 hrs sleep. At 5:30 am I had breakfast of a plain bagel with PB & jam and a maple brown sugar granola bar. At 6:30 am I arrived at race sight, did a very short run (no calf pain at all) from the water exit to the transition area. Then I set up my transition area: put my bike shoes (with wind resistant toe covers!) in pedals, hung a WattsUp jersey with arm warmers and bike gloves in two back pockets (just in case), helmet upside down on the aerobars, sun glasses with yellow lenses in the helmet (b/c it was overcast).
Next, I did at 15 min swim warm-up at 7:45 because I didn't realize that there would be another one later. Spent the next 45 minutes a bit chilly. At 8 am I had a KICKBUTT BALL!
8:30 swim start (last wave!): I started on the outside again and was able to break away from the pack. Naomi Cermak sprinted the start though so while I followed her through the whole swim she was too far ahead of me to get a good draft. However, being in the 6th wave there were always people in front of me so probably got a draft off them. Didn't stop my watch for the swim :( but I think that the timing mat was pretty close to the water's exit so...SWIM TIME: 27:45 and T1:3:48 (ahhh - this hill into T1 was a preview of the entire run course).
Bike: This bike ride felt amazing! Even though my de-railler wouldn’t allow my to shift into my two easiest gears! I was in aero for a lot of the hills even. I just felt like I could power up any hill and even at the end of the bike I thought I could have done North Portage Road all over again and still be fine. Claudia Johnston passed me at the 40km mark (aside: after she came 3rd woman overall she went out for another 100km ride...wow!).
Splits:
5km (i didn't start this until 500m in though): 8:53.19
10km:8:38.95
15km: 9:50.93
20km: 8:04.05
25km: 8:26.95
30km: 9:50.36
35km: 7:47.95
40km: 9:32.24
45km: 8:01.26
50km: 9:25.54
55km: 8:34.77 (time was 2:10.07...almost a minute faster than Muskoka LC swim-bike)
60km: 8:49.67
65km: 10:02.70
70km: 8:46.94
75km: 9:25.57
80km: 9:10.52
85km: 8:48.08
90km: 10:13.33
94km: 6:50.51
T2: 1:05 (during this part I noticed my calf a little tight)
RUN Splits:
1km - 4:21.97
2km- 4:31.88
3km - 4:35.98
4km - 4:28.99
5km - 4:27.28
6km - 4:40.43
7km - 4:19.51
8km - 4:42.17
9km - 4:04.25
10km - 4:58.99
11km - 4:39.73
12km - 4:53.10
13km - 4:32.83
14km - 4:19.59
15km- 4:40.28***this is when the pain hit and the hills were making me angry
16km - 4:48.89
17km - 4:57.78
18km - 5:08.50
19km - 5:03..79
20km - 5:05.14
21.1km - not sure...but probably > 5min. Just happy i survived without calf issues!!!
Happy with the race! Excited for Clearwater. And my wedding next weekend!
