Syracuse 70.3 Race Report

Syracuse 70.3 Race Report:

Saturday I drove up to Syracuse on a mission to get a qualifying spot for the Las Vegas World Championships @ Syracuse 70.3.  It was very important to me to validate all this time and sacrifice I have been putting into training.  This was also my main race of the season.

I drove up solo & was feeling great after a suprise visit from my brother/wife and their new baby, who had been in New Jersey for a couple days.   After I had registered months back, I found out that Ironman was giving out 100 vegas slots instead of 50 for certain Ironman events & Syracuse 70.3 was one of them.  Regardless of how many slots were available I really wanted to try for a top 3 finish in my age group(considering there's usually only 2/3 slots per group).  There's always uncertainty with how you can place as you never know what kind of talent will show up on race day.(usually its very good)

I was meeting 2 members of my Pearl Izumi Triathlon team, Joe McMahon (who coached me and still provides great insite) & Carrie Slavinksi, both well experienced/talented athletes who would arrive later in the day.  After a 4 hour drive I arrived at the race site early to make sure I got in a good 30 min bike ride with a 2 mile race-paced run off the bike & check to see everything was working well.  The swim course was closed to swimmers, but managed to get in a good 20 minute swim half way around the lake where there was no authority.   

Taking lessons from my Florida 70.3 performance in May, in order to qualify for Vegas I knew I needed to really push the effort on the bike, in addition to swimming a couple minutes faster, while assuming I could run sub 1:30.

- I always think out my goals going into the next race, making sure they are realistic/difficult yet attainable.

- I write my goals for the race and break them down by each segment & times a couple days before the event. 

-I can usually get a good idea by looking at previous years results and athletes times that I know or that I have raced against in the past, which are usually accurate if the course hasn't been changed from the year prior.

Swim:

Motivated and tired of putting in very horrible early season swim times I started strong from the sound of the gun.  I lined up center middle and felt great as others in the group weren't as aggressive as I was used to, which gave me some room to distance myself in the first 200-300 yards.  I immediately caught on a draft line of 2 swimmers who seemed to be holding a good pace.  I made a huge effort to stay with them and if I had the chance I would go for the pass.  When drafting you follow the bubbles and hope to stay within a bodies length or closer to the swimmer you are trying to follow.  Meanwhile, you need to make sure they are guiding you properly & watch out & avoid any other triathletes (dead bodies) I like to call them, which are the slower swimmers from swim waves that started before you.  3/4 of the way through the race I was still drafting off the same two guys and pretty happy about the effort.  I had a chance to pass, but smartly deciding to hold off as it may only save me a couple seconds as opposed to sitting back on their feet to save energy before I got out of the water.  As you can see in the picture below I did a double take at my watch to realize I hit a personal best for a half iron swim going sub 30 minutes.  Finally putting in a good swim to what my training was at!

Swim: 29:09      

Bike:

I knew Syracuse would be hilly the first 13-15 miles and I had a clear advantage training in the hills of NY.  From March-June Route 9W provides some challenging hills and is far different than the terrain of a super flat Florida course.  This is where I was confident in my ability as opposed to racing many locals floridians at the Florida 70.3, who were used to a flat course & most likely had more early season outdoor training time.  Still the bike was my weakest of the three segments & after looking at last year's results I was shooting for around a 2:32.
First 2 miles flat, and then begins what felt like a slow-motion first hour of non-stop hills.  I drove the course the day before so I wasn't suprised, but feeling the hills on your bike as opposed to driving them is a whole different ball game.  40 minutes into the bike is where I usually warmup up and feel comfortable, but I started feeling sick and had a lack of energy.  I was mentally trying to convince myself to give up and check out of the race, which doesn't happen to often this soon in a race.  I kept pushing & as mile 30-35 approached the course began to pickup speed with many downhill sections.  I clocked in one downhill at 48 mph, so we were cruisin!  This is also the first race I got to experience a group of cheaters who caught up to me around mile 35.  There was a pack of 4 guys from Panama with one lead man ( of course in my age group) drafting off of eachother, while really being reckless on their bikes cutting people off & blocking the road.  These guys didn't seem to experienced and noticed they would pass me fast then slow down, which meant they really had no idea how to pace & were over working themselves.  I knew that if they were cheating on the bike, they would probably crap out on the run so I wasn't worried to much about them.  They actually helped me out, as I got pretty motivated & found another level to push past them on the bike to finish out the last 20 miles very strong, while keeping my heart rate in the high 140' to mid 150's.  I came off the bike right in front of the eventual 5th place guy, who had a 2 min faster run than me & later found out was a 9:20 Ironman AZ finisher & finished 20th in the World at the 70.3 World Championships last year ag 30-34, quite impressive. He finished 3 minutes ahead of me overall.

Bike Time: 2:30:50

T2:

Was devastating.  Lost a minute finding my bike as I forgot to practice my transition from bike to run before the race.  I literally was running up and down rows to realize I went down the wrong row and was doing limbo to get under to the next.


Run: 1:30:50

A big reason I ran so well in Florida was my nutrition & adding 4 total salt caps to my two bottles.  For some reason, I had underestimated how hot it was going to be In Syracuse(cut my salt cap intake in half to 2 caps) during the bike/run.  The early morning it was cloudy and low 60's, but it was very humid and hot (85 plus) in the last parts of the bike and run. Coming off the bike I didn't feel as good, which could have been related to the lower salt intake, but I took into account the monster hills we had to run up & possibly the hilly bike course wore down my legs.  I was really trying to hold a 6:30 pace, but soon realized that this plan wouldn't happen.  At about mile 2 there was a solid mile of extreme hill with most people walking up.  I kept the legs moving & made sure on the downhill I pushed hard.  The run course was a two looper & I can't really complain other than it being a pretty tough course.   I managed a 1:30 and change at roughly 6:50 per mile. 

Overall:  4:35

I finished with a 4:35 time good for 6th/112 age group and 48/1045 inlcuding the 20-30 pros in the race. Qualifying for the World Championships in Las Vegas.   Very excited to build on this race, looking forward to my first ironman in New york & 70.3 las vegas.