I went into the Walnut Grove Triathlon with mixed expectations. On one hand, I had thoughts of winning overall. I expected a smaller, weaker field given it was a 2nd year race and a sprint distance race. The boys I knew I couldn’t beat weren’t there giving me a chance for the win. On the other hand, I was in the midst of my last block of hard training and had left it all out there the day before in a 40 k time trial. So a top performance wasn’t likely.
Sure enough I woke up in the morning feeling nothing but crappy. Light-headed, nausous, a little weak, you name it, I felt it. To be honest, thoughts of just skipping the race were seriously considered. But then I knew I was using this race as a tune up and not a test of where my fitness was so I needed to just get through it.
Fighting the nausea the entire morning, I got to the pool deck and put the excuses behind me. I had been feeling sorry for myself all morning, dwelling on how I was feeling but as soon as I was on deck, I somehow unconsciously put it all away and focused on the race.
As it was a pool swim and they were going slowest to fastest, I was in the final heat. Within each heat though we were ranked fastest to slowest and sure enough I was slowest in the heat which also meant I would be the very last swimmer in the water. I was fine with that as it meant that I would more than likely have a clear swim unless I managed to catch the swimmers in front me.
The swim itself was fairly uneventful, only catching the swimmer in front of me just as we were exiting the pool. I knew it wasn’t a fast swim as it felt like it was just taking a little too much effort to keep myself moving. Tough to say how fast it really was as the time of 12:20 for 750 m included a quick run and hop into the pool and a significant run out of the pool and to transition. But the 10th fastest swim isn’t bad but not great either.
Out on the bike I definitely felt the time trial from Saturday. While the motivation was there, there wasn’t much jump in the legs. And without any flat sections on the course, it was tough to get much of a rhythm. Did manage the 4th fastest bike split in a time of 29:45 but looking at the times, should have been able to have the fastest.
When I hit the run I started to get a little concerned. Stephanie had started maybe a minute and a half ahead of me and when I saw her on the bike course it was probably a little more than that. So the entire run I was looking ahead trying to find her and make sure she wasn’t going to beat me (because I knew I wouldn’t hear the end of it if she did). I was running scared. Luckily I finally spotted her about a kilometre from the finish and crossed the finish probably only 15 or so seconds behind her. Phew. My run came in a decent 18:31, 5th fastest on the day.
In the end I finished 4th overall in a time of 1:01:44. It was a decent showing given how I felt going in and continued to feel the rest of the day (which was spent mostly laying on the couch). Hopefully with a little more training this week and then a solid taper the following week, I will be ready for Kelowna. One thing I can say for sure is that I’m not peaking early.
Finally, a big shout out needs to go to a couple of up and coming triathletes from the Keiffer family. Matthew raced his way to the podium, finishing 3rd in the boys 8-11 category. He showed some serious guts, holding off two of the fastest runners to keep 3rd by running one of the fastest runs of the day himself and completely exhausting himself as he crossed the finish line. On the girls side, Jessica took on the Tiny Tri and looked like a pro, especially in transition with her speed laces. With a good swim and bike, she scorched the run course passing competitors left and right. Now if only some of that running talent could rub off on mom so she could hold off her sis at Worlds in September.
