Cincy One World Triathlon...scratch that, Duathlon

Me with my medal (35th overall)

Brian receiving his M30-34 medal (4th overall)

Two AG victors after the race

Intense triathlon discussion

Me on run leg 1

Brian just looks fast on his bike...and he is

Me heading out on the bike

Brian on Run leg 2

Susan catches my attention on Run leg 2

Well, this is my last one of these for a little while since I don’t race again until late August (Chicago Accenture Oly). Now I just have to focus on the rest of my build phase and more importantly, my wedding in just over a month. Onto the race report:

The event was the Cincinnati One World Triathlon in its inaugural year. It had the option of either a sprint or an Olympic distance, and I opted for the Oly. I hadn’t heard anything about the race until about a month ago, but wanted to use it to see where I was with my swimming, clearly my limiter thus far. I figured, what better way to see how I am training in regards to swimming a 1.5k than swimming a 1.5k. Unfortunately, there was one small snag in my plan…there was no swim.
Storms moved through Friday evening and all throughout the night into Saturday morning. The race was scheduled for Sunday morning and the Ohio River, being the glorious body of water it is, gathered too much runoff bacteria raising it beyond swimmable levels. There was already a good deal of apprehension to swimming in the Ohio from other competitors, so I’m sure this didn’t raise their confidence for future events. I have swum in the Ohio in Louisville 2x in Oly tris (before IMLou shut them down), so I was fully prepared to make the plunge, but oh well. As disappointing as that was, my money was still sunk in the event, so I decided to show up and compete in the duathlon that was made at the last minute to substitute. A 2 mile run replaced the swim leg (not exactly comparable obviously). Here’s how it went down:

Well, first…I accidentally set my 3 alarms for 5:15, 5:25, and 5:35pm instead of AM, so 6:25AM rolls around and I happen to notice in my sleepy stupor that it’s way too light out to be pre-5:15. I panic, but luckily had prepped most of my stuff the night before and was out the door with the fiancé in less than 10 minutes. Got to the race site at 6:45, still plenty of time since transition closed at 7:15…whew!

Run 1—2 miles
With running being my strength, I had to remind myself that there were 2 legs to go and not to go out like I’m doing a 2 mile time trial. Being in the Clydesdale division and starting in a separate wave along with the 50+ males, I assumed I’d be near the front of my wave, though…so I thought pacing might be tough. Ended up since the first leg was actually a mile loop repeated 2x, so it didn’t matter b/c we got swallowed up by the earlier waves on their 2nd lap. I ran a pace that felt comfortable and definitely held back. My main concern was not injuring myself since the course had been thrown together on a semi trail/slanted cobblestone path that could have been dangerous if you weren’t being careful. Anyways, a couple 50somethings were ahead of me at the end of the run, but I was fairly certain I was the first Clydesdale to hit T1. Time: 15:12.8

T1—Nothing exciting to report, except that it’s much faster of a transition from run to bike than swim to bike. Time: 1:34.9

Bike—40k (24.8miles)
Based off of no actual experience or evidence, I assumed the bike would be flat despite the fact that Cincinnati is a hilly city (as far as the region goes). I guess it was the fact that the majority of the ride was on a 4 lane highway that follows along the river. Either way, I was wrong. The Parkway we were on was basically extended rolling hills the entire time and the on ramp we used to access it was like hitting a wall. The course was a double looped course for the Oly, so we had to do it all twice. The second time I hit the on ramp, I went from 22.5mph to 7.5mph in about 25m or so…however, I passed plenty of people who were struggling worse than me to get up (Yay for road bike geometry I guess). All in all, I was glad the bike was tough since it should make Chicago feel very flat come August. I was passed by one Clydesdale from what I could tell in the last 5 miles. I didn’t try and chase him down, just kept him in eyeshot until the last mile. I figure if it took him that long to pass me I must have had a substantial lead on just a 2 mile run, so catching him on a 10k wouldn’t be an issue as long as I didn’t blow up. So I spun it in and prepped for the run. Time: 1:11:54.1

T2—Nothing exciting again. Time: 1:30.0

Run 2—10k (6.2 miles)
I took off with baby steps to keep the cadence high, and was actually moving pretty well. Soon enough I found my stride and was cruising along. I passed the clyde before the first mile, so was pretty certain I had AG in the bag…now to focus on my time and being consistent. I was moving along pretty good until I rounded a corner under a bridge and realized that a staircase was part of the run course…a steep staircase that climbed up to a bridge to KY. I hit it hard trying to keep going at my pace, then almost tripped, caught myself and realized how badly my legs burned. I walked the rest of the steps. That took a lot out of me and my pace slowed for the entire 2nd loop until I hit the stairs again. I didn’t attempt to be aggressive this time and just walked them. After that it was about .5 miles to the finish so I pushed since I could see the light. I met up with 4 other guys about 200m to go and we all looked pretty beat. I swung around from the back like I was pulling off a slingshot maneuver and took off to start up a dash to the finish. Everyone started coming with me, but 2 backed off pretty quick. I then dueled with the other guy who had longer legs than me and a larger cheering section since he’s part of the local tri club. Needless to say, he won the duel, but it was fun anyways. All done. Time: 47:47.5

Official stats:
Run 1: 15:12.8 (7:36/mile)
T1: 1:34.9
Bike: 1:11:54.1 (20.7mph)
T2: 1:30.0
Run 2: 47:47.5 (7:32.5/mile)

Total: 2:17:59.4 (1 of 9 in AG, 35 of 213 overall)

A friend of mine also competed and took the M30-34 AG victory (and 4th OA, he’s fast), so it was a good day all around.