This past weekend I celebrated father’s day at the St. Peter’s RecPlex Sprint Triathlon in St. Peters, MO. My dad was there participating in the race as well, and it’s the 5th consecutive year we’ve spent father’s day this way. St. Peters is a small town about 25 minutes west of St. Louis. We usually travel to this little race because it gives us an excuse to get to St. Louis to see my sister, who also raced.
The race itself involves a 500m (nice and short for weaker swimmers like myself) serpentine pool swim, a 20.5 mile almost pancake flat bike through farmland, and a 4.4 mile trail run through mostly parks and suburbs. The course has changed a bit since my first year racing because the transition area was moved and the RecPlex has added on, building over some of the original course. The heat always seems intense and this year was no exception, with 95 degree heat index at 9AM. Luckily, the swim start is determined by order of registration (chronological), so the past two years we’ve made sure to register ASAP to make sure we get to be early starters. In addition, the race organizers moved the start time forward 30 minutes to 6AM. I was slated to start 18:30 after the first starter…possibly the earliest I’ve ever started a race. However, with St. Louis being Central time it felt more like 7:18 to me, so not so bad.
Race morning: Up bright and early at 4:30AM, dressed and out the door with a banana safely in my stomach. We arrived to a muggy race site, checked in, got marked, and setup our transition areas. This race has a biased transition area with limited good positions and no assigned spots. With being early starters, we were able to get a decent spot, but the good racks were already full. I have provided a general diagram to depict the transition area below…
Once properly setup, I hit the bathrooms, downed a powergel with caffeine, and waited by the pool watching the starters before me and chatting with the family and some other racers in the area.
500m Swim: Since the racers are started on a first come, first serve basis, there really is no logical speed progression in the swim. Luckily, since there were 4 in my family racing (sister, myself, my dad, and my wife) and we know our swim speeds relative to one another, we signed up to start fastest to slowest. This way, we didn’t run over each other in the first few laps. The swim was uneventful, I felt pretty smooth, but was apparently going slower than I thought. Same lesson as previous races…I need to get some lessons to repair my poor technique. Time: 10:32 (9/13 in AG)
T1: I didn’t have to deal with a wetsuit and the run to transition was short, but I was a little frustrated after seeing my swim time so I was slow here. Estimated time 1:45 (T1 and 2 are added to bike split)
20.5 mile bike: The plan was to go all-out here since I was familiar with the course. It takes you away from the RecPlex, across the interstate, down thru old St Peters, and then into the country for the next 15miles or so…flat as a pancake and super-smooth roads. From putting my sunglasses on with my head still wet, the lenses fogged up pretty badly, particularly on the left side. For this reason, my visibility was pretty low until about mile 18. I did however see my wife on the out and back section. Since it was morning the wind hadn’t picked up, and I was able to fly (for me at least). On the only real hill with about 2 miles to go, some guy hopped on my wheel to blatantly draft. I had never experienced this before. I turned to look back and heard him say “thanks” for the free ride, I assumed. So, then I started yelling at him to back off, which he didn’t do. Luckily, the hill steepened before long and I was able to drop him. I wanted to report him, but decided it wasn’t worth it, especially since he was part of a relay team so wasn’t direct competition…I didn’t get his number anyway. Time: 52:38 (1/13 in AG, 23.4mph avg)
T2: Quick in and out, except for moving the bike that was now on my rack. This is another quirk of this race since people with later swims show up later and just force their way onto already full racks while people are out on the bike…Estimated time: 0:45
4.4 mile run: As I left transition, my legs felt pretty heavy…they just seemed to have no bounce to them. I tried to focus on small steps and high cadence, but my legs were like lead. This continued for the first half of the run. I’m not sure why they started to loosen up, it could be because I realized I was on my way back, but either way I was thankful. Around this same time, a runner from a relay passed me. He was moving pretty good, so I used him as a rabbit to pace me in. The run wasn’t what I was hoping for, but wasn’t way off what I normally do here. Considering that it was uncomfortably hot by that point in the race, so I’ll definately take it. Run times seemed to be slow across the board. Time: 32:25 (4/13 in AG, 7:22/mile)
Overall, I was glad to be done and done early for that matter since it only continued to get hotter. By the time we left at around 9:30, it was unbearable and there were still people just leaving for the bike.
Total Time: 1:38:06 (3/13 in AG, 17/384 OA)
Next up is my first ever crit race this Saturday…I hope to survive uninjured.
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