This past weekend I raced in my first triathlon since our move to England.  The race was held at the Eton Rowing Club grounds which will host the 2012 Olympic Rowing events.

I went to the race without the family. Heather was busy preparing for a weeklong business trip and we decided it would be difficult to make a family day trip out of this race outing.  When I arrived, I immediately noticed the wind.  You can see in the video clip below that it presented a bit of a challenge for the day. The bike was 4 laps and the run was 2 laps, so you got some good and some bad out there.

The race was well organized. The only interesting thing I wasn’t used to; the waves started every 1/2 hour. They had waves going off from 9AM until 3:30PM.  I guess this was because of the bike course which is a fairly narrow path around the lake. With four laps per wave it could get pretty congested if the waves were closer.  My wave was at 1:30PM, so I had plenty of time to find the venue in the morning

The race went pretty much as I expected:

The Swim

The swim was too short to really matter; 400m. The wind was in your face on the way out and you had a nice draft on the return. There weren’t any good swimmers in my wave so I was able to come out of the water 7th out of 74.

The Bike

The bike was the as expected, I haven’t been on the road since being in England. I’ve been pulling a Christophe (aside from the fact that he’s twice as fast) and doing all my bike training inside. Below is a picture of the torture chamber set up in the basement of our flat.

The Run

The run went well.  Despite what “Stealth” might tell you about our flat hour long run along the Thames, London actually has quite a few hills.  We don’t have a car in London so I end up pushing the boys in the double jogger everywhere and I think that’s been helping a lot. I get quite a few comments on those runs, especially when I’m pushing them up a steep hill. A few weeks ago one man exclaimed “Now that’s proper exercise” as I was huffing up Primrose Hill.  Last week while summiting Parliament Hill, Heather heard a woman say “That chap is bloody mental”

Below are some stats from my race results site. I held an ever so brief lead out of T1 until getting crushed on the bike.

To get fueled up for the Sunday race, Heather and I went out to dinner on Friday night to celebrate my birthday. We went to a restaurant we have heard a lot about but have never been to; La Foret. We had a great time in a quiet restaurant while Grandma and Grandpa were nice enough to put the kids to bed. 

Race morning I made the 40 minute drive south to Uvas Reservoir.

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A lot of us were very familiar with the course since this is the same location as another race that takes place later in the year. This particular race is new this year. It’s put on by a new race management company made up of a number of local triathletes and is called  Threshold Racing

I don’t think I was really ready to race an Olympic Distance race this early in the season, but thought it would be “fun” to see where I am fitness wise. 

While I got ready for the race, the rest of the family was driving down together to be spectators.  My swim wave was only 10 minutes away when I spotted them on the bank of the reservoir. Below I am getting some last minute race advise from Kevin and Ryan before I head to the starting line!

There were only 5 start waves in the race and the “old men” were last; 45 and older. I saw a lot of familiar faces in the water as we were getting ready to start. There was a lot of joking going on just 15 seconds before the race. Of course there were also plenty of nervous looks on others faces and all our joking around was probably not helping them concentrate

The swim went well and I headed out for a little 40k bike ride. For the entire hour I was out on the bike, Kevin was sitting on a police motorcycle. He and his mom approached a policeman because Kevin is obsessed with motorcycles. It took a little warming up before he got the nerve to sit on it, but after that there was no getting him off of it. He talked about it for days after the race.

While Kevin sat on the motorcycle, Ryan was happy to just watch the race and enjoy an early morning prune snack.

I felt pretty good the entire way on the bike. I purposely started out a bit reserved since I knew I hadn’t been biking enough to really pound a 40k from start to finish.

The run was tough. I could tell it was just a bit early in the season to have a solid race start to finish. Nevertheless I had a good time and it was fun to see the whole family at the finish line!

After the race, “Team TRIbe” enjoy pizza and strawberries from the post race food tent. It turned out to be a perfect April day for a race, sunny and near 70 degrees.

So now at least I know I have a little work to do before the rest of the season arrives. I have 2 fun races coming up in May…both shorter distance than this one:

1) Angels Camp – My annual trip to Gold Country in CA with Rad and friends to do a low key, fun race.

2) Got the Nerve – This will be the 2nd annual trip to Pennsylvania on Memorial Day weekend to visit the family and do a little race while we are there.

Of course I’m still hosting a local triathlon results website bayareatri.com in my “spare” time. Below is a graph from the website showing where I finished relative to everyone else in the Reservoir Triathlon. I just noticed it also gives away my true age!!

Being able to stay so close to the race start sounds great, but with Kevin it’s always unpredictable.  Heather and I found out that he has become very use to his comfortable crib at age 2 and doesn’t much care for his pack and play anymore. He spent most of the night flopping around like a fish in our room trying to get comfortable. So neither Heather or I got a good nights sleep.  Then Kevin was up at 6:30AM waking the rest of the house up by playing with a toy vacuum cleaner that made a lot of noise!

With the lack of sleep I poured  a few extra scoops of Pete’s Major Dickenson’s blend “The Major” into the coffee maker and drank a few cups to get me going for the race.  I headed down to the race start to pick up my chip and race number while the rest of the household slowly woke up, had breakfast and made their way to the beach for the 8AM start.  While they were making their way to the beach I did my usual warmup routine, a little biking and a 10 minute run.  The biking is a relatively new addition to my warmup routine. I never did that in the early days of my triathlon career, but I’ve found that it helps to the get the legs going in the race at my “advanced” age

I finally made my way down to the beach and spotted family and friends standing on the boardwalk. I went over to say hi prior to my swim warmup.  I came back later to tell them how freakin cold it was. The water was 56F and that’s cold enough to make my head hurt when I get in.  The fun part of the warmup was swimming 20ft from a sea lion (who was wondering what all the people were doing in his swimming pool).

The race went off in 3 waves, the first wave was all men 35 and under. The second was my wave, all men over 35. The 3rd wave was women and relays.  The swim is around a big boat wreck sticking out from the beach and is about a 1/2 mile long.  I felt pretty strong the entire way and was later pleased to find that I did better than the swim on my last race at Treasure Island.  As I approached T1 I spotted Heather, Trilbe and Kevin. I took time out to come up and high five Kevin. He was very excited and I was just happy he recognized his Dad.

This year was the first year they have split timing, so we ran across the timing mats entering the transition area. I was quickly out on the roads and decided this year to just start out steady and strong and try to build. In past years I’ve tended to blow it out on the first couple hills and struggle towards the finish.  The entire bike course is very hilly, so it’s good to have something at the end.  The roads were very wet from the morning fog and there were several turns where my back race wheel slipped out and I was lucky to recover. After those first few incidents I decided to take it a bit easier around the corners so I didn’t end up crashing.

The biggest difference between this years race and the last 2 years is that my main competition from the last 2 years was missing.  In both previous years he passed me on the bike 2/3 of the way through the course and then I slowly reeled him in on the run only to have him out spring me at the finish.  This year I didn’t have any competition and with the youngsters 5 minutes ahead in the previous wave I had nobody pushing me on the run. I was running all by my self the entire way.  The run was a bit harder this year because it was high tide.  There were also several “sea lion obstacles” where they had beached themselves and volunteers had actually set up cones around them so that we would run around them.

After the race it took a while for the race organizers to sort out the results.  In the end I managed to win my age group and ended up 6th overall.  While we were waiting for the awards ceremony, Kevin had a blast playing in the sand with his friend JT and his Grandma.

He was one sandy mess and exhausted but had a great time.  It was also fun getting the race trophy with him.

Next up is Pacific Grove, then Sentinel and a week later baby #2 is arriving!!!

I finished my 2008 triathlon season almost as quickly as it started. This was Heather’s year with her first Ironman in June.   My last race was Sentinel, the week after Pacific Grove.  I’ve done Sentinel numerous times. I really like the course and since it’s local there are always a lot of friends racing.  Of course Kevin was there to cheer with Heather and his grandparents.  It was a beautiful day in Santa Cruz and the race went really well. For the second week in a row I felt great running off the bike and I finished 4th in my age group.

After I retired my swimsuit, bike and running shoes, I headed to the east coast for a 5 day trip to the Outer Banks with my high school friends. This was our 4th trip and we hope to continue the tradition. It was really nice of Heather to take care of Kevin and let me get away for a few days. For the most part we just hung out at our huge rental house on the beach. Off season rates started the day we checked in and we really got a deal on the 8 bed/7 bath house for the week.  We did take a quick trip to see Kitty Hawk and tour the museum. I had been there with Heather years ago, but it was still fun to visit again. We also rented ocean kayaks for the week and had fun taking them out from our beach several times a day.

While I was on the east coast playing,  Heather and Kevin took a trip to the Sacramento zoo with the family. Heather said they saw a lot of animals, but for the most part Kevin was too busy playing in the dirt and picking up rocks to notice the animals. The only ones that caught his eye were the bright pink flamingos.

Just two days after returning from the Outer Banks (OBX to the locals) my parents made a trip to California to visit us..mostly just to visit their grandson!   Nanny brought lots of clothes for Kevin. Below are a few pictures of Kevin modeling his new outfits.

Kevin had a great time showing his grandparents around CA. We went to the beach one day and watched Kevin play in the sand. My Dad and I drove up to the top of Mt. Hamilton and toured the Lick Observatory.  Heather, Trilbe, Kevin and my Dad went to the Tech Museum in San Jose and Dave and his parents took a day trip to Yosemite. In between all those activities we found plenty of time to just enjoy hanging out with Kevin.  We got all 4 grandparents together several times and Kevin really enjoyed that.

Fast forward two weeks and I ran the ½ marathon in the Silicon Valley Marathon/Half Marathon. Many friends also ran and Heather’s brother ran the full marathon. Thanks to “Coach Heather,” I was able to do better this year than last. Her sound advice was to keep a consistent pace throughout the whole race.  (Heather’s editorial note: Everyone knows you are supposed to do this. This was nothing new. He has always just started out too fast and tried to hang on.) I actually ran the same pace (6:15/mile) for the first 8 miles and then the group I was running with decided to pick it up to 6 min/mile pace for 2 miles. That kind of hurt me but I hung on to finish right behind 2 of my friends. Below in the center is a picture of all of us at the finish line doing the “finish line dance.” Heather’s brother Kim set a PR for the marathon in 3:21  He looked strong at the ½ way point and still had a smile on his face. The last few miles got tough but he hung in there for a great finishing time!!

The week after the marathon was our 3^rd wedding anniversary.  We decided it would be fun to get away for a night so we booked a hotel in Calistoga, CA.  Heather’s parents were nice to offer to care for Kevin during our trip.  We had a very relaxing time, wine tasting, roaming around downtown Calistoga and St. Helena and going out to a very nice dinner at the Martini House.  The best part was being able to sleep in until 8:30.  Kevin usually makes that impossible.

Now Halloween is here. Kevin had fun making a jack-o-lantern. He also had a great trip to the pumpkin patch with his grandparents while we were in Napa.

I haven’t been to the triathlon at Pacific Grove since 2000, the first year I started doing triathlons. To the left is picture of the relay team from 2000. That year my friends Gregg, Alex and I decided to do the race as a relay. I’m not sure how I ended up doing the swim leg since that’s my weakest leg…but I did. The Pacific Grove triathlon is known for the swim because:  the water is usually really cold and you have to do the “kelp crawl” because the swim course is through kelp beds and the only way to get across is pull yourself over the kelp.

It’s definitely somewhat of an equalizer on the swim leg.

Fast forward 8 years and I went back to Pacific Grove this past weekend.  Heather and Kevin were there to cheer and Kevin greeted Dad at the finish line.

For those of you who don’t want to bother with the details, here is the summary.  I spent Friday night at a hotel near the start, Heather and Kevin drove down Saturday morning to spectate.  I managed to spot them in the crowd just before the swim started which was nice.

I saw Heather and Kevin along the bike and run course numerous times. The bike is 4 loops and the run is 3, so there were lots of spectating opportunities. The race went well,  for some reason I really felt good on the run from the beginning and really had a great run.  I finished 3rd in my age group and got a cool plaque for my efforts.

The race details.

The swim:
They bunched all the old men 45+ into one last wave  I lined up in the second row..but according to Heather didn’t run very fast at the gun and ended up in the ocean behind a lot of people. Whatever the case, I got beat up pretty good the first couple hundred yards…lots of elbows and hands crawling over you. Finally by the time we headed back on the triangle shaped course on the first lap, things opened up a little bit. The swim is 2 loops and you have to get out of the water, run around a buoy on the beach and then dive back into the water. There is something about having all the blood go to your legs when you stand and run…and then returning to horizontal when you dive back in that is very unsettling. I’m sure your brain (and body) isn’t quite sure what’s going on. Anyway, the 2nd lap was more of the same. Kelp crawling on the first two parts of the triangle and then the return leg was pretty free of people and kelp.

T1:
From the beach you run up some steps to the transition area. I knew what row I was in and quickly found my bike. I knew in the past that I had problems getting my wetsuit off quickly so I actually practiced the day before and figured out how I was going to do it. I guess I need more practice because it didn’t work race day. I ended up sitting down and wasting 10-15 seconds getting my wetsuit off my feet.

Bike:
I’ve never done a race before with so many laps of the same course. This bike course was a flat to rolling out and back 4 times. It’s great for spectators but the times aren’t all that fast because of all the 180 degree turnarounds. I felt pretty strong the whole way. It certainly was nice to see Heather and Kevin on every loop…even though Kevin seemed preoccupied with anything but the race! Somehow in between watching Kevin and cheering, Heather managed to take some great pictures like this one on the bike.

T2:
I cruised into T2 with my feet on top of my shoes…a quick dismount and ran and racked my bike. I slipped my shoes on quickly…grabbed my hat and race belt and I was off. I felt like I had pushed hard on the bike but certainly still had something left in the tank.

Run:

The run is also a multiple loop course.  I started the run not feeling any of the tightness in my back that I’ve normally felt the last few years. (Maybe my minor bike fit adjustments have helped) In any case, after loosening up the first mile I was feeling really good and started passing lots of people on the course. Again I saw Heather and Kevin on the run course..and again Kevin was busy…but not paying attention to the race.

These graphs show my place after each portion of the race and how I did compared to everyone else in the 45-49 age group.

After the race, I hung out waiting for the awards ceremony (not until 3PM) while Heather and Kevin headed home. It turned out to be a beautiful day in Pac Grove once the sun came out. Here’s a view from the beach where we swam.