Vineman

Sara accompanied me to the race, and was kind enough to crawl out of bed into the chilly morning air a bit early to bring my forgotten nutrition to me in transition.

Swim (2.4 miles): the swim is 2 loops, starting upstream (with a very slow current). you swim .6 miles up stream, then turn around and come back down, then repeat. I started near the front, and quickly settled into a steady rhythm. At the first turn around, i felt things were going well, not too fatigued, and had a good rhythm. this continued back to the start and through the final turn around. i felt i swam straight and without exerting too much energy. when i exited to see 1:13:xx on the race clock i realized why it felt so easy, it was my slowest swim to date, guess this is going to be a liesurely day? SWIM 1:13:00 (1:55/100m)

T1 : Into t1 i stripped my wetsuit, and ran down 2 or 3 rows trying to find my bike. another uncharacteristic display. after finding my bike, i stripped my wetsuit and placed it in the allocated bag. on with the helmet, sunglasses and grab my bike: 4:00 transition time. continue with the leisurely day theme.

Bike (112 miles) the good news is the bike course is supposed to be very scenice. my legs weren't quite with me out of the water, so i pushed a little harder, knowing that a bit of extra effort typically wakes my legs up and helps out. i tried this for the first 25 miles without the expected results. around 35 miles the climbing started, and along came the strong cyclists from behind. much earlier than i typically get this. so i settled in and enjoyed the scenery. the bike continued like this for the remainder. the good news is my lap splits were pretty consistent. the course was enjoyable to ride and the weather was nice. I got to see Sara around mile 70, she drove out along the course, and parked waiting for me to pass by. that made the trip much more worth while. after a bit of this, i rolled into t2: Bike 5:29:17 (20.3 mph) not a stellar performance, though it did give me more time to appreciate the course.

T2 nothing exciting about this, the pavement was hot, so i was anxious to get my shoes on, and get onto the run so i could finish the 3 loops and get to enjoying the food and scenery of the russian river. transition time: 3:20.

Run (26.2 miles) : my first loop went ok, just a steady pace, and sara was there for the first mile or so, then she went to enjoy some of the wine tasting. shortly after the first loop, the wheels came entirely off, and i was relegated to walking and asking "what was i thinking, i knew i didn't have the legs for a marathon". i accepted this wouldn't fix things, and keep moving forward, knowing full well i was not ready to stop until i'd finished the full marathon course. RUN 4:55:10 (11:18 min/mile)

Overall time: 11:46:02. looks like i didn't get the necessary work in before showing up. that makes 2 in a row. 1 more for the season and i'll have to re-evaluate where i am, where i want to be, and how that fits with my time commitments.