Last Season Race 3 (Graham Beasley)

The Graham Beasley was a great event.  It was out of town so Marie and I stayed at some friends place the night before.  Had a great night, and great dinner (thanks guys!).  I got up nice and early and did my morning routine and got to the race site nice and early.  I got "good" place in the transition area, I use the rabbit ears because it was easy to find, but a long run with the bike.  The forecast for the day, sunny and HOT.

The swim was a deep water start, a little different than the last race.  The start was much more orderly and I came out with what I thought was a pretty good pace. This was the first race where I needed to spot the buoys and couldn't follow a lane rope or the bubbles in front.  As it turns out, I'm not so good at this.  I swam in a bit of an S pattern until I found somebody that was much better at spotting than I and tucked in behind him.  When it was all said and done, I felt my swim was a little slow, although this probably reflects a shift in training from swimming to  the bike as biking.  Had to justify the big purchase :)  I transitioned and got onto the bike with no problem.

The first part of the bike was through the town and then out into the country.  The roads were shared which was interesting.  Got passed and even passed a few cars who decided to just go "race pace".  This was the first race where I had a technical problem on my bike, I derailed at the start, that angered me a bit.  Ultimately probably cost me less than 30 seconds, but definitely was not good for the state of mind.  There were lots of people out watching us race at the end of their driveways cheering us on.  It was great.

I made it back to the transition area, and boy was it hot.  I don't think I took enough water on the bike.  I grabbed as much as I could in the transition and dumped a bunch on my head to cool off then off for the run.  The run was hot, the road was just radiating heat back up at us.  I really enjoyed my racing gear, it really helped me remove as much heat as possible.  I finished the race and pretty much let my momentum carry me right back into the river to cool off.  This was the first race where heat was a major issue, and WOW, did that post race swim ever feel good.  Probably a top 5 swim ever!!

When it was all said and done, by 500m Swim +T1 was 12:13, 20km bike was 39:51 and my T2+5km run was 25:51.  I was very happy with how I handled the heat and with the results.  Another great race and lots of experience.

The next race was 5-6 weeks away, and this one was going to be far the biggest race of the summer.  It was another overnight in Orillia at my moms, and the race was longer and the most popular in Ontario.  Given that it was the summer and such a long stretch, I was just hopping I could maintain my fitness until then.
 
http://results.sportstats.ca/display-results.php?lang=eng&racecode=46632