St. George 70.3 Race Recap or What goes up makes me sad :(

It's been a few weeks now since I raced in St. George so that means my memory is such that I only have good thoughts in my heart!

Truthfully, this race was pretty awesome! My results didn't measure up to my pre race plan, but then again, maybe I was a little over ambitious.

As a Midwesterner a May race is tough to train for, especially this year. Secondly, as a Midwesterner a hilly race is also tough to train for. The logic that "we have wind her in the Midwest" yeah, that's bullshit, hilz is hilz folks! We definitely don't have hills that last for miles and miles either. Thank gawd Al and I sought out the hilliest place we knew of relatively close by and hit them hard during our "Misfit Immersion Camp" on the Kentucky Tennessee border in early April. Great showing by the way - insert sarcasm - which included me, Al and our friend Nicholas Sikes from Team Kestrel.

Vegas Baby! Why does
everyone say that? 

So back to recapping. We left for Utah on May 2nd flying into Vegas and making the drive into St. George. The four of us (myself, Al, Kyla and Stan) stayed with friends in the area making the entire experience less stressful.

Day 1 included a quick 4 mile run to shake the legs out and get the travel off our bodies. Threw in a few 2 minute stride-outs feeling those muscles wake up. Food during our stay was on point. Niki and Dean, our hosts, prepared an assortment of vegetarian / vegan options that worked well with our diets. Personally I find traveling totally messes with my tummy, I'm a creature of habit with my food and race week is notorious for wrench throwing!!!

Later that evening Dean, a veteran of the St. George full Ironman, took us for a guided tour of the bike and run courses filling us in on some key tactics! This year both he and Niki were race captains at the 5 / 8 mile aid station on the run course.....the best aid station BTW!

Al, me and fellow Wattie Jake Steen sportin' our custom
Blueseventy Helix wetsuits

Day 2 included a quick 2 mi run up Snow Canyon and a peek at the notorious "BEAST." The 4 mile hill on the bike course near the end of the race. For most of us (except Speedy McSpeederson Wattie Teammate Mike Larsen) this was the point in the race your avg. mph laughed in your face, single digits folks! Later that day we dropped our run gear at T2, checked in and headed out to Sand Hollow Reservoir for a dip in the ice bath (no jokes kiddos, water was said to be 54 degrees) then we rode a few miles of the bike course and racked our bikes. Pre race dinner was nothing fancy, just a veggie sub.

Kyla and Stan in Snow
Canyon

Waking up race morning was easy, I slept soundly, went for my coffee, banana and almond butter sandwich and called it good.

We drove to the downtown square, parked and walked to the busses near T2. I popped in my earbuds and tried to visualize my race. My race mantra "the faster you race the higher you place."

Fellow Wattie Jake Steen, Al and me with our bikes at
at Sand Hollow Reservoir 

Now the good shit. My swim, goal time: 34 minutes, actual time: 36:28. Meh.....it was cold guys and gals, really cold. My salvation, I wore the Wattie Blueseventy Helix full sleeve wetsuit. This was it's maiden race voyage. Thanks to Ryan Vanderloop and the good people at FedEx our suits were delivered two days prior right to Dean and Niki's front door. Let me tell you this suit is EVERYTHING your suit is not! It fits how it's supposed to fit, it sheds water like its supposed to shed water, no chaffing on the neck, no tightness in the shoulders, it's just AWESOME! I chose to double up swim caps opting not to wear the neoprene cap. Once the initial OMFGawd chest clenching I can't breath shock wore off I relaxed and fell into my swim groove. Glide, stroke, glide, stroke, breath and repeat. Never really had to battle for real estate in the water, the wave starts enabled enough room between groups for that. Boom, out of the water and up to transition, a little hypoxic, a little wobbly and feeling more like a pirate with peg legs than a Wattie Ink Elite age grouper I made my way to my bike.

My bike goal: 2:46, my actual time: 2:57:22. I feel like, no wait, I know this is my weakest link in the tri. If one wants to be faster on the bike, one must bike A LOT and FASTER. Well, I'm workin' on it, promise. The bike was incredible. The views, sweeping, the ascents, brutal, the descents, pee your pants scary, but scary with a smile on your face. I won't break it down mile by mile but I will say the bike went by faster for me than it ever has during any other race. So something in my training is working....could it be that I actually am beginning to like the bike? Let's keep that under wraps.

Into T2 I had a little potty emergency, remember that travel belly I mentioned before... yeah, about that.... Soooo K-Swiss Kwicky Blade Lights on my feet, PowerBar energy gel in my tummy, I was set for a run.

 Smoochin' my man after a hard earned finish!

My run goal: 1:37, my actual time: 1:51:25. This. Was. Disappointing. Not sure what went wrong here? I've run hilly courses, I've done the Z2 training.....all signs pointed to a much faster minute per mile than what I ran. What can I say, one foot in front of the other, pick people off one by one, see a 30-34 on the back of that chick's leg, run. her. down! That's what I do, the run is MY event. It's where I shine. I guess not every day is graduation day though.....

So total time: 5:31:57, you can do the math if you want to see just how far off I was from my goal time.....just don't laugh too loudly. Let me just say, It is attainable, I was close to breaking the 5 hour mark last September in Cedar Point, even won my age group. Different course, different terrain, different time of year. But still, you get those numbers in your head and you think, maybe just maybe there's a chance I could best that time.

Moral of the story is, goals are great, but don't get hung up on them. Race plans are invaluable, but don't live and die by them.

Looking forward I'm pretty stoked to say I'm putting road tris on the back burner for a few months and hitting the dirt. Stay tuned for my XTERRA race recap coming shortly......