Blue Lake Club Championships

Hailed as one of the Pacific Northwest’s favorites and the Tri Northwest Club Championships, I had to attend. It was a crazy week leading up to this race. With school ending and grades needing to be in, there were some long nights and the training this week was sub par. We had a home stay coming when we came back from Finland to race IM Cda, and had people coming to look at our home that was listed. Emma had a dance recital on Saturday night in Spokane which was over at about 9:00pm. The race was in Portland, OR on Sunday at 8:00am. So doing the math, we had to drive 6 hours, sleep about 3 hours, and race like we were ready. Kind of a tall order really. But we made it. We were fortunate enough to have some good friends in Natalie and Greg Gallagher join us in this adventure. They watched Emma’s recital as well. Everything said, ‘this is probably is not a good week.’ But I had just come off of a disappointing experience at ITU Worlds and wanted to get a race in.

So, now the race. With a field of over 450 participants, it’s a pretty big race. They have a self proclaimed ‘elite’ field, but it’s basically part of the age group results with an ideal transition spot and they get to start first with a field of 20. My wave started 1 minute behind and my transition spot was pretty good. So I decided not to switch my division and thought it would be nice to ‘chase’ than be chased. Knowing that I was hypothetically 1 minute behind the favorites on the bike would make me want to chase them down.

So after getting my B70 Helix on and heading down to the water, I was kind of excited to get a swim in. I HAD been swimming pretty well, but did not get to test that out at ITU Worlds. I had a crappy swim here last year and was hoping to go a bit faster. The elite wave took off and we were next. The countdown started and next thing you knew, it was ‘go time.’ I started fast and found some clear water right away. There was a guy swimming faster that came up next to me and I got on his feet… and then he swam away. Darn it! But after that, I had open water until I started swimming through the elite wave. There were men and women in this field, so I had not clue who I was passing. I was feeling solid and had a good turnover. As I rounded the last buoy and was heading for home, I felt good.

I got out and headed for my bike quickly getting out of my suit and running up the short hill. I got to my bike and glanced over to see that a couple elites were in there transitioning as well, but the rest must be out on the bike. I quickly passed one of the elites and was on the hunt for the rest. At the first turnaround I took a split on the lead guy and started looking for some of the guys that I normally gage my placement by… but I did not see them. After I rounded the turnaround, I started seeing who was behind me. The guys that I was worried about were actually behind me. I passed them in the swim. Wow, the swim went better than I thought. Now I needed to put some time on them. There were still a few guys up the road, but there was also a duathlon going on and it was hard to tell who was doing what. All I knew was that if there was someone in front, I needed to catch them and put time on them. I caught everyone but the lead guy. I just could not close on him. I was thinking that it was the guy who swam away from me and he was just having a great day. The bike went okay for me. I seemed to put out a decent amount of power and I felt very comfortable on my Trek TTX. But I did have some moments that I just felt like I was fading. Nothing horrible, but I did not feel like I had in past races. It might have been a mental thing knowing that someone was ahead of me, or it could have been the lack of sleep that I figured would start to play a part later I this race.

I eventually came into T2 in second place. I thought I was about 1 minute down and blazed through T2. I started out on the run trying to get into a good pace, but I also could see that there were guys coming in to T2 behind me. Mostly elites that I was actually 1 minute more ahead of… nice thing to have in the bank :). As I was approaching the first mile I was closing fast on the 1st place guy… he was running pretty slow for how fast he rode. As I approached him, I gave him some words of encouragement and realized he was pretty much done. I later found out that he was a duathlete, so I was chasing someone that was not even in my same race. So the short of it is that I started 1 minute behind the elite wave and rode through them all in the first 2 miles of the bike and now I was trying to maintain that lead on the run.

I had some pretty good runners behind me and at the turnaround I would have an idea how far back they really were. The first person I saw was Ben Greenfield. I was about 1:04 ahead at the turn… plus the 1 minute he started ahead so really over 2 minutes up. I knew that would be tough to close, and really, unless I totally fell apart, it would not happen. With less than 3 miles to go I was feeling it though, but was still moving along fine. At this point though I wanted to be the first to finish. I did not want to get passed. After a few more ups and downs and turns, I was within a half a mile, and then the finish was in sight. I crossed first, and about 50 seconds back was Ben. I thought we got 1-2, but the guy who swam so fast in my wave snuck into the 2nd spot so Ben ended up 3rd.
It was a pretty good race. I had some stomach issues, but nothing that ruined my race. This is a pretty non technical course, so I really don’t have too much of an advantage. The bike is straight out, flat, and pretty fast. The run is similar with more turns and a few ups and downs. So I felt I performed well. I don’t know if the lack of sleep played a role, or if a stressful week did, but a win is a win and I felt like I was able to stay in the race and not get frustrated. Some redemption from ITU Worlds, and my swim is coming along. I was a little disappointed in my run, but everyone seemed to run a little slower.
The club I raced for, Tri Fusion (www.tri-fusion.com) I believe was again named Club Champions for the second year in a row. Pretty cool.

So, there you have it, two races in a row in anything but ideal conditions. But you race them anyway and make 'no excuses… play like a champion.’