2006 Danskin Women’s Triathlon

Pre-Race

My alarm didn't go off. I goofed and set it for 4:15 PM and not AM. Was it my subconscious telling me something? Perhaps I should have stayed in bed. Roger's alarm went off, luckily and we got up. I ate breakfast, showered, put on my outfit and we were on the road on time. We made good time getting to the race site, but about 3 miles from the site we were in a huge traffic jam of spectators and racers trying to get into the race site. Luckily we were 10 minutes early. Unfortunately, we didn't make it to the parking lot for the race site until about 30 minutes after I wanted to be there. It took us nearly 40 minutes to get through the jam up. It was 6:40 when I jumped on the shuttle from the parking area to get to the race site. Transition was supposed to be closing at 6:45. There were tons of people in traffic behind us so there was so way they were starting on time.

Roger and I were separated getting on the bus (athletes were given priority) and I rode over there while he walked the mile to the site. At the race site I quickly got body marked by a woman that didn't know where to mark what (I explained and she marked me properly). Next time I'm marking myself at home. I went into transition and quickly set up myself amidst cries over the loudspeaker to hurry in transition because the race couldn't start until everyone was out of transition.

I got in the long long long line for the port-a-potties where Roger found me. After that, it was time to hurry up and wait. They were running behind and my wave, that was originally scheduled for 8:12 started around 8:35. Sally Edwards (the Danskin triathlete spokewoman) gave a little motivational speech and gave us a mantra to chant while swimming. Everyone gets the same thing with a different adjective thrown in. Ours was I. Am. An. Unbelievable. Swimmer. I was a little disappointed with the word "Unbelievable" and wanted something like "Awesome" or "Fabulous." Oh well.

Swim

I swam incredibly well. The water felt great and I felt really comfortable out there. Farther out in the lake it became a little choppy and it was hard to get a breath without also getting water, but a little breastroke helped. I did a lot more of my crawl than ever before and it felt good. I tried to remember all my technique. I exited the water and looked at my watch: 19 minutes. WOW!! Of my three goals for the swim (good, better and best) I actually BEAT my best goal (which was 20 minutes). Go me! I felt so great and I even ran a little bit to transition.

T1

My first transition went well. The journey from swim to transition was a little long so it wasn't as good as I was hoping for, but I did it in a little over 4 minutes (my better goal for T1). I ran my bike out and began the bike.

Bike

I felt so good on the bike. I was a machine. It felt really good and I was going really fast. Then there was a hill. A steep hill. A killer "granny gear" hill. I shifted and kept pedaling. Wow, it's a nightmare hill - out of the saddle I go. Kept pedaling, heard a clank, looked out and my chain had come off. I stopped, pulled over, freaked out a little for a second. There was a volunteer a little way down the road. I called but he didn't hear me. I flipped my bike over, slid the chain back on it's cog and the volunteer came up. He gave me a baby wipe to get the chain grease off my hands and I kept going.

I was frustrated that I probably lost a few minutes dealing with the situation, but it was under control and I was back in action, or so I thought. A few minutes after getting back on the bike, I heard a clanking noise again. I looked down and saw, almost in slow motion, my chain go around the front cog and fall completely off my bike. I suddenly had no chain. I couldn't believe it. I stopped, turned around and picked the chain off the ground and found the same volunteer that helped me before. He told me there was nothing he could do and radioed for a support vehicle to come pick me up. My day was over. He took the chain and I used his cell phone to call Roger and explain what was going on.

I walked my bike along while women cheered at me, "Get back on the bike, you can do it!" Well, no, actually I couldn't. I finally made myself to a water stop about 1/4 of a mile up from my little chain incident. I was at mile 6 - halfway through the course. At the water stop I waited. And I waited. And I waited.

While I waited, I drank some fluids and ate a half a Clif bar I had in my bento box for after the race. I figured I was done. DNF. Finished. I tried to think of Andrea Fisher, an elite who had a mechanical in CapTexTri. I saw her on film later (they showed some of the elites on TV) and she had handled it so gracefully. I tried to be graceful but the cheers of "You can get back on the bike and pedal" eventually got the best of me and I was reduced to tears at one point. I was so disappointed and it was such a hard pill to swallow.

After some time, Matt (an acquaintance of mine who was a volunteer) came upon me. I've never been so glad to see someone I didn't really know in my whole life! He said he could fix my chain! Unfortunately, my chain was gone. So he and another volunteer set off in search of the dude with my chain. Eventually, someone found him, but he wasn't the one with the tool that could fix it. Finally, another guy came along and he did have the tool. He fixed up my chain. Then the support vehicle arrived. Too little, too late. I was going to finish this race.

After an hour and a half in the hot 100 degree sun, I was on the road again. It was nearly 11 (remember, I started the race at 8:35 and this was only about 20 minutes in to my bike that this happened). I got back on my bike and headed out ahead of the last few cyclists on the course. I saw Matt along the way and he rode with me up a hill which saved me a little bit.

T2

At around 11:15 I rolled into transition. People were packing up and leaving. One girl asked me the time and I gouchily told her I was in transition and to ask someone else. I didn't mean to grouch, but I was not very happy.

Run

I began the worst 5k of my life still feeling heartbroken and having lost my momentum. I mostly walked. It was nearly noon and seriously hot. The Clif bar sat in my stomach like a pile of rocks. I felt sick to my stomach, tired, and grouchy. I tried to think positively, but I had lost all momentum, adrenaline and excitement. My heart broke back on the bike course with my chain.

I walked the 5k. I didn't care any more. I finished it 43 minutes later. I crossed the finish feeling pretty horrible. It wasn't exciting and it wasn't happy.

Post-Race

They took my chip and I got my finishers medal. Roger came and hugged me and I burst into tears. Crying, I entered the food tent where I grabbed a banana and was handed a sack of food. I gathered my stuff from transition, one of the last few to do so - they were already dismantling the bike racks.

We walked back to the car - back at the parking area a mile away. It was not a fun walk. It was hot and I was in pretty bad shape. It was slow going.

I'm trying to focus on the positives of the race. I swam seriously fast and I'm really really happy with my swim. I also finished. I could have just jumped in that support truck even with a fixed chain, but I got back on the bike and I finished the race. It's hard. I'm upset that my race was screwed up, but it was out of my control. I'll just have to wait until July for the next one. I took a look at my final time. If you take of an hour and 35 minutes for my bike situation, I actually did pretty well on the bike. The run is bad no matter how you hack it. The swim is just excellent. Here are my times (again, adjusted with 1 hour and 35 minutes take off the bike).

swim 19:34
T1 4:32
bike 43:00
T2 2:41
run 43:03
total 1:52:50

I wanted to finish in under 2 hours and I would have done that. My real real total was 3:28:31, but 1:35 of that was sitting on the side of the road. I don't know if I'll do Danskin next year. There were so many people and the parking situation is really quite annoying. Part of me wants to go back and do it for real and part of me just wants to do other triathlons instead.