7 July 2016 - Boulder Stroke and Stride

As many of you know I am planning to participate in the USA Triathlon age group nationals in August in Omaha Nebraska.  I qualified and will be participating in the olympic distance (1500 meter swim, 40K bike, and 10K run) triathlon competing against the best triathletes in the country.  For those that don't know metric distances: (1 mile swim, 25 mile bike, and 6.2 mile run).  The top 18 finishers in each age group qualify for team USA and get to compete in the Triathlon worlds next year in the Netherlands.  I have little to no chance of making team USA but thought it would be fun to do the event and maybe learn something from some of the best triathletes in the USA.

The lake water in Nebraska in August is warm (low 80s) and therefore the wetsuit will not be permitted.  Before this stroke and stride I had never participated in an event without the wetsuit.  The wetsuit is quite buoyant and gives you a sense of safety and also makes the swim easier since it  keeps your core up in the water.  Swimming with the wetsuit also requires minimal kicking so saves your legs for the bike and run.  Most people can cut about 2 minutes off their 750 meter swim times with the wetsuit.  In other words, it is much tougher to swim without the wetsuit.  

Since I needed to practice for the USAT Nationals,  I decided to do the stroke and stride and to do the long course without my wetsuit.  The long course includes a 1500 meter (approximately 1 mile) swim and a 5K run.  I have never swam in a race without the wetsuit and I have only swam 1500 meters in open water once before.  Needless to say I was nervous to start with and really scared once I heard the water was a chilly 70.2 degrees.  My goal coming into this event was to just finish and prove to myself I could do the 1500 meter swim.  I had no thoughts of winning anything since all of the folks I was competing against were in wetsuits.  All I had on was triathlon shorts.  In other words I was swimming bare chested.

The swim was actually broken into two 750 meter loops.  We start in the water, swim 750 meters, get out of the water and run through the goal posts and a short run on the beach, then get back in the water and swim another 750 meters then get out and run through the goal post into transition.  For most people, the second 750 meters is usually about 90 seconds slower due to the running out and back into the water.

I was nervous from the start of this race and cold due to the water temperature.  My nerves came mostly from the fact that this was all new for me.  Once they signaled for us to start, I stayed toward the back and started swimming while trying to get comfortable in the water.  I can't say I ever felt comfortable but didn't feel unsafe since there were several boats watching us like a hawk throughout the entire race.  The worst part for me was the pockets of water where the temperature felt colder.  I was already chilly and then hitting those spots made it worse.  I did a horrible job of sighting the buoys and stopped several times in the water to get my bearings.  This all costs precious time and was quite frustrating. My time for the first 750 meters was 19 minutes.  This is about 2+ minutes slower than my previous swims with the wetsuit.   Here is the Strava data from the first 750 meters. 



After completing the first 750 meters and getting out of the water, I thought momentarily about not getting back in for the next 750 meters but my willpower would not allow it.  I really thought my second 750 meters went better than my first but the finish times did not show this.  I was the 3rd slowest swimmer out there and I think the other 2 folks wore wetsuits.  One advantage of being one of the slower swimmers is there was no traffic in the water and I felt very safe as there was always a boat an arms reach away if I needed it.  As I approached the shore after my second 750 meters, my legs felt really wobbly so it took extra time to get my legs going.  My time for the second 750 meters was 21.04.  This was 2 minutes slower than my first 750 meters.  I was slightly disappointed in this time since it felt like the second swim was faster.  Bottom line, my swim time without the wetsuit added about 6 minutes to my time.  Here is the Strava data.  I think it is inaccurate as I can not believe I sway that crazily with all the zig-zags.



Once I reached transition, my spot was easily located between 2 trees.  I tried to quickly put my running shoes on and start running but unfortunately my calves and hamstrings started cramping.  This was painful and made me slow down in transition and elongated my transition time.  Without having to pull the wetsuit off I hoped transition time would be about 1 minute.  Unfortunately my time was a dreadfully slow 2 minutes and 30 seconds.  Once the running gear was on I felt fine and my run went great.   In fact my time (26:04)(8.23 per mile) was my fastest so far on this course.  While running, I spotted my buddy Phil Wang wearing his Arvada Triathlon jersey.  It was fun to run into Phil and to catch up with him after the race.  Here is the Strava data from my run:



After the race they served us pizza!  I don't usually eat pizza but felt it was earned after doing this event so I enjoyed 2 pieces!  The Stroke and Stride is a well run event that I recommend.  I call it a race but seriously it is pretty low key.  Everyone there is friendly and helpful.  I learned some things from this experience that I will try to do differently next week at the Stroke and Stride.  Specifically I will try to start the swim in the middle of the pack and do a better job of relaxing and sighting in the water.  I am also gonna wear my triathlon race suit, which will hopefully be warmer in the water.  While approaching the shore I am gonna try and kick my legs a bunch so they are ready for me to start running once I stand up.  Finally I am hopefully gonna reduce my transition time by half.

The numbers:
Swim Lap 1: 19:00
Swim Lap 2: 21:04
Total Swim time: 40:04
Transition time:   2:30
Total time:   1:08:35:58

Age group:  5th out of 5
Men:           41st out of 42
Overall:      61st out of 64

What's next for me:
7/14/16 - Boulder Stroke and Stride (Long course - no wetsuit)
7/24/16 - TriBoulder Olympic Distance Triathlon
8/4/16 - (Tentative) Boulder Stroke and Stride (Long course - no wetsuit)
8/13/16 - USA Triathlon Age Group Nationals (Olympic Distance) Omaha NE
9/24/16 - Tour De Cure (Diabetes) Metric Century Ride