Fall Frolic Race Report - review of week

Well, my peeples this was an interesting week for training/racing/life for me. It is the first of four in the the last 4 week build before Ironman Florida and also the Danforth Fall Frolic sprint triathlon and my best friends wedding. Crazy.

First off it was a solid training week which capped out at slightly over 12 hours. It was a little rushed to get everything in as I was leaving for Buffalo, NY on Thursday night after work. (I was also leaving work 2 hours early in order to do a 16 mile run before I went to Buffalo) I was running late (as usual) and had like 30 minutes to pack for a wedding, a long weekend and a triathlon that Sunday in Barker, NY. I packed up the beast and headed out the door en route to Buffalo after a nice 16 miler in which I linked a lot of short runs together because I lacked the time to plot out a nice 16 mile route.

In Buffalo, we drink. We drink each night and since I was 150lbs after the run, it takes me about 0.5 beers before I start acting silly. We drank every night that I was there. Not heavily (at least I tried not to) but still nonetheless, my system was not used to the abnormal eating and drinking each day. Josh and his wife Melissa are in Aruba as I type this and they didn't want rotting groceries in their fridge so they ate out the last few nights before leaving, which since I was also up, forced me to eat out at chain restaurants...ewww. Anyway, needless to say, when I stepped on the scale back at the apartment, I was 158lbs...Not cool.

So, the wedding goes great, I was the best man, things are good, I have a triathlon the next morning and I stop drinking at like 8pm. Go to sleep, wake up a little later than expected and realize on the drive over to the race site (about 45 minutes from the hotel) that the mapquest directions are mental...not really getting me to the race site. I'm freaking a little, and when I finally get there it's t minus 30 minutes till my wave goes off.

I'm running around with the bike in a muddy field and bare feet (yes it is a trend, just like Timberman) since it was a mudfest, my corduroys are smattered in mud and I am pushing the bike and all my gear til I find the race registration table to pickup the bag, race# and timing chip. (I almost ran to transition without my chip...that wouldn't have been fun) I get there, set up everything in the mud and off to the lake to warm up, I'm slamming on the wetsuit, get it all zipped up and as soon as I am waist deep, I hear, "alright, everyone out of the water, we've gotta get you all counted, back thru the corral." damn, no warm up, again.

We get set and find out there are only 4 men and 5 women in the eliminator wave. For the men, it's Joe Niezgoda, Joe Meyers, Daryl Clarke, and myself. Good talent. Daryl is joking around and the mood is light. We see the women go off 4:48 in front of us and then take off at the second siren to chase them down. I exit the water in first place for the men with Mr. Niezgoda on my heels and Meyers and Clarke behind him. For the 400m swim I was 6:52.

We hit transition and I get everything going and head out to the bike course. About a mile in I hear what seems to be a car, but it was Niezgoda and his disc wheel floating by me. I was watching him pull away from me the whole time, but we both managed to catch all the women before the turn around. So much for the equalizer... The bike was 12 miles and ended in 34 minutes on the dot for me and I held off a fast charging Joe Meyer. I was 21.9mph average.

The 5k run was nice and flat, and had a bunch of turn arounds which was nice to be able to see where the competition was. I was hurting near the end REAL bad and was trying my damndest not to get passed by Joe M. I didn't realize how much Joe N. was fading up front. He crossed the line 28 seconds in front of me and I was able to hang on for the runner up (first loser!) haha. Meyer was about 30 seconds back on me and we all were caked in mud after the final 400 meters of the run was thru a field. Fun times. I ran an 18:38 5k which was 6:01 pace/mile. Not bad. No one broke the elusive hour, but the course really wasn't suited for it this year. Too much mud. I was happy with another nice podium finish.

At the awards I snagged a nice tech top from Mizuno and a large tub of the worst tasting stuff in the world...Mandarin orange HEED. Bleh. since we were a special wave and not considered in the race, there were no Score-This!!! plaques for us. Bummerooski. Better luck next time.

Next week (this week) is a 3 miles of swimming, 8.5 hours in the saddle and 28-30 miles running. With a 100 mile ride and a 18 mile run, wish me luck. It's crunch time. I'll write another report next week. Mentally, this is do-able :)