R.I.P. "the BEAST" (4/27/06-7/26/09)

This post will be a fitting tribute to a partner in crime whose life was tragically cut down in her prime. The BEAST was only a little over 3 years old, a respective toddler among other bikes, but had the enjoyable journey to have taken part in four Ironmans and countless half irons and smaller triathlons. The beast also dabbled in some time trials and was a trusty steed for the Great Race in Auburn, NY and also several RATS short course and long course races.

I tried to deck her out in only the best, much to my other bikes despise and constantly was upgrading her equipment and buying her new and fancy things. She knew that each Ironman would be preceded by new presents to help her get ready for the big day ahead. Below is a picture of her all decked out and nervous before her first foray into the wonderful world of Ironman down in Panama City Beach in Florida. I had rented a pair of Zipp 606’s for her because “baby needs a new pair of shoes!” and I just wanted to go fast!
She treated me well at IMFL and I came away with my first 20+mph split in an Ironman. It was a good day, but she wanted more. She urged me to test my meddle in the mountains, so I strapped her to the back of my car and we traveled to the North Country to have a go at Lake Placid. The first round went great, we hit the podium and collected more and more IM stickers on her top tube. Gathering more and more by hitting up Wisconsin in 2008 and finally we made our way to Placid again in 2009. We went all out for the ride in Placid in 2009. Traveling to the mountains several times, we became comfortable on the hills and rode as one. By this time, she was pretty with ceramic derailleur pulley’s, a fully integrated carbon cockpit, carbon fork spacers, carbon water bottle cages, carbon TT brake levers, brand new borrowed Zipp 808’s and even my name stenciled on the seat collar. (Thank you eBay because that upgrade cost like $5)
She was looking really pretty come race day and we had an excellent first loop. We split it off and were really cranking on the hills. It felt effortless as we strode thru the first loop in a time of 2:35, good for a 21.6mph split on the first loop. In my mind it was destined to be a day I would not forget. The BEAST had other plans for me though. Below is the last photo that was taken while she was still alive...
We caught a crosswind on the 2nd loop and she got a little finicky on the downhill. Unfortunately, this is where she ultimately met her demise. Her beautiful carbon handlebars spun around and cracked the carbon top tube of her frame as I launched over the handlebars and onto the pavement. Most of you know the rest of the story from there, and if you don’t, just go back and read THIS. The crack in the top tube and my subsequent black out led me to have to replace her as she couldn’t be trusted to stay in one piece for the upcoming seasons (you know, due to the carbon being structurally not-sound…)
But with every sad song, comes a silver lining. And with that being said and me getting on the bike again rather quickly and, you know, still be alive and all, I was in need of a new chariot and new companion to share my many miles of trials with. So for the 2010 season and beyond, the new addition to my arsenal will be (drum roll please…..)
Introducing the “Lunar Phoenix” or in short “LP” (notice the similarity to IMLP….) the story of the phoenix is that they rise up from the ash into something that is more beautiful than the original creation. The BEAST had to die on the downhill section so that the lunar phoenix could be born. For those keeping track at home, the BEAST was a Cervelo P2 and good old LP will be a brand spanking new Cervelo P3. Now I do not know which color I will be getting, but I’ve put in a preference of the black and grey one because it looks way sweeter. But we’ll see what TriSpot orders me. Thanks guys for all of your hard work on the crash replacement.

So in sadness, let us all give a moment of silence for the fallen comrades of late. Beast you will be truly missed. Thru 4 seasons of long course racing and over 9,700 miles, she definitely paid her dues. But you did not die in vain; it was thru your death that a new companion could be born. The lunar phoenix (2010 - 20??).

TriSpot live TV "spot"

This is from a few months ago when a local Buffalo news team came out to TriSpot Multisports for a live early morning TV broadcast. I'm the one giving the "hang loose" sign while riding on the computrainer! Cheers!

Johnny's 5 miler race report

Johnny's Running o' the Green is usually the spring "opener" for the Rochester racing series. It always attracts top talent in the area and is known for great competition. Above is a shot that showed up in the Rochester D+C from the race start. I was somewhere about 2 people back from the starting line.

Having been a beautiful week prior to the race with temperatures in the middle to upper 40's this was looking to be a pristine day for a race. Mother nature had a different opinion on the matter. As you can see from the photos of the start, it was wet and a little windy out that day.
I started out the day by running from my apartment in Brighton to the starting line of the race because I knew I needed to get in a slight warm up and wanted to get about 15miles in that day. I threw on my race number and running clothes and made my way the 6.5 miles to the starting line. I quickly got inside of the Raddison Hotel downtown in Rochester because the constant sprinkling and dribbling of rain had left me quite wet and when I stopped, I got pretty chilly. The start was at 10:30am and I was at the hotel trying to get warm by 10:00 sharp, right on time. I found my sister who was doing this race too and Kim and several other folks upstairs stretching out and getting ready to race. Jenna and I made our way downstairs joking the entire way and I wished her good luck. The game plan for me was to race as hard as I could, then once finished, turn around and run her in the last few miles of the race.

I got myself positioned at the start after chatting with several friends roaming around the start line doing my warm up and it was so nice to see everyone out and spectators all "greened" up for the St. Patty's day parade immediately following the race. The gun went off and we were blazing thru the streets. I hit the first mile in 5:22 and instantly was not cold anymore. This course is an out and back which goes from downtown to the UR campus and back. It's nice to be able to see everyone and spot people you know on the "back" section. I hit the 2 mile mark in 11:06 feeling good. It was a little fast I thought, but I wasn't straining yet.

The turn-around came sooner than I expected (always a good thing) and I hit that in roughly 13:3X, so I knew if I could keep that up, I had a good chance at having a solid time. My PR from the 8km distance that we ran in college was a 28:03, so I was aiming to break that this day. I hit the 3 miles in 16:4x and the 5km in approximately 17:08. I was flying.

Mile 4 was a little trying and as soon as we turned around it was wind in the face and slowed the fast pace excessively. I passed by all the folks still making their way to the turnaround and got some cheers, saw some friends and tried to focus all of my energy on the race I was having. I hit the Ford Street bridge and caught up to two runners in front of me. I put in a half hearted surge and they fell behind me. (which I was surprised at) I rounded the final turn and climbed a little knoll up to the finish to hit the clock at right around 28:00. The final time in the results says 27:59 so I have officially bested my college PR and broken 28 in the process:o) Wahoo!!! During college I was solely running and not doing any multisport which amazes me more that I was able to best that. It was good for 15th overall and 7th on my age group. I felt like I turned myself inside out during this race and it was a DEFINITE test of speed. Makes me excited to see what else I can do this year!

I turned around and ran to get Jenna and met her at mile 4. She was looking strong, but having some troubles with all the wind. I advised her to tuck in behind the tall people and have them break the wind. I talked her in and ran with her until the final corner where she made it to the line and improved her time from a 5 miler we did in late 2009 by I think about a minute! So proud of her. The coolest thing though was that my mom and dad came out to spectate and watch the madness of the race. My mom brought her clown horn and I thought I recognized that sound when running into the line. (I don't know I was rather hypoxic...) But they came out and it was really cool to share a race with them again.

I was completely stoked by my time and I think it was mental fortitude rather than anything else. I'm in the results as Travis O'Earley as I wanted to "Irish" up my name for this race :o) haha. I however showed up as "anonymous" in the Rochester Runner of the Year (RROY) points standings in the newspaper, but oh well. I know I earned my 1 point! haha. I hope you all are out enjoying the beautiful weather recently and you all are racing hard. Now's the time to get the miles in folks. Train hard and rest harder, talk to you all soonish. Cheers!

Snowshoe Nationals race report

March 6th was the official date of the US Powersox Snowshoe National Championships in Fabius, NY this year. It was a rough race and many folks were concerned that good old upstate NY wasn't going to have enough snow to host a national championship race in March. Mother nature complied however and dumped about 2 feet on the region a week before the actual race.
The race was really cool to be able to wake up in your own bed, drive 2 hours east and have national level competition in basically your backyard. Participants were coming from all over the US and there were some great runners present. The snow on the other hand was no so great. Because it had been particularly mild the last few days prior to the race, the sun had created a massive melt and left sugary snow which is EXTREMELY slippery and not too easy to gain traction on.
As you can see from the pic above, people were falling all over the place and it was slippery as all get out that day. Times were about 15-20 minutes slower than they should have been and I struggled to get my feet under me until I came up on a guy that was getting excellent traction about 3 miles into the race. Following directly behind him and in his footsteps was the wisest choice I made that day. We both immediately gaped the several runners in the pack behind us.
This was the only photo taken of me during the race and you get a nice shot of my backside as we trekked thru a snow covered parking lot and back into more single track. The finish of the race was most impressive and I've included a picture below. It was COMPLETELY uphill and caused your HR to sky rocket at the end of the race. Most people ended up walking this hill to the finish line as it was inevitably faster, but I made the decision to NOT walk about 3/4's of the way into this run.

To make matters worse there was a guy on the sidelines yelling at me, "there's someone RIGHT behind you, pick it up!!!" But I couldn't do anything about it. I was giving it my all and the hill was too steep...Below is a pic of Tim Ratowski hoofing it up the final climb with Ken close behind and Mort in arrears stage left. Just glad I got this one over with and a good end to the snowshoe season.

I still have to post on the Johnny's 5 miler from 3/13, but that will come up shortly. Good times and great beers were shared with friends afterwards and I have to thank Mort for bringing the tradition of Ubu to the races recently...at least I HOPE he makes it a tradition! :o) Well the sun is shining here, and I'm not wanting to be stuck inside, so I hope this post finds you all well and getting out and enjoying the roads. Cheers!

Crossed a life goal off the list yesterday

So, since I started running after college I've had a few goals roaming around my head. One in particular was to be able to run a 10 miler in under an hour. Last night I went out for my normal 5 mile loop around my neighborhood and was planning on doing it twice to be a total of a 10 mile run. I clocked thru the first loop in 30:30 and was feeling pretty fresh. I hauled as fast as I could for the 2nd of my two loops and when I hit the finish, I was kind of in shock. I always thought that I would do this in a race setting and not a training run (and definitely not a training run that was on week 3 of a three week build session…)

I came thru for 10 miles in 59:36.

I think I’m still in shock….

Medved Winter Challenge Race report

So this was my first foray into the "adventure racing" realm of things and even though there were not too many teams that showed up on this particular weekend, it was STILL a blast.

Let me preface this by saying that Western NY got the typical late February/early March DUMP of snow about a night or two before this 4 hour orienteering race in Mendon Ponds Park on Saturday March 27th, 2010. We got hit with about 8 inches of fresh and deep powder that would inevitably create a hastle for the race directors in disguising the check points (they didn't want to leave tracks to them in all the fresh snow) and for course management.

This race was a 4 hour orienteering/adventure race and it consisted of a mountain biking portion, a snowshoe or XC skiing portion (your choice) and a "post hole" loop in the very beginning. The race started out with about a post hole 1/4 mile loop up a very steep embankment (you weren't allowed to wear snowshoes for this...hence the post hole aspect of it) This was the only point in the race that teams split up and each person did this individually and then had to partake in the "challenge" of the race. The challenge this year was to knock off the cardboard heads from this 2x4 with a snowball from about 20 feet away. The cardboard heads are the race director Mort Nace and I don't know if he had prior knowledge of this before race day. Good stuff :o) After both teammates went and knocked the heads off, they were free to start orienteering their way thru the course.

My teammate was none other than Tim Howland and we set off on the bikes for checkpoints one thru four. We raced away from the lodge and took a trail that was an old road in Mendon which would've saved us a lot of time, had it been plowed. Thing was there was about 8-10" of deep powder to trek thru with our mountain bikes and snowshoes strapped to the outside of our packs. It definitely made travel a little slow. Well, we made it to the transition area, ditched our bikes, strapped on the snowshoes and headed out to collect punches 1-3. Things went really smoothly until punch 2 where a few of the teams bunched up and we were kinda lost looking all around for the call out. It was labelled as a fence and with all the snow, it made it really hard to find. The only bobble was that #3 I went down the side of a creek and realized I was on the wrong side and unable to cross given all the ice. We caught up and blazed thru 1-3 and grabbed the bikes and picked up #4 on the way back to the lodge.

Tim and I set out for 5-9 and were feeling good with a comfortable lead. We sailed thru 5-9 and hit some good hills there (cardiac hill included) and breezed our way back to the lodge for the win in 2hours and 50 minutes having collected all 9 check points. The 2nd place team of husband and wife Weilers came in on skis about 20 mintues behind us.

This was a really fun day and a great haul prize-wise. Tim and I each won a pair of Pearl Izumi Shoes, a pair of smartwool sox, and got a long sleeve t-shirt out of the mix. I won a pair of Kahtoolah microspikes in a raffle and will be giving those to my buddy Brian who lent me his bike (Hambone) for the race. Good times, a great foray into orienteering and I would LOVE to do more races like this in the future. The combination of orienteering yourself and hauling butt to the next checkpoint was REALLY fun.

I gotta get a post up about snowshoe nationals that were this past weekend, but I'm afraid that will have to wait for now. Hope the good weather is treating everyone well and you are hitting the roads in style. Train hard and I'll see you out on the roads. Cheers.

Cast-a-shadow race report

Well I hope this post finds everyone doing well and enjoying the not-so wintry winter that we’ve been having this year. Ironically, the states that are more southern than NY have been getting blasted with snow rather than the usual lake effect off of Lake Ontario. Because of this warming trend, the infamous Cast-a-shadow 6 hour snowshoe relay on January 30th was ended up being a treacherous trail race instead of the normal snowshoe soirée. 2010 brought a new location as well and moved the race to the west side of town at the Greece Canal Park instead of Mendon Ponds. This particular Saturday it was BITINGLY cold in Greece and when the sun went down, the temps plummeted. On a warmer note though, I started a new job over at The Employment Store on Monday of the week of the race and I was laid up on Wednesday that particular week with the stomach flu/virus that’s been going around. I felt terrible that I had to call in sick on only my 3rd day of work, but I couldn’t make it out of bed without losing the contents of my stomach for like the 4 billionth time. So for the race I was unfortunately approximately ten pounds lighter than normal given the sickness. (I do not recommend this as a way to lose weight, it was completely awful….) And as fair warning to my teammates, I told them I didn’t know what to expect come race day. But being this, a race that I had bailed on last year (only after securing a replacement runner) and catching hell for it ever since, I knew I couldn’t miss the fun that awaited.
2pm is the start time for this race and that makes it unique because, being that it is a 6 hour relay and the sun sets around 5pm, you run about half of it in the dark with headlamps on. Gun went off at 2pm and spirits were high as they normally are. People were racing hard, the ultra runners slogged off to a start and folks were hanging in the lodge waiting on their turn to run. I felt okay thru about 4 loops and that was when the sun went down. My teammates Jason and Tim were racing hard and I was starting to feel the effects of the inevitable lactic acid building up in my legs. Loop 5 was good and the start of the mandatory headlamp requirement.

The course was starting to get REALLY chewed up and sloppy. As I said before it was not a snowshoe race, but a trail race that froze over as the darkness waned. Lap 6 for me was my breaking point. I threw up in my mouth in the first quarter mile (almost before I got to the woods) and added about 5 minutes on to my average lap time. My teammates were wondering where I was when it was dark and I hadn’t shown up to the exchange point yet. I made it back and realized I hadn’t changed any clothes yet, even though I had brought several changes. I got into a new dry pair of shoes, hit some new clean and dry base layers and shirts and bundled up for my last lap. Time was running out and we were SOLIDLY in 2nd place overall, so we just had to hold on.

My last lap was my prideful retribution for having a lap that was 21+ minutes (when I got sick). I powered thru and was SO glad to be finished. Our overall time and result was good for 2nd overall male team and we won some Mountain Hardware beanies and had some great home cooked food at the awards ceremony. (Along with a few slices of pizza!)

This race really kicks the crap out of you for about 4-5 days afterwards. Most of the folks that I spoke with had the “smokers cough” for several days and had extremely tight hamstrings as well. I was hobbling and couldn’t really run for the following 2-3 days after this one. This is a fun endeavor and weird to race pretty much your 5k race pace for 2 hours or so with 40 minutes in between each jaunt. It really rips up your legs. So other than that, it’s been status quo of getting out there and getting the miles in for prep for these half ironmans and half marathons this year. I did sign up for the Chicago Marathon and it looks like there will be several folks there this year as a crew in Chi-town. I’ve registered for about all the races that I’m planning on this year (minus a few local triathlons) and am stoked to get out there in the sunshine once the season hits. But for now the focus is Snowshoe Nationals on 3/6/10 in Syracuse, NY to get some national level competition at the hardest sport around. See you on the roads and trails friends. Cheers.