Boulder Peak

Boulder Peak Triathlon was over a week and a half ago, I just haven't gotten around to writing about it yet. My race was a little disappointing, but I finished the race and still had a fun time.

The start of the swim went directly into the sun. After the gun went off I stuck myself to the back of the lead group of 5 guys. We had a good 25m on the rest of the field within the first 500m. I kept trying to sight the turn buoy but couldn't see ANYTHING into the glare off the water. I looked to my side and saw a course buoy about 50m to our left and immediately panicked that we were going off course and had missed the turn. So I took a sharp turn and ditched my draft pack to try to get back on course, thinking the rest of them were going to swim for a while before they realized they were going the wrong way. As soon as I "got back on track" I turned and saw the turn buoy...directly in front of the lead pack. I ditched the lead pack for no reason at all, and I lost time swimming sideways. Needless to say, my swim sucked. I started the bike almost 2 minutes behind where I wanted to be, and kept it conservative for the first few miles out of transition knowing I had to get up and over Olde Stage. I conserved energy to the base of the climb, and when it came time to open up and give it everything I had, nothing was there. I felt like Hans Solo expecting to haul ass only to find out his hyperdrive was busted. I got through the bike and had an AWESOME T2, best I've ever had. After half a mile on the run I just fell apart. My form disappeared, my cadence slowed, and my IT band syndrome reared it's ugly head. By mile 2 I was in pain and knew I was going to have to settle for just crossing the finishing line. My trademark dying animal noises emerged from my mouth, my neck went slack, and my stride turned into a limp. I'm positive I resembled a zombie... With a half mile to go, my good buddy Matt caught up to me and paced me to the finish line.

Crawling up Olde Stage

Me on Mike's heels into T2

Matty and I heading to the finish.



I didn't do so hot in this race last year either. I think the placement of the race relative to my racing season may have something to do with it. It's just a few weeks after I peak for Age Group Nationals and it's right around when I start feeling burnt out. I've got the 5430 Half coming up in a little over a week, and I'm looking forward to finishing my first race at that distance. I've been contemplating what I would do if my IT band problems came back during the half marathon run. My strategies include; running backwards, skipping, and speed walking.

In other news, I had a great swim today. I had a 500y set at tempo pace, which I did in 6min flat, only 5 seconds off my 500 PR! If I had actually been gunning it I'm fairly sure I could have broken my PR. Pretty exciting.