70.3 Weymouth-- One too Many.......
After returning from Australia on Wednesday at 6am to the UK, it was straight home and into the pool. It was 37 hours of travel door to door, and I got a decent amount of sleep. The body actually came around pretty well in the training sets and I was getting a lot of sleep as Hila & Asher were up in Edinburgh for a conference. I picked them up Saturday evening along with my Mother who had flown out to help out with Asher (let's not forget it really does "take a village" in this sport).
Justin Metzler (a fellow American Pro) had been staying at our place training here in Oxford between a race in Norway and was heading to Weymouth 70.3 with us. It was great to have him in town and show him a bit of Oxford and the UK. We had previously raced at Challenge Iceland together and was hoping to use him as a good gauge to see where my swim was compared to a few months ago.
Pre-Race Photo (Photo Credit: Huw Fairclough)
THE GOOD:
- My Swim was the best to date, losing 3:07 to Harry Wiltshire (who I previously lost 4:41 to at Staffordshire 70.3 in June) & 1:21 to Justin (who I lost 3:22 to at Iceland). We will see in a few weeks at Hefei 70.3 if this was a fluke, or if my swim is improving.
- I came out of the water 1:21 down to 5th - 7th, and I was able to close the gap on the bike by mile 10. We then picked up 4th place a while later. It was nice to be towards the front of the race that early on and have others to ride with.
THE BAD:
- I got popped off the group on the final climb with about 5 km to go. I lost about 30 seconds to them and came into T2 in 7th. This was due to several things: doing too much work on the bike early on and not sitting in enough once catching the group. Also, my legs were still somewhere between Australia and the UK.
THE UGLY:
- Despite my legs feeling good leading up to the race and early on in the bike, I started to feel it on that last climb when I got dropped. That is when I realized I could be in trouble come time to run.
- 5 km into the run I realized that my legs did not make it back from Australia, and British Airways must have lost them somewhere on the flight home, surely they are to blame for this and nothing to do with it being the 5th 70.3 in 8 weeks with travel between 4 continents.......
People are probably questioning why I have raced so much in the last 8 weeks, or why I tried to back up Weymouth after a long trip back from Australia. Racing so much: with Asher just arriving in early July I knew the training was going to be hit or miss. I knew I had some really good fitness before he was born, and I took the approach to just race and try to carry that fitness from race to race. It worked well early on, but towards the end, my body and mind were needing a break. As for Weymouth 70.3, well I think race experience is good, and when you can get another 70.3 under your belt for a total possible loss of ~$250, and take the family to Weymouth for the weekend, can't really complain!
Out on the run course, before the legs came falling off......
Swim- 26:42 / Strava File
Bike- 2:23:47 / Strava File / TrainingPeaks File
Run- 1:33:04 / Strava File / TrainingPeaks File
Total- 4:30:28 / 10th Pro / Results
Overall, I am disappointed with the end result of Weymouth, but there was a lot of good that came out of it, so I still chalk it up as a great learning experience. I cannot thank my wife, Hila, enough for letting me put together a big racing block over the last 2 months. At the end of the day, this wouldn't be possible without her support. Big thanks to my Mom for coming out and taking care of Asher while I was in Australia. 70.3 Worlds wouldn't have been possible with Hila at a scientific conference and needing someone to watch Asher during the day. As always, big thanks to my sponsors for the continued support, scroll to the bottom and click the logos to find out more about each company. If you want some deals on select products, CLICK HERE.
I am racing in honor of Bryan Clauson (if you don't know the story, I wrote about it HERE.) If you are not an Organ Donor PLEASE consider becoming one, you can do so HERE in honor of Bryan. Even if you are registered in your state / on your license, you can still sign up for the National Registry.
