A 9am start in a beautiful lake in Rapperswill. Great, because I hate early morning starts and I had the worst sleep the night before.. Nice hotel but why do they have to have a band playing every first saturday of the month until late?
We got to the race with plenty of time to check my bike and get ready to rock and roll. unfortunately the whole ‘rock and roll’ feeling was far gone. When the gun went for the swimstart it took me forever to find a good pace. With about 500m to go I finally started passing some people and felt better. Got out of the water after 33min so I was a bit disappointed with that. Sort of hoped to do 31-32 min swim.
It was heating up nicely and I was more then happy to take my wetsuit off and get on the bike. Legs felt crap but they usually do for the first 10km so not too worried. There were several hills on the bike course and they seemed so steep that I was afraid I couldn’t ride up them with my 39x23.. I know, very stupid that I didn’t bring my 25 and 28 I usually do but of course the one time you actually need them.. So, not taking any risks, right at the bottom of Witches hill(first one of the day) 39x23 it was and I was relieved when I got up it. I kept thinking I should of ridden my Moozes here, with tt bars on.
After a short downhill followed by a head wind section we got to the bottom of the second hill. The Beast, ow yeah it sounds awful. I started really steep so straight back onto the 39x23 and passing people. yeeeeeeeey. After a couple of 100 mtrs it sort of went slightly downhill again so had a little recovery moment and then back up. This one was a bit longer than witches hill but nothing too hard. Nina Zoller, the girl that I thought was gonna win the race in my age group passed me already by then. In T1 in noticed there was at least 1 bike missing so I knew it was gonna be hard to win.
After I got over the Beast there was a long downhill so time to get the pace going. Then another short uphill, downhill and back to Rapperswill for lap nr 2. During this race I really tried to get enough food in me. Usually I have 2 bottles max on the bike with just iso drink in it, not quite enough for a 90k bike leg though. I’m not sure if it was the extra food but I felt a lot better on the 2nd lap than the 1st one. Before I knew it I was ready for T2. a 2:53 bike leg was 3 min’s slower than I hoped but still ok.
The run started good. really good, except for that my stomach didn’t seem to take in all the food I had before on the bike and started to bother me. every step I took it felt like a liter of water was jumping around in it :-S hmmm, this could be a problem. km 1-10 were ok, we had to got uphill and up some steps between km 7-8 but it was doable. going at 5min a km for the first bit and feeling like I could keep up the pace. Slowed down km 7-8 but then got it back together straight after the steps.
At the end of lap 1 my body was screaming for some food but I still couldn’t get anything in. Of course my pace dropped dramaticly again and my legs started cramping up. Damn it! I was going so well. so km 10-15 I suffered big time but at least I could have some coke and take some of my isogel that I carried with me. Started feeling a little bit better again untill I got to the uphill bit. Last couple of steps I had to walk up.. dizziness!! Tried to find my rhytm again and I got to the finish. In 5th position.. aaaargh. Lost 2 spots on the run. So a shocking run time of 2:01, 5:33:15 in the race, and not sure if I was happy or not with this result I crossed the finish. And I just wanted to sleep ...
During the race I made a decision. It’s been playing my mind for a while now and I’m sure. I don’t want to go to Las Vegas this year. It will be too hot, too hilly run course and will be too slow to do this how I want it. I rather go back in 10 years time when I’m ready and I can get a good result there. For now, I need to work on my running and cycling and swimming.
Tomorrow I got my next race lined up. OD in Retie. Not riding on the TT-bike but my superfast Moozes. I’ve made that decision too: getting rid of the bike that i’ve never been comfortable on. I’ve never had the idea it was right for me, I couldn’t find the right position even after changing a million things. So i’m getting rid of it. It’s too small anyways! Never get too attached to a bike :-S
Got some changes in my training scedule as well, and I don’t think we’ll see the results of that by tomorrow but i’m confident things will change over the next couple of weeks... Exciting times!! :-)
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