Still Alive
Wow... it's been a solid six months since I've updated my craptacular blog. I'm sure my one or two loyal readers (hi mom!) are very disappointed. Truth is I've been on my grind. If I want to get any training done these days it has to happen in the early morning, so setting the alarm for 5AM has become completely standard. Between work, training, and trying to keep my kid alive and my wife sane there isn't room for much else. My master plan of regularly posting original content in order to build up a loyal following who I can then proceed to spam with Adsense and affiliate links so I can eventually generate enough revenue to go to the liquor store and buy a 40oz is way behind schedule. I'll try to do better.
Since it worked out so well last time, Patrick Parish and I decided we'd take our show on the road yet again. This time for Duathlon Nationals in Tuscon.
Since it worked out so well last time, Patrick Parish and I decided we'd take our show on the road yet again. This time for Duathlon Nationals in Tuscon.
In Duct Tape We Trust
Ever since I forked over my credit card at the luggage counter on the way out to my first fly-in race back in 2010, I've had the dream of cobbling together my own bike boxes and outwitting those greedy bastards. About a half dozen trips and several hundred dollars in bike fees later I finally got off of my ass to do something about it.
This trip was the maiden voyage of my DIY ghetto bike boxes. They're made out of corrugated plastic held together by canvas straps and several hundred feet of duct tape. The good news is that the bike got there and back without damage, the boxes held up just fine to the rigors of air travel, they actually fit through the x-ray machines so there's less chance the TSA will open them, and they're much easier to carry and get into/out of a car than a traditional bike box. The bad news is that I only avoided the fee on one leg of the trip. I can make the frame box substantially smaller by removing the crank, so I'll make that adjustment for the next trip and see how it goes.
The Pre-Race Ridiculousness
For some reason USAT insists on having a mandatory day-before packet pickup and bike check-in for this race. Since Tucson is about a 2 hour drive from Phoenix you either have to take a really early flight out that morning or head out two days before the race and deal with an extra night away from home. Since the extra night away from home is not a viable option I went with the really early flight. I hopped out of bed at 4:30 on Friday morning, said a prayer for my sketchy looking homemade bike boxes as I tossed them in the trunk of the car and headed off to the airport for a 6:15 scheduled departure.
Eventually the bomb suit guy comes back outside, gets in the truck and rolls off, but for some reason it's a solid 30 minutes before we get the all clear to go back inside. It turns out some numbnuts checked a bag with some sort of homemade water filter that looked like a pipe bomb when they x-rayed it. By now it's about an hour and a half past our scheduled departure time.
When they finally give the all clear I hustle back inside as fast as I can and end up 2nd in line at the Southwest counter. I say another silent prayer for my plastic and duct tape handiwork and get in the now hour-long line for security screening. The whole time I'm in line I'm checking the status of my flight on my phone and the departure time keeps getting pushed farther and farther back. When I clear security I head over to my gate and see the board is displaying no info for my flight at all. It turns out they sent the thing out about a half hour after TSA declared the bomb scare over. I can only guess that the plane had approximately zero passengers on board since the vast majority of us had no chance to clear security in that time. They must've really needed that plane in Phoenix or something.
Luckily I was able to get rerouted onto a flight to St. Louis with a connection to Phoenix that got me in around noon. Patrick was not so lucky. He was supposed to be on the same flight, but it took him several hours to get through the luggage check and security lines and he wouldn't be landing in Phoenix until 8PM.
Once I hit the ground I hopped in the rental car and headed toward Tucson with a quick stop at the In-N-Out Burger drive-thru for some pre-race fuel. Upon arrival in Tucson I threw my bike together like a NASCAR pit stop and made it to packet pickup and bike check-in with about a microsecond to spare. For some reason the packet pickup only went until 4PM. Seriously guys, if you're going to insist on this day-before crap at least extend it into the early evening. It would make life much easier for people coming from out of town.
I could've had it much worse however. By the time Patrick finally makes it to the hotel I've already been asleep for a couple hours.
The Pre-Race Jams
In honor of my recent entry into the M35-39 age group, here's an appropriately titled blast from the past:
The Race
Between the time zone change, the travel freakout the day before and general pre-race nervousness both Patrick and I are wide awake by 5AM. Patrick had negotiated a race morning packet pick up due to the airport drama, so he left for the race site pretty early. Our wave wasn't going until 8:15, so I sat there and watched TV for a couple hours before I headed out.
Once I arrived I quickly aired up my tires, set up my transition and emptied an entire spray can of sunscreen onto my pasty white midwestern skin. We actually got pretty lucky with the weather. It was in the high-70's/low-80's with light winds while we were racing. It could've easily been much, much hotter and windier.
After a more than likely inadequate warm-up jog I got in the start corral the moment they called my wave. The start line was extremely narrow and I wanted to stake out a spot on the front row so I wouldn't have to worry about getting boxed in by anyone else.
Right from the gun some maniac takes off at full on kamikaze suicide pace, a couple other guys try to follow, and 1/4mi in I'm sitting in 5th or 6th. Strangely enough, Patrick is not one of the guys in front of me. That should've been a giant red flag that I'm probably not pacing this run very intelligently. At about 1/2mi Patrick finally pulls around. I hit the first mile marker at 4:55 and I'm somewhere around 7th position nowhere near the leaders. Assuming that marker was in the right place I think that's my new mile PR. Even if it wasn't in the right place that opening mile was still damn fast.
Mile 2 is significantly downhill and I clock a 5:13, getting passed by 3 more guys in the process, which is pretty standard for me since I hate running downhill and seem to really suck at it compared to most of the guys I try to race with. Of course, what goes down must come up, and we soon make the turn to climb back toward transition. I manage to pass a bunch of guys on the uphill and come into transition 5th in my wave.
I got through transition quickly and headed out onto the bike course still in 5th. The bike course is a 2-loop out and back with constant rolling hills. The 50+ wave went out 15 minutes ahead of us, so there was a constant stream of traffic to pass. Because of all the traffic I never had that great of an idea of where the rest of the guys from my wave were, so I just did my best to keep hammering away. I made my way around the one and only guy from my wave I ever came into contact with at about mile 9, putting me in 4th.
Shortly after making the turnaround to start the 2nd lap I had one of the scarier moments of my racing life. Heading into a turn I'm rapidly approaching one of the guys from the earlier wave and screaming "ON YOUR LEFT!" at the top of my lungs. He seems to have heard me and looks to be setting up for a wide turn so I start to take the inside line, still shouting at him for good measure. Well, it turns out he must have interpreted "on your left" as "move to the left", because as soon as I get up next to him, he drifts over to me and we rub shoulders. Since I have more momentum I continue to pull ahead, and eventually his front wheel touches my back wheel and down he goes. Luckily there were two police officers working that intersection as well as a couple dozen spectators, so figuring that my stopping would serve no purpose I rode on.
The whole rest of the loop I'm replaying that incident in my head and praying that the guy isn't seriously messed up. I breathe a giant sigh of relief when I ride back through that corner ~15 minutes later and there are no body or bike parts on the ground and no ambulance on the scene. I would've felt like the world's biggest scumbag for riding off had that guy been seriously hurt. I jogged out to that intersection after the race and talked to one of the cops. He said the guy had some road rash, but was otherwise OK, refused any medical attention and left the scene under his own power. Everything happened so quickly I don't know what else I really could have done, but I still feel pretty shitty for being one half of an encounter that probably ruined someone's day.
I get through transition without any hiccups and head out onto the run course in 4th place, about 20 seconds back of the guy in 3rd. I manage the first mile in 5:15 this time around and look to be closing the gap a bit to 3rd, but I start to lose ground again as we head down the hill. I develop a wicked side stitch on the way down the hill, which is odd. It's been several years since that has happened. Did I mention I hate running downhill? Luckily the side stitch clears up toward the bottom and I try to maintain some type of reasonable form for the last push back up the hill. By now I'm in pretty rough shape and just ready to be done.
I enter the finish chute a few steps behind one of the 60+ guys from the first wave. Deciding that a finish line sprint with a guy who started 15 minutes ahead of me is ridiculous (and truthfully, a little afraid that I wouldn't even win said sprint), I set up shop about 10 yards behind him and cruise the last couple hundred meters, crossing the line in 4th.
When I cross the line I give Patrick (who finished 2nd overall, only a handful of seconds behind a guy who finished 2nd in the pro wave at last years Duathlon Nationals) a high five and and proceed to dry heave over a fence while Patrick is being interviewed.
Since the awards ceremony is at 6PM back at the host hotel we don't stick around long and collect our belongings as soon as the transition area is reopened. We head back to the hotel and to get cleaned up before a post-race refuel at In-N-Out.
This whole time we're still under the impression that we're 2nd and 4th overall. After returning to the hotel I get on the computer and check to see if the official results are posted. It turns out that I've been upgraded to 3rd overall since the guy who crossed the line in 3rd managed to somehow accumulate 6 minutes worth of penalties. And since the overall winner is Canadian, he's not eligible for the US championship (apparently he was racing in a one-man "open" division). That makes Patrick the US champ and me the runner up!
Minnesota was well represented at the awards ceremony, as not only were Patrick and I on the overall podium and winners of our respective age groups, but Bob Powers and Ben Ewers won their age groups as well.
So the first race of 2012 is over and done with. Patrick and I both brought home national championship jerseys and a hell of a lot of stories to tell (although most of them have more to do with the fake bomb scare than the race). I'll take that to kick off the season anytime.
Add me to your fan base. You are quite impressive, nephew
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