Wasaga Beach SPRINT DUATHLON

So, the title says it all. Saturday was the day, that after 5 years of triathlons and a full season of training (including rides of up to 63 km, runs up to 12 km and bricks up to 40 km/5km) I was going to do my first every olympic triathlon (1500m swim, 40 km bike, 10 km run). Turns out the weather gods thought differently.

We arrived at the race site ready to go at 7:20 or so saturday morning. At our hotel there had been absolutely no wind and the pavement was dry. I was actually super excited for my race and the better than predicted weather. Not so much at the race site. The race is on the very bottom of Georgian bay. Strong winds from the north meant swells of 3-4 feet which were crashing for about the 200m closest to the shore. They announced as I was picking up my kit that the swim was cancelled and that they were changing the race to a duathlon. Every duathlon I've ever seen goes short run, bike, long run. Not so here, they had long run bike short run. So 10k run, 40 km bike, 5 km run. Joy.

I freaked out. I've never run before biking before (except running the mile to the gym to do a spinning workout, but I haven't even done that in a while). Secondly running 10K right now isn't easy so biking 40 km after running 10 km was very very daunting (not to mention having to run again) - Note: I've never done a duathlon before today. So I opted out of the olympic/international distance race and switched over to the sprint triathlon instead hoping for the water to calm down in the next few hours.

2 hours later, sure enough the swim got cancelled for the sprint as well, turning it into a duathlon as well, this one seemed a lot less daunting 5 km run, 20 km bike, and a 2.5 km run.

Run 1: My goal for the first run was to take it pretty easy and to finish in about 30 minutes (not easy long run pace, but not race pace either, my 5K best time is < 25 minutes but I doubt I could run that right now). The first 300m or so were in the sand (ick) so I started off super slowly and was definitely one of the last in my wave to get onto the pavement. The rest of the run was spent passing a few people in front of me that took off too fast and getting passed by a lot of people in the wave behind me. This put me onto a position in the bike that I've never been in before - at the end of the pack for my wave. I'm a good swimmer and am usually at the front of my wave. Finished in 28 something so faster than my plan

Bike: Yippee! fun course, there were about 3 km or so that were gradual uphill that were into the wind that were not so fun, but it made for a fast return with speeds getting up to 55.5 km/h :) I like hammering down hills. The benefit of starting the bike near the end of the wave is getting to pick people off I passed about a dozen people over the 20 km but only one or 2 were in my age group, the rest were 20-24 F. (with the odd guy thrown in). Man, if I were only a year younger that would have been a great ego boost Only one gal passed me the entire ride and she was the winner of 30-35 and in the top 5 over all. She started the race 2 waves behind me, but didn't pass until the final kms of the bike. My only problem on the bike course is that all summer I was focusing on going further and not faster so my calves were cramping a bit in protest. finished in 42 something, but my speed from my bike computer and the speed from the mats don't match so either the course was long or something wonky happened with timing in there.

Run 2: My calves knotted up in transition and I thought the run would be horrible but it worked itself out quickly. I didn't have a lot of oomph left, but the 2.5 km went super quickly and before I knew it, I was at the finish line with a bit of a look of confusion on my face. second run 12:5x (go me!)

Other thoughts - the run courses and the run in transitions were on beach and were like a death march. I hate running in sand.
- I don't understand why they had the long run at the beginning but meh.
-I didn't get to do my olympic triathlon but I did get to do something else new, a duathlon, so the day wasn't a complete waste.

I got 3rd place athena woman (ie. heavier than average), but still don't know my official times on any of it (other than the final finish time was 1:29:04 - I think I had a nap in T1 - my time was over 3 minutes! ack!)

After thoughts - I was disappointed that I didn't get to do my race that I have been training for all summer. For a bit I was upset and thought they should do the swim anyways since anyone doing an olympic race should be able to swim in that surf, but then I realized that it really is for the safety of the athletes that they cancelled it. I may be able to swim in that surf, but I'm a strong swimmer, and I know other people would be incredibly intimidated by it. I think I'll be mulling over it for a few days before I decide what to do. Next summer I want to do a Half Ironman, but I would have wanted to do an olympic race before I commit to the training. Now I don't have the experiance and being in the frigid north that is Canada, won't have another opportunity this season. I'll have to be thinking that one over.