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09-07-09, 05:37 PM
I posted this in the Training & Nutrition Forum under another thread I started earlier in the week, but I thought I'd like to share this here since I'm a long standing Clyde here.
Yesterday I completed the 12 mile cycling portion of a Team Sprint Triathlon Relay. This was my first time ever in a competitive event on my bicycle and I had a ball. I was initially worried about being the fattest dude out there and getting blown away by the competition, but I was all wrong, and the event was just too fun. So I must bore you all with the details.
Since this was a Team Sprint Triathlon our bikes were required to be in the transition area on the racks during the whole event. Prior to the event I rode my bike from my sisters house to the start/finish area which was just a couple miles, but it gave me an opportunity to spin a little bit and get the blood flowing. I was worried about not having a longer warm up but I think I did fine without one. However, due to the number of people registered to compete it would actually be an hour and a half before I would even think about starting off on my cycling segment. Therefore a warm up would have been useless that early before my segment.
I used this first event to watch and observe all the other experienced and inexperienced triathletes go through their routines. I witnessed NO other cyclist warming up. I guess because those triathletes that were completing all three segments by themselves would already be warmed-up from swimming the first segment. My sister swam the pool event in about 8 minutes after waiting an hour for her turn to jump in the water. I did some stretches for my calves, hams and quads during the ten minutes before she finished and we had to trade the tracking chip for my segment to begin.
I have been back riding my bike again since August, after approximately an 18 month couch session and have gained a lot of weight during that time. Since August I have lost about 25lbs and continue to do so, however I'm still a big clyde at 245lbs and only 5'8" tall. Based on my group rides and training rides here where I live I expected a 4o-45 minute 12 mile race, depending on the route, weather and how I felt going out.
I had a smooth transition from the hand-off of the chipped leg-band and running the bike to the mounting area. Some of the experienced triathletes that were competing solo and not doing relays kept their shoes clipped into the pedals and just mounted the bike and slipped into their shoes on the roll out. Very interesting technique. I found the course to be pretty flat throughout with some real small roller hills, but just enough to feel the quads burn on load. I went out the chute with a pretty fast rider in front of me and we were averaging around 24mph for the first mile and a half. I knew I needed to settle down and pace myself as I'd be riding for another half hour or so. I dropped into a rhythm and wound up keeping the pace pretty steady throughout the ride and found my Garmin showing sustained speeds of 18-22mph pretty constant throughout. I finished the 12 mile route in 38:40 which was faster than my goal of 40 minutes. I averaged 18.1 mph which is a lot faster than most of my actual ride averages of 15.8 or 16.
My brother-in-law picked up the chip from me in the transition area and took off for the 5k run. He finished pretty respectably and we finished at just over an hour for the whole relay. Out of 25 teams we finished 7th overall and I finished 8th out of the cyclist. There were some 400 other individual participants which I have not had a chance to compare my results with thiers yet.
After the ride I felt great. I could tell that I had been sucking wind on a few grades during the ride as my lungs had that feeling they get after a long hard ride.
I think if this would have been just a bicycle race it would have been more appropriate to do a warm up on the trainer just before the race, but due to the organization of the triathlon it would have been really difficult to do this. However, I might have done a little better had I been warmed up from the start. How much would I have gained on my 38:40 time? Who knows? Maybe put us in fifth or sixth place? In the grand scheme of things it doesn't really matter as we had a blast and this was a great result for my first triathlon event. Next year I'd like to try it solo, but I suck at swimming.
Yesterday I completed the 12 mile cycling portion of a Team Sprint Triathlon Relay. This was my first time ever in a competitive event on my bicycle and I had a ball. I was initially worried about being the fattest dude out there and getting blown away by the competition, but I was all wrong, and the event was just too fun. So I must bore you all with the details.
Since this was a Team Sprint Triathlon our bikes were required to be in the transition area on the racks during the whole event. Prior to the event I rode my bike from my sisters house to the start/finish area which was just a couple miles, but it gave me an opportunity to spin a little bit and get the blood flowing. I was worried about not having a longer warm up but I think I did fine without one. However, due to the number of people registered to compete it would actually be an hour and a half before I would even think about starting off on my cycling segment. Therefore a warm up would have been useless that early before my segment.
I used this first event to watch and observe all the other experienced and inexperienced triathletes go through their routines. I witnessed NO other cyclist warming up. I guess because those triathletes that were completing all three segments by themselves would already be warmed-up from swimming the first segment. My sister swam the pool event in about 8 minutes after waiting an hour for her turn to jump in the water. I did some stretches for my calves, hams and quads during the ten minutes before she finished and we had to trade the tracking chip for my segment to begin.
I have been back riding my bike again since August, after approximately an 18 month couch session and have gained a lot of weight during that time. Since August I have lost about 25lbs and continue to do so, however I'm still a big clyde at 245lbs and only 5'8" tall. Based on my group rides and training rides here where I live I expected a 4o-45 minute 12 mile race, depending on the route, weather and how I felt going out.
I had a smooth transition from the hand-off of the chipped leg-band and running the bike to the mounting area. Some of the experienced triathletes that were competing solo and not doing relays kept their shoes clipped into the pedals and just mounted the bike and slipped into their shoes on the roll out. Very interesting technique. I found the course to be pretty flat throughout with some real small roller hills, but just enough to feel the quads burn on load. I went out the chute with a pretty fast rider in front of me and we were averaging around 24mph for the first mile and a half. I knew I needed to settle down and pace myself as I'd be riding for another half hour or so. I dropped into a rhythm and wound up keeping the pace pretty steady throughout the ride and found my Garmin showing sustained speeds of 18-22mph pretty constant throughout. I finished the 12 mile route in 38:40 which was faster than my goal of 40 minutes. I averaged 18.1 mph which is a lot faster than most of my actual ride averages of 15.8 or 16.
My brother-in-law picked up the chip from me in the transition area and took off for the 5k run. He finished pretty respectably and we finished at just over an hour for the whole relay. Out of 25 teams we finished 7th overall and I finished 8th out of the cyclist. There were some 400 other individual participants which I have not had a chance to compare my results with thiers yet.
After the ride I felt great. I could tell that I had been sucking wind on a few grades during the ride as my lungs had that feeling they get after a long hard ride.
I think if this would have been just a bicycle race it would have been more appropriate to do a warm up on the trainer just before the race, but due to the organization of the triathlon it would have been really difficult to do this. However, I might have done a little better had I been warmed up from the start. How much would I have gained on my 38:40 time? Who knows? Maybe put us in fifth or sixth place? In the grand scheme of things it doesn't really matter as we had a blast and this was a great result for my first triathlon event. Next year I'd like to try it solo, but I suck at swimming.