Well, at least this race report is being written the day after, as opposed to the month after for my last race report. Yesterday I competed in the Door County Half Ironman, finishing in 30th place overall, which includes the one female who finished in front of me. The first place male and female from High Cliff repeated their performances in Door County, so props to them.
Door County and Pre-Race
My wife and I stayed at the Door County Lighthouse Inn Bed and Breakfast, which I highly recommend. It was around $150/night and it includes an awesome home cooked breakfast (more on why this is such a great value below). The inn is a converted house I think, and has 5 rooms, plus quarters for the owners. There were three other couples there while we were there, and 2 of them were competing in the Triathlon (well the men were). In addition to breakfast, there were fresh homemade raisin cookies always available, which we took full advantage of. I felt guilty brining my bike into the room, because instead of the industrial strength, dark colored carpet you see in most hotels, this was very soft, plush off-white carpet. So I left my bike locked in the car for the first time.
Friday night we decided to go in search of a fish fry, and we didn’t have too much luck. We were pretty hungry and decided to just get a table at the second restaurant we tried. This resulted in a $40 bill and I was still hungry. So we went to get ice cream, and that was $10, and I got totally ripped off on my ice cream sunday. What a joke, we spend less then $9 at cold stone for a small and a medium and my $6 sunday consisted of 2 scoops of ice cream and some chocolate sauce. We happened to stop at a Culvers the following night to use the bathroom while we were driving the bike course and I noticed that the value baskets were $1 more then in Madison! Needless to say, Friday night, I had some of those raisin cookies.
Saturday morning we slept in until 8 and then went out to the main room for breakfast at 8:30 am. We got a generous serving of fresh fruit, a giant omelet and two home made muffins. It would have easily cost $15 a person at an area restaurant, which is why I said this place was such a good deal. After breakfast I went to work on my bike. I had rented a HED Jet 6 front wheel, which was brand new, never used. Unfortunately, the shop forgot to put rim tape on it and I blew the tube they had put in it the day before. So on my way up I picked up some rim tape and got that all taken care of. Then I had to readjust my front brake to get the wheel to fit properly, and make some minor adjustments to get my wheel cover to turn without rubbing anything.
After the bike was good to go, we headed out to take in the sights. We stopped at Peninsula State Park and walked around a bit. My wife wanted to go check out the light houses, but the one at the state park cost $5/person for the tour, and the other 3 were in county parks you had to pay admission to get into as well. So we ended up just driving around door county a bit and ended up back at the hotel in the mid-afternoon. It was pretty warm out, and driving around made me sleepy, so I took a short nap, before we went to Murphy Park for race registration and packet pickup.
The first thing I noticed when we got to the park, was the ample, marked parking in the field across from the park. It looked very well thought out, and everything only looked more and more professional as we made our way thru packet pick up. This turned out to be the best run race I have ever attended (in my brief 2 years as a triathlete). A local bike store had a Speed Concept on display, in black, and size small, with a $500 store credit if you bought it that day. Had the owner been a little more willing to work with me on component selection, I would have bought it. But to be fair to the owner, it was at the end of a long day, he probably had a lot of “interested” people already, and I don’t look like the type who would/can buy a 9.8 speed concept on sight.
After packet pickup, we set out for dinner. During our earlier drive around door county, we found an Italian restaurant just north of Fish Creek on the right hand side (I’m forgetting the name). This turned out to be a pretty good value, and good food. Going for dinner at 5 turned out to be a good idea, because the place was packed by the time we left.
Next up was a another drive around door county, the part most people probably never see, in order to scout the bike course. We also drove up bluff pass, home to the infamous bluff I would have to run up the next day and was kind of disappointed. Given all the hype, I expected seeing this hill to give me nightmares, but it’s not the worse I’ve had to run up (well that’s what I thought the, lets see what I thought the next day). We got back to our hotel and got to bed pretty early. Even though it was a 8am start, they wanted us there by 6:30 and I thought it would be nice to get to a race early enough to warm up for a change.
Race Morning
Woke up to a pretty dark room, but at least it didn’t sound like it was raining out. Looked out the window, ground was wet, sky was dark, but it wasn’t raining. I made my first trip outside to pack up the car and was greeted with warm and very humid air. I couldn’t decide what would be worse, rain, or sun plus high humidity. I figured it wasn’t something I could control, and after racing thru the monsoon at PigMan last year, I knew I could handle the rain.
We arrived at the park by 6:30 (or at least we were parked by 6:30) and I started to get my stuff ready. I aired up my tires, and proceeded to leave my crack-pipe adapter attached to my air pump and didn’t realize it until someone asked to borrow my adapter in transition. Thankfully the latest CO2 air adapter I have works with disc wheels (and wheel covers) without an adapter. With it looking like it was going to rain, my wife decided to just go back to sleep in the car.
I got setup in Transition and also managed to get in a little run and bike. There was a report of lightening in the area, so they delayed the start of the race until 8:30. 2 spots down from me in transition was the exact same green/white Speed Concept I tried out at Emerys in Milwaukee a few weeks ago. I wasn’t a fan of the green and white so I decided to pass on it for now. I saw a Red/White speed concept, and it looks better in person then online. It’s pretty similar to the red/white Cervelo P2C, so I might consider that color (yeah, I’m thinking about drinking the Speed Concept kool-aid if you can’t tell).
I should note that I got to setup in the rack closet to the water for a change. That was because I registered for the elite wave. The criteria for the elite wave was that you could swim 1 mile in 30 minutes or less, which I knew I could, so I thought why not? It would be a change to race starting at the front as opposed to starting in one of the middle waves for a change. It’s more fun to start a little later as you get to pass more people, but starting in the “elite” wave made me feel like I had to be more serious.
Swim and T1
Like I said, the race was delayed until 8:30 and we started pretty much at 8:30. The water was calm, clear and warm (72 I think). I tried my hand at drafting, but don’t have enough patience, so that’s something I have to work on. I noticed a couple of wetsuits at the beginning and at the end, which means I could have drafter off of them saving energy and still going just as fast. The trick is to identify those people early on next time. They had wet suit strippers, which is always nice, but I think this is where I dropped my GPS (old one I wear under my swim cap) and lost it. I do remember stopping it as I was getting out of the water with a time around 30:40 and my chip time was 30:56. This was the fasted 1.2 mile swim I’ve ever had, but it’s only been the second out of four half-iron events that has had a full 1.2 mile swim.
I had my usual slow T1. This time it was due in part to the chance of rain in the forecast. I figured it would be nice to at least start with dry shoes, so I put my stuff in a plastic bag and that slowed me down a bit. Although forgetting to put a sock on first on the right foot caused just as much of a problem. I’d go sockless but my shoes are old and the insides are starting to wear. I should probably stop drooling over a Speed Concept and buy a new pair of tri-shoes for the bike 
Bike
My plan on the bike was the same as High-Cliff, keep it nice and easy. My heart rate wasn’t as high, so I think I paced the swim pretty well this time. The bike was pretty uneventful, and that’s how its supposed to be these longer triathlons. A well paced bike, sets you up to be able to have a solid run (i.e. run, don’t walk the run portion).
I heard a weird sound coming from my back wheel around mile 18, but couldn’t figure it out. I stopped for a few seconds just to check things over and didn’t see anything. A few miles later the sound got louder and then I realized it was the sticker on the wheel cover that covers the value stem cutout. Stopped again and pulled it all the way off. Note to self, those things only last 2 races, not 3.
While the sky looked bad at times, we only got a couple very light showers. With the wet conditions, my drive train started to sound very rickety, but everything held together for the duration of the race.
I passed a few people, and got passed a couple of times as well. I thought I was pushing it harder by 10 watts compared to High-Cliff, but it turns out I had almost the exact same average power, work (kj) and training stress score. However, according to my last FTP test, I should have been able to push it another 10 watts, so I’ll give that a try at my next race.
T2 and Run
I got off the bike and stopped at the port-o-potties on the way to the rack. I didn’t have as bad of stomach discomfort as I did at High-Cliff, but I still had to go to the bathroom. I’m glad I did, as I was able to pass some gas which would have bothered me on the run. So once again, my T2 was slow, but I’m not going to worry about that until I can shave a few more minutes off my run and bike splits.
I saw Jessica from SBR coaching as I was leaving T2, or rather she saw me and cheered me on. I saw my wife sitting near the finishing shoot which we had to pass, and she cheered me on as well (of course). It’s nice having people that you know cheer you on.
I started out pretty fast on the run, with my pace at under 7 minutes/mile, which was a little faster then what I wanted to do. However, my heart rate was pretty low and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t slow down, so I just went with it. I was able to maintain this comfortable pace for about 3 miles, and then I started to slow down slightly while maintaining the same effort. Even thought I thought the bluff at mile 10 wasn’t the killer it was hyped to be, I was content to play it safe this year.
The run course takes you thru the main section of Egg Harbor, so there were tons of people cheering you on. Just after a turn around point near mile 6, I saw someone I knew (and that they are comparable to me time wise) coming up from behind and decided I needed to up my pace a bit. Right after the turn around we had a long up hill section and I was able to get up it pretty quick and no one was gaining on me. After the uphill we had an equally long down hill which was nice. I passed one person on the way down and then we were running back thru egg harbor.
I just ran my race for the next couple of miles, checking over my shoulder to see that no one was coming up on me. Then all of a sudden some guy appears out of no where and passes me with little effort around mile 8.5. I make the left hand turn onto Bluff Pass road around mile 9 and Jessica was there on her bike cheering people (and me) on. The hill starts at mile 9.2 and lasted until 9.6 I think. I just shortened my stride up and took my time getting to the top. I knew there was an aid station at the top and since I had a bottle with me I could grab some fluids and keep going. I think I was able to pass one person at the aid station, and then saw three more people on the long straight road in front of me. I told myself I got 2 miles to pass those three people.
I caught the first one at the aid station at mile 11, and the second shortly after. I had the third guy in my sights and was closing the gap, but it was taking a long time. I got within 10 yards by the time we hit the last aid station at mile 12 when some women ran up to him and started pacing him back towards the finish line, which did not make me happy. Thankfully she left and went back towards the aid station after a half mile or so, and I started closing in on those last 10 yards.
The last 1/4 mile, maybe a little more is all down hill. It starts gradual and then increases in steepness until it bottoms out at the intersection just before the finishing chute, and then you got 100 yards downhill to the finish line. So just as I start to feel the ground pitch down and pick up my pace and pass the 3rd guy I spotted after climbing the bluff. He stayed with me for a bit but I just started letting gravity take over, trying to just fall forward and let the hill do the rest. Just as I approached the really steep section, I caught a glimpse of another guy just in front of me. Would I be able to catch him? At this point I really try to just do a controlled fall down the hill. My pace exceeded a 5 minute/mile pace and I looked behind me to see the guy I just passed letting me go. I got to the intersection and was still picking up speed, but wouldn’t have enough distance to try to make a final pass. I crossed the line at 4:39:47.2 and the guy just in front of me was 6.9 seconds faster.
Post Race
I drank 40 oz of water and sat in a “ice-bath” for about 10 minutes immediately following the race. The water was cool, but probably could have been colder now that I think about it (anything would have felt cool after running 13 miles), but it still helped. It’s nice to see races supplying ice baths, and I hope its a trend that continues.
We hung around for a bit and talked to a few people that we knee, but then the sky started getting dark again. I figured it would be more enjoyable to load up the car before it started raining, so I headed back to transition and packed up. I don’t think it ended up raining, but it was still good to be on the road home, as it’s a decent length drive back to Madison.
Results
Swim: 30:55
T1: 2:09
Bike: 2:30:04
T2: 2:57
Run: 1:33:39
Total: 4:39:47
Male Division: 29 out of 545 (30 out of 546 with the one female placing ahead of me)
M30-34: 9 out of 83
Overall I am pleased with my results. Most of the time difference between Door County and High Cliff is due to the correct swim distance at Door County. My power meter says the bike was almost exactly the same. I’d say the run was pretty close to the same as well. Door Country might have been a little more difficult course wise, but it was a little warmer at High Cliff.
Next Up
I have five weeks until my next race, Pigman, and then three weeks until Ironman. I’m going to work my way slowly back into training this week, and then go hard for three weeks. This gives me a week off before Pigman, where I can try to atone for last year, go hard, and put everything I’ve learned into practice in order to build some confidence heading into Ironman. After Pigman, I’ll have a mix of rest and long rides (70 miles), plus one last power test to see what my goal wattage for the bike should be on race day.