Confessions of a Bike Racer
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Triguy98 posted 2 years ago.
My first sprint last year didn't exactly go the way i wanted it to, and neither did my first Oly. Ya just gotta learn the lessons and fight to improve. It gets easier... sort of.
My first open water swim came 2 months after starting with a masters swimming team. I just took it easy and swam my own pace. I am also near sighted and had fogging problems. Got a new pair of aquapheres and havent looked back.
Glad you had fun even in light of the race not going your way.
Some advice for next season: STAY away from the Dunedin Beach sprint. It sucks. Seriously. Mad Beach and Sand Key are two nicely run races.
Life is short. Play hard and get dirty doing it.
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1101 days
deepbluex posted 2 years ago.
You did great - finishing 3rd in your division! Swimming a couple of laps in a pool v. in open water with dozens of people within striking distance of your body is a very jarring first experience and a vertical learning curve indeed. Relaxed slow strokes go out the window as breathing rhythm gets disrupted by choppy water or splashing near your face and by then your head starts to tell you you're in danger. But now that you've been in the thick of it, it will only get better.
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1360 days
RV posted 2 years ago.
My first Sprint experience was a little similar to yours - I was the second to last out of the water - thought I was going to drown. Ended up finishing the swim on my back. It was great to get on the bike and start picking people off. The race became fun again. When I crossed the finish line I was hooked and immediately signed up for more and went to work on the swim.
I then went the TI route - however swimming in open water is still different than pool swimming. The problem for me was going out too hard and getting into O2 debt and then that threw me out of any semblence of form - your basic struggling. Once I was able to keep myself on a steady pace, and go out slow things turned around for me in open water.
You had an great finish - and it just keeps getting better. Have fun.
RV
It takes a long time to get good. - Scott Molina
Slow is smooth; smooth is fast. - Rich Strauss
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1548 days
virturace posted 2 years ago.
First, a huge congrats! Bike being my slowest leg - I can always appreciate a good cyclist on the list to pick from.
Second - the open water failure is your best training. Triathlon is unlike so many other sports in that you almost HAVE to fail to get better. I'm sure that 90% of us on here could tell a very similar story about their first open-water race. No amount of training in the pool will help you on race day until you get all of the other stuff out of your head. Your biggest skill in open water is being able to shut everything and everyone else out and swim your race. You have to learn to take the hits and the pulling and the sighting problems, etc and just shut it all off - ignore it. The only way to get better at that is to 1) get some friends to come to the gym and beat the heck out of you while you swim laps (I've actually seen this done), or 2) enter any and every open water event that you can.
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Just completed my first triathlon, The Boca Bop in Boca Grande Florida, a sprint triathlon.
I have to confess that this was way harder than I thought it would be. I'm a reasonably competitive Masters Bike Racer, with a few accomplishments this summer (Silver Medal L'Etape de Tour, 10th place Brasstown Bald Century, 4th place Deland Road Race, 14th Florida State TT championship.) So I thought a sprint triathlon would be pretty easy (hey I can't swim or run, but it's short). In fact, it was much more difficult than I expected.
The swim was my downfall. While I practiced for several weeks, read the TI book, and thought I was ready to swim at least a mid pack time, when I got in the water, everything I had drilled on just fell apart. I had huge problems sighting (fogged goggles and being near sighted didn't help) was on the edge of panic, and nearly quit. Fortunately my fear of humiliation trumped my fear of drowning and i sucked it up and finished the swim, with a terrible time (19:31, compared to the first place time of 7:13)
Starting the bike leg my HR was sky high because I had used everything I had just to finish the swim. So the first half of the bike was way below my planned pace. (Also, my self esteem, and willingness to push myself was about zero at this point.) Fortunately, I pulled it together a little bit, and I ended up with a decent bike split (1st in my division, and top ten overall).
Suprisingly, my run wasn't half bad (2nd in my division) and I ended up 3rd in the Clydesdales overall.
Conclusions: 1) I am very impressed by those of you that do all 3 of these disciplines well. 2) even a sprint triathlon is an accomplishment 3) I'm never swimming in open water again, without more practice and instruction.
As for the race itself. The Boca Bop is a fantastic race. Wonderful Course, great support. And Boca Grande is a fantastic place to visit. We stayed at the Gasparilla Inn, and had a great weekend.
And the best part of the weekend, My daughter won the Female under 14 age group!