IM 70.3 Las Vegas RR

It is with great mixed emotions that I write this report.

As I have made clear, competing at the Worlds for the 70.3 distance was my big goal for this year, and I was successful in qualifying for it at the KS 70.3 in June.

The result of the worlds were...well...a reflection of my own stupidity.  Because of that, this race report will not have the normal feel of my others.

First, just a bit of prelude for those who do not know:  the Las Vegas course is very fair and challenging for a Championship course.  The bike is almost constantly up and down, with a net rise in elevation, since T1 and T2 are maybe 15 miles apart.  None of the hills is excessively steep, but it's pretty relentless. It's September in Las Vegas, so it's going to be hot.  The run is a three loop L-shaped course that is basically up for half and down for half.  It's not steep, but it's certainly enough for you to notice at the end of a race!

I felt physically prepared.  I had a good taper and good training.  Unfortunately, I developed a head cold in the couple of days beforehand, but it was not enough to keep me out.  I felt more or less under control with some decongestant and pain reliever.

On the one hand, I am very pleased.  I had a great swim.  My time of 37:xx with no wetsuit was quite comparable to where I have been in wetsuit swims previously.  I got out of the water feeling strong and ready to go.  I had gotten some prescription goggles so I could see better and this was wonderful.

The bike transition there is nutty-long.  I got going fairly efficiently and was happy enough.  There were aid stations about every 12-13 miles, and I drank 8 bottles over the course of my ride, seven of which were Perform, and one water.  I was in nearly the last wave, so the course was not crowded at all.  As usual, I got passed going uphill and passed people going downhill.  While I would have been happier with a little faster bike split, I was intentionally being conservative, knowing the run would be very hot and tough.  After about an hour on the bike, some of the people in my AG who passed me were coming back to me...so everything seemed to be going as per my normal pattern.

I got onto the run, and started to go.  It was hot and difficult, but I was going fine.  However, I had a malfunction with my Garmin.  First, my HR strap battery apparently chose race day to poop out.  Either that or I was dead sometimes, and crazily high on my HR sometimes.  This was frustrating, because I had planned to race by HR rather than pace, given the course and conditions...so I went to RPE, glancing at pace.  Secondly, I don't know exactly what I did, but I was using the watch in multisport mode, and it did not behave as I expected... it stopped for a while and I really didn't notice until I had no idea how much it had missed...so I gave up using it for distance.

I continued my run and passed a particular landmark for the third time, and turned in to the finish.  I raced very hard the last mile or so, and managed to out race a couple of guys in my age group.  I was really excited...even though I knew it was totally middle of the pack stuff.

But in the end, I discovered that I had skipped one of the loops somehow.  I still can't figure out how this slipped past me because I was counting the mile markers as I went, but I can't deny the evidence.  My finish time of just under 5:00 is unrealistic, and I am missing two checkpoints (there were two of them per loop).  I was in decent enough condition and would not have had any trouble finishing the race more or less at the pace I was going.

I have made an estimate of how much longer I should have been on the course, and it's about 40 minutes, meaning I should have finished in about 5:40.

The irony is that - maybe because of the late start and therefore higher temps - maybe just the luck of the draw - who knows... that time of 5:40 would have been very close to the 50th percentile "A-goal" I had.  (That would have required a much faster time in 2011)

I am, of course, really frustrated about this.  But it has given me a mission to accomplish for 2013.  I have unfinished business.