Planned on going out hard and racing my own race. Last weekend I got screwed up trying to keep up with people who were sighting horribly, so this time I decided to do my best on my own, and if I can find feet to draft, *maybe* I'll use them.

I was a few people over from my friendly buddy rival Cesar at the start. We often share a lane at swim when he's not in the lane up for me, so I knew he'd be a great guy to try and hold on to. So I moved over to start right behind him. This worked out perfectly.

When the race started, I held on to Cesar (who mentioned his strategy was also go go out hard) for the first 200m. We were in the top-10 swimmers in our wave, and we were all moving in a very straight line to the first set of buoys.

After the halfway point, there was a yellow buoy (which we were allowed to pass on either side) marking a dogleg turn. There were two kayaks blocking one side of it, pointing to the left for us to go around. I was on the right of another swimmer in my wave. He didn't seem to see the kayaks, so he kept going straight. I tried to nudge him to the left, and he didn't seem to care. I swam into him a bit, and he finally realized what he had to do. He cut the buoy close, leaving me no room. So I dove under the buoy and passed him. BAM!!!

There were a few more feet that I randomly kept onto, but I didn't let anyone else swim my race for me. When they went the wrong way I dumped them.

The swim exit was a ramp with a rail. I grabbed the top of the rails as soon as I could reach, until I was shallow enough to step up and run.

Nothing at all.

I forgot to bring cooking spray. It works so much better than vaseline for me. Wetsuit wasn't perfect getting removed, but it wasn't bad.

Also forgot elastics for my shoes, so I lost about a second or two there. Not too bad.

See above.

The bike started off very well. There were a few sharp turns in the early section, which were handled well. When I got onto the Gardiner, it was easy to settle into a nice pace. The eventual AG winner passed me soon after this, and I knew I wouldn't be able to hold on to him for long. I had no idea that I just had the lead taken from me—good thing, since I may have done something stupid and blown up trying to keep 10m behind him.

There were some big potholes early on, and my asthma inhaler popped out of my homemade storage box (oops). My wave was one of the first few, so there weren't too many people from other waves to pass. The ones that were there were going way too slow to really help. I passed them far too quickly.

As I passed one of these people, there was a marshall on a motorcycle who made some kind of motion to me. No, not a penalty—there was no reason for one. I was *well* within 20 seconds in the draft zone (more like 10). I think it was just a signal to say "I'm keeping my eye on you." Fair enough—he had no idea how long I actually was taking to pass either way.

The winds were fairly gusty, and I was getting blown around a fair bit. I've never ridden with big wheels before. I got used to getting blown around (especially on the return), but I had to make sure that I left enough space beside me when I was passing. This slightly defeated my ability to slingshot off slower riders.

After the turnaround I realized how much of a tailwind we had on the way out. I kept my power in check, and prevented myself from doing something stupid. Just stick to the plan. I took what turned out to be the only gel of the race, and kept pushing on.

Around 12k in I started VIMing. This was responsible for me losing a bit of my focus (and causing me to have my least-consistent power-wise 5k split). After that cleared up I was able to continue at the pace I was at. I was looking behind me at the last turnaround to see if anyone was catching, and I could see a few guys who I didn't remember passing. I did already pass them, but my brain was a bit foggy. They pushed me through the last section.

I think I would love doing crits. The last section took us through the Honda Indy track, and through the tight chicane by the Better Living Centre. There was a volunteer there warning people to slow down (as well as a sign saying the same). I completely ignored both. Errr, not *completely,* I thanked the volunteer for the warning and barrelled through.

I made some serious time on the guy ahead of me through here. Just a little confidence was enough to make it through successfully.

Eat a bit less before the race.

I don't want talk about this. If I didn't have any witnesses I could have just let it all slide, but I had such an amateur moment. My only screw up of the race.

When I ran back to rack my bike, I forgot my race number. All the racks were numbered, and I knew where I was. About. But since there were only another handful of bikes in transition (and none on my rack), I didn't recognize any of it.

I could hear Annie and Jennifer cheering and yelling (and then laughing), when I ran my bike to the next rack over. I saw the numbers there were FAR off, so I then ran back to my rack, recognized the shopping bag I hid my shoes under, and had my transition.

I deserved the "that was a nice transition" comment on the way out!

LOL!

I can't believe how well this run went. I felt good as soon as I started running, and about 1k in I hit the "I can't believe I'm trying to hold onto this pace, I'm going to die" feeling that I got last week at that time.

I picked a pace that I thought would be a best-case-scenario pace, and tried to hold onto that as long as I could. It was 4:20. I held onto it for the first k, then the second, then I felt like I could keep it up the whole time.

I saw Cesar after the turnaround. He was far behind me at this point. He sounded surprised. I think he said "George! What?"

It was a good feeling run. I was cheering on the people I passed, and the one or two guys that passed me (as long as they weren't in my AG (which they weren't)). I saw friends who had finished the Olympic as I neared the last km, and I said hi.

There wasn't much left in me for the final kick. I paced that really really well. I tried to turn it up slightly as I entered the park, but at this point I really didn't care. I knew I nailed it, and anything else was unnecessary.

Nothing

Gave in my timing chip, then ran a few hundred meters in the park. When I got back into the food area, Cesar saw me and told me how hard he was trying to catch me, and how he wanted to kick me. LOL! He's the best.


In this race (and in all of them), probably the run. I could still stand to be faster. It's been my best run yet, but it's still not enough to perform at a comparable level to my bike and my swim.

I feel like my bike power output is lower than it should be right now too. I haven't spent much time training on the bike this year, and I feel like my functional threshold should be significantly higher at this point in the season.


Loved the race. Only minor complaint—ribbons instead of medals for placing. I know we all got medals for finishing, which was nice, but it *was* something I was looking forward to when I realized that I had placed second.