It's Not Always About the Podium....

3Sports Richmond TriClub Sprint Triathlon
Saturday April 27, 2013
Richmond, Virginia
400 meter swim
20K bike
5K run

This weekend I raced in Richmond,Virginia, home of one of the largest triathlon communities in the nation! What was really cool about this race was the special needs kids being pulled in boats, pulled by bikes, and pushed on the run! There were also paralympic triathletes racing! How inspiring! United Athletics was there, a group out of Midlothian, VA, which assists athletes to swim, bike, and run! The kids were really adorable and their assistors really smoked that course and even beat my swim time when they had to pull a boat! The race started with the amazing athletes from United Athletics! What a PERFECT way to start the race!

Before race start, I'm actually standing there on the left towards the front of the boats!

And the race is on!

You guys SMOKED the swim! Nice!

Jenna getting out ready for the bike!

I love that everybody had their name on their buggy so we could cheer you all along the way!!

What a finish!

Amazing!

Awesome!

Jenna ready for the podium!

You all are AMAZING!

So this was my highlight of the race! Watching people come together to make magic happen! You all are amazing! 

Richmond has so many coaches and training clubs and it is an amazing and a wonderful place to be! It is really a neat city because the people there always seem so happy and friendly! I had to laugh on the bike portion because as most of the guys would pass by (no girls passed me!) they would make some positive comment like "looking good!, dig deep!". Ofcourse with a bigger race you also had your crazies who don't like it when a girl passes by them and they make a many mile game out of passing you again and blocking you and you go around them and leave them in the dust and they find you again and block you. Seriously, this went on a large portion of the race! The guy finally passed me the last time coming in to dismount! He was really determined he was going to get to that dismount line before me! Well, at least it was entertaining but the part of slowing me down and blocking me was not THAT cool. 

All the athletes lined up in their corral! Almost 600 of us on the pool deck!

This race was offered at a new venue and was quite a unique pool swim. It was held in the Greater Richmond Aquatic partnership, a 50m, 7'7" deep pool, and home of the 2008 Olympic trials. It was set up to be an indoor "open water" swim. We were put in groups of 10 and sent out every 30 seconds and we went up and down 8 50m lanes around buoys. It was a unique experience and set up to be a race with an elite group in the first wave. The race started at 8 and I was placed in the 8:02:30 wave. Now, I am not the fastest in the water so I spent most of my swim being clobbered. Nothing like a great preparation for next weekend's race which is actually an open water swim! Now, speaking of clobbered, Dear Triathlon Dudes, there is no reason to beat the crap out of me continually in the water. You can pass by me without dragging my body down attempting to drown me and without beating me with your arms and kicking me in the face continually. Is there no sense of politeness in the water?? I do expect a degree of clobbering and I don't mind it at all but if the same person continually drags you down, hits you really hard, kicks you with so much force, and just doesn't go around you - that just is NOT necessary! Swim on "no manners" dude! 

Time in the car as we were heading down the road!

We left at 3 AM and got up at 2:30 AM in order to drive three hours to the race site. This was a new venue for everyone and I felt a bit uneasy having not had time to see the course before I rode and ran on it! While we arrived at 6AM, time flew by so fast that I just didn't have time to take many pictures and the next thing I knew I was just putting on my trisuit at the time when I was supposed to be in my corral on the deck at 7:40AM. I was a bit frazzled and didn't get a chance to warm up!

You would never guess that pink set up is mine :) 

You can't tell but the transition area was HUGE and L-shaped
The elites and earliest starters were on the end where I was and
it was a VERY long run with the bike to go in and out of the transition area!

Now coming into this race I knew the competition would be fierce! There were three other girls I needed to worry about in my age group and only three slots at the podium. We were only seconds apart in a race at the beginning of April and I managed to take a second place on the podium at that race. However I really only beat one girl on the run (just by a bit) and on the transitions. I also knew that all of these girls swam faster than me so it would be a very slim chance to get to the podium this time around because the swim was longer! 

Hugging the kids before I get started

My swim time was not so super. I was clobbered and drug down ALOT. The bike was painful but my average speed was 21.05mph. I knew I would have to pull a 23 minute or 7:30 pace run out of a hat if I expected to podium. The course was pretty flat, but running and I seem to have a love-hate-unknown-inconsistent relationship. My first mile was 7:29. Yay. I'm on schedule. Hang in there and get this done Kimbo! 2nd mile 7:40. Holy Smokes Kimberly, make up that 10 seconds! Uugh. Couldn't hold it. Dropped my pace to 8 in the third mile. This was a mental thing. It was a double loop. I hate loops. How many times did I have to see that finish line? I had thought I was closer to the finish in that third mile and still had so far to go it seemed. In the last quarter I took it from 7:27 to 6:52 at the end! I finished! I knew the run wasn't going to cut it or make up for the swim! My run time was 24:08. Not what I was shooting for but I did what I could do! The girl who took first in my Age Group had a run of 24:13, the second had a run of 24.19, and the third a run of 23.07. I came in at fourth with about a minute difference between me and third. I knew I had to pull that 23 minutes but just couldn't make it happen! 

Yes, I'm looking at my watch ALOT. What did I ever do before that awesome pink Garmin??

Swim Start!

My swim was pretty atrocious. Really, it is better than it would have ever been last year though! First place in my AG had a swim of 5:44, second at 6:50, third at 7:15, and me at a whopping 8:18. That is alot of time to have to make up in a sprint! I also have to realize that I just put my head in the water in 2010 (bobbing and didn't get across the lane until that May) and did some races through September that year, and then I didn't get back in the water until June of 2011. Really I only spent a couple of months in 2010 doing any swimming, biking, and running, and only worked on swimming towards the end of 2011 (from Nov-March) and this winter (from September - present). I never even ran except on race day until I got a coach in May of last year! So what I'm saying is that this is a technical sport and it takes time for improvement to happen. Yes, you see people all the time who have their first triathlon and they win overall. That happened at this crazy competitive race this weekend! But guess what, if they can swim that fast and run that fast - they clearly already were doing those things competitively before they dipped their hands in triathlon! 

So, pulling a podium win isn't everything. It was very competitive and I did the best I could do! I took 4th in my very competitive age group and 13th overall out of 161 females. That is still the top 8 % and what is even cooler is the people in my swim wave were way on down the list even though they smoked me on the swim! But my favorite part of the race was watching the athletes with United Athletics! They are the ones who work hard to make magic and happiness happen for many! They put a smile on TONS of faces!

I also had a great time seeing so many friends at the race! 

Angel Moyer

Connie Glueck

Kate Fisher

Liz Futrell

Trisha Holland

After the race we had tons of post race family fun! We headed to the Children's Museum in Richmond, to one of their malls for a yummy vegetable pasta at the California Pizza Kitchen, and to see a lululemon store in person for the first time! I totally walked away with two ruffled running skirts! Can't wait to wear them and run in them this summer! Ah, my very first lulus! So, it was a really fun weekend. While I had moments in the middle of racing wondering why in the world I do it (due to the pain!), I sure do love this thing called triathlon. I love watching magic happen and I'm going to keep chipping away always working on becoming a better triathlete. It takes time and I'm loving the journey!

Childrens Museum of Richmond:
http://www.c-mor.org/

Childrens Museum Cave

Eva

Eva - face painting at the museum!

Arie

Arie on the carousel at the museum

Arie

Thijs made a friend on the carousel!

Thijs having fun at the museum!

Thijs