Ashland Race Report

If I didn't know any better, I'd have thought I'd stepped into a time warp. I did this race last year under the exact same circumstances and the weather was absolutely identical. The Kropelnickis were nice enough to let me stay at their house like last year, and that morning I drove Jesse and I over and it was a nice change from last week when Mooseman has gotten too big to do a nice, incredibly low-key race. We parked right next to transition - as did everyone else who was there, I signed up when I arrived, the transition area wasn't even entirely set up. The start time said 8am, but in reality it should've read, "Somewhere around 8-ish" but you know, as long as you are aware of that fact, then it's not a big deal to me.

It was a dreary morning of course, as a lot of them have been lately, and it started to rain right about the time we arrived, which again, was exactly like 2009. Also, once the race started, the rain stopped, which again was exactly like 2009. After hiding out in the car during the worst of the rain, I quickly got my transition are set up and headed down to the water - and I do mean down. You arrive at this venue wondering to yourself, um, where the heck is the water? The answer is that it is down a muddy trail, about a quarter-mile from transition. Last year I made it nearly all the way to the lake before I slipped on the last downslope and had myself a little mudslide in my wetsuit. Fortunately, this year I managed to remain on my feet the entire time.

I was in the third swim wave - out of three, with the rest of the women. One other thing I enjoy about small races is small swim waves and knowing that it is very unlikely that I am going to get the crap kicked out of me. I was right. The water was incredibly comfortable, maybe a tiny bit choppy, but the swim is very well-marked and easy to follow. So I knew I had the opportunity to have a good swim and I went for it. I think the waves were something like three minutes apart and I managed to come out with quite a few people from the first swim wave so I figured I had at least set myself up in a good spot.

Then came time to climb the mountain to get back to transition. After about two minutes of this, I was pretty sure I was about to throw up, so I decided to ease back a bit and just make sure I got up there without falling or vomiting up my applesauce. Once I finally made it to my bike it was pretty quick to get out of there.

Now, since my training and racing has not gone so much according to plan this season, we are playing around with some new tactics. For example, this week we decided that I am now going to do my run workouts by pace instead of heart rate for fear that I might never be able to run faster than I can walk backwards if left to fight with heart rate limits. For the race, my goal was to "keep the heart rate stimulated." That is, find a heart rate on the bike - Jesse didn't care what it was - keep it there and make sure it doesn't drop at all on the run. So that was the little game I was left to play on the day.

Right out onto the bike my usual response is to pedal as hard as I can. Right out of the gate my heart rate was in the low 180's, although probably partly due to the swim still and that run up the trail, but I knew that was going to be nearly impossible to maintain for two more hours, so going against my normal instincts, I eased up quite a bit. It was incredibly hard for me to do that, especially early on and going up hills while I watched other people pass me.

It's a two-loop course that has more uphills on the first loop and more downhills on the second loop right after you cross the Boston Marathon start line painted in the road. It was wet and dreary, but not raining, so that was nice. I managed to pass a lot of people on the downhills and flats, so that was nice, but I knew I wasn't going nearly as hard as I could've. I settled on targeting 172 as my heart rate for the bike, which is my threshold. It was really tough to keep it down on the hills, but for once I was actually trying to practice a bit of patience on the bike. It wasn't that fun, and I'd say that's more of a heart rate that I used to ride a half ironman at, but hey, I had to try something new.

After a nice, short bike ride of 26 miles it was already time to get off and run. I think I might've been the first woman off the bike, but I know from recent experience that was not to last long. Transition was quick and I headed out on the run course to wonder what was going to happen. The run starts with a long, gradual uphill before taking a hard right and heading down a long hill. It's sort of a lollipop-shaped course through some little neighborhoods that leave you wondering if you are still on the correct course since there are many occasions in which you are out there all by yourself. I started out with the heart rate approaching 180 again but I didn't want to burn myself out so early, especially given my awesome running "skills" so I dialed it back just a bit and hoped that maybe that would leave me something for the end. I saw some of my teammates headed back to claim most of the top 10 spots in the race.

After a couple of minutes some of the women came from behind me to pass and disappear pretty quick, as expected. I was just running and trying to keep my heart rate in the same place, which resulted in an amazing ascending pace, but, well, again I was doing what I was asked to do. At one point a woman passed me and for some reason decided to take a right on the next street where there were cones that very clearly (or at least I thought it was clear, apparently she did not) had arrows on them for us to continue straight. I have to admit, it took me a while to decide whether to let her continue running down the wrong road by herself or tell her to get back on course. Finally, I yelled, "I think you took a wrong turn." She shouted back, "Are you sure?" Probably thinking I was lying to her. At that point there was nobody in front or behind us in sight, but yeah, I was pretty sure. She chose to believe me and eventually caught and passed me again. So due to my being stupid? Too nice? Not competitive enough? You decide, I came in 6th instead of 5th.

The final ascent had my heart rate climbing over 180 and my pace climbing to new lows, but I knew as soon as I reached the top of the hill I'd be able to pick it up and run down to the finish. It was a new thing for me, actually picking up the pace for the finish. It was painful, but I did manage to do it, at least. The result of my heart rate experiment was not a fast race at all, but apparently fairly well-executed. So I wasn't really disappointed with the race even though I was quite a bit slower than last year. I'm tired of being high-maintenance. I just want to do the training and get faster like everybody else.

But anyway, congrats to Tim who won again but is so over it that he doesn't even stick around for awards anymore. In all fairness, he did have to go ride his bike for another 4 hours. Jesse came in second, Pat I think was 4th and Jay was 6th, so nice job, guys. Then I got to drive home in the rain and that was that. Now it's already time for some big training for some big race that I may or may not be doing in several weeks.

As a total side note, to continue the trend of my siblings being injury prone lately, my sister's foot is still broken from that jump-roping injury back in March. My brother's sprained ankle had finally healed enough for him to start playing again in his softball league which he did for a few weeks without incident until yesterday, when he reverse dislocated his shoulder and apparently might need surgery. I have to say, between the three of us, based on our hobbies and interests, if you had to pick one who had never had a ride in an ambulance, I don't think you'd pick me, but so far (and hopefully the trend will continue) that has been the case.