I’ve been competing this summer in the Scheels Duathlon Series, as I’ve written about in two previous post. The series consists of 3 duathlons located in the Iowa
City area. After I finished 3rd in the first
race and 2nd in the second race, I was thinking it was my
turn to finish 1st in a race… it seems logical, right? Realistically I knew I wouldn’t be able
to win – not fairly anyway. The top guy in the race was
a pro triathlete and there is just no way I can match him on the
bike. So here was my plan:
build as big of a lead in the first run as possible. If I could bank enough time in the first run, maybe I could give myself a chance in the
final run of the race. At this point, it was either go for it or settle
for 2nd place at best. However since the run
was only ~ 2 miles long, I wasn’t sure if I could really get much of a lead.
Run 1: Hills suck, it’s really as simple as that. The first run of
this race opened up right away
with a fairly steep hill; I
had to walk a fine line between building a lead and blowing up in the first
couple minutes of the race. I made
sure I warmed up
well before the race started, so
I could go out fast on the first run.
Going up the hill I just wanted to be near the front; once we got over the hill
that’s when I pushed the pace. My plan seemed
to work - just not as much as I was hoping for. I ran most of the
first run alone in front; it seemed like a pretty good lead, but as it
turned out it wasn’t as big of a lead as I had hoped (~ 10 seconds). Distance = 2.18 miles; Time = 12:03; Avg. pace = 5:31; Run 1
place = 1.
Bike: The
bike portion of the race had to be shortened from 15 miles down to 10
miles because of gravel on the roads. While the more serious bikers in the group did not like this last minute change, I
thought it was great news! A shorter bike course meant that the 2 runs
would become more important. Since I am a better runner than cyclist this
change could only help me. I knew
there was no way I could hang with the top cyclists. Going
into the race, with the original
bike course, I thought
best case I would lose 45 seconds on the bike. But now with it
shortened…maybe lose only 30 seconds? I could make that up with two really good runs… I hoped.
Nope, didn’t happen. Even though I had the fastest first run that day, I ended up losing over a minute on the bike to
the overall winner. The course was extremely hilly and I simply just
couldn’t match him (or the
other guy who blew past me… where did he come from?) On the bright side, I was leading the
overall race until 3 miles into the
bike course. But once I got
passed by them both there was no catching them again (if it weren’t for turning around, I may not have even seen them again!). Below is a picture of
the course where you can see that it was nonstop hills. I was able to keep pace with the leaders going up but for some reason I just don’t have
the same speed coming down. So
much for my plan of only losing 30 seconds on the bike. Distance = 9.97 miles; Time = 26:13; Avg. speed = 22.8 mph; Bike place = 4.
Run 2: I started the final run firmly in 3rd place overall. With the 2nd run again only 2 miles, I didn’t think I had
much of a chance of catching either of
the athletes ahead of me. But as I started the run, I got some welcome running company. Just as he and his brother had done at the start of
the bike portion, my oldest son ran along the outside of the course cheering me
on. Come on, how does that not motivate you?!?
I had a huge smile on my face and
it forced me to run as hard as I could. The run course was
a loop, so you had a chance to see others on the course and gauge how far
ahead/behind they were. The farther I went without seeing the leaders
coming back, the more hopeful I got. Finally with a little under a mile
to go, I saw the overall leader but not the second guy…was he starting to
struggle? I kept pushing and finally saw him. He looked to be about
45 seconds ahead with only about 0.8 miles left – that’s a pretty big lead with
that little distance left to go
to the finish line. I felt good and thought I might have a chance
after all, but it turned out to
be just too much of a gap to close. By the time I finished the race, the overall winner had already crossed the line 23 seconds ahead
of me. I was able to cut his lead over me by 48 seconds during this run, but in the end he just had too big of an advantage coming off the
bike. Distance = 2.20
miles; Time = 12:10; Avg.
pace = 5:31; Run 2
place = 1.
Overall race summary: This was my final duathlon for the
season. While I was never
able to contend for 1st place in any of these races, I’m not at all disappointed losing to a pro triathlete (every race). I’m happy with my 3rd overall finish
and a total time of 52:13 (full results). In a way it was really nice having
such a short race this time (first race that was under an hour) because my
family didn’t have to wait as
long to see me between transitions.
They stayed by the transition area, played on the playground and got to see me
come through 3 – 4 times. As far as the duathlon series goes, I
thought it was great and I really hope Scheels continues
with the series again next
year. I’m a little concerned that they won’t continue to sponsor it which would be really disappointing because I had a lot
of fun doing it. And after
the race, in what has
become a race day tradition, the whole
family went out for pizza (buffet
no less!). While everyone enjoyed themselves, my wife was relieved that
racing season was over since in her opinion, I’m the only one burning enough
calories to warrant our pizza gluttony tradition.
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