April 18th 2009 Collegiate Sprint National triathlon championships race report

I went to Lubbock TX over the weekend to visit my cousin who had just came back from the Middle East. My cousin is good friends with the RD who was putting on the 2009 Collegiate National triathlon championships race in Lubbock. The race was a 500 meter swim, a 19.7 mile bike & a 3.2 mile run on the exact same course as the BSLT, the Buffman & sqeakey, & Tri Rader triathlons.

The night before the race my cousin pulled some strings & got me a spot to race. This was sweet because the race sold out a few weeks prior. Since I was going to be visiting for 4 days I had brought my bike, cycling gear, & run shoes for training. Essentially I had everything I needed to race except for a race belt & a wet suit. I even had lounge chairs & blankets for my tri-spectator family packed up in my triathlon machine; ok, it's just a mini-van, but let me have some self respect here & allow me to call it my triathlon machine ok?

I get to the race sight the morning of & realize the event is a REALLY big deal. There were 1200 triathletes- 1201 if you include me, & there was an energy in the air I'd only felt at Iron distance events previously. It was 45 degrees at the start of the race. I dare say it felt much much colder. There was a 7am start so the temperature wouldn't really start to warm up until after I was done racing.

Now as I was saying, since I was visiting family & not expecting to race I didn't have a wet suit. I assumed in West Texas I wouldn't need one anyway. WRONG!

After setting up my race gear & transition area I headed down to the lake start. The lake temp was only 55 degrees!!! Everyone else but me & one other idiot had on full wet suits, neoprene booties, & neoprene swim caps because of how flipping cold it was!!! I only had on swim shorts & goggles. I won't go into much detail about the first leg of this triathlon to save myself at least a bit of dignity. I'll sum it up by saying the 500 meter swim which would normally take me 11 minutes took me almost 20. There was 30 people who were pulled out of the lake for hypothermia, each one of them had on wet suits to fight the cold. I didn't- sissies! When I finally got out of the water I couldn't feel anything below my elbows or knees & I was shaking uncontrollably.

At the mass swim start one spectator came up to my cousin having no idea he was there to watch me & asked "what kind of a retard races in these conditions without a wet suit?". My cousin & I both agree he had a great point.

My swim to bike transition is always less than 1 minute. But have you ever tried to put on cycling socks & shoes when your shaking uncontrollably & unable to feel your hands or feet? Not an easy task I assure you. It took me almost 4 minutes to get out of T-1.

As everyone hopped on their bike to start the cycling leg of the triathlon everyone realized very quickly that legs don't work well after a swim that cold. There were a huge number triathletes simply falling over because their legs simply weren't working quite right. The bike start was like I was trying to pedal through a war zone with flopping bodies laying all over ground. At the time I was annoyed, but looking back I realize it was pretty funny. Next year the collegiate nationals will be held in Lubbock again & at the same time of year. I'm bringing my camcorder & having my wife film these youngsters. It'll be a U-tube hit. Good thing helmets are mandatory.

I had a really poor bike. I never did end up regaining the feeling of my hands or feet. & my legs never started working properly, yet I still passed a whole bunch of these college students who looked to have perfect physiques. Anyone who has seen me knows I don't exactly have a slim physique;)

The bike to swim transition was a little faster for me, but still no where near as fast as what I usually do, yet I still ended up making up a bunch of time in T-2 on a lot of college students. Apparently they study & party to much to practice transitions because I'm telling you they were REALLY slow getting off their bikes & onto the run leg.

My run was no better than my swim or bike. I still couldn't feel anything below my ankles. Running without being able to feel your feet is a very odd feeling. You can't tell when your feet hit the ground or what kind of footing you have. But surprisingly I was only passed twice & I passed 10 of those pups! The majority of these college students I passed were running with race shirts that had no waist or no shirt at all. Most every one of these guys I passed had 6 pack abs & perfect looking bodies, yet here I was a decade older & easily 50 pounds heavier passing them with authority! Invariably when they saw me passing them & they saw how heavy I was their pride would force them to pick up the pace to keep up. I'd pick up the speed too & drop em like a bad habit! Oh how sweet that run was! I should race with college students more often. It's great for my self-esteem! Apparently those bodies which could be on the front page of fitness magazines are just for show.

I ended up finishing 4th place in my division. Not bad for an overweight 33 year old eh?