Triathlon Would Be A Lot Better If Not For All The Swimming

Yeah, I haven't posted anything here in about forever. But since people seem to want to know about the Millheim Triathlon, lets see if I can dust of the posting skills.

I'd really only decided to do this about a month ago, so I had no great expectations going in. I figured I'd suck in the swim, dominate on the bike, and hold my own on the run. I was shooting for a finish between 80 and 85 minutes, somewhere in the middle of the pack.

Well, the day started with me getting pulled over for speeding on my way to Millheim. I didn't try to BS my way out of it: we both knew I was speeding. I told him the truth, I was on my way to do this tri, and I was a bit excited. He reduced the ticket to "failing to heed traffic signs," which is a smaller fine and no points on the license. So, maybe that was a good omen?

Now, this tri has a couple of unusual features. First, the swim is very short (300 yards), and it's in a pool as opposed to open water. Given my fear of drowning in the swim, both of these seemed like positive features. Another thing that was strange about it was that the transition from the pool to the bike is super long: easily 2 or 3 city blocks. And they suggested that you put on your shoes as soon as you get out of the water, for fear of gravel and broken glass, but then you run to your bike, which like I said is some distance away. So essentially you're doing two transitions there.

Anyway, the pool. 300 yards is just 12 lengths of the pool. We line up according to our projected times, and every 20 seconds someone goes. You swim up, touch the wall, swim back, go under the lane line, and repeat six times. I'd swum 400M in my training, still struggling, but I felt ready. My average time in training was just over 6 minutes.

The line ahead of me is shrinking steadily, until finally the guy ahead of me goes. I get in the pool, wait for the countdown, and then I'm off. Right away, I know that I'm going to struggle. The water is all churned up from the other swimmers, and it's messing with me. But I hit the wall, turn, make it back. All good. Then I push off and go under the lane line. Except, I don't, quite. I bump it with my shoulder, take in a mouthful of water, and I panic a little. I get it under control, but now I'm rattled. I keep going, and my hand hits the lane line. Things are a little off. I struggle to the wall, turn, and see the person who started after me is closing fast.

When I get to the wall, which is an agonizing long time, I let her pass me (I didn't think I could turn without running into her anyway). I go under the lane line to start my next lap, and take in a nosefull. All my bad habits return: my head pops up, I'm hyperventilating, and letting my legs fall. This makes swimming so much harder. And I've still got 150 yards to go. I struggle for the next 100, letting two more people pass me. I had to stop for a moment before the last 50, just to settle down a little. Then I struggle through the last 50, and a set of stairs never looked so good. I got out of the water in just over 7 minutes.

I guess I must have been a bit disoriented when I got out of the water, because one of the volunteers had to point the way for me. I found my shoes, and began the jog to my bike. I grabbed the bike, and jogged with it, right past the end of the transition zone. I'd say I'd gone 30 or so feet before I realized that I could actually get on my bike now.

Once my butt hit the saddle, all was right with the world. I got down on the aerobars and just cranked it, flying down the road, looking for people to pass. I didn't see anybody for a long time: almost 5 miles. But then I passed one, then two, then three, and still flying. I saw another group about a quarter-mile ahead, making a turn. I chased them down. Then at about the 12-mile mark, the big hills started. Now, I'd seen the course elevations, so I knew there were some steep climbs, but I hadn't actually seen the course. I shifted down way too early for that hill, which stole all my momentum. It was a fight to get to the top, but finally I crested that thing and cranked it again. I saw that this was just a quick dip before another climb, so I didn't shift to the big ring. I should have though, because the next hill was easier than it looked.

At about 13.5 miles, or 2 miles to go, I rounded a turn, and was faced with a wall: a steep climb, maybe a quarter mile. But I was caught out in a big gear: I had to burn some legs muscles to get it enough slack in the chain to downshift. A guy passed me like I was standing still. Then, just before the top, another guy. After we crested that hill, it was pretty much downhill the rest of the way. I kept inching closers and closer to the second guy, passing more people the whole way, but I never could catch him.

When I finished the bike, I knew I had crushed it. I changed my shoes and started my run. One thing I've learned from my previous endeavors is that I tend to go too fast to start the run: I'm so used to bike speed that I feel like I'm running too slow. So I made a deliberate decision to try to slow down until the jelly legs passed at least. On the run, the first thing after the transition zone is a steep, steep hill, which really kicked my ass. I wanted to stop and walk, but just kept trudging up the hill. I held back going down the next hill, because I didn't know what else was coming. I was dying, too. The sun had come out, and the humidity had picked up, and I was wishing I'd hydrated a bit more on the bike.

At one point, I made a turn, and one of the volunteers called out "2.3 miles to go!" What! The whole run is only 3.1 miles, and I'd been running forever. I just keep pushing. I saw people ahead of me stopping to walk. "They stopped," I thought, "I can too." But somehow I didn't stop, I just kept going. People were coming back the other way now. The turnaround has to be up here somewhere! The plodding continued. Finally, the turnaround, the half-way mark! I went through, and immediately my stride improved. I got stronger and stronger as the next mile ticked by. Then there was that last hill before the finish. I knew all I had to do was get up this, and I could fly down the hill on the other side.

I was back in the sun, and so tired. My body was telling me, "oh, just walk to the top, and then run." I refused to quit, it was a matter of my personal pride now. There is no walking in Tri! Oh it felt so good to crest that hill, and I just let the speed come out down the hill. When I saw the finish, I found another gear and crossed the line at 93 minutes and change.

Yeah it was slower than I wanted, but I finished 31st out of 75, and 5th out of 8 in my age group. Middle of the pack, just as planned. I knew I could have done the run way better: I was way too conservative early. The most important thing, though, was that I had persevered all the way, in spite of the betrayals of body and spirit. I earned that beer and burger at Elk Creek Cafe!

Hate to Say I Told You So

But I did tell you so.

She didn't drool on herself, so folks are calling it a win. Never mind that she didn't actually answer any questions, and couldn't go off script to answer any of Senator Biden's attacks on McCain. I believe that Nate at fivethirtyeight put it best though: "To be completely frank if that were anyone other than Sarah Palin on stage, this would be regarded as a blowout..."

Mr. Biden I thought played it perfectly: there was nothing to gain by attacking Ms. Palin directly. I'm sure she was waiting the whole night with some well-crafted comeback designed to make her look like the plucky female victim of the big male bully. By keeping the attacks on McCain and on policy, he kept her on shaky ground the whole night. She could only fall back on her talking points, even after they'd been debunked.

Four highlights for me:

• "The past is prolog" A perfect reposte to Ms. Palin's woefully ignorant complaint about Obama's "looking backward."
• "I haven't heard how McCain will differ from Bush," the perfect response to her whine about his continued dissection of the Bush regime. Made all the better because she had no response to that.
• The awesome dismantling of the "maverick" theme. Only Mr. Biden could have done that, and I thought waiting until the end of the debate, after Ms. Palin had said maverick about 130 times, was smart.
• The momentary deer-in-headlights look on Ms. Palin's face when asked about the possible use of nuclear weapons.

The real loser last night was Gwen Ifill. To some extent you can blame the format, but she never pushed for answers to her questions, and then cut it off anytime there was something akin to a discussion going on. She never got back to the education issue, even though it was clear that both candidates wanted to talk about it, and I believe most Americans wanted to hear about it.

And how could she let Governor Palin get away with "I'm not going to answer your questions, I'm going to talk to the American people..."? All Ms. Ifill had to do at that point is say, "well, you agreed to these rules, if you don't want to follow them, neither should I," and then let a real debate fly.

My Prediction for the Debate

A lot of folks are looking forward to tonight's VP debate. Most are predicting a complete train wreck, and gleefully predicting that Senator Biden will wipe the floor with Governor Palin. While I am certainly no fan of Ms. Palin's, and I do believe that she is woefully under-qualified for the vice-presidency, I think she'll do much better at the debate than people expect.

There's a few reasons for this:

• Lowered Expectations. At this point, people are almost expecting her to wet herself and cry. If she manages to stay upright the whole time, and avoids slurring her speech, it will be seen as a miracle.
• The Debate Format. This format is not a free exchange of ideas. Instead it's a series of very short (90 seconds) speeches. It's perfect for her: she just has to say her well-rehearsed lines, which will no doubt include tasty sound bites and attacks on Obama. She doesn't have to go toe-to-toe with Senator Biden.
• Past Performance. She's debated before, and did a creditable job of it. She certainly didn't set the world on fire, but she managed to deliver her vague talking points without putting her foot in her mouth. That's all that's required at this debate (see "The Debate Format"). Remember from the convention: she knows how to give a speech.

Tomorrow morning's commentors are all going to be talking about how well she did at the debate, compared to her expectations. She's not going to electrify anyone who isn't already firmly behind her. She's not going to assuage anyone who thinks she's not qualified to be "one heartbeat away" from the presidency. But if you're looking forward to a meltdown on stage tonight, you'll be sadly disappointed.

Recovery Day

After the biking on Sunday and strength training yesterday, I feel like I need a day off. I might do some yoga, or at least some stretching, but that's about the extent of it.

Speaking of recovering, Senator Obama is bouncing back nicely in the polls. It's a long way from over, of course. We still have the debates, and whatever skulduggery the McCain team can dream up. I remain optimistic.

Long Ride

Yesterday I went out and did my longest bike ride of the year, just over 28 miles according to my bike computer. MapMyRide had it at slightly less, but that mapping interface has problems. There were a couple of good hills, including one leg breaker that I wasn't expecting. That was the first time in quite a while where I wasn't sure if I was going to make it (although partly that's because I didn't shift down right away at the base of the hill, not realizing how big it was).

I just kept plugging away, kept the wheels turning, and I somehow made it to the top. I still had about 18 miles to go though, over terrain I didn't know, so I backed off from my pace a bit. And by the time I did get back to familiar ground, I was tired.

Great day for a bike though, and I rested while watching my Eagles win ugly over the Steelers.

Expand my reach

It seems that the US is becoming increasingly compartmentalized, a process known as the big sort. The county I live in, I believe, is going to go for Obama in a big way. We'll be isolated in a sea of red, however. The presence of the University makes this county much more liberal than the surrounding counties. (That said, some of the nearby counties are suffering much more in this economy, which in theory should turn them off to Sen. Fundamentals-of-the-economy-are-Strong.)

So, acting locally may well be preaching to the choir.

I need a way to speak to those outside of my sphere. And I need to do that in a way that doesn't insult or demean them. The divisiveness of politics in this country over the past 10 years wearing us all down: that's not the nation we know and love. I will endeavor to be the change I want to see.

Pressed For Time

I didn't get much time to write over the past two days. Yesterday I went to the gym, and then did the weed-eating and lawn mowing. Last night we went over to our friends place for dinner. He's still pessimistic about Senator Obama's chances. I hear that a lot, but I'm trying my darnedest to bring positive energy to the election.