Thousand Islands Olympic 2016

After the disappointment of Nationals being run as a duathlon, my season pretty much came down to this race. I had set the goal at the end of last season of breaking 2:20 for an Olympic distance triathlon, and above all this was what I wanted to achieve in Brockville. I had also set the goal of getting into the top 5 overall, but given that you can't control who else shows up to the race, the time goal was the big milestone I  wanted to reach.

The forecast was for a chance of thunderstorms, and I was nervous that the swim or perhaps the entire race might be cancelled. There were a few ominous clouds in the sky, but the storms held off and the race went off as planned.

I got to Brockville with plenty of time to spare this year, so I got a full warmup in before the swim, unlike last year where I was pulling on my wetsuit with 30 seconds until start time.

There was lots of contact over first 200m of the course - I got squeezed on both sides and had to reposition a few times. Lots of slapping, kicking and grabbing. The first turn was violent - this was the first time I've been punched in the head and had my goggles knocked off. Luckily I had double capped for the first time, which likely saved me from losing my goggles. I did have to stop to get the goggles back on but it didn't cost me much time. I stayed on a guy's feet for most of the race, and there was someone on my feet for most of the race as well. There was a lead pack of about 5 guys out ahead and then a chase pack of about 5 of us that stayed mostly together and exited the water at the same time.

I made it out of T1 in 8th place in a time of 29:17, only 35 seconds faster than last year. This is frustrating because I've made a lot of progress in the pool and it didn't seem to translate in this race (whereas in Smiths Falls I saw a huge improvement over last year). I felt like I swam with a good effort level, and drafted well, but the time doesn't really reflect that. Perhaps I was on some faster feet last year, maybe my lower swim volume in the week leading up to the race was a problem, I don't really know.

Once out on the bike I aimed to hold 210W - final average was 207 so pretty close. The pace felt right - it was hard but sustainable and wasn't too hard on the legs. My big problem this year continued though, in that keeping an eye on my power (and on the road) I lost focus on keeping my head turtled. I kept catching myself with my head up and likely spent most of the ride in a less than ideal aerodynamic position. Once again, despite feeling like I've made some good progress in my bike fitness, my 1:08:45 was only 2 minutes faster than last year, and I came off the bike in 5th place. I got a puncture during the bike that my Orange Seal seemed to take care of (I think I would have noticed a flat, especially on that final descent/90 degree turn), but when I checked my tire after the race it was completely flat, so my rear wheel would certainly have been running on lower pressure.

The run is where things really went wrong for me. When Somersault emailed out the race info at the end of the week, they included the following map:

With the announcement that "The run course is back to the original route however, we are keeping the 2 km Blockhouse Island ‘tour’ for the Sprint Du first run and Try-a-Tri final run". I took this to mean that the Olympic course did not include the Blockhouse Island tour, and that the turnaround for lap two was right at the start line. However, when I exited the T-zone and turned onto what I thought was the run course, a volunteer insisted I go the other way and do the island tour. I asked if that was the case for the Olympic distance too, and they said yes, so that's what I did. Apparently lots of other people tried to do the same thing as me, as that seemed to be what the pre-race instructions called for.

Once out on the run I tried to settle into a 4:20/km pace, which is what I was able to hold at Nationals. For whatever reason, it wasn't in the cards today, and I ended up averaging 4:35/km, which, while far better than last year, was not enough to get me to my 2:20 overall time. The real problem, however, occured at the turn for the second lap. I had in my mind my understanding of the pre-race instructions, which called for the turn to be made at the start line. When I arrived at the start line, there was a pilon with a sign that said "Turn Here", so that's what I did. Unfortunately there was no volunteer there to correct me (they were short on volunteers at this event and were pleading for people to help out over the PA prior to the race). I think that sign must have been for the duathlon people, telling them where to turn around for their second loop of the 1km "island tour". I should have realized that each loop would be the same and if I did the 1km loop on the first lap, I should have done it on the second lap, but the instructions and the sign seemed to agree with one another, so I made the turn there.

When I finished the course my garmin read 8.63km. I knew that the first part of the run course was not counted in this number since it took me a while to switch over from the "bike" setting on my garmin, but I also knew that it was certainly less than a km in when I did that. I saw a few people starting their second lap and they were all doing the full tour of the island (by this point in the race the "turn here" cone had been removed). I asked the race director for clarification and found out that I had made the turn early and as a result was 1km short, so I went over to the Sportstats tent and DQ'd myself.

So in a way, double disappointment in that not only did I not hit my target time on the run, but I made a mistake that resulted in a DQ. If I extrapolate the time I would have ran with the extra kilometre in there, I would have finished the race in 2:25, so 5 minutes short of my goal.

In diagnosing my failure, my lack of improvement in the swim and minimal improvement on the bike where part of the problem. While my run was much faster than last year, I know I could have performed better. Despite it being an easier course than Nationals, I ran slower, which I attribute to a few factors:
1) I put out more watts on the bike, which maybe sapped my legs just that little bit more
2) Worse taper (family trip the week of the race really limited my training, and I tried to make up for it when I got back, so instead of taking friday off and doing a quick shake out on saturday, I put in a solid bike and run on friday and then just a swim on saturday)
3) Higher humidity

So a disappointing end to my season. I take some consolation that my extrapolated time would have put me in the top 5 (and would have landed me in 3rd last year). I also didn't get passed on the run, and would have had the 6th fastest run - so 8th best swim, 5th best bike, and 6th best run makes for a pretty consistent performance.

Goals:
1) Break 2:20
2) Run under 43 minutes
3) Make top 5 overall

Time (extrapolated): 2:25:03
Which would have been 1/3 AG and 5/73 OA