70.3 winner??? How about 74.1 Champion!

It has been a full week since at raised my arms in VICTORY at the Louisville Cardinal Half Ironman... Yes Total Victory! But much more has been happening.

The Commander is still deployed and defending our freedom overseas, leaving me to be sole caregiver for Teegan (God help her). I'm trying my best to not create a triathlon equivalent "latch key" kid, so all of my training is indoors, early/late, and working around her heiness' 8 year old schedule... Yikes! However, I have taken to hiring a baby sitter once a week so I can get out and put in a 5 hour bike ride :)

This is a triathlon racing blog so let's get to it:

I did a sprint race where I did no course recon and went from second place to ninth when I missed a turn on the bike and went 1.2 miles too far -----> Know the course!

I raced a double super sprint race where the format was swim, run, bike, bike, run, swim. That was actually quite an awesome race where I was able to take home third place overall and the fastest bike split of the day. Awesome race! Kure Beach Super Sprint in Wilmington NC run by Set Up Events.

With Ironman Lake Placid looming and my endurance fitness in a generally sad state (waist line too) I packed up the kid and off to grandmother's house we went. I needed a big week of training to make my mind right. Almost 300 miles on the bike, 55 miles running, a couple miles of swimming and "what the hell," let's end this week with a half ironman and a 100 mile ride the next day.

Louisville Cardinal Half Ironman.

As I walk with a slight gimp from a sore foot and tight muscles to packet pick up, my day's challengers surely wrote me off as not being a rival as I must be injured. As I finish my warm up run and break out my swim bands, the locals start murmuring about me, a stranger in their town. A triathlon is about to break out! I have my weapons ready: Aquasphere googles, Trek racing bike, and K-Swiss K-ruuz racing flats.

BOOM! The race has broken out. Feet, Arms, Bodies, and water are assaulting every part of my body in an attempt to subdue me. I take the abuse for 200 meters and within 400 meters I am clear of the melee' in 2nd place. I am near to redline trying to hold the draft of the swimmer in front. I give myself 100 strokes to continue at this pace to see if he relents his fast pace so I can hang on his toes. 100 strokes pass and I slow down and quickly lose his draft. 27 minutes and I'm out of the water now hunting for first.

The bike course follows much of the same route as Ironman Louisville; I know this course VERY well. I also know that the last 30 miles of the course is much more difficult than it appears and can cost a lot of time lost to those that attack the early hills a little too hard. About 10 miles into the ride I see first place ahead. "Good, catch made!" I take on fluids, salt, and calories and regain composure. The next five miles are quite hilly and someone weighing 215 pounds does not make passes going uphill. I decide to soft pedal and close the gap between us but not make the pass until at the top of the two 5 and 8 minute climbs. Once at the top... Big Ring time and the pass is made. It is now me that is the hunted! The rest of the ride continues as planned. There are no time checks or out and back sections to see the damage I causing behind me so I just pedal hard. My 56 mile bike ride was a "wee" bit long at 58.8 miles, but since I'm a cyclist... who's complaining??? Bike time 56mile split was 2:20:xx, 58.8 mile time was 2:27:xx.

Rolling into transition to start the half marathon I calmly put on my socks, shoes, and fuelbelt. I also grabbed a 1L bottle of water to take along with me and forced it down in the first mile. This is a new run course and only the first mile and the last mile were flat. It was a hard, hot, and hilly run with lots of sun exposure. It was a two loop run course so again very little way of knowing where I was at in terms of time... running "scared." Again, much to my dislike this time, the run course was long. It turned out to be 14 miles in total. Run time overall was 1:36:10 for 14 miles. My garmin beeped at 13.1 miles at 1:29:xx which made me quite happy to run a sub 1:30 in the heat with those hills. The last mile of the run was an surreal feeling. I had turned up to this race for some high intensity training leading into Lake Placid and here I am winning the dang thing. I was jubilant! High 5'ing the crowd, whooping it up, and just taking in that moment of winning.

So here I am days away from heading north to Lake Placid NY and my thoughts are not on how to handle the bike course or run, but how excited I am to see my best friend and wife that will be home on her deployment R&R. My plans for this race are to not fight for a Kona slot (already got that) but to impress her with the size of my... quads!

See ya in LP