Worst. Triathlon. Ever.
There are innumerable people who participate in triathlons or their component parts and I know almost none of them. It’s a little odd, really, the dearth of people I know who share this interest. Thus, when a coworker sent a group email invite to the Renegade Turkey Triathlon, I couldn’t say no for three reasons. First, many of the people he included were cute, possibly single women and that right there should be enough. Granted, not one participated, but how was I supposed to know other than my very first sentence above? Second, I’d always wanted to do this tri but never got around to it, so this presented a reasonable opportunity. Third, I had my sights set on a half-Ironman in the near future and this would break me into the training regimen. One quick sign-up and an empty wallet later, I was in.
My training was one part awesome, and two parts stupid. I was training around the 1 mile mark, so the half mile swim would be nothing. However, I wasn’t riding at all and running less. By the time of the event I’d cycled twice to the pool, for a total of 18 miles of training in 5 mile or less increments for a 14 mile ride. I think I had a stomach ache once and may have run to the restroom, but aside from that, nothing on the hoofin’-it side. It was during the barely riding portion of my training where I should have realized things were not going to go well.
When I got to the week before the race I noticed that my tri shorts were becoming threadbare from the chlorine. Relatively okay in the pool, not so much at the race. Whatever pride I may or may not have in my jiggly bits doesn’t need to be shared with the world beyond the very exposing nature of riding shorts as it is. Given that the shorts (2XU) I had fit extremely well I purchased the first pair I could find on sale as these things are crazy expensive. Who wouldn’t want to spend almost $100 on a pair of shorts? They arrived just in time to pack for the race the night before, one of my most worrisome parts of the event as there are many tiny little details for which to account and little space to place them.
Random photo. Not from this event because, well, bad triathlon. This shot is training for the Magic Mountain Man Tri.
My alarms sounded around 4am or so; I can’t recall because it was 4am or so and not even God is awake at that time, much less me. Groggily I gathered everything together and started loading the car. Since I hadn’t had a chance to try on the new shorts I figured this would be as good a time as any. I had a pair of Pearl Izumi back-up shorts just in case but really never wore them as they were just a skosh too tight. Not seam breaking embarrassment tight, just not as stretchy as I’d like them to be. My mental alarms sounded when I realized the new shorts were about the same size as the back-up shorts so I now had a dilemma in addition to my current question of whether or not to wear the shorts to the race or put them on there. I set both aside with my keys and wallet and went about putting everything together since getting fully dressed was just about my last concern.
I was glad to have given myself a wealth of extra time because for the life of me I couldn’t get the bike rack locked on and struggled with it for something like 10 minutes, eventually winning the day. Thinking back to my extensive training on the bike and my intimate knowledge of its workings, I thought I recalled the chain being a little under-lubed so I set about finding some chain-lube to ensure a great race. Nothing doing, couldn’t find anything but motorcycle lube or wax and I figured that might not serve too well on the much lighter bicycle chain. Obviously thinking with great clarity I opted to spray everything down with WD40 and go about my day. Look, I know that’s a solvent, not a lube, but I figured for the duration of 14 miles it would suffice. Done and done, moving on.
I toss everything in the plastic tub and make my way to the race with time to spare. Upon securing a parking space I unloaded everything, did the last minute preps and headed to the first transition area. 650 meters later – I sadly had opportunity and desire to measure this in the near future – I realized that using a plastic tub instead of my default backpack method was a foolish idea, what with my hands starting to tire from carrying 20lbs that distance. Nothing dramatic, just annoying. After making my way through the line to pick up my swag bag I headed to the transition area to set up. Pull out my helmet, set it on the handle bar. Towel goes next to the bike; set out the shoes, just slightly unbuckled with the socks as open as possible, one in each shoe. Plastic bin next to the bike but just off the towel to clean the feet. And so it goes, each carefully thought out step well-orchestrated from many events previous. Happy with my progress I went to put on my shorts.
Shorts which I’d left in my Jeep, a rather long walk away, let alone in flip flops. Whatever, I’m making good time so I set about going to the car. A few minutes later my heart is well entrenched in my trachea and my blood pressure rising accordingly. No shorts in the car. Turns out when I’d set them aside with my wallet and keys, I didn’t realize how well black spandex blends in with black bed sheets, which is where they were now, all warm and comfortable, ensconced in the bliss of my sheets and quilt. My next utterances were not becoming of a gentleman but you can probably guess how many letters they contained.
It’s now 7:27am, with the first wave starting at 8am. I’m not going to say that a Jeep “can’t” go near 100mph, I’m just going to say it “shouldn’t” and leave it at that. Right as I took off a deluge opened from the sky, my only solace being that I wasn’t stuck out in it waiting for the race to begin. 15 minutes later I’d been home, dressed and back, my eyes burning holes into every clock visible. I pull in and find the first parking lot closed, as well as the second lot. Recalling my previous visits I grew anxious with how far away the next lot would likely be and I was dead on. I learned later that my new parking spot was right at the 1 mile marker for the run. I could lie and say that’s how far I had to run back, but to be fair, I cut through the wet, recently mown grass in my flip flops and a new cut on my big toe. Right there on the big crease underneath? The part that flexes a lot and hurts when it’s cut? Today is going to be a GOOD DAY!
In all honesty, that was probably a ¾ mile run, but at least I hadn’t warmed up at all and flip flops make for great track shoes. I get back to the transition area and realize I never got my swim cap, so I hoofed it down from the transition to the swag area, only 50 or so feet from my bike but probably 30 feet down a steep slope. Now my 4th or 5th hike up that thing. At least they were out of the lime green hat color so I got a red cap with the letter “G” hand-written on it in sharpie. Of course they ran out, why would they have enough?
When I got back to my bike I realized that while I did have water in my Jeep to fill the foot wash station, I did not bring it with me and had neither the time nor the inclination to go get it. “That’s ok”, I thought to myself, “I had the foresight to bring a Nalgene so I’ll just fill it up in the restrooms.” Which were closed. It’s after 8am, the first swim wave has already started, I’m out of time. But at least I was walking around in just my tri shorts in front of a bunch of high school girl volunteers. Have you seen a picture of me? I don’t embarrass easily and have exponentially less shame than I have mass, but that doesn’t mean I go looking for situations like these. They took pity on me and filled my Nalgene half full with drinking water and I jogged back to my area. Half a liter of water, just enough to not cover most of my soon-to-be-dirty feet. Like a tablespoon of water to a parched traveler: Just enough to be worse than nothing.
Out of time I jog like a bear to the water, wondering in some dark part of my brain if my shorts might not fit as well as I’d like. I get to the water’s edge, do some basic stretches and wade into the 64F water, one of about three people in the entire race not wearing a wetsuit. You’ve heard of a weather inversion? Moving on. I had maybe 5 minutes in the water before I had to line up for my wave. Thus far I’m stressed out, have walked/jogged roughly 1.7 miles in flip flops and haven’t swum stroke one to get ready for the rather chilly water. What could go wrong?
I’ll tell you, damn it, I’ll tell you. So much can go wrong and by now it has to or Murphy will not have had his day of glee. I always stay to the back of the pack since I’m not the fastest swimmer. Strong, steady, good form, yes, but not The Flash (should probably say Aquaman, but what sort of irrelevant superhero is he and can he actually swim fast? I submit that he cannot, since his form is simply that of a man doing a dolphin kick. I digress). This is a smart tactic, but foiled by the fact that I was feeling cocky about my skills, having trained reasonably hard and at distances consistently double that of the race. I enter the water a little earlier than I should and get hit by and myself hit my fair share of limbs. Doesn’t matter, I’m a shark, this race is my prey, I’ve got this. Would help if I could breathe though. I’m a beached shark, ferocity made suddenly irrelevant. The moment my face and upper body touched the water the wind was sucked out of me, never to return. I did my best to maintain my composure and training but what little success I had was ruined by the fact that I swear I was breathing in pure unleaded gasoline fumes. Every breath was 87 octane. It wasn’t until a week later, when I finally put away my gear that I gave a good whiff to the swim cap and soundly confirmed the source of the smell. I have half a dozen caps and not one has ever outgassed like that. Was the race sponsored by Exxon? That first buoy was not getting closer with any alacrity. Manning up, I put my face in the water, commanded my lungs to hold ‘til I was good and ready and concentrated on my stroke. Ease into the water, glide, pull down with a slight S, turn my hands a bit at the waste so as not to increase drag, repeat, breathe, get clobbered over the head with dramatic force, swallow some nasty water and surface with a few more choice words and a murderous look at the great evil upon me. Off my pace again and oh! That lovely breath of dead dinosaurs. Breast stroke it is for the slow finish.
Probably didn’t help that I forgot my earplugs and upon reaching the shore had a bit of vertigo from the cold water sloshing around my eardrums. The swim was over, time for the bike which to me is something of a great relief. If you have enough butt callouses (I didn’t) the bike can almost be restful, especially on the fast flats and faster downhills. I was able to wash my feet well enough so there weren’t any rocks on the soles of my feet, caring not for the sides as much so I celebrated the very small win. I mount up and have the start of a good ride. I’m bombing through the course and maintaining good speed and strength on the initial uphill sections, passing one lady on a particularly steep section of road. Physics are my friend here, with my two hundred and blah blah murmer pound frame gaining great speed with great urgency, opposite of the light frame of the woman to my right. At the bottom of the steep hill are some course workers yelling at us to shift to the lowest gears and slow down for the hard right to the steep uphill. I slap my right hand hard into the shifter to get into the larger sprockets quickly while simultaneously clicking the inner lever of the left shifter with my left hand. I’ve mastered the timing of this task through hundreds, even thousands of miles of rides, so I’m expecting smooth transitions. What I’m not expecting is the soft, quiet nothingness of a shifter malfunctioning. Not only am I now at a steep uphill grade, I’m doing it in the tallest front sprocket and the shortest rear sprocket, putting my chain at a severe angle and my gear ratio firmly at “this is going to suck”. And suck it did. I eventually was able to shift, by reaching my left hand over the front of the hoods and manhandling the thing ‘til it acquiesced, although not without almost causing me to forcefully dismount first. I get the stupid thing shifted and am ready to climb on when I crest the hill to see a long, slight downhill in front of me. Not steep enough to coast, but too steep to stay in low gear. Reluctantly – and I think for the last time – I shift into high gear and turn on beast mode.
Most of these pictures aren’t in any order and aren’t even from this triathlon. Some are just training shots for another triathlon. Better, happier triathlons.
As I’m pushing through this misery I realize my chain is squeaking ever more loudly, like that kid’s bike which sits outside all year and has a chain colour of dirt-brown rather than anything good. Squeak, Squeak freakin’ embarrassing SQUEAK and it’s getting louder with each pedal. If you recall, I made the unbelievably stupid decision to use WD40 on my chain, made all the more exceptionally poor a choice by the hard rain which washed away what lubed remained. Remember, WD40 is a solvent, which normally wouldn’t hurt too much if everything at least stayed relatively in place, but after being pressure-washed by a rainstorm I had the joy of metal-to-metal cacophony at my heels. All is well, I’m back at the start of the course, ready for lap 2, when out of the bushes comes a cheerful yell from my coworker. Since he’d participated in a relay, he was well and done with time to spare for cheering on me and his teammates. His support was much appreciated but his timing, combined with my increasingly poor state-of-mind was problematic.
At his cheer I looked up and around to see the two riders in front of me bearing right while a course worker flagged me on the same. About 100 yards later I realized I was at the transition area but with only 1 lap under my tires. Momentarily confused, I dismounted and asked bystanders for info before realizing I should have gone to the left of the course worker instead of to the right. 100 yards later I’m back on course.
At this point, any compliance by my left shifter was gone and I’d had too many close calls to do any manhandling of it, so I relegated myself to a small chain ring race. This quickly sucked the joy out of the straights and downhills, as well as wore me out faster since I was having to pedal faster to go slower over the same distance. At this point, I also had the increasingly legitimate fear that my chain was going to break, considering all of this stress was on a 6 year old, high mileage chain. Nothing came of this, but it was nonetheless distracting.
Finally I got to the run and had a decent transition, oddly enough. I get out there and have the feeling that the race was over. It was a little disconcerting, as people were walking through the course as though it was a regular walk way. Kids here, finishers there, someone with a cooler there. Made me question my pace. I mean, I knew I was going slow and at this point was in it just to finish, but I spent a considerable amount of time looking behind me and at the bike course, just to make sure there were others yet to come. As I was running I made acquaintances with a nice woman who had just run the NY Marathon two weeks previous. I’m no Aquaman on the street – see what I did there? – then again, maybe I am if you think about it, but I figured if I was holding pace with her I wasn’t doing too bad. We yoyoed back and forth for a bit but otherwise held roughly the same pace and had some nice breathy conversation, most of which I cannot recall other than the NYM bit.
As I was running, the thought about my shorts crept back into my mind. Well, to be more accurate, the sensation of every seam along my butt and crotch and the fact that I needed desperately to adjust was becoming the focal point of my mind. At a strategic location on a hill, with no one around, I clandestinely adjusted myself to a more comfortable state. Reach down, do my thing, realize that very cold things shouldn’t be moved with aggravating force, wonder if any of that sensation involves the tearing of skin given the rather painful burning sensation. Kids, don’t buy your race gear just before the vent and test it on the event. That’s called being stupid. Don’t be stupid like me.
At this point I was slightly in front of the marathon lady but my bladder, which was full to bursting, was becoming a major distraction so I lost ground when I diverted course to relieve myself. Had I been thinking ahead I could have combined the aforementioned stupidity and nature’s call into one, less painful event. The rest of the run was relatively uneventful and while I gained ground on my cohort, I never caught her. One last push over the line and my travails were over. She saw me and congratulated me on a good run, and I her. I forgot to mention, she was 71 years old. 71! I couldn’t catch a 71 year old little lady. That’s just, not worth finishing this thought.
I get my pumpkin pie, medal and gather my gear into the stupid plastic tub. That .75 mile walk? Yeah, it’s now a full mile because the bin has gained about 5# and I’m too tired to try and carry it through the grass. All of that and another mile yet. Get to the Jeep, load up and get home uneventfully, grateful that Murphey, while he does live, has thankfully chose to focus his efforts elsewhere. That is, until I take my bike rack off and realize that I never did lock it on and have now lost the rack. The only reason it stayed on is because the hitch pin was threaded and I torqued it down well and good.
While I understandably should have trained better and perhaps prepared better, the true takeaway of this story is the unmentioned, internal realization: While I’ve done myriad events, I’ve never done any of them alone. I’ve always at least had one friend with me as support. Prior to the triathlon I’d well and good fallen for a woman and she’d even promised to meet me at the finish line and give me a hug (that’s one of my things. Whatever, we each have our eccentricities, this is one of mine), but she suddenly stopped talking to me a week or so before the race. What a weird realization to come by from all of that muck.
So there you have it, the worst race of my life, worse even than my very first. Rough, tough bike course, a mile longer run than normal, parking too far from the transition area, breath-suckingly cold water and an expensive registration fee to boot. You joining me there next year?
Gear:
Specialized Allez
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