San Diego Spring Sprint May 6 2012

Well my first Triathlon is in the books!!! And man do I have my work cut out for me for future races. I dropped my 2 year old off that morning at my brothers so my wife would have a little easier time only having to worry about my 6 year old son. My son Kyle was more nervous than I was about swimming in the ocean, he was sure a shark was going to get me.

Ha-ha we got to mission beach right when the parking lot and transition area opened up I was one of the first to my wave section and was able to set up nicly my area. I managed to get an end spot, i figured it would give me more room and for my first triathlon my transitions went fairly good. My training for the swim leading to the event was 300-400m workouts but not at the same time and in a controlled setting of the swimming pool. When I first checked out the swimming course I thought to myself, I got this it looked super easy and I was sure that I could at least finish in the middle of the pack, my biggest fear was finishing last in the swim or having to be rescued because I bit off more than I can handle. When I first dipped my toes into the bay I was surprisingly happy with the water temperature, I was surprised that it was fairly warm. My entire age group was treading water and I was looking around and sizing up the competition, I knew I was going to get smoked on the swim but was pretty confident in my cycling and running. When I looked to my right I was pleasantly surprised to see another dude out there with nose clips…Ha-ha. I don’t know what my problem was but I can’t swim with after my clips, my wife tells me just blow air out your nose..hmmm….That doesn’t work for me. The 3 minutes that we treaded water seemed like eternity with all my nerves on edge. When the alarm went off to go I tried to get into a groove and follow all the steps I used in practice but at about the 75 meter mark I panicked and pulled up and ripped my goggles off. I never swam in the ocean and I was out of breath and couldn’t see anything. I paddled over to the nice lady on the paddle board to catch my breath and she was all “this is your first race huh?” I’m like yup. She then asked if she wanted me to paddle me in, I said no even though I wanted to head back to land. I tried back stroking for a bit to help relax myself. This worked great until I noticed that I swam roughly 25 meters past the first buoy and was heading for land across the bay. I quickly made an adjustment and stayed on course, it was at this time the next wave started and it was pretty clear I was about 10 seconds from the last person in my wave. I continued to conserve my energy and continued to back stroke out until I was 50 meters away from the finish, I was beginning to get smoked by the women in the wave after me.

When I got out of the water I was completely out of breath and dizzy but I survived and headed to my strong sports cycling and running. When I was watching the first waves come in I was wondering why everyone is out of breath and not pulling their wetsuits down? Then it was my turn and I was slightly dizzy coming out of the water and I didn’t remember to pull my wet suit down until I was near the transition area. I was pleasantly surprised that my transitions went smooth. I ran my bike over and clipped in and was GONE! The course was 9.17 miles of a flat FAST course. This is where I made up a lot of time.

This is where I made up a lot of time. I put on some new aero-bars the night before and despite having some cramping in my calves I finished in 26 minutes flat, nearly a 22mph average. My transition into the run went fairly smooth again, I started my run off fairly slow since both my calves where cramping but once I was about a mile in the cramps left and I was able to put the hammer down.

I ended up finishing strong on the run with a time of 25:41 and a total time of 1h 11m 32s, my age group was fairly tough and I finished 40 out of 60 in my group and 333 out of 572 overall. With the fact I can’t swim for crap I was pretty pleased with my final results and can’t wait to do another sprint in July and a Olympic in September, I defiantly have my work cut out for me in regards to the swim. Below is the GoPro video of the bike section of the race.

Training Log 01/16 - 01/22/2012

Twitter “Even though I showered I still reek of chlorine…ugghh”

Man what a week!! I got my new trainer a cyclops2 fluid trainer, a Christmas gift to myself.  I was pretty motivated to jump on that. It’s going to take some getting used to when managing the time that I can ride the trainer. Normally I get all my WO’s in during the early mornings and at lunch time, with my training on the bike trainer I am going to have to add a few nights to the weekly routines. This is going to be difficult since my nights are pretty fool with home work, dealing with two kids and handling all the nightly chores my wife things I need to do..ha I did manage to get on the trainer once this week, but my hopes is to be able to get on the trainer at least twice a week followed up by a Sunday ride .

Swimming!! How much do I hate you!! I planned 3 swims this week but due to a chest cold that I was battling I was only able to get in one session. I am not too worried about it, I find that I have been approving every time I get in the pool. My breathing is my biggest issue with my swim, I am guessing that is like most people struggling with the swim.  I just need to keep my cool and keep my form tight, I tend to freak myself out so I gasp for breath rather than following a smooth process. WORK IN PROGRESS….My spring sprint isn’t until May so I have time to get decent at the swim.

My totals for the week

·       RUN     16.63 Miles , 2:42:43

·       SWIM    219 Yards, 20m

·       BIKE    17.19 Miles, 1:00:02

·       Strength 1:00

Total Time 5hrs 02min 45seconds

Miles: 33.94miles

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Registered for my first Triathlon

Over the past 2 years I completed my first Marathon at the Rock “N” Roll 26.2 and completed my first century bike ride with the tour de Tucson. I have a passion for both sports but the one passion doesn’t dominate the other. With that in mine I decided why not add in swimming to the mix and become a Tri-athlete. I officially registered for the 2012 Spring Sprint in San Diego. This will be my first Tri and I hope I do well enough to maybe register for an Olympic later in the year. I also have the 26.2 Rock “N” Roll marathon sprinkled in to the mix.

My biggest concern is that fact that I CANT SWIM!!! When I first started to contemplate if a triathlon was right for me I headed to the pool very confident that I could swim decent enough due to my high level of fitness. Well, that was NOT the case I swam about 100m and got out of the pool and told the guy getting into his lane..This is HARD!  I knew then that picking up swimming is going to be harder then I originally thought. The sprint is only ¼ mile so I am pretty confident that I can transform myself into a somewhat decent enough swimmer to be able to hold my own in a ¼ swim.

Please follow me in my journey to my first Tri. I will be sharing nutritional tips as well as training tips that I have learned from my past events. I am looking forward to watching my progress with swim as well as learning as much as I can about what to expect in transition.

Thank you,

Matt

Follow me at @mrubcic

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