Downtown Columbia Race Report

My second sprint tri in as many weeks and first collegiate race of 2011 was the Downtown Columbia Triathlon. Since last weekend’s race down at Parris Island (http://www.teamsportfactory.com/2011/03/nick-sykes-parris-island-triathlon/) I’ve been suffering from an unfortunate cold, while at home in Connecticut for spring break. Needless to say, I was not feeling so great heading into today’s race. Last year at this race I did moderately well, finishing 18^th Overall in 56:58 (10:22, 0:59, 26:58, 0:50, 18:00). I knew I’d have a good chance at beating that time this year but I didn’t think it would be by very much.

This year the start time had been moved to 1:30pm, making for a long day as we decided to forego a hotel and drive to and from Clemson on the day of the race, a 2 hour drive each way. I woke up to miserable weather and the forecast in Columbia called for showers and thunderstorms most of the day. Setting up transition the rain was light, but steadily falling and the roads were clearly going to be slick for the 3 loop bike course (3.2 miles per lap). My main concern before the race was staying warm, rather than actively warming up, but by race time I felt somewhat focused on the task at hand, at least it’s just a sprint!

I started 22^nd in the open section so I could have a mostly clear bike course to ride like last week. I quickly got dropped by the person I started next to and 3 others caught me after about 200m into the 500m pool swim. I stuck to their feet for a while, and which may have slowed me slightly, but jumping out of the pool at 9:40 was a clear indication that my swim was not on form today. I hit the timing mat at 10:13, just 9 seconds faster than last year when I was much worse at swimming. Onto the bike after a 54 second T1 that included putting bike shoes on, I pedaled away up the major hill on the course. As expected the roads were slick, but as the laps went by I learned how best to navigate the turns and they didn’t seem to be too terrible. I came around after lap one in 8:45 and began the big climb a second time. Fortunately for me, I can climb fairly well on the bike, so it helps when I can aim to catch someone ahead of me. In this case I saw athlete 24 just ahead, one of the 3 that had passed me on the swim. I passed him going up the hill on the second lap but heading down he rolled right back taking full advantage of his disc wheel. I passed him again on the flat after the tight turn at the bottom of the downhill and finished lap 2, which may be slightly shorter because there was nothing added from or to the mount/dismount line, in 8:30. Onto the 3^rd lap and up the hill for the final time; by this point I knew that my bike time would probably be faster than the previous year by a fair amount, the goal remained to hit about 26 minutes for the bike. By the time I stopped my computer I was just under 26 minutes for a 3^rd lap of about 8:45 again, this time including the extra part to the dismount and taking my feet out of my shoes, which proved somewhat troublesome with frozen feet. Regardless, into transition I ran, hitting the timing mat with a 7^th best official bike split of 26:22. Off with the helmet, on with the running shoes, and out to the run I went after a quick T2 of 37 seconds. Assuming the first mile marker was correct (because the second was certainly not) I split 6:17 out of transition, and slowly tried to pick it up again as I did last week at Parris Island. I was running almost entirely alone in about 10^th place on the road again and unfortunately began to cramp fairly badly after about 12 minutes of the run. That, however, was short lived after I got a quick drink of water, but must have impacted my run to a certain extent. I crossed the line with a run of 17:36 for what a teammate measured unofficially at 2.82 miles (6:14 pace) for a total time of 55:40; a minute and 18 seconds quicker than last year. That improvement cannot be attributed to any single area of the race, however, as I went 9 seconds, 5 seconds, 26 seconds, 13 seconds, and 24 seconds faster for each split in comparison to last year.

Overall I finished in 20^th place out of a deep field, and 12^th in the collegiate category which many teams used as their warm up for Collegiate Nationals in 2 weeks time in Tuscaloosa. The Clemson Triathlon team did exceptionally well placing 1^st, 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th, 8^th, and 12^th in the men’s collegiate division. In addition, Anna Battiata used a race best 18:04 run split to win the overall women’s race in her first race representing the Sport Factory!