Sunday’s weather in Kingston… Cold (10 – 12 degrees), wet, and windy (30 km/h with 50 km/h gusts)… Not ideal conditions for race day! All that aside, I was looking forward to giving this distance another go after my unimpressive time from the Canadian Championships last July. My best time over this distance is a 2:17:xx from 2013 and my most recent; a 2:23:xx last year. Despite the weather, the goal was improve in all three disciplines and attempt to finish sub 2:10 today.
Earlier in the morning, I had noticed that the swim buoys were looking a little scattered in the water… This was their first year running this race so some hiccups are expected but I was curious how they were going to handle this. When we made our way down to the pre-race meeting, they had just finished pulling many of these buoys from the water and they announced that the swim course was being shortened (due to the winds or currents)… In the past, I would have been excited to hear this news but I was really looking forward to testing myself over 1500 meters open water; this also meant that with a shortened course, I would not have the chance to chase my sub 2:10 goal over a complete Olympic distance race.
Swim (~950 meters – 14:19 – 1:30/100m – 2nd OA)
Rumblings were that there was a VERY strong swimmer in the race so the plan was to line up near him to see if I could keep up in his wake. I made my way into the water, did my warm up to get comfortable in the cold open water and then took a look around… As I 
sighted the expected swim leader, the count-down started and I was nowhere near where I needed to be!
The gun when off and I quickly pulled ahead of everyone around me as I watched who I expected to lead pull away from everyone on the other side of the start line. I contemplated put in a sprint effort and cutting over to the inside to try and get on his feet but he was just too fast. I ended up coming out of the water in second almost 2 minutes back of the leader and 30 seconds ahead of third. The distance was probably somewhere around 900 – 1000 meters so my 14:19 was an improvement over any past races. Looks like my new, more enjoyable, swim training (less volume, more speed work) is working. Two years ago, I was happy just finishing the swim, now I am racing!
Bike (40k – 1:04:56 – 37.0 km/h – 3rd OA)
Clearly I need to continue to work on improving my transitions and tackle them with some 
more urgency. I lost my 30 second lead over third place and another 5 – 10 seconds getting on the bike (that is where I was passed, putting me in third place). Once we hit the road, my ride was going well; my heart rate came down into my targeted area as expected and I was keeping second place in my sights. Just after the turnaround (20 kms) I was feeling good so put in a little extra effort for a few minutes and made the pass to put me back in second place. This lasted until the last km where I was passed while turning back into CFB Kingston… At the time, I felt like I was going fast enough (even though my HR had come down under target) and I assumed I was continuing to put time into third place so I was a little surprised when I was passed here. Even with slick roads, 1:04:56 over 40k is over two minutes faster than my prior best 40k bike split and my legs were fresh and ready to run!
Run (10k – 40:41 – 4:04/km – 3rd OA)
I went into transition and started my run just a few seconds back of second place but it was made clear pretty quickly that I was not going to be able to run with this guy… I ran the first km sub 4 minutes and second place pulling away quick. This was not an easy 10k run! A lot of hills, 65%+ on wet cross country track and it was a point to point with a large net gain in elevation.
My previous best 10k in a tri was 42:31 and my open 10k PR is 39:29… A 40:41 for me on this course was far better than I could have expected and I am very happy to see this improvement in my run!
I finished with a 2:01:56 (would have been very close to 2:10 if the swim was not cut short) and 3rd place overall!
I would highly recommend this race and hope it continues to run! They had their issues attracting athletes, bike check-in, the swim course, and a few smaller points but I give them 10 out of 10 for race day effort! Volunteers/police were everywhere on course where they were needed and they really attempted to put on a world class event… Lead vehicle on the bike course, prize money, former Olympian (Sharon Donnelly) as the race announcer/award presenter, great site (finish line inside Fort Henry), and the best draw prizes I have seen at a race (two bikes, plus, plus…). I expect they will do a far better job advertising all these perks next year and this race will grow.
4 more days to recover before Muskoka 70.3 and I find out how this back-to-back weekend racing experiment goes.
Transforming into a Triathlete 