Rumpass Bumpass International Triathlon – Bumpass, Virginia (April 16, 2011)

The weekend of April  16th, both my husband and I competed in our first triathlon(s) Rumpass Bumpass of the season down at Bumpass, Virginia (on Lake Anna).  For those interested in reading about the course, here is the description.

The definition of Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. We left on Friday afternoon – earlier than last week by two hours – to drive south on I95 heading to Lake Anna with the hopes to avoid traffic.  But, yet again our strategy failed; we ended up sitting in traffic for about 1.5 longer than the trip indicator estimated.  We arrived at the race site to pick up our race packets by 5:30 PM and to my parent’s house about 6:00 PM.

Saturday – Race day 1 International Distance (Swim 1.5 kms   Bike 38.62 kms   Run 10 kms)

I love early and late season races because races start at 10 AM versus the normal early 7 or 8 AM start. Brett and I got to the race site about 8:00 AM. We expected to have a bit of breathing room, but unfortunately Brett had a flat and had to change his tire before the race. Usually this would not be a problem, but we forgot our pump. You would think with the sheer volume of teammates Team Z has and 800 racers, we would be able to find several pumps. Funny enough, most people left them in their car usually would not be a problem either, but it was pouring rain and everyone wanted to stay covered.

It was raining extremely hard and the lake had big white caps. The temperature was in the low 50’s and the water temperature was 65 degrees.

Is the triathlon cancelled when it rains?  No, of course not. If it starts lightening, they will postpone the race until weather conditions improve. Or if the water looks too dangerous, they will make it a duathlon (bike and run).  But, no such luck for us, we had to get in the water.

Trying to get on a wetsuit when you’re already wet from the rain proves to be a cardiovascular workout in itself. Heck, who needs to get in the water right? For women, the best example I can provide is trying to pull up a pair of Spanxs and the Spanxs being two sizes too small and then add on top of that just getting out of the shower and not drying off. For men, sorry can’t provide an example, will have to ask Brett. My one handy trick I learned was spray Pam, it makes my wetsuit go on better than any Body Glide I have tried.

The wetsuit provides a brief haven for warmth, but that only lasted about 10 minutes. Brett and I decided it was best to warm up. This tells you how cold it was, a number of people including Brett were wearing their thermal wetsuit swim caps under the race sanctioned swim caps and some were even wearing their thermal booties. Funny enough, once you are in the water and your hands and face got over the initial shock or just went numb, swimming was not too bad.  However, that was not the common theme by other participants; a great number dropped out before and after the swim.

I was nervous about the swim. I had only been in the pool twice since our last race of 2010 season Giant Acorn in October and those two times were this past week. So, I was not that confident that I would make it through a 1 mile swim. I kept telling myself this race is for training and not to get a PR.  Once the horn blew, I was off.  Not in the front of the pack as usual, but somewhere in the middle of the 35-39 women age groupers. The waves proved to be brutal; it was very hard for me to site the buoys, especially when the men in the kayaks were wearing the same color hats (yellow) as the buoys. I found myself gravitating to the kayakers only to be told the buoy is over there.  I made it through the swim focusing on my stroke and ensured that I did not get above Zone 2. Much to my surprise, I can swim a mile in 39:13 with no training.  According to several reports I read, a number of people DQ’d due to not being able to finish the swim or had to be rescued by the kayakers.

So, the one thing I dislike about wetsuits is getting them off. For me this is much harder to do than the average triathlete. I haven’t figured out quite why yet, but the only strategy I can see that will change this is to practice getting the wetsuit off. Luckily getting my wetsuit off was a bit easier than normal and I think it was because I had no expectations and did not try to hurry it up.  The funny part, is one of the announcers came over to me while getting my wetsuit off and said, “# 120 Lara Coffee is getting ready to get out on the bike course.” I said to the participant next to me, “boy, he had no idea how long this will take me.”  Luckily, he did not announce my name again, 4:16 minutes later when I finally did make it out onto the course.

We had to run through the mud and mount the bike.  The bike course was challenging. The wind was very treacherous at mile 7, 10, and 14; the wind was blowing head on.  Although, I felt like I was doing well, when it came for the second loop of the course, I was all alone. I was hoping the entire time I was not the last one. I had an internal dialogue the entire time with myself saying, “You can’t be the last one, there has to be others because not that many past you in the first loop.”  No, I was not the last one, but it was very lonely.  I thrive on competition and the more people that are around me the harder I push myself.   As I was finishing my second loop and dismounting, one of our coaches Alexis yelled out, “It is about time.” Knowing he was joking, I yelled back “Tell me about it?!?!” and I was not joking.  I finished the bike in 1:30:19.

Even though I had low expectations for this race, I was still hoping to complete the race in less than three hours. I realized when I got off the bike and my watch said 2:15, I knew my chances were very slim, but I gave it a try.  My hopes dwindled as I started running and my legs were like lead.  I knew taking too little nutrition while on the bike was what was going to kill any chance of achieving the less than three hour mark.

After the first 1.5 I met up with another Team Z’er Sam who was on her second run loop. She encouraged me and pushed me through the first three miles. I started passing people and feeling good. The funniest part of the course was going through the trail between 3 and 3.2 miles. It was really muddy and people were slipping and sliding. Lap two was great, and I was able to pick up my pace, but unfortunately not enough to break a 10 minute mile. My run split was 1:01:12.

I came across the line with another Team Z’er at 3:17:47.  It was not my best International distance triathlon, but was not my worst either.  I was proud of myself for finishing the race and still have some energy left. Now, I need to really get my rear in gear and start training more seriously.

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