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Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Racing with Awesomeness! USAT Age Group Nationals, Burlington, VT, Aug. 18-19, 2012!

After my race and before Chris'.  He has one more day of tapering!
What's the quickest way to cure the post-Ironman blues?  Do another race of epic proportion!  The USA Triathlon Age Group National Championship certainly was that.  I was able to qualify for this olympic-distance race at the Pocono Mountains 70.3 last October and was excited to hear that is was within driving distance for 2012.  Chris signed up for the sprint-distance race for the next day, so just 3 weeks after IMLP...Burlington, here we come!
Wow...that's some choppy water!
Glad that swim's over...time to ride!
My race was Saturday and started out with a .9 swim in Lake Champlain.  To say the water was "choppy," is a slight underestimate!  Having done ocean swims, I can truthfully say this swim was one of the most difficult I've ever experienced!  Whitecaps, drifting buoys, swallowed water, flailing limbs...it had it all.  Thankfully after 27 roller-coastering minutes, I was outta there!
Away we go!
Hill?  What hill?
The 40k bike had a little bit of everything...city streets, country roads, views of farms and mountains...Interstate Highway?  Yes, and it was fast and awesome!  We definitely had some strong winds to contend with, but the rolling hills kept things interesting.
Finish line...here I come!
Thanks, TriSports.com!

Finally it was on to the 10k run - one of my favorite distances!  The one hill on the course was right at the beginning, so after powering up that, it was GO time!  After a long stretch of road, the course eventually meandered onto a paved bike path where it was a little challenging weaving in and out amongst the many runners.  Got a lot of shout-outs for TriSports.com along the way, as they were a strong presence sponsoring the race this weekend!  Hearing the support and crowd noise build, I was happy to reach the all-American finish lined with flags waving and cheering spectators.  Happy that the race was done and thankful to Chris for the support, it was now my turn to relax and cheer Chris on!
We even had the same wave # and cap color...though racing on different days!

What exactly was your complaint about the water conditions?!
 As luck would have it, Chris' swim start on Sunday was in calm, serene waters!  Really?!  Though he got frog-kicked in the neck, Chris quickly recovered and flew through his .5-mile with the greatest of ease.  The sprint-distance bike was a little different, but also got to go on a closed highway.  Something you don't get to do every day! 
Finally...a picture of Chris in action on the bike!  Of course, it had to be on top of a hill!

Powering up that hill!
Chris powered through his 5k run, which also hit the one big hill and the crowded bike path.  Before I knew it, he was flying down to the finish, but not before overtaking one more guy in his age group!  An awesome weekend for both of us racing with the fastest in our age groups in the nation!  It was especially neat to have the rare opportunity of supporting each other on back-to-back race days!  Here is the breakdown of our results:
Polly:
Age Group Place: 39 out of 142; Overall Place: 860 out of 1988
Swim: 27:57; T1: 2:21; Bike: 1:14:27; T2: 1:24; Run: 41:36; Total time: 2:27:46
Last guy to pass...here I go!

Great finish!
Chris:
Age Group Place: 28/48; Overall Place: 321/1025
Swim: 14:08; T1: 1:59; Bike: 34:39; T2: 1:23; Run: 20:09; Total time: 1:12:20

1 comment:

  1. You both are awesome! Only you guys would do this race just weeks after your first Ironman!

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