Pre-Race
We embarked on a long road trip to OKC a couple of days before the race. OKC is around 400 miles from Austin. We stopped in Dallas for some pre-race carb loading at New Start Veggie Garden which serves completely vegetarian Asian cuisine. The food was awesome – not very spicy but yet had lots of flavor. We checked into one of the race hotels which was about 5-10 minutes from the race start area. After some confusion on whether or not we actually made reservations (our reservation did not show up on their system), we finally managed to get a room thanks to some excellent customer service from the hotel rep.
Packet pickup and bike check-in day before the race went smoothly. Everyone had pre-assigned bike rack spots, which made things easier. We scoped out the entire transition area so as to have a mental map of the swim/bike/run in and out. We met the other Tri-Sition Area (our triathlon store in San Antonio) athletes who had also made their way from South Texas. We also met some of our Austin T3 athlete friends who were doing the full Ironman distance. Pre-race night dinner came in the form of a meal at PF Chang’s- this is turning out to be a tradition now. We end up finding PF Chang’s in cities we go to race. :) Ohh…and not to forget, we had a kickass Indian buffet lunch earlier that at Gopuram as well. If you like Indian food and are ever in OKC, don’t miss this place!
Race Day
As always I did not sleep very well the night before the race, hence I woke up a little groggy. We had bought supplies for breakfast the night before from Target (packed our own toaster because of the early start). We went to the race venue fairly early and hence got a good parking spot. The parking area is almost a mile away from the transition area; the morning walk helped me feel more awake and even warmed me a little – it was a little chilly!
Swim + T1
Charanya is the swimmer in our family and she had a good 1.2 mile distance swim. I will let her describe the swim in detail on her blog [Charanya – blog SOON!!]. In short, she had a challenging but fun swim and looked strong when she entered transition to meet me (after a long run from the swim finish thanks to the fallen water levels!:() I met her in a corral dedicated for relay participants and did the chip exchange, got a good luck kiss and headed off on the bike ride!
Swim: 52:33
Pace: 2.40 min / 100m
T1: 2:17 min
Bike
The bike course started with a 2 mile sweep around Lake Hefner. I felt like I was going too fast (I realized later that I had a tail wind). I consciously tried to slow down but my MPH was still too high. My legs felt fresh so I decided to go with the flow (no pun intended). Within a few miles I felt my bladder bursting, I thought it was a one-off thing so I decided to make a pit stop at the 2nd aid station (we had 6 aid stations on the bike course). But the bladder issue continued throughout the bike ride (more on this later). The course was advertised as “fast rolling hills”- which was exactly how it was. Now I have been training on some hilly terrains in San Antonio and Austin, so compared to those, the so-called “hills” in OKC were nothing major at all. The course had some small climbs and fast declines where I had ample time to recover. I had to take another bathroom break at the very next aid station, and this trend continued throughout the ride. The aid stations were very well stocked, and I picked up water and Gatorade at every stop. To compensate for my frequent water stops, I had to keep changing my nutrition plan on the fly. I decided to take in more water and electrolytes then I had originally planned to – but this again meant more bathroom stops! Suddenly completing the ride/run distance wasn’t my biggest headache- it was my nutrition and bladder issues! I got to the turnaround point (26 miles) quicker than I wanted to (~1 hr 30 mins), but this was expected as there was a tail wind pretty much all the way until the halfway mark. On the way back the route was tougher - the head wind felt brutal on the open roads which had nothing but farm fields on either side. I took the semi-hills very easy, taking into account my nutrition and using the down hills for recovery. It was around mile 45 when I first started to mentally check-out. I felt my right calf cramping a little bit, which started to concern me. During my training, 50 miles was the longest distance I rode, so it wasn’t surprising that I was reaching my endurance limit. I stopped to use the bathroom again at the last aid station which was at mile 48. A volunteer (all the volunteers were BRILLIANT) fooled me (I think she was trying to make me feel better) by telling me that I had only 5 more miles left. Now 5 miles vs. 8 miles may not seem a lot, but the mind works in weird ways - especially when you are mentally exhausted on a long race. The last 8 miles were painful - not physically but mentally. Negative thoughts about the long run ahead started to form in my head, which was NOT GOOD.
Coaches always say that happy thoughts are invaluable in endurance races. As I approached the transition area I could hear my friends Amit and Rad cheering for me. Charanya was right there with her camera (of course :P). This really perked up my spirits and put me in a good frame of mind for the 13.1 mile run ahead. I gave Charanya a big smile for her camera as I was under instructions from her to smile at EVERY camera I see on the course. Again this helps with the “happy thoughts” that I mentioned earlier.
Bike: 3:32:17
Pace: 16 MPH
T2
I had a good smooth T2. A couple of things delayed my transition - my laces (which got tangled) and having to fill my belt water bottles. I need to get easy laces for my future races. And of course I HAD to make another potty stop! :P
T2: 3:47
Run
As I started my run I couldn’t help but think about how relieved I was to get off the bike. As some of you know, I am a runner first and then a cyclist. The plan always was to keep my legs as fresh as possible for the half marathon. I started with short strides at high cadence - a tip I picked up from my mentor Amit. The run course was made up of two loops, and each loop was 6.55 miles. My legs felt good for the first couple of miles, so I decide to pick up the pace just a little. I still had to go to the bathroom a few times and to add to it my stomach started to feel completely bloated. Overall I stopped 5 times to go to the bathroom. But the good part was that I wasn’t feeling tired and I was able to fight off the cramps courtesy of my changed nutrition plan. At the end of the first loop (which was parallel to the finish line) I saw my cheering squad Charanya, Amit and Rad. Again this really pumped me up. Charanya asked me how I was, and I told her that I felt great and that if my legs held up, then I should be able to finish strong. Miles 7 through 10 - I went a little conservative with a goal to finish strong. I walked through every aid station throughout the race while making sure that I took lots of fluids. I tried flattened coke for the first time in the race, it worked well for me. I found a couple of other folks who were newbies at this distance to run with. Running with and talking to other competitors was such a joy, and we ended up working with each other to get us through the rest of the race.
With a little over 5k distance left, I could finally visualize the finish line and it was at this point that I decided to go all out and give whatever little I had left. I picked up the pace to a sub 8 min/mile, which was fast but doable on the flat course. Right as I was approaching the finisher’s chute, for the first time in the race, my calves started to severely cramp. But I didn’t care as I only had about 50m to go. I could hear the huge crowd cheer from the stands on my right which brought me extreme joy. I saw Charanya at the other side of the finish line; when I crossed it, I gave her a big hug!
Run: 2:26:30
Pace: 11.1 min/mile
Overall Time: 6:57:23
Bottomline
In the end, 634 miles of biking and 182 miles of running in a span 12 weeks, resulted in a solid race for me. I wasn’t out there to break records; I just wanted to finish the race strong. More importantly I wanted to not finish the race with my legs cramping horribly, which has been a major problem for me in the past. My workout plan along with my nutrition plan has helped me overcome some of the cramping issues I have faced in the past. The only concerning part was having to stop 5 times on the bike and 5 times on run due to the bladder issues. I could have shaved off close to 25-30 minutes overall if it wasn’t for these multiple stops. Of course I also had to alter my race and nutrition plans on the fly. You will quickly learn that race day can sometimes be a whole different beast from what you imagine and plan for – and anytime, you have to be ready to change your strategy!
Some shout-outs before I end this post-
- Big thanks to my mentors – Amit Bhutani and Augusto Hernandez – for helping me with all training / nutrition tips. Your inputs were invaluable!
- Thanks to Radhika and Amit for traveling to the race to cheer us on and all my friends who cheered me on virtually!
- Thanks to all the athletes/triathletes that I trained with at Tri-sition Area, T3, Austin Fit, and Tri-Oomph.
- Thanks to my family for being understanding, they still think Charanya and I are way too “active” :)!
- And last but not the least, thanks to Charanya for being patient with me while I slogged through my summer training. At the end of the day, without your swim, I couldn’t have completed this race! [If I learn how to swim next year, will you buy me a new Tri-bike? :P]
I have no time to chill as I have to get on my marathon training bandwagon now. The Philly Marathon is just a few weeks away and an 18 mile long run beckons this weekend! :)
