November 13, 2009

Flashback: Last season's Bearathlon Race!


22 March, 2009: RACE Day


I awoke at 4:30 A.M. to the adrenaline-pumping cell phone alarm clock at the side of my bed. I flopped my legs over the side of my bed and prepared my eyes for the brightness as I turned on my room light. Race day was upon my thoughts as I began the familiar process of waking up by starting to brew fresh coffee and hopping in a warm shower. Just as I finished getting my uniform and necessary warm up gear on, the coffee was prime and I sat down with my dad for a not so appetizing bowl of plain oatmeal with a pinch of brown sugar. Only 25 minutes had passed and buddy and training partner Bee-Oh showed up with his goofy demeanor after he got a mere hour and half of sleep. We mounted our bikes on the top of my car and threw our gear in the back as the three of us to ok off into the wet and dark streets of Berkeley. After a quick transition to pick up Mike Sontag, we headed to the race site at Lake Anza. Of course we listened to appropriate music that slowly got louder and louder and when we were in the Lake Anza parking lot, music was blaring Infinity 2008 as Bee-Oh and I danced and got the nearby racers pumped. I once turned off the music for a second, and I heard about 10 moans, so I put it back on and everybody was happy, including some older age groupers.



It was time to set up our transitions. I got a great location 4th bike on the last row closest to the bike out. I threw down my transition towel, bike shoes, sunglasses, nutrition, and swim stuff next to my bike. Bee-Oh and I headed over to grab our timing chips and throw our T2 equipment in the back of the truck that would take it to T2 (Note: if you don’t know about this course, there are two different transition locations. Swim to run up at the Lake Anza site, and bike to run at the Briones overlook 5 miles away). Due to a good amount of hydration, I constantly went off into the darkness to due my business. Thank god it was so dark that morning, I think I went 3 or 4 times before the start. Next step before warming up was to get my body marking with my number on my left arm, hand, and calf. It was a dreadful thought to strip down to get marked when the air temperature was a freezing 36 degrees.


With the boom box playing Kevin’s loud techno music, a group of us got our bikes hooked up to the trainers and began the warm up routine. With 4 layers on (uni, t-shirt, sweatshirt, warm up jacket) I quickly got warm, which was a relief in the chill of the air and the thought of getting into Lake Anza. After 25 minutes on the trainer, it was time to get the T1 organized: cycling shoes, arero helmet on bars with sunglasses inside, and gels taped on top tube. With 15 minutes until race start, I slid into my wetsuit, zipped up, and headed with the masses with goggles and neoprene cap in hand. As I headed down, I somehow remember hearing our very own Dave Penny’s on the loudspeaker spit out something about “don’t forget your ear plugs and butt plugs.”



Swim

After a few minutes to get acquainted with the 52 °F lake temperature, the race was off. The collegiate men were off on the first of 2 swim loops that included a run along the water’s edge before diving back in. On the first loop, I quickly got into a good rhythm with the adrenaline creeping all over my body, or that could have been my last pee to warm my body up. Who knows. I finished the first swim lap with teammate and accomplished high school distance swimmer, Mike Sontag, and quickly ran past him before he caught and pasted me on the second lap. Towards the end of the swim, I began to visualize the bike course and began kicking my legs harder to warm them up. I swam a solid 16:30 on a 1250-meter swim and was 8th out of water. I quickly ran into T1 and couldn’t help from laughing when I saw Louis Vayo (the 1s out of the swim and teammate who swam NCAA) seriously being dressed by our coach. He had his hands straight out in front of him as Coach Andy draped him in a biking jacket and strapping the Velcro on his gloves. With a smile on my face, I got to my T1 and quickly pulled off my wetsuit and attempted to get my biking shoes on. The first attempt just led to one shoe flying off due to such cold hands and toes. I quickly got both shoes, sunglasses, and helmet on and headed off on the bike.


Bike

I began with a high easy cadence to get my legs warmed up. I got off to a great start as I went from 8th to 3rd in just the first 4 miles, even before the top of Wildcat hill. Louis gave me another laugh when we were close to each other and we both saw a deer crossing the road. The deer was seriously right in our path and I closely avoided it. I looked over at Louis while passing it, and with his excited voice like a kid, asked me “Did you see that? Did you see that deer?!!” Yes I did see it. The next obstacle was the technical decent of Wildcat hill. Sharp left, sharp right sharp left and so on. I took the entire descent quite aggressively. I passed 1 more guy descending before getting to the bottom and taking a sharp left onto San Pablo Dam Rd. Just as I turned left, I saw one more guy in a Cal uniform ahead of me, but was unsure who it could be. I figured it must be Bee-Oh since he is a strong swimmer, but as I got closer the last name of the butt was visible and read “Dahls”, which I think is misspelled rather than Dahlz. I thought to myself, “this can’t be right, I must be imagining it.” John Dahlz is a respectable elite triathlete and teammate who is one of my role models in the sport of triathlon. He is a very strong swimmer as well as an excellent cyclist, but I would never have thought that in just 8 miles of cycling that I would have bridged a 2-minute gap. It is at these times in a race when you start to think to yourself, “Am I going too fast and will I blow up at this pace or can I keep it up and pull away?” I convinced myself that my legs were feeling good and picked the latter of the two. I kept trucking on and read my speedometer flirting around 25 to 30 mph on the flats and slight descents. One thing I have learned in the years is to never look back if you pass someone. It’s not a way of showing dominance, but a means of staying focused and assuming that your opponent is always on your heals. I kept my focus ahead and pushed over the first two big hills known as Mama and baby bear. As I got closer to the final and biggest hill known as papa bear that was jus 2.5 miles from T2, I looked back and John was nowhere in sight. I was getting excited and began to visualize the next leg, the run. This was quickly interrupted when I was just 1/4 of the way up the last difficult climb when I heard, “psss…pssss…pssssss”. I had a flat in my front wheel. I knew there would be no air soon so I made one last surge up the hill and got half way up before I got off and saw that I would be riding on rims if I went further. My instincts quickly kicked in with the thought that I could still salvage this lead since during the race I thought it was only .5 or 1 mile away (I thought 1 mile, but after the race I calculated it to be 2 miles to the T2). I took my shoes off and clipped them both back into pedals and took off up the hill on barefoot pushing my bike. With my aero helmet and sunglasses still on, I ran hard up to the top of papa bear. About 2 minutes after I began running, John Dahlz came whizzing by with a sympathetic question, “Flat?” Yes, but I kept running hard with my left hand on my seat pushing my bike up and myself most likely at around 5:30-5:45 pace. Adrenaline was fuel. Nothing could stop me now. I began by running on the asphalt covered in uncomfortable pebbles, but I didn’t mind it too much at first since my feet were still a bit numb. But I soon began to feel my warm up and found the cement and smoother storm drain to be more comforting. The drain was rounded and was about a half foot lower than the road, so my bike was way up. As I kept going, I began to sing aloud. Yes, you heard me right, I began to hum and sing. If you have ever ran on hot sand at the beach and started chanting “ohh ahh yikes ohh ahhh,” that is what I was doing but with a tune to it. “Ohh ahh yess I’m going to run across the street now doobie dahh lalala”; something like that. The entire run included the 1/2 of papa bear, a short flat section, then 1 big dip down and then back up, then a steep .5-1 mile downhill into T2. Another teammate of mine, Craig Fellers, an extremely strong cyclist came whizzing by with another sympathetic expression to my circumstances. As I came tearing down the last hill as fast as my raw feet could take me I came down the last hill singing and another 5 guys passed me as I got to T2. My dad was awaiting me at T2 with a video camera, and yes there is footage of me running down the hill. The first thing my dad said was “Ohh noo…” haha. As I came in I shouted out “I just went for a mile warmup” and “It hurts sooo good!” I quickly parked my bike, grabbed my running shoes and was quickly off.



Run

I came into T2 in 6th or 7th, but had a quick transition and was out on the run course in 4th, ready to do whatever had hunting I could do. John Dahlz was long gone, but my new goal was to pick off a UCSD triathlete and teammate Craig Fellers to the best of my abilities who had nearly a 2 1/2 minute lead on me going into the run. I started off on the treacherous and very hilly run course. For those unaware of the course, the first 1-mile is relatively flat, but then the next 2 miles are all on a steep uphill on now muddy and slippery trail. Then you turn around and head straight down the cliff of a trail. So I began on the flat beginning with a blazing pace. Just a 3/4 mile or so into the big hill, I caught both of them and was now in2nd place. But I knew I had a long way to go and I began to feel the effects of running on asphalt barefoot for 2 miles. It felt I had glass and sharp rocks under my toes and with every step the balls of my feet seemed to stick and unstuck as if blood was covering my feet. I tried to keep my focus on the race and fight through the pain. After the race, teammate Bee-Oh noted that after the halfway mark “you didn’t look so good.” And I didn’t feel so good. I was constantly slipping on the mud that was everywhere on the trail. Mud would build up all over the bottom of your running shoes adding a lot of weight and mud would go flying. I started heading down the step face of the hill towards the flat section at a very cautious pace to my standards since my feet hurt more with the extra pressure on them with the descent and uneven ground. With 1/2 mile left until the finish I bonked harder than I have ever felt in my life. My nutrition had been thrown off due to the flat. I had taken 1 gel earlier in the bike leg, but I planned to take 1 more gel right before going into the run, but was preoccupied with running barefoot to remember. I now felt like I was running in place. Trying to grab the air to push my way forward. I now gave up on what I said before about looking back at your opponents. I kept looking back to see Craig Fellers 30 seconds back. I felt like he was getting closer and closer. With 1/4 mile and one last climb to the finish I was flirting with fainting. I seriously began to lose my sight. I saw stars zipping by and then all colors got darker. I knew I just had to take one step at a time. It was like an endless crawl up the last hill. When I finally put one foot over the finish line, I was so relieved, worried about my feet, but more importantly hungry!



Post-Race

I had finished! I now limped over to the first aid tent and sat on the massage table to examine my feet. I didn’t know what to expect. After removing shoes and socks, there was blood all over the toes on my left foot and two silver dollar size blood blisters staring at me from the balls my feet. As I sat down getting cleaned up, Danielle Moultak generously offered her warm jacket and brought a feast of food. I was so pale, cold, and hungry. But I still had enough energy to laugh about the whole event. My other teammates came over to check in on me and we exchanged a few laughs. I didn’t get off the table for another 10 minute as I ate about 15 orange slices, 5 bagel slices, and a bottle of fluid recovery as I waited for so me padding to put on my feet. My dad came over with my clothes and I put on 2 pairs of socks, running shoes, 2 jackets, and sweats and then I limped over to the food table trying not to apply any pressure.



The awards for the race were soon announced and Cal had dominated as the men went 1, 2, 3 and the women went 1, 2. I ended up placing 2nd overall and actually had the fastest run time as I ran on blisters, which amazed me.



The rest of the day was filled with eating a delicious burrito and icing my feet at Cancun, sitting in the hot tub at the school pool, ordering fresh blackberry frozen yogurt, and watching coverage of the 1992 Kona Ironman World Championships with Mark Allen and funky outfits until both Bee-Oh and I passed out halfway through and slept for over 2 hours. We then ate a delicious meal at Zachary’s Pizza.



Overall it was an incredible day and I enjoyed every moment of it. I want to thank everyone who organized the race, volunteered, cheered me on, and left everything on the course. Great job everyone! And thanks for reading this extremely long race report.



One last note about the weekend that I can’t

leave out was on my drive home from Berkeley to Newport Beach. As I was driving my dad and I just north of LA, we were discussing the whole ordeal that had gone on the day before. My dad asked me, “So would you remember exactly where you flatted on the course if you went over it again?” I barely had enough time to say “Yes, of course” when a loud sound came from the back of the car, “clunk…clunk…clunk”. ANOTHER FLAT TIRE!! (As Norman Stadler once said at Kona Ironman a few years back. If you haven’t seen footage, youtube “Norman Stadler’s meltdown”) Yes, I now had a flat tire on my car. The back left tired had popped and I veered off from the fast lane to the center divider area. I told my dad that I could to start running barefoot if needed. My dad was able to quickly change the flat tire with a spare faster than most people on our team can change a bike flat.

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