ORU Indoor Triathlon

"You're a lap and a half down!" I hear as I sprint off the stationary bike to start the run. Up until this point, I had pretty well "screwed the pooch" at every part of the race. Starting with my swim time. 20 seconds slower than last year. 40 seconds slower than expected. I had bumped my swim mileage up 250% over the week. That probably didn't help. But I had to do something to compensate for the lack of running stemming from an injury earlier in the week. At this point, I could still only run half a mile pain free. Hopefully, that wouldn't be the case during the race.

Which, back to it, I had spent way too long setting my bike up. Last year, I had a bike pre-setup. This year that wasn't allowed. And I definitely picked the wrong bike to try and setup to my specs. There's another 20 seconds. Or more. And then the spin as fast as you can stand bike leg of the indoor race was on. The previous year, with all the spin classes and gold sprint races I had been doing, spinning fast for a long time was something I could do. This year, with all the outside biking I'd been doing, I was much, much faster on the bike. But not a faster spinner.

All of this meant that as I started the run, I was a minute and a half down in my heat with just a 2 mile run left to catch up. If I was going to have a chance to repeat as champion and win the $100 gift certificate, desperately needed for a new pair of running shoes, I was going to have to hit one heck of a good run. Luckily, with that kind of adrenaline going, I never even felt the knee.

Three laps later I had caught up the half a lap, and had a full 10 laps left to make up the rest. That's when the pain hit. Without doing any hard running in months, I was now in a situation my body was really not used to. My heart rate had been at the ceiling the whole race. Now it had busted through the roof and into my throat. And, as expected, I was not prepared to handle it at this point in the season.

I was shut down for the next couple of laps as I struggled to get myself back under control and convince myself I could still make up the time needed to win this race. The next few laps I did all I could to pick the pace back up, with the hopes that I was indeed still catching, still making up time.

And then I saw him. But with only three laps left, I was still half a lap down. I didn't think I could do it. I was already doing everything I could to keep the side stitches at bay and I was growing more and more nautious each lap. But I had to try.

The pace was kicked up again. To the max I thought I could sustain for the next lap. Instantly I was there. Closing in fast. Halfway through the next lap I was now trailing, stalking my prey, waiting for the right time to make my move, and trying to recover, just a little, before launching the final kick to the finish.

He heard me coming and sped up to prevent the pass. All the way until we were both kicking like it was the last lap. Except it wasn't. There was one more left. And if he could hold this pace, it would be his.

But there was no way. We were almost sprinting. This race was mine. He had to have misjudged. And, after finding there was still a lap left, he broke. It had been the last courageous kick to try to hold the lead for a possible win. But the race was a lap too long for him and just long enough for me to catch up and pull away for what did, turn out to be the win.

After all the times were in, we had put down the two fastest times of the day and pushed each other to the top, over some very good athletes. And I got that pair of shoes I needed.