Race Report:  St. Anthony’s Triathlon

This past Sunday, I competed in the prestigious St. Anthony’s Triathlon.  The race is beginning to have a hometown feel to me, as it was my fourth time competing at the race.  I missed last year after undergoing surgery in Feb. or 09’ at DISC Medical facility in CA for a nerve entrapment release in my leg.  This was the first time we stayed in downtown St. Pete’s and experienced the atmosphere and flavor of city.

The race is EARLY, especially traveling from Colorado with a 6:55AM start (which is more like a 4:55AM start; however, once race morning arrives any feeling of tiredness is replaced with a rush of adrenaline!) I woke up at 4:40AM; had my normal breakfast, including my Multi-V and Optygen HP supplements.  I also drank 16oz of Lemon Lime EFS before heading out the door and walking the .8 mile to the transition area. It is still very dark at 5:30AM, so fortunately Nate had his flashlight to help me get all my gear set up in transition. Around 6 AM, I started my warm up and ran down to the swim start, followed by some activation, drills and strides. I wanted to make sure to get in the water and test out a couple of runs into the water since it was a beach start. The water felt very refreshing at 74 degrees vs. the muggy, humid 76 degree morning.

The men started promptly at 6:52 and we began just three minutes behind.  I had a decent start, next to Laura Bennett who is one of the best in the world at beach starts.  She had a body length on me after the run into the water, but I remained calm and got right on her feet for the first 400meters of the swim.  After the first couple of buoys, I took over the swim lead and swam at a comfortable, but strong pace.  The swim started off fairly calm, but the waves definitely picked up the second half of the swim.  As I approached the steps to climb out of the water, I was grateful a couple of volunteers were there to help me onto that first step, as I was feeling a little dizzy from the waves at that point.

Once out on land, I focused on getting my TYR Sayonara off as quickly as possible and strapping on my Rudy Project  Wingspan TT Helmet.  I felt comfortable on my Fuji D-6 with my 921 Oval Aerobars, ISM Adamo saddle, Zed Tech 404 and Sub9 disc.  I also loved my new pedals from Sampson Sports; Stratics S6, which are lightweight, yet have a great platform for power.  The bike was a bit windy (wind from the south), so the first 15 miles of the bike were challenging.  I focused on making sure all my corners were smooth and keeping up a high and steady tempo.  At two points on the course (around mile 3 and mile 17), I could see where the other girls were located.  I noticed I had about at least a minute lead over the next girl, so I continued to ride at my pace and made sure to hydrate in preparation for the run. Several times on the bike; I caught myself grinding my teeth; so I was very glad to have on my UnderArmour Bite Tech Mouth Piece!  The mouth piece really helps me to stay relaxed while pushing the bike, focused during transitions and staying smooth during technical corners on the bike. I drank 36oz of EFS fluid while on the bike course, much more than most races beginning at 6:55AM due to the high humidity in Florida!

Heading into T2, I focused on starting the run off at a high tempo pace, especially thinking about my form.  The run is an out and back, so I only could see the other competitors at the half-way mark.  I noticed I had a lead by a couple minutes, so I knew if I could keep everything together at that point, I should break the tape in first. I was very glad to get to that last stretch of the run, knowing that I accomplished my goal for the day!  My time was the second fastest for me on that course (although it is tough to compare overall times because conditions change so much from year to year!).

After the awards ceremony, we headed home back to Colorado.  This made for almost two days in one, but it was nice be able to spend my recovery day on Monday at home.  The travel home was much easier than the travel to Florida….we had to drive in a snowstorm up to Denver last Friday!  Yes, Colorado can still get pounded with snow at the end of April!!!  Hopefully, that snow was the last!!! I am now gearing up for my second WCS race in Seoul, Korea on May 8^th.  Recently I have been doing lots of traveling and racing, but this is my last race for quite some time (five weeks).  I will spend most of May and part of June training for the races upcoming in this summer.

Best  Wishes

Sarah

Sarah’s nutrition report for the race follows her race report.  Sarah is now 2 for 2 in the Life Time Fitness series.

This past Sunday,  I competed in the Chicago Triathlon located right in the heart of downtown.  This was my first year racing in Chicago and I can t be happier with my finish, as I met my race goal and finished on top of the podium.  I was amazed with how many athletes were competing in the race (9300 athletes in total).  I believe this makes the Chicago Triathlon one of the biggest triathlons in the world!  I was great to see so many people out watching the race and so many athletes out competing.

The weather was perfect day for racing, with temperatures in the sixties.  The pros did not start until 11:15 (men) and 11:18 (women).  I am sure it was a bit on the cold side for the age groupers with the first wave starting at 6:00AM!  We really lucked out with the weather, as August can still be hot and humid in Chicago.  The wind on the other hand, made for tough conditions with a 20mph wind from the north.  The swim was swum in the New York Yacht Club harbor of Lake Michigan and it was a straight out and back swim.  The water was 65 degrees, so wetsuit legal, and was quite choppy with the wind.  I lead out of the water, with Sarah Groff right behind me and headed to the run transition (almost a mile run to my bike).  I was debating weather or not to put shoes on, since most of the run was on pavement, but opted out of the shoes (I think this was a good call, although I my heels are a little sore at the moment).  I started off the bike wanting to hit it hard for the first 10k and it was hard, as the first 10k was slightly uphill into the strong headwind.  At the first turn, I could see Sarah Groff about 30 seconds back and I though I saw Julie Dibbons, but surprised I did not see her the rest of the ride.   Turns out Julie crashed right after I saw her and was not able to finish the bike portion, but fortunately, she is okay!  I continued on the second half of the bike in the lead and managed to spin the legs at the end to prepare for the run.

The run was again a straight out and back with a tailwind for the first 3.5 miles and then a strong headwind for the last couple of miles.   I felt pretty comfortable the first half and once I made the turn, my heart rate spiked with the run into the headwind.  With one mile to go, I was beginning to feel confident with a win; however, did not want to led up as you never know what can happen at any moment.  Once I crossed that finish line I was relieved to have accomplished my goal!  It made the extra special to have family and friends to share it with as they made the short drive up from St. Louis.  I could not thank all my sponsors enough for all the support they have given me thus far, especially Toyota and Blue who were both sponsors of the race as well.
My wishes go out to Julie Dibbons and Andy Potts (who also crashed in the race) to speedy recoveries and back to training for the remainder of their 2009 season.

My race nutrition

I started the day with a 20oz EFS with my breakfast.   I then sipped on 6oz EFS mixed with 1/4 scoop of PreRace just prior to the start.  During the race I drank an additional 24 oz of EFS lemon lime.  I find this is all that I need for Olympic distance racing.  Its simple and very effective.

Pro women

1. Sarah Haskins (Colorado Springs CO) 1:59:48
2. Sarah Groff (Colorado Springs CO) 2:00:23
3. Becky Lavelle (Los Gatos CA) 2:02:45
4. Rebeccah Wassner (New Paltz NY) 2:04:11
5. Jenna Shoemaker (Boulder CO) 2:07:31

Lifetime Fitness Triathlon Race Report

This past Saturday, I competed in my third LTF triathlon in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  The weather was perfect again this year, with temperatures in the sixties during race morning and just a slight breeze.  The race began early, as the Pros were the first wave to begin the race.  The women started 3 minutes behind the men at 7:03AM.
Before the race, I had most of a bagel with peanut butter and a banana along with 16 oz EFS sports drink. This was my first early morning race of the year, so I could not quite finish the entire bagel as I can with a later start race time.  I did not take a gel before race start, as I was still feeling pretty satisfied from breakfast, but I was sipping on water and EFS sports drink (16 oz).  The race was quite cool, so I did not need a large amount of liquid:  during bike: 18 oz of EFS, 1 gel…that was it for my nutrition during the race!
The swim was a beach start with a short run into the water.  The swim was one loop with calm, lake water.  The water temp. this year was a nice 74 degrees; usually  it is closer to 80 degrees, so it is very nice starting off the race without getting your core body temperature up at all.  I was in second position most of the swim, just behind Sarah Groff.  I had a smooth and fast T1 and was the first to hop on my bike.
I had a goal heading into the race to really push the first 15k of the bike.  When I got o n the bike, I was feeling good and had a great rhythm.  I followed my goal plan and pushed the start and as I got into my ride eased back just a bit.  I was expecting to see some other competitors come up on the bike (last year eight of us were riding “together”), but this year I was able to stay in front the entire ride.  During the bike ride, you have to stay very mentally focused, but not just focused on pushing the pace, but paying attention to the road, looking out for turns, holes, people, etc.  The course is pretty technical, with narrow roads, so you have to keep your head up.  I was most pleased with my bike ride overall with the race.
I exited the bike about 20 seconds ahead of Julie Dibbons and about 30 seconds ahead of Becky Lavelle. Once I got onto the run course, I pushed the first mile and then settled in to pace.  I was able to keep my lead and extend it to 1:23 once I crossed the finish line.  It is a great feeling being able to break the tape and accomplish your goal.  I was second last year, so it was nice to finish up on top this year.
This was the first race in the Race to the Toyota Cup Series, with the final race in Dallas, Texas in October.  I will be racing in four out of the five races and will be eligible for the overall series standings.

Two months before the 2008 Olympic Trials, Sarah Haskins came to First Endurance because of a recommendation from her coach, US Olympic Sport Dietitian Bob Seebohar.  Within a few weeks her training and racing went up another level. “I began using First Endurance products and was surprised to have immediate results,” explains Haskins.   She later confirmed the products were working through blood tests.

” I had a blood draw taken several months after beginning several first Endurance supplements.  As an elite athlete training at altitude, it is always a struggle to keep up my iron stores, even with taking iron supplements (pure iron).  My coach mentioned that the iron in the Multi-V, would absorb better into my body and the test results proved this theory.  My iron level increased by 33% after beginning the Multi-V supplement two months prior to the blood test.  I noticed other positive benefits after taking the Multi-V supplement; decrease in illness (especially while traveling and intense training cycles) and improvement in recovery.  In addition to the Multi-V, I also began taking the Optygen-HP supplement.  A blood test showed my cortisol levels decreased by nine points, which means I am able to handle more intense training sessions and my chances for getting an illness decreased.  I have yet to have a blood draw for the year, but I will be interested to see if my iron levels and cortisol levels have changed after taking the First Endurance supplements for almost a year.”

These supplements are a key component to my racing and training.  My health feels better overall and I feel stronger and faster.

The two developers of Team First Endurance—Robert Kunz and Mike Fogarty—considered what a real athlete wants, which is either a PR or a qualifying spot. Moreover, they want knowledge, and a way to test products in their own training that will help them develop a solid nutrition program.

First Endurance has a stable of doctors and research board members in their stable who actually race as well, including Bob Seebohar (a former U.S. Olympic Committee sports dietitian and the 2008 Olympic Triathlon Team dietitian who is also an Ironman athlete) and Neal Henderson, the director of the Sports Sciences Department at the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine, who’s also a Masters road racer. They actually get what endurance athletes need. They do the studies on subjects and then they do the studies on themselves.

As a result, the pros who have joined First Endurance, including Ironman athletes Michael Lovato and Donna Phelan, Olympian Sarah Haskins and Xterra’s Ryan Ignatz, have joined because they believe in the product line, not because of money, shirts or jerseys. I’ve spoken to longtime First Endurance athlete Michael Lovato about his association with First Endurance in the past, and for him, it was never about money; it was about the product and the people behind the product who wanted him to perform better. To that end, Kunz and the team were at his beck and call, explaining everything from the benefits of a gluten-free diet or salt supplementation to calorie intake.

Which was great for him. But what about us age groupers?

Enter Team First Endurance. They have just launched their team website: http://team.firstendurance.com, and it has grown by word-of-mouth. The premise is not about getting a free jersey and a box of expired bars. It’s about getting through an Ironman without puking your guts out or bonking. Wouldn’t that be worth infinitely more than a cheap jersey? Methinks so.

The impetus behind the site is to provide a place for athletes to learn about key components in endurance sports nutrition. It’s about putting testing into practice, relaying data, examining cumulative data from other athletes and First Endurance docs, talking with them about personal nutritional experiences and finding a way to identify the best nutritional plan for your own body. It’s a version of a personal nutrition testing protocol—for free.

“People can truly learn a lot about their own nutrition by going through the programs we have on the site,” Kunz told us on a visit to our Competitor Group offices last week. “We have three programs set up—sodium loading, gluten and caffeine.”

Of course, Triathlete publisher John Duke had to chime in: “Is that like eating French fries the night before a race?” Kunz’s reply: “Lots of them—loading with two to three grams of sodium the night before a race. Bob Seebohar is testing this new concept on some athletes at the Olympic Training Center, and now we can test it on the masses, within our team.”

This is why so many pro athletes—including ones that have had nutritional issues in the past—particularly Joanna Zeiger, have joined the team. To solve the conundrum of GI distress, a problem that befalls many of us. This type of distress can derail the “A” race that has been circled on our calendar for five months.

“Mike and I talked to our pro athletes and our customers about how to finish the race and not bonk, not have gastric distress,” Kunz said. “There are so many variables, and everyone is so individual. So we created this website to work in both directions—we gain a lot of very valuable data, while at the same time each member who joins gains a lot of information.”

A simple email and password makes you a member, and allows you to create a page, where you can update it with images, blog posts and much more.

But the biggest benefits are located in the “Programs” tab. They have three big subjects on at the moment—salt loading, gluten and caffeine—along with pH-balanced foods, low- and high-calorie training, anti-inflammatory food studies and product testing coming soon.

So we come back to the question, which is more valuable: a jersey, or a chance at racing without GI distress? The latter is the stated goal of Team First Endurance; A high success rate among its team members of staving off GI distress and avoiding bonking. I know which team I want to be a part of.