Shawnigan Lake Olympic Triathlon

Overall - 2:22:50

Overall 3/115

Male 3/79

May 29th saw my first triathlon of the year at the Shawnigan Lake Olympic Triathlon. After having raced the Half in the previous 3 years the Olympic was a good choice as with the exciting times associated with the first 3 months of being a dad 2011 had been a relaxed training year for the first 5 months with about 60% of my normal training volume in the bank. The body and the mind has enjoyed the break and although wanted to be a little sharper at the start of the racing season have been happy with where my priorities have been.

The main thing I had not done to this point in the year was any hard rides so this would be the test for me at Shawnigan.

Swim (1500m) - 26:59
(Avg Pace 1:48 per 100m)

Overall 26/115

Male 18/79

Two lap swim, had a good first lap but lost the group I was with at the lap turnaround buoy. This was a bad mistake as ended up getting lost in no mans land. That group swam 26:15 so that mistake cost me 40 seconds over the second lap.

T1 - 1:51

Overall 5/115

Male 4/79

Not the smoothest T1 in terms of getting wetsuit off and lost a little time as a result.

Bike (44km) - 1:11:12
(Avg Speed 37.1 km/h)

Overall 2/115

Male 2/79

This one hurt a little, essentially held the same pace I did for the half in 2010 so a fair bit more time to be gained here once I sharpen up. Carrying a few extra pounds so I am sure that did not help either. in the end though riding hard is always fun, split was a bit slower than I had thought could do and had a few scary moment's when had to dodge a firetruck at 45km/h as confusion abounded around the transition area. Two laps were soon done though and into T2.

T2 - 0:58

Overall 1/115

Male 1/79

T2 is not that complicated, got in, put my Newtons on and got out.

Run (10km) - 41:12
(Avg Pace 4:12 per km) 

Never felt good on this run. Legs felt like heavy from the start and in the end just ran for position. Had come of the bike in 6th place and moved into 4th pretty early on. was forcing it a bit at this point and soon lost 4th place after being re overtaken. Zoned out a little bit at this point and the gap grew until hit the turnaround and got a sense of where I was at. 

1 and 2 (Nathan and Paddy) were well ahead so my race was for 3 through 6 with 3 and 4 being about 300m ahead. This woke me up so smashed a couple hard km's to get into third and create a bit of space. From this point just tried to maintain the gap with the odd surge if it was closing. Was able to hold on to third and a spot on the podium. Not a great job but realistically based on where I came off the bike position wise was the best result could attain.

Closing Notes

Congrats to Nathan Killam on a strong performance and a convincing win.

Thanks to Speed Theory, Forerunners, Newton and CycleOps for their support.

From a personal perspective happy with the hit out, to be back racing was fun and looking forward to a good summer and fall of training. This report was written on a slight time delay and have already raced the Victoria Half since Shawnigan and are racing the Vancouver Half iron tomorrow so I am looking to catch up on the blog posts while watching Le Tour de France.

Provisional Triathlon Race Calender for 2011

May 29th - Shawnigan Olympic Triathlon - 3rd Overall (2:22:50)

June 20th - Victoria Half Iron - 14th Overall (4:26:26)

July 3rd - Vancouver Half Iron

July 17th - Peach Classic Olympic Distance (Penticton)

August 7th - Sooke Half Iron

Sept 11th - Banff Olympic 

Oct 23rd - Austin 70.3

Also considering a trip to Cowtown at the end of July - but working that one out to if it is a good idea to do 2 half's in 8 days (Think I know the answer to that!)