(Or, to be really correct: “Zurich Triathlon - A 5150 Series Event. powered by ewz”. Now say this ten times in a row.)
My first olympic distance triathlon! I was a bit scared of the swim, I had never done such a distance without a break before, but somehow I would manage.
The week before the triathon wasn’t full of good surprises, though. During my last bike ride before the weekend, I got my first flat ever. I changed the inner tube, inflated it with the mini pump I had with me and just about made it to my training buddy’s place, where I could use a real pump.
On race morning, I was supposed to meet Adrian, a friend from almost forgotten army times, at a place near the transition zone; he would participate as well. But after carrying my bike down the stairs I noticed that the rear tyre was flat again. Great practice to use one of my CO2 cartridges, I thought, and inflated the tyre.
Unfortunately, after five minutes of riding towards the meeting point (already being late), the tyre was out of air; obviously, the inner tube hadn’t survived the two days. Awesome.
I started walking, met Adrian (whose nervousness I was supposed to calm, but guess who was nervous now), and together we walked to the transition zone. We arrived 15 minutes later than what we were supposed to, but luckily that was no problem at all, as there were still amost two hours to go until our start.
I brought my bike to the bike doctor to get a new inner tube. After the mechanic showed me something like a nail sticking in the tyre and the tyre being generally near the end of its lifetime, I decided to also get a new tyre. Bad for the colour coordination of the bike, but good for finishing without another flat.
Waiting at the bike doctor had its benefits as well: Nicola Spirig, ITU Vice World Champion 2010, ITU European Champion of 2009 and 2010, Team Sprint World Champion of 2010 (and so on… you get it) had trouble with her chain and brought her bike as well. We chatted a little, and she was super friendly. Zurich Triathlon would be her first complete competition after a stress fracture suffered a few months ago; it wasn’t quite clear if she would be able to run or not. So we wished each other luck, on appropriate levels: “Hope your leg holds so you can win!” - “Don’t drown, good thing it’s a wetsuit swim, eh?”
I got my bike back with a shiny new tyre on it, so all was ready now! I entered transition and got set up. Here’s Adrian and me all sceptic in the transition zone:
Probably we were watching Macca setting up his transition zone, because he was there as well, getting some short distance practice one week prior to the ITU WCS series race in Hamburg. Too bad I wasn’t paparazzo enough to get pics of or even with him. Next time!
After a short warm up run, we donned our wetsuits and walked to the swim start. We were a tad late, so not much swimming for me before the start, but I hopped in and got wet to get the minimal preparation done.
We positioned ourselves at the outer back part of the field, and seconds later the race started. Here is a pic of that moment:
Now this is not just any pic. I could caption it “Me racing the Ironman World Champion”. But that’s more theoretical. Zooming to the upper part of the field reveals this:
I’m the grinning guy, and Adrian is to the right of me with the dark tinted goggles. Then, looking at the pros getting in the water:
Macca! (The one with the “3.8” on sleeve and leg.) See?
I didn’t see Macca for long though. I actually didn’t see a lot of people during the swim in general, as I employed a very conservative strategy. Like, start at the end and stay there. Once I had a look around, and the leading pack was about twice as far as I was. But at least I didn’t get kicked in the face and stuff.
Even though I did swim freestyle almost all of the time (with a few breaks here and there, just because), my swim split was terrible. I mean “become 10 minutes faster just to be average” terrible.
Anyway, less hassle in the transition zone for me!
I did exactly what I always joked about would be ridiculous funny: be one of the last out of the water, and then use super fast pro transition techniques with shoes already on the bike and what not. Got to save the seconds where you can! (And maybe spend more time training the actual disciplines next time.) Anyway, getting into the shoes:
Notice the mix-and-match tyres, courtesy of my last-second (not quite voluntary) equipment upgrade.
I had a hard time getting into the biking. When pushing down, the glutes felt somewhat empty, maybe due to the two days of mountain running at Gigathlon the week before. The course was three laps on a flat road along the lake plus “Heartbreak Hill” every lap. After a while during the first lap, a motorbike passed me, followed by a super fast Nicola Spirig who was leading the race with a large gap by then. I didn’t see the top men ever, but Macca was around third by then.
Heartbreak Hill was really quite heartbreaking every time, but after the climb there was an aid station with drinks and gel as a little reward. A lot of people were watching the climb, probably because that’s where the participants suffer the most…
This was taken at the end of the climb (notice the pretty lake in the background):
The only time I ever felt strong was after the descent back on the lake road, but after a while on the flat bit I was back to my not so powerful self.
My parents came to watch and dad snapped a few pictures, like this one from a pass past the transition zone:
And this one of me gloriously passing another athlete:
I was rather happy about the end of the bike leg approaching. Here I am pushing the bike back to its rack:
And here I noticed my parents for the first time, about 200 metres into the run:
The run felt okay, I tried to keep a sub 4 min/km pace and almost succeeded. The course was first a bit along the lake:
And then, after a few loops, onto an out-and-back course where we had to do two laps. Like this:
Because I was somewhere in the back of the pack where people are usually not super strong runners, I could pass a lot of people – fun! Towards the end of the first lap, I caught up with Michael, a colleague from work. We chatted a little, somebody said we weren’t running hard enough if we could still chat (probably true), and then I let him go because he was done with the race already. Here I am at the end of the first loop, with Michael in front:
The second loop was less exciting, but a few friends were cheering at a water station midway, which helped a lot. I thought I’d be able to clock a sub 40 minutes run split, so I gave all I had for the finish. About 100 metres to go:
About 20 metres to go:
Aaaaaand done.
See the not-so-stellar overall time. Hmmmm. Guess I should start swimming for real. And there’s lots of time to be saved on the bike. The running and the transitions were okay though. (Running was 40:07, almost my goal!)
Everybody I knew who was racing as well had been faster than me, from 2:08 (super fast guy from the tri camp) to just a few minutes faster. Well. Next olympic triathlon: Uster, end of August!
In the pro race, Nicola was able to do the complete race and won by a six minutes margin; the men’s race was won by Ritchie Nicholls from Scotland. Macca came in third (would have placed second without a penalty he got for being on his aerobars where it was not allowed), the best Swiss was Ruedi Wild on fourth place. Fraser Cartmell, whose mom had been kind enough to comment on my post before the race, finished 10th.
Edit: I forgot because it happens all the time. When I first climbed Heartbreak Hill, I lost one my of contact lenses… on the climb! That makes two out of four triathlons where I have to finish with half blurry sight. Not a limiter, but hey, I’d like to see what I do! In focus!
