Malibu Nautica Olympic Distance Triathlon

I just completed the Malibu Nautica Olympic Distance Triathlon today. It was a very fun race, and one that I felt prepared for, although I did no special rampup in volume or intensity, and thus only a minimal taper.

The race takes place in the Pacific Ocean shores just off Zuma Beach in Malibu. A beautiful locale. It is a 1500 yard ocean swim, 40k bike ride (24.8 miles), and then a 10k run (6.2 miles), which is the standard Olympic triathlon distance.

This is a popular race, with many locals in attendance. It sells out two months before the race (even earlier for the sprint). If you do triathlons in LA, virtually everyone will have done this one at least once. I decided to jump into this one as a "training" run for my goal race, the LA triathlon in another few weeks.

MY GOAL FOR TODAY

My single biggest goal in this race was to not finish DFL (dead f****in last) on the swim again. (Or 2nd to last, which is where I ended up in my last 2 tris!) For the last 6-8 weeks, I completely overhauled my swim workouts, taking advice from the beginnertriathlete.com forums which recommended doing intervals after intervals to increase swim pace and endurance, which is a very different approach compared to running, where you run a lot of easy miles. Although my goal was to spend half of my training time swimming, I found that I couldnt' ramp up volume easily as I would get tendinitis in my shoulders. Also, I simply love cycling too much to slack on it, so my swim hours really haven't changed much from my less-serious swim days. For sure though, the intensity has gone WAY up, and every pool session is a hard one for me, 2-3x per week. My typical workouts started at 12 x 100yards at 1:50-1:55 pace with 15 sec rest between sets, and peaked at 22 x 100 yards at 1:45-1:50 pace. So definitely improvement on speed and endurance in training. In terms of OWS (open water swims), I've done less, but I had a fair amount of experience in the months before that, so I stayed with the intense pool workouts. My total swim hours are still in the "pathetic" range compared to real swimmers - I'm lucky if I hit 3 hrs per week of swimming, when I really should be at least 5-6 for real improvement.

Ramping up swimming to do intervals every session, 3x / wk, was hard. Much harder than I expected. When I started up with the 12 x 100s, I wanted to give up after the 2nd one and go back to my mellow easy swimming pace. I really suffered through the rest of them, and only made it due to sheer determination. It's strange, as when it comes to running, I'm well known for my relentless training - I usually will do intervals in a group track workout well after everyone else quits, and even run additional 4-10 miles on top of any workout that they do. On swimming though, there was little x-over, and I was shocked at how "non-hardcore" I was in training. Feeling like quitting after the 2nd set? Unbelievable. I now have more respect for new runners doing intervals for the first time - it's really hard for them!

THE START & THE SWIM

I got to the race at an ungodly 4:30AM, having awoken at 2:45AM and leaving for Zuma at 3:45AM. That wasn't too early though, as there were plenty of people doing a similar thing. It's also good to get bike rack space early, as it gets very crowded near race start.

The swim is a parallel 1500yards to the shoreline, and I have done it before in practice with the LA tri club, so I definitely was not intimidated by the open water (a first for me.) Also, the water was on the warm side today, so I felt extra comfortable warming up in the waves. Mentally, I felt very prepared for this swim, unlike all prior races where I was extremely anxious. Experience helps a lot.

I was in the 2nd wave after the elite start and the men 14-29 age groupers, which I wasn't sure I would like, as in prior races I got smoked by waves start behind me. Regardless, I had to go, so I lined up with the other 60-70 guys in my age group and before we knew it, the race was on.

This time around, I had no intention of walking and waiting in the surf for everyone to gap me. I knew now that I should theoretically be strong enough to keep pack with others in my group, and that helps a LOT for sighting. When you are all by yourself, you end up wasting a lot of time trying to find the buoy rather than following the pack. I ran into the surf with everyone else and it was a mad rush to the first offshore buoy. There was no avoiding the churn of bodies - there was simply no space to maneuver as the lifeguard boat was situated only 30-40 yards off the buoy, leaving a small gap for all of us to squeeze through. After getting kicked in the head twice, swam over twice, and banging my way through and over other bodies, I was around the buoy and into more open space.

Now I started to swim in earnest, hoping (praying!) that I could stay with at least the rear pack. It is usually at this point that everybody drops me, so I picked up my pace. Next thing I know - I'm with the pack! (Probably the rear pack, but that's better than no pack!) Bodies everywhere around me, and I'm keeping pace. It was a new experience for me, and corny as it sounds, exhilarating to know that I was holding my own out there. In fact, after 10-15 minutes, guys around me started to tire, and I actually began passing people in my wave. I couldn't believe it, but there I was, moving up the chain!

20 or so minutes into the swim, most of us in my wave had settled into our final finishing positions, but we actually started to catch the red-capped 19-29 year old slowsters ahead of us. I probably caught 10 of them, to my utter amazement. As well, I didn't see any caps from the wave behind me go flying by. I'm sure they did, but there were sufficiently few that I wasn't surrounded by them (unlike my last tri.)

The swim still felt like it took longer than I expected, but we soon made the final turn and headed for the swim exit. Lots of accelerations around me, and I had a hard time keeping up, as my top speed is still pretty lousy. I did manage to catch a good wave in, and made up a bunch of time by bodysurfing the wave nearly to the shore. I ran out of the surf, and then launched the next important part of my plan, which was to cut down on my transition time hugely by running the entire way from the shore to my bike - fast. It felt like cheating since everyone around me was walking or jogging, but heck, running is my strength, so I should maximize it if I can.

Unfortunately, I didn't click "stop" on my watch to get my split, so I'll have to wait for the race results, but I'm guessing about a 33-35ish minute swim. That should correspond to somewhere in the front of the BOP (back of the pack) - it's not a good time for triathletes, but for me, it's a GREAT time!

As I got to my bike, I was gratified to see that there were many bikes still racked. For sure, over 30% of them, if not 40-50%. Wow! That's orders of magnitude better than the 1 or no bikes I've been seeing at my last two tris. In a great mood, I got my bike gear on and set out to hammer it down.

THE BIKE - A NEAR DISASTER

Immediately after gently pedaling out of the first chute, I cranked up my gearing to aggressive, and prepared to do some serious damage on the bike. Unfortunately, the moment I cranked down hard, my rear wheel locked! WTF?! I thought my chain had dropped or caught, but it was fine. Shifting around didn't help - my rear wheel was barely turning.

After a loud curse, I dismounted, and realized quickly that the limit screws for my back tire which I had adjusted a few days ago probably moved as I cranked down hard, thus locking the tire against the frame. So to add insult to injury, the mechanical was definitely a result of my tweaking my bike a few days ago. And I was carrying NO tools to fix it. I stood there like an idiot, really frustrated for nearly two minutes, removing the rear wheel and being unable to adjust it. Fortunately, a friendly asian girl spectator saw me struggling and she happened to have a multi-tool in her purse! (Likely for the person she was cheering on.) With a huge thank-you, I adjusted the screws - it took 3 separate adjustments before it was no longer stuck. I had lost nearly 6 minutes on this mechanical, and I saw my good friend Ken take off, as well as some other guys I've seen from the triclub. Still, 6 minutes is a salvageable loss, given my good swim, so I took off and planned to race hard to the finish.

The bike went well, as expected. Probably not as well as I'd hoped, but I tend to overestimate my biking abilities on race day. Flattish course with a couple of significant rollers but no really big hills. Held a 23-25mph pace on the flats and stayed in the big ring on almost all the climbs. I got passed only by relay racers who only were doing the bike leg (they were marked "R" on their calves) and one strong triguy in my age group, but otherwise, it was the Willis bike express train, passing people nonstop, sometimes at nearly double their speed. I went pretty hard on the bike this time, and was a bit disappointed that I couldn't keep up with the relay guys who passed me, as I kept catching up and even passing them on the inclines (my strength is hill climbing), but they definitely pulled away on downhills and flats. I actually suspect a lot of this has to do with their superior aerodynamic wheels and helmets, which gives a bigger speed benefit at high speeds and not slower hill climbs.

I did try the trick of removing your feet from your cycling shoes while still on the bike this time, and had no problems coming into the transition. (I still need to learn a flying dismount though.) Definitely saved me some time there.

THE RUN

Not much for me to say here except it was hard but not hellaciously hard, and I finished only a smidgen faster than my last triathlon, in 41:20. Running is still my strength, and I passed people continuously from start to finish. I was surprised at how long it took me to catch my friend Ken, who was running solid 8 minutes/mile, but I guess that's expected as I was only doing about 6:55/mile. After an expected wobbly legged start off the bike, I got progressively stronger with each mile and easily put down the hammer on 3 other guys in my AG in the final chute. I'd call this a 98% effort for me - for sure, I could have gone faster in the final mile.

OVERALL

The final results still aren't in yet, but even with the mechanical, I clocked in overall time at about 2hrs 32mins, which is a respectable time. Nothing great, and probably barely front of the middle of the pack, but a big improvement from my last race. Most important though is my dramatic swim improvements - that alone would have made my day even if I DNF'd the bike and run.

I've got the LA Triathlon in a few weeks, and I'm hoping to maintain my bike and run as is, but make a further dent in the swim portion, and also the transitions, which I plan on practicing in the next few weekends.

I do miss being in the top group of overall finishers, though. In pure running, I usually finish in the top 10%, if not the top 5%. In triathlon though, I'll be lucky if I'm even top 33%. (<- Correction 9/13/09 - woops, I guess I'm actually top 11% as of this race, even with the mechanical. Not bad!)

Results Addendum 9/13/09:

Willis Huang

2:32:27.5

35th/321 in 30-34 Age Group (11th%)

Swim ( 0:34:46.0 ) 85/120 (29%)

T1 ( 0:02:35.4 )

Bike ( 1:11:59.5 ) 44/120 (63%)

Lost 6 minutes (at least) due to a mechanical on the bike

T2 ( 0:01:50.2 )

Run ( 0:41:16.2 ) 15/120 (88%)

In retrospect, my friend Ken who is a similar cyclist (I am slightly faster on the bike) finished the bike in 1:07, so an assumed a finish of 1:06:xx on the bike for me would have translated to 13-15/120 on the bike, or exactly the same percent (88%) in my age group. So, I am likely equally strong on the bike and the run as of now. Swimming's got a LONG way to go...but I'm not DFL anymore!

Also, I strongly suspect that my slow swim pace has to a lot do with veering a bit off course, as I highly doubt that I was swimming at the computed lowly pace of 2:32/100yds, considering that 2:00/100yds feels VERY easy for me. I did notice this during the swim, as I would find myself alternating between swimming alone (off course) and then with a lot of guys (on course). I will strive to improve this by the LA triathlon - I suspect I can knock off 2 minutes off my swim time with this alone.