2003 Sports Spectrum Race Report
On a hot and humid Saturday, I headed for Shreveport, Louisiana to pick up my race packet and to get checked into the hotel. The two hour drive was not bad because I was consumed with thoughts about the race. About an hour in to my drive, I decided that I had visualized everything that I could about the race and gave up on that tactic. I lifted my arm over my head to stretch and, out of nowhere, my neck locked. I had no range of motion to the left – the side I breathe on during the swim - and very little to the right. What had I done to make this happen? I just didn’t have an answer.
I proceeded to pick up my race packet and was not in the best of moods, I have to admit. Whether it was out of fear of what trouble this injury could cause me or because I was just miserable - it didn’t really matter. But then it happened: as I walked up to pick up my race packet, some little bitty guy told me that volunteers picked up their gate pass in another building. I didn’t need a volunteer’s gate pass. I was competing tomorrow. How dare he mistake me as a volunteer! Before I could stop myself, the words just rolled out of my mouth, “I’m racing. Do I look like a volunteer to you?” At that time, something must to have clicked in this little guy’s head, because he said, “It’s all good! You can race if you want to! Volunteers are good people! It’s all good! It’s all good! Yeah, that’s right, It’s all good!” I admitted that, “It’s all good!” got my race packet and made my way to the hotel.
By the time I got to the hotel, my neck was really
getting stiff, but I was determined to race because, “It’s all good!”
My rooms weren’t ready, so I went to a pharmacy and got a bottle of
Ibuprofen and took a few of them because I now realized, “It’s all good!”
I then decided to go to the race site and walk through the transition
area, view the swim, and drive the bike route.
This did take my mind off of my neck and I was settling down a little
after the events of the day. As I
returned to the hotel, I found my rooms were ready and my wife, son, and mother
met me in the parking lot.
The night was pretty much what I had anticipated.
I slept more than I did the year before, but I still had a fairly
restless night. Occasionally, I
could hear my two-and-a-half-year-old bouncing off the walls of the adjoining
room that they were staying in.
Finally up at 4:30 A.M. to get in my breakfast.
One orange Gatorade spiked with Hammer Gel, a banana, a bagel and a nice
hot bowl of oatmeal. I took a shower to try to loosen up my neck, but it was just
not happening. I got out of the
shower, got ready and I was off for the race.
The gate actually opened for the race site at 6:00 A.M. but the line
started forming at about 5:30 A.M. and by the time the gate opened up the
traffic was backed up quite a ways.
I got to the transition area and got set up while
passing the pleasantries with acquaintances made at last year’s race.
I don’t have the fear of the swim like I did last year, knowing that I
can make the cutoff with ease. Hopefully,
I can get enough rotation on the swim to get a breath of air.
Finally it was time to start.
My wave was scheduled to go off 24 minutes after the first wave so we got
to see some of the elites come out of the water.
By the time my wave started, I was ready.
Now this year was no different than last:
the swim was long, just how long no one really knows, but it was not the
half mile it was supposed to be. It
was a minimum of 150 yards too long and the announcer was saying that it is 250
yards too long. But as one of my
friends said before the race, everybody has to swim it.
The cannon fired and we were off. I
had been working on the swim to improve it and I found that I had swum up into a
pack and I began to fight it out with the best of them.
What was unusual about the swim this year was I was still fighting it out
with people at the halfway mark and as we made the turn on the backstretch, I
was still in a pack and holding my own. You may be wondering how my neck was
feeling. In one word, TERRIBLE!
I was not used to the limited range of motion that I was having, so I was
taking on water on some strokes and it was starting to make me sick.
I did chum a little in the water, but as dirty as the water was, probably
no one noticed. I fell off my pace
just a little, but came in six minutes faster on the swim, than I had the year
before. That translates in my
opinion as a good swim.
I had one of my better transitions for T1 and was on
my way for the bike. This course
was a hilly course and is not conducive to Clydesdales. But everybody has to ride the same course.
Where I thought that I could make up time I lost it due to a headwind
that I had not expected. I was two minutes slower on the bike than I had been the year
before, but there had been no wind to contend with.
T2 was slower than I had anticipated, but I still
made it through it and got out onto the run course. By this time, the temperature was in the low 90’s and the
sun was beaming down and the humidity was 66 percent. I plodded along on the
course in my usual fashion and decided that I was on pace to meet my goal.
At the two mile mark, I was a little behind, but knew that I could make
it up. As I started on the trail
portion of the run, I knew or thought I knew I was getting close.
I raced down a hill and up another to where I thought I would I would get
back on the pavement and be headed toward the finish line.
To my surprise, I was wrong about the course and had missed a turn last
year that cut an entire loop off of the run.
The year before, this portion of the course was not marked as well as it
was this year, plus there was a volunteer showing participants the way.
Well, knowing that I had unintentionally cut off part of the racecourse
from the previous year really bummed me out.
I literally found myself giving up because what was the point to race
hard any more? My time last year
didn’t mean as much to me anymore. But
last year did mean something to me: I
didn’t quit last year and I wouldn’t quit this year.
As I proceeded to the finish line, I was met by one
of our collegiate tri club members who ran the last four hundred yards in with
me. My time was roughly 5 minutes over what it had been the year before, but I
didn’t have to get any I.V.’s this year.
A friend gave me encouragement on how well I looked after the race, and I
felt really well. My son slept
through the bike and run, but when he woke up after the race, he didn’t care
that I had fallen short of my stated goal; he just said, “Daddy I love you!”
Somehow the words of my child made me a winner that day.
Do I still have a goal to meet, ----- Oh yeah! Will I achieve, my goal
next year? I hope so.
"Win or lose you will never regret working hard, making sacrifices, being disciplined or focusing too much. Success is measured by what we have done to prepare for competition." ---John Smith
