I’ll make this one quick since this happened one week ago, plus it would be wise to get this one up before I put up one on Welland. Better late than never, but sometimes life gets in the way of these race reports from time to time. Here is my report for my 2 races in 2 days at Binbrook.
First of all, I love Binbrook as a race site. It is not too far away from home, it is a cozy spot with parking within a stone’s throw of transition, the run course is on varied terrain, and the bike is super fast. It really is a great spot for a race and especially so for the first timer because of its separate day for the GT 12.9/Give It A Tri race.
I had a great weekend on the results end of things, but most importantly I feel my body is responding well to training. My cycling is getting stronger by the week, and I am super happy with my run because I am going faster at a lower level of exertion. All of which are great indicators as I head into my ‘A” race in less than a month.
Below are some stats from the two races I did and some thoughts.
By the way, I am loving those post-race Hero Burgers and Chocolate Milk.
Hope to see you in Welland.
Saturday June 18, 2011 – Duathlon
9th overall – 1st Men 40-49
Total time – 1:43:19
* My legs were tired from a 6 hr bike, 2.5 hr run so my plan for the race was to run easy (5:00-5:20/km pace), then blast the bike, and run as steady as I did with the first segment. I had no thoughts of any podium because I thought I’d be way behind the faster runners. In fact, I actually started from the very back of the field (I started 10 seconds after the race did thanks to chatting it up in transition). I enjoyed the first run, picked off as many people as I could during the bike (second best split), then ran steady. I saw I was in the top ten at the run turnaround so I picked up the pace for 1km to create some separation then backed off the pace when I knew I could not be caught.
5km Run – 25:11 (5:03/km)
T1 – 0:55
30 km Bike – 50:43 (35.5 km/hr – 2nd best bike overall)
T1 – 0:52
5 km Run – 25:41 (5:09/km)
Sunday June 19, 2011 – GT 12.9
* I never do speedwork so doing races like the GT 12.9 is perfect for that. Plus, this race tends to have a few up and coming juniors who are crazy fast so there is nothing like getting your 40+ year old butt handed to you by teenagers. Or if I am lucky, I can get the upper hand. On this particular day, only one 14 year old dusted me. He took this non-swimmer to the cleaners, but while I chased him down on the bike, I had him in my sights on the run – but with him weighing as much as my leg – he easily took off from me. I had to settle for second overall but I had to remember to run hard to the line to do so since I started in an earlier wave and those in later waves could catch me without me knowing it.
2nd overall – 1st Men 40-49
Total time – 39:57
400 m Swim – 9:01 (2:16/100m – time includes run up to T1)
T1 – 1:05
10 km Bike – 18:08 (33.1 km/hr – top split)
T2 – 0:20 (finally a transition I can proud of. Best of the day)
2.5 km Run – 11:26 (4:35/km)
Brave man for doing two races over two days! Well done.