Congrats to all my paraTriathlete friends from the USA who cleaned up at the ParaTriathlon World Championship. Here's the article from triathlon.org
http://www.triathlon.org/news/article/usa_top_paratriathlon_medal_table/
Hope to join you all on the podium next year!!!
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
2009 ITU ParaTriathlon World Championship Race Report
Saturday September 12 was the 2009 ITU ParaTriathlon World Championship. The competition was tough and I was very nervous at the start. Usually I go for a nice 15min jog before the start to clear my head and warm up my muscles. However I ran out of time and was only able to do about 5 mins and then had to rush to get into my wetsuit. I had a little bit of swim warm up to but mostly my head wasn't in the right spot and I felt rushed.
The gun went off and away we went. I picked a great starting line and didn't get clobered like in NewYork. I managed to stay fairly cloe to the leaders into the first bouy at about 200 meters out. After that we turned parallel to the shore. Here's where things started to fall apart. I was swimming long and slow thinking that the tide was coming in and pushing us along. Come to find out later that it wasn't. The water was shallow and clear so you could see the bottom for most of the race. I slowly watched the pebbels and sand go by. It was rather frusterating.
About half way through the swim one of the Tri-6 (blind) Italian athletes with his guide swam by me. I jumped on their feet to catch a draft. For the next 400 metes or so things started looking up. Here's where I made a fatal mistake. I left the draft. It looked like they were headed a little off course and I felt like I could swim faster on my own. The Italians were out of the water almost 5 whole mins before me. This was the worst swim I've ever done. Slower than when I was racing with side stroke back in the spring.
I got out of the water, looked at my watch and thought wow, I'm toast. That was quickly confirmed on the out and back 2 loop bike course when I saw the leader headed back almost 20 mins up on me. I chased on the bike, probably not as hard as I could have. With about 8K left to go on the bike I ran over someone's helmet number that had come off. It stuck to my wheel and mad this wooshing sound, very annoying but I wasn't stopping. In the last kilometer I caught Brandon, however I had a problem with my race belt in transition and he was out of T2 before me.
The run was ok except that my pacing was off. I ran the magority of the run in the low 8's and high 7's but ran the last kilometer at a 5:15 pace. We call this not having good mental toughness. Idealy the pace should be just about even with a bit faster for a finishing kick.
I know that I had a better race in me and am a bit frustrated I was not able to execute it. Especially give the stage it was on. This winter I'll be focusing a lot on my weakness and next September be ready to go to the World Championship in Budapest and get myself a podium.
I want to thank all the people who helped support me financially and other wise at the last second to make my trip to Worlds possible, thank you from the bottom of my heart and God Bless you.
The gun went off and away we went. I picked a great starting line and didn't get clobered like in NewYork. I managed to stay fairly cloe to the leaders into the first bouy at about 200 meters out. After that we turned parallel to the shore. Here's where things started to fall apart. I was swimming long and slow thinking that the tide was coming in and pushing us along. Come to find out later that it wasn't. The water was shallow and clear so you could see the bottom for most of the race. I slowly watched the pebbels and sand go by. It was rather frusterating.
About half way through the swim one of the Tri-6 (blind) Italian athletes with his guide swam by me. I jumped on their feet to catch a draft. For the next 400 metes or so things started looking up. Here's where I made a fatal mistake. I left the draft. It looked like they were headed a little off course and I felt like I could swim faster on my own. The Italians were out of the water almost 5 whole mins before me. This was the worst swim I've ever done. Slower than when I was racing with side stroke back in the spring.
I got out of the water, looked at my watch and thought wow, I'm toast. That was quickly confirmed on the out and back 2 loop bike course when I saw the leader headed back almost 20 mins up on me. I chased on the bike, probably not as hard as I could have. With about 8K left to go on the bike I ran over someone's helmet number that had come off. It stuck to my wheel and mad this wooshing sound, very annoying but I wasn't stopping. In the last kilometer I caught Brandon, however I had a problem with my race belt in transition and he was out of T2 before me.
The run was ok except that my pacing was off. I ran the magority of the run in the low 8's and high 7's but ran the last kilometer at a 5:15 pace. We call this not having good mental toughness. Idealy the pace should be just about even with a bit faster for a finishing kick.
I know that I had a better race in me and am a bit frustrated I was not able to execute it. Especially give the stage it was on. This winter I'll be focusing a lot on my weakness and next September be ready to go to the World Championship in Budapest and get myself a podium.
I want to thank all the people who helped support me financially and other wise at the last second to make my trip to Worlds possible, thank you from the bottom of my heart and God Bless you.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
How to Travel to Australia - Skins and Trigger Point
So I'm in Australia for the ITU ParaTriathlon World Championship. I have a few days before the event on Saturday morning so I'm hanging out getting acclimated and just enjoying the awesome weather here.
The travel time from Portland, Oregon to Gold Coast, Australia is about 25 hours. Often when I travel I end up with dead legs afterward. However this time I tried out a few things during the flights and I'm happy to report that the legs feel awesome! Here's what I did.
1) Wore Skins Travel and Recovery tights from the Portland airport all the way to Gold Coast.
2) Did some light Trigger Point work on my legs during each of the 3 layovers.
I assembled my bike shortly after arriving and went out for a easy ride with my roommate, Rob. We did not do anything hard but man I felt great, which is shocking after all the travel and the time change. We were cruising along and I said, "this nice easy pace feels great, 17 mph is nice." To which Rob reply's, "You realize we are doing 21 right?"
So if you don't already use compression gear AND Trigger Point when you travel, what are you waiting for? Get on that! I highly recommend the Total Body Package
Here's a sweet shot of me in SFO using the Trigger Point footballer, representing Arizona State (Go Devils!) and listening to HillSong. Normally you would use the foam block to elevate your leg but I didn't have space to pack it so I'm improvising.
The travel time from Portland, Oregon to Gold Coast, Australia is about 25 hours. Often when I travel I end up with dead legs afterward. However this time I tried out a few things during the flights and I'm happy to report that the legs feel awesome! Here's what I did.
1) Wore Skins Travel and Recovery tights from the Portland airport all the way to Gold Coast.
2) Did some light Trigger Point work on my legs during each of the 3 layovers.
I assembled my bike shortly after arriving and went out for a easy ride with my roommate, Rob. We did not do anything hard but man I felt great, which is shocking after all the travel and the time change. We were cruising along and I said, "this nice easy pace feels great, 17 mph is nice." To which Rob reply's, "You realize we are doing 21 right?"So if you don't already use compression gear AND Trigger Point when you travel, what are you waiting for? Get on that! I highly recommend the Total Body Package
Here's a sweet shot of me in SFO using the Trigger Point footballer, representing Arizona State (Go Devils!) and listening to HillSong. Normally you would use the foam block to elevate your leg but I didn't have space to pack it so I'm improvising.
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