The Road Bach #3 - Santa Cruz 70.3 Recap
I'm back from Santa Cruz 70.3 and here's a recap.
The big takeaway from the weekend was that training works! ha, I think we knew that right? I did minimal training leading into the event (1-3 endurance workouts per week for the 4 months since I learned the extent of my health issues) and it showed up in the numbers, even more so than expected. I overestimated my fitness thinking I'd be around 30-32 in the swim, and swam 33:09. I thought I'd be around 250w on the bike, but only averaged 233w. As mentioned in my blog pre-Santa Cruz, my goal was to run an experiment on the bike...to build throughout the leg and get a nice negative split. Did I accomplish that? Eh...not really. I figured I'd be around 250w overall, so I started with a target of 220w for the first 10 miles, then moved the target up 10w every 10 miles until targeting "Hard" for the last 16 miles. As you can see in my TrainingPeaks file, that plan went pretty well until mile 30 when I was supposed to notch it up to 250w, but could feel the effort weighing on me and decided to back it down a tad so that I could still push it hard for the last 16 miles. I did achieve that, as the closing miles were my highest normalized power and speed.
My negative split attempt that turned out pretty much even
Segment Power Target Speed HR Elevation Δ VI
1st Half 232w 229w 21.4 155 +82ft 1.07
2nd Half 235w 260w+ 23.3 161 -97ft 1.05
One thing that struck me about racing this weekend was that even though my swim was ~5min slower and bike 45w lower than when I was at peak fitness, it felt the same. It still felt like a race! I still felt the burning legs, high heart rate, adrenaline and competitive drive that I always feel in races. It was great to be bach.
Other highlights of the trip:
- Christine Hoffman, a training partner and friend from when she lived in NYC before moving to Tucson, was also racing (in a wave that started 8 minutes ahead of me) and it took about 30 miles to catch her. Once I did, I shouted some words of encouragement, and then rode by, but on the next hill, she repassed me! It took another few miles to catch her again. She went on to ride just 4 minutes slower than me and take 2nd overall amateur at the race and to earn her pro card. She's a beast.
- Mingling with pros - prior to the race, I had the chance to meet Jesse Thomas again at the pro panel (met him briefly in Kona last year). I very much admire his story...All-American NCAA runner, co-founder of Picky Bars, races in aviators, 6x Wildflower Long Course champ and 2 for 2 at the Ironman distance including a win against Jan Frodeno. The next day, I met Ben Hoffman (2nd in Kona 2014) for the first time since receiving some great advice from him via email conversations, and then met Cody Beals finally. Cody, those who have read my blogs and followed my story will already know, has been very helpful with solving my low testosterone issue. He had low T and low bone density himself, and has overcome it to go on to be a solid pro on the 70.3 circuit. He was gracious enough to sit down and chat with me at the athlete food tent for about 40 minutes after the race. These three guys placed 5th, 3rd and 4th respectively and were part of a speedy running group off the bike, hitting 1:13s for the half marathon. Impressive athletes!
- I stayed with a high school friend of mine, Wes, and his wife (Hilary) and dog (Riley). They're a power couple working at Tesla and Lockheed Martin and living in Sunnyvale. After seeing redwoods for the first time, I had the chance to ride with Wes on the bike course and then climb up a meaty 6 mile hill back to the car. If I was racing "for real" two days later, I would have been panicking! but since I wasn't looking for peak performance, it was fun checking out some of the Cali terrain. The next day they drove me to the race in a Tesla Model S, and WOW that car is amazing! The thing goes 0-60 in 3.9 seconds and we might have tested that. The G-force (less than 1 G) made my head spin - I can't imagine astranauts at north of 3 Gs...
- Two of my cousins live in San Mateo so I visited them Friday night. They took me on a boat ride over to one of their favorite restaurants where Jay walked in like a celebrity. Everyone knew him, and he knew everyone. "Kids good?"..."Yea! How's business?"..."Hey, get me my usual please"..."Sure, Jay!" You might think he owned the place. Both Christine and Jay have personalities and hearts that fill a room.
- It was my first time flying Virgin America and it was great. They were also ultra-speedy returning my bike to me after each flight.
All in all, the trip was a success. A strong mix of excitement, learning, networking and fun. As my health returns, plans are formulating for the future and my road bach. Stay tuned for future blogs on that!
