- Race day.
(swoosh)
Boom! Hello folks, I'm ready to run.
(swoosh)
(percussive music)
Toast with a light spread,
and a small glass of Hyper Hydrator.
No big jug of water today.
Not on race day, we don't pit stops.
(gulps drink)
Oh that's salty.
(lips smacking)
(door closes)
Picking up Mel from the office.
It is 4:49 in the a.m. on a Sunday.
I'm the best boss, aren't I?
Thanks Mel.
Some people aren't into mornings as much as I am, so
so I tell Mel I'm here.
(soft knocking on door)
Subtle, but effective.
(soft knocking on door)
She's in there.
15 minutes of breathing on her door.
(car door handle clicks)
Later - [Female] Oh my God.
(man grunts)
- I'm handing you over to Mel.
- Okay hold on.
- There you go. You're dealing with a pro now.
There you go. (Mel laughs)
(man laughs) - So professional.
(upbeat music)
(siren)
(rhythmic clapping)
(person cheering)
(crowd chatter)
(upbeat music)
(clapping and cheering)
(upbeat music)
- [Man] That's it. Doing good!
(footsteps)
(upbeat music)
Second place, I would think.
- I think so.
(upbeat music)
(applause)
(beep)
- [Man] Come on in, bring it in, bring it in.
(upbeat music)
(person grunts)
(steady clapping)
- [Woman] Push in there. - [Man] Thanks.
(man laughs)
- [Man] I was hoping you were biking and running scared.
- [Man] Wow. This guy made me work for it.
(man laughs)
- [Announcer] 35 to 39 Olympic.
In first goes to Teran Gesell.
- [Man] It's anti-climactic.
- [Man] Who got the overalls up here?
- [Crowd Member] Good job guys!
(person cheers)
- [Man] Good race.
- [Man] That's not fair. You're taller than me.
- [Man] This guy went fast.
- [Announcer] Hey Trainiacs, race report.
So that was an awesome day.
I didn't think that I had that kind of time in me.
Final time 2:04:36.
Course was a little bit short.
The swim, I'm not a superstar swimmer
so it was a 24:43 for, if anything
it was a little bit long swim course.
The bike was short.
It was just under 37K and I did that
in 56 minutes, 29 seconds.
Speed-wise, that is going an average of 39.1 km/hr.
Top speed 52.4 km/hr.
Normalized power 272 watts. Bam!
Yeah, that was what we wanted.
We wanted to see a big jump in the power.
And then the run, basically bang on 10K.
If anything just a hair under,
in 40 minutes, 38 seconds. Yeah!
Story time, here's how this whole thing went down.
Because it was fun.
So right at the start of the swim
I knew there were two guys, Josh and Andrew,
Andrews's an awesome Trainiac by the way,
I'm sure he's watching this by the way,
Andrew, awesome racing with you,
who were much faster swimmers than me.
I knew that going in and I thought maybe,
just maybe, I could hang on to their toes
and draft off of them for a little bit.
Yeah, well. 50 meters later I'm like
that ain't happening. No. No way.
So, as I wanted to do, I went off at the start
all the way just hammering it to the first buoy
and a little bit around the first buoy
and I'm in third place.
At that point, I lead it out for about 100,
200 meters, and then Philippe Chabot,
who's like legendary in the province,
old dude that still has it in the swim goes in front of me.
I'm like hello Philippe, thank you very much,
yes please, I will take a draft from you, thank you, sir.
So I draft him the entire way and there were
a couple of times that I pulled out
just to see if we were going to do a little back and forth.
Not gonna happen. Water was just perfectly calm,
so all we had to do was just battle our own bodies
and battle each other and the time.
(man sneezes)
Oh, wow. That's how excited I am.
One loop in the swim and Philippe was actually
basically ahead of me coming in to the beach,
but I stood up out of the water, Bam Bam Bam,
and I was out, so third out of the water
and a really nice quick transition.
You know, I need to get proper
PowerTap P1 Power Pedal cleats on my my tri shoes.
That's the only reason I'm not racing in them,
so I had my road shoes, lost a few...
(dog barks)
Will you quiet down?
(dog barks)
So I lost a few seconds trying to slip into my road shoes,
but then Pat wanted me to completely hammer the bike,
and hammer, yes I did, thank you very much.
By this point, Josh and Andrew are out in front of me
by about four minutes because they did a 20 minute low,
and that means low like under 20:30, swim.
So they're like four minutes ahead of me.
So I start hammering it and I'm basically
out there by myself.
Mel is out there doing a fantastic job
driving ahead getting footage of me,
which you all saw,
and I could see as we were starting to do roundabouts,
every five minutes I would gain
about 20 to 30 seconds on Andrew.
I didn't gain a whole lot of time
on the bike on Josh. He's pretty strong.
And by the time we came in to transition 2,
Josh was about four minutes ahead,
Andrew was about 30 seconds ahead,
and I had a transition that was like Boom!
Hello folks, I'm ready to run.
Went out and I gained like 20 seconds on him
on the transition,
and had about a 10 to 12 second gap going into the run.
And what my plan was on the run,
take 2K, just pace myself,
see what my body's going to be capable of.
Did that, held back, held back,
and I didn't gain anything on him
and I had to have that mental fortitude to say
you know what, just let him be in his race
and you be in your race.
Don't race him right now because
you got a hell of a lot of running left to do.
So for 2K I went out, no cramps,
no stomach issues, no nothing, no balk.
And I'm like alright, after 2K I can start to play here
and at that point, at 2K because I knew I was ready
to go I said alright I'm going to do 5K
good steady running here.
First 2K I did at somewhere around a 4:14 per km pace
and then I brought it down to about a 4:05 per km pace
and then I started gaining on him,
and started gaining on him,
and started gaining on him.
At 3K I passed him, and at that point
I wanted him to keep running with me
because it was fun, it was motivating
to have that person side by side, duking it out.
You don't get that a lot in Manitoba.
But he was kind of off the back of me but not by a lot,
so he was like 20, 30 feet behind me and I kept going.
It was a two loop run course, so I did the first loop
and he starts gaining on me a little bit
because I took a gel and it didn't quite sit right
at about 4.5K and he starts gaining on me a little bit
but I was like just hold him off, hold him off,
stay steady, stay as close to 4:05 per km as you can,
I slowed down a little bit, and the plan was to,
at three km left, seven km into the run, Bam!
Let out everything that I had and at that point,
that was when I lost him.
Josh had already finished by that time.
He ended up finishing I want to say 1:58 or so,
but at 3K left I hammered it, started losing Andrew,
and I think he finished about 30 seconds in behind me,
maybe 25 seconds in behind me.
So anyway, good for second place,
some new higher FTP numbers on the bike,
apparently I've got some good running speed in my legs,
and by far a new personal best.
Second place and a time of 2:04:36, short course,
but it translates to a 2:10 olympic distance race.
I'll take it Trainiacs, I will take it.
Oh and the best part about today?
This is hands down,
I haven't been racing locally here all year,
so I haven't seen any local Trainiacs,
people that watch the videos.
I'm at like, a half a dozen.
I'm not even going to start into the names
because I'm going to miss out people,
but there were a huge amount of people that came up
and I got to meet them, and it's awesome because
here in Winnipeg we don't have this massive
Tri community where I get exposed
to a bunch of people that watch the videos.
I did today.
And, you all motivate me when you tell me
that you're watching the videos, and that you like them,
and that you have fun with them, and you find them funny.
So, thank you to all local Trainiacs,
and I'm proud of all y'all for the races
that you put in today.
Good day! It was a good day, Trainiacs!
More like that.