April 6, 2009

Mad rush called duathlon - Brandywine Duathlon race report

This morning I completed my first ever duathlon and as Craig said these things hurt. They actually hurt like hell. If you think triathlons are hard I have a surprise for you - duathlons are harder. But they are a lot of fun as well. In case you never raced duathlon or even did not hear about the format. It is almost like triathlon only the initial swim is a run. Actually some triathlons may be turned into duathlon if the conditions for the swim are not optimal and race director decides that it is unsafe to swim. But back to the duathlons.

The race I did - Brandywine Duathlon - is 5k run, 13.2mi bike and 3.1mi run. The course for this race is quite hilly both on the run and bike. The run is on mix of road, train and packed gravel (which I don't like too much). First half a mile is nice paved road that then turns to trail with bunch of stones and path without stones. At about 1.75 miles you are back on road running all the way to the transition area. The run is kind of interesting - the loop is T-shaped so it is pretty hard to gauge where you are in the second half of the race (not that it would make much difference this time).

The bars were too low - I later raised them so the bike can go under without tilting it

The bike is 13.2 mi loop around the lake with mix of long gradual hill climbs, few flats and many steep descends. Great course to test what you can really do on the bike and how well you can climb. It is hard course to race especially if you pace the bike incorrectly your run will suffer quite a bit. The descends are good to get your HR down and I reached peak speed of about 40 mph on one section so it is comparable to Anthracite Tri. Only on Anthracite Tri there is one or two climbs and the rest is pretty bearable. This course seems like always uphill with few short steep descends. Very nice course.

The second run is on the same course as the initial run with finish line just slightly below the transition on downhill slope so if you still have some energy left you can finish strong by just keeping your legs turning.

The duathlon is totally different animal than triathlon mainly due to the fact that you need to be careful to pace your first run to get to the bike and still be able to ride.

Go!!!
Craig suggested changes to my original (overly optimistic plan) and I was to go out at 7 minute mile for the first 1.5 or 2 miles and if I felt strong or there were enough downhills to pickup the pace to 6:50 before the end. The run course was pretty much up and down all the time. Not many long downhills to pickup speed. I passed the second mile marker at 14 minutes and was quite happy with pacing. I probably lost few seconds on the last mile as there was much more climbing than on the first part. I finished the run at 22:40 which is slightly off pace, but good.
End of the first run - I was gliding to transition
My T1 was just OK. It took me a little time to get my helmet and shoes on which gave me 1:06.

The bike starts on flat and downhill soon turns to steep climb to a curve after which the climb continues into downhill, and so on. Basically all you need to know about the bike is that there are very few flat sections and we had the pleasure of riding into the wind on those sections. I passed quite a few people on the bike, but I did not count them as I would on little easier course. Also I had to pay more attention to drafting violations as the course speeds-up and slows down everyone pretty equally and at times it was on the edge to keep the distance between the bikes. Two or three times I just pushed the pedals little more to pass the folks before the climb to prevent any penalties. The worst part of the bike ride came at around mile 4 or 5 on the flats when I got cramp to my left calf shortly followed by cramp to right calf. I had to pull to the side, slow down and stretch it out. The cramps came and went away in waves for another 3-4 miles and were quite annoying. Not too bad to prevent me from going, but bad enough to slow me down. I guess if you do duathlons it is good idea to do some reverse bricks to get used to this type of stress. One other thing I did on the bike was to try to follow the power zones plan as closely as possible - stay under 265 for most of the ride and not go much over 300 on climbs. Which on this course means sitting on the climbs and spinning them. I was riding granny gear on all longer climbs and interestingly enough was riding as fast as folks that stood up on their bikes. I got passed by about 3 folks on the bike that looked really strong. One guy that passed me on the longest climb had a jersey that read 'US National Duathlon Champion'. I kept up with him pretty well on the climb and noticed that he stayed in his aerobars and was in easy gear. So there is something about keeping the gearing easy on the bike leg and spinning it up to save legs for the run. The bike leg was relatively short and the 13.2 miles were over soon. I got to the bike dismount and braked with my front brake little to harshly after I jumped off the bike. The bike was in the air, but I just lifted it and kept running to T2. T2 was fast and I was on the run course in no time. Well in 43:31 of biking and 40 seconds in T2.

End of bike leg. Looks like I felt, but I did not. Recovered from this and ran into T2. Notice both wheels are in the air here.

The second run plan was to keep at 7 minute mile for the first half and then pickup the pace if I can. The first half a mile was fairly good although my legs felt like jelly - the usual bike to run transition. I was also running close to red line. At the aid station I tried to get a sip of water - that was a mistake. I had to slow down to about 20 seconds walk to keep it down. Then I gradually picked up the pace and at that point my watch stopped to show my pace. Earlier in racing I would freak out, but not these days. I just decided to run the redline - basically run as fast as you can without throwing up (sounds gross, but that is pretty much where most people race). I got passed by 4 or 5 people in the next 2 miles and passed 2 or 3 folks - you lose some you gain some. Just shortly after the last turnaround on the road back to the finish (about 750 meters before the finish) the last of the 3 guys passed me. I decided to keep him in my sights and if I had enough in the tank before the finish to sneak-up on him. I was getting closer to him and closed the gap he built to about 10 meters before the descend to the finish line. I started sprinting, but he also had enough fuel left so I ended-up finishing behind him by one second.

Final sprint - luckily this part was downhill

It was a great race. It is definitely a mad rush as the HR gets pretty high up on the first run and stays elevated during the entire event. I had mine drop to 129 on downhills on the bike, but most of the time I was pretty high and the sprint to finish line on the downhill I was 4 beats away from my max. And yes the event hurt as well as the rest of the day (and also today). I guess that means that I gave it all I had. I'm very happy with the results. You can check out my time and few official photos on the Piranha Sports website. By the way I did not grow gut between the first bike and end of the race - the gut is actually my gloves and hat that I stuffed under my shirt during the run as I was getting warm. I have the great photos in this post thanks to Ivana who accompanied me to the race as the cheerleader and official photographer. Thanks Ivana for the support.

All done and spent

6 comments:

Leah said...

Congrats! Sounds like torture. But in a good way. I think. :)

Janyne Kizer said...

With the mixed terrain bike section what bike did you use? A cross bike?

kxux said...

Leah: Yeah it hurt so good. I almost forgot how much fun it is to do a fast race with all the focus on half iron. This was definitely a good one.

Janyne: Sorry about the confusion - the run was on mix of trails and road, the bike was all on the road. What was mixed about the bike leg were the frequent hills and just few flats. I used my TT bike which may have been a tad heavy for all the climbing, but I do not have road bike in my stable so this was the best I could use.

Unknown said...

This is so friggin cool. I would have loved to try to compete in a duathlon. I have heard so much about it. The only thing is that I don't have a fancy bike. I only have the fat mountain bike which I purchased about 20 years ago. That's a laugh. Congrats dude !!!

kxux said...

Ted - next time come with your bike. There were people with mountain bikes and just basic bikes from sports store and they had just as much fun as the people with really fancy bikes. I fall somewhere in between. My bike is not bad, but I certainly do not fall into the group of people that have bike that cost more than their car :-).

And yeah these things are a lot of fun.

jay said...

Hi Jan - Duathalon is a new one for me! After my Wildflower tri, I ran the San Diego Rock and Roll 1/2 marathon....not too bad but early this year, the soles of my feet started hurting. Plantar Fascitis is what I have and am stretching and stretching away. I am going to get a "boot" to wear when I go to sleep so hoping in another 3 months I'm good to go again!!

Congrts on your run :)