The weekend before Elephantman I attended a wedding. I was nervous that the time away from training would seriously derail my preparation for Elephantman and ultimately affect my performance at the SOMA half-iron triathlon a month later. Fortunately I was able to keep my jets cooled and everything worked out fine. Attending the wedding was probably a blessing in disguise. I had put in some hard weeks of training and a few days of rest would likely do me good. However, a few of us at the wedding were entered into a 10k run just for kicks and giggles. I'll spare you the boring details but I had a massive negative split indicating my form was coming around.
On race morning a week later, I awoke at 5:00am from a sleepless night at the Oxford cabin with my fellow NMSU Triathlon Race Club team mates. We proceeded to gear up, fill our bottles, and jam some breakfast down our throats. I never know what I should eat but I had decided that 2 brown sugar and cinnamon pop tarts, a banana, and a few bites of a plain bagel would do the job along with a cup of instant coffee.
The Elephantman course is easily the slowest (and hardest) Olympic distance triathlon I have ever done. The swim is a mile in length and always seems slow, regardless of the conditions. The slightly long 26.5 mile bike is easily summarized as hilly and windy. You are either ascending a 10% grade or descending it. The last 10 miles of the bike are flat and fast but you are so tired at that point. Finally on the run, the first (and last) 3/4 of a mile is on soft sand and again, hilly. Then you run up some more hills to the turn around before repeating it in the opposite direction.
I am not sure where to place this but I must mention it. A few days before the race, my good friend Brian Perrine passed away. Brian was a member of the NMSU Race Club and his absence from the race and from life hit me harder than I thought. The final days leading up to the race Brian was on on my mind an awful lot. Even though he was gone, just remembering him and his life gave me strength and motivation to carry on when things were getting tough and looking hopeless. Before Brian I though it was amusing that people would dedicate a performance to someone, especially someone who is gone. I don't find it strange at all anymore and honestly, I feel if anyone still finds it amusing they are missing the whole point of relationship, of life, of a friend. I miss you Brian. This one is for you.
The race started as normal and we were off at 8:00. As we settled into the swim I did my best to find a fast pair of feet to follow. Unfortunately the water was so murky that it was nearly impossible to see the feet in front of you. I realized that just swimming by myself was easier. I was swimming hard but making sure to stay within my limits knowing that this race is won on the bike, most years, followed by a solid run. The swimming course was a little different this year (a big 'T') compared to previous years so you had to stay pretty alert with all the extra turns and buoys in the water. As I rounded the second to last buoy there were some extra same colored buoys floating around. I was starting to get confused so I stopped to look around and figure things out. Well, I thought I figured it out, so I started swimming again but I was mostly just following the people in front of me. Eventually I swam up to the splashing swimmers I thought were swimming my direction but quickly I realized they were swimming right at me! OOOH NOOO! I had swum to the wrong buoy! Now I had no idea where I was or what buoy I was supposed to swim to. Should I just jump in with these swimmers and swim the course again? Should I swim back exactly the way I came? I finally just decided to swim directly back to the beach where we exited hoping I wouldn't get DQed for missing a buoy. "I messed that swim up so bad!" I thought as I ran up the beach. I wish I knew how much time I actually lost but I don't. It could be four minutes, it could be one minute. Who knows?
I got out of the water in 27th position. Ouch! I've never been that far back before. Mike Montoya hollered at me that I was over 5 minutes down and although I knew I had a lot of work ahead of me I was super motivated to give it everything I had.
At the top of the first hill out of transition I started to get to work. I wanted to be a little more conservative at first but being so far back after the swim, the time for patience was gone. One by one I worked my way through the ranks. At first, passing the cyclists just ahead of me came relatively easy, but as I moved through the field, each progressive cyclist became stronger and stronger and the passes became just that much harder. At mile 15 the hilly uphill battle was over and it was flat and fast the rest of the way back. I pulled up on Rance Irvin with maybe 8 to 10 miles to go and moved into third place (not knowing that at the time). I seemed to be having one of the best bike splits of my life but would it be enough to make up for my horrendous swim?
Rolling towards T2 I couldn't believe what I just did. I took another wrong turn! What? Am I trying to give myself a handicap? Although I was having a good day physically, I was just making every mistake possible. I ended up rolling all the way around the parking lot and then back up the hill to get back on track. Again how much time I lost is anyone's guess. Likely around 30 seconds but could be 15 or more either way. Despite my little mistake around the parking lot, I surprisingly still recorded the fastest bike split of the day! Now the run... the race is on!
I stormed in and out of transition still not knowing if I was tenth or first. Someone eventually yelled I was third but first and second place must be miles ahead since I couldn't see them. Last year on the run I just sort of fizzled away, and pretty much gave up. I wasn't contentiously thinking about Brian, but each time the going was getting rough, he seemed to just pop into my head. I felt I couldn't slow down otherwise I would be letting him down. Eventually I saw second place but he was ridiculously far away. It didn't matter. I would keep pushing no matter what, all the way to the end.
I was beginning to make all sorts of weird noises and gasping groans running up the last final hill to the turn around but I made it without collapsing. At exactly mile three, I caught Adam Miller and moved into second place. I was running as hard as I could but I still didn't know if I was running that fast, sometimes it's hard to tell when you are so tired, have numb hands and tunnel vision.
The last few miles I kept thinking that at any moment I would collapse and need to be carried off in an ambulance as my vision got slowly darker and more narrow but thankfully I held it together to finish second to Michael Stoner who swam like a fish and rode like a freight train to destroy us all. Despite my efforts of combining the best bike and run splits of the day (the run was a new run course record surprisingly) I still couldn't close the gap on Michael. However, I know that my placing on this day was not my primary goal. I wanted to be satisfied with my efforts and more importantly, race for my injured and missing friends.
But before I sign off I want to acknowledge some more people who have helped me get this far. In no specific order... Jeffery Oxford- for your leadership, Taylor Burgett, for firing me up to train and race, Xavier Nolen- for being the best bike training buddy, Deanna Drayer- for your supporting friendship, Silvanna Francescitti-for your light good humor, Pietre Hamblin-Hatchell- for your cool natured friendship, Jason McClure- for your pre-race pasta dinner, humor, and everything else, David Rutledge- for being a good friend and showing me the cycling world, and finally Brianne- (I could write a whole blog entry on this one) for letting me do what I want to do (mostly) and loving me for who I am. You mean everything to me. So that was the Elephantman 2011. An interesting race to say the least but, a damn good time! Sorry this post has gotten a little emotional but I guess I really did race for my friends whether I would admit it or not. I honestly appreciate the time we spend together.
