Philip LaVoie’s Blog

here we go… (janes addiction)

so the courses are getting longer now, and this was supposed to be the litmus test for IMLP considering what went down and the challenge that this course provided, I am so proud to have finished.

I want to start off saying that Rev3 was an awesomely setup and executed race. I’ve now been blessed by 2 in 2 weekends that were run so perfectly (the previously unposted one – yeah i suck – was Ridgefield handled by our bud and crewman Evan). i will do Ridgefield every year that I can and would prefer to do rev3’s over wtc’s if they grow and compete in the same space.

I headed up early on saturday for the open water swim. i had the usual pre-raceday short swim, short ride, short run on the sked to stay loose. i tried to zip up the wetsuit and bang, the zipper shot off one of the rails. damnit! that’s 2x that happened on a damn expensive zoot suit. I think i’ll move to J’s Xterra suits once this one is done. I was able to jimmy it with some scissors i had on hand and clipped it so that it worked like a jacket. no prob, we roll on.

The water was cold but the lake was nice and it was perfect temps for the wetsuit (raceday was warmer). I was STARSTRUCK! so many pros all running around and chatting Ag’s and each other up and saying hi… it was one of the coolest and most populated pro races i’ve ever been too outside of kona (and even then i wasn’t into tri and didn’t know who they were). They are hands down the coolest people.

I just did one leg of the 3 on the swim at a really chill pace, came back in, changed and kate and i went to register. the weekend schedule was a little misleading and they weren’t ready for us yet, so kate and i headed out to drive the course and as we were out received a bunch of calls from well wishers and i soooo appreciate that. the course looked hard and the kinda hard that was deceptive as it was sooo beautiful. I’ll definitely be going back there to ride it again for training.

we headed back into trans after the drive, picked up the packet (and a whole lotta goodies) i set up the bike and left it for the night. I checked twitter and saw that Jameson was at the trakkers booth and swung down to say hi – i luv meeting the online gang in person. unfortunately we missed guru and jav… but we headed back out to drive the run course and then hit the bricks for home and some food.
back at the home for wayward triathletes we linked up with the strays and shot the breeze. the mrs. and i turned in early after having my feet up for most of the day and i felt calm and pretty well rested. 4am was the wakeup. man i hate that part. 5 is doable, but 4 hurts.

alarms go off… coffee starts to brew… raceday is afoot…

all packed and ready to go, one more check of the list…

backed out of the garage and ran into j’s car – great start. it was a kiss, but it sucked just the same. got to the end of the road and realized that i forgot 2 gu packets for the run (i use the hammer dispenser from the bento). So we whipped a u’ee and grabbed em. Take 2.

So we were on the road and rollin. Hit the hosting location dead on time, no sweat. Got set up, got suited up. Took my warmup / test swim. Came out and hung with the family and our tri-gang for a while. SimplyStu was on the mic… all was good. Time for the show to start… pros go off. man they rock. now AG’s… and then me. 3 waves back or so. the water was shallow so i wadded in for a bit as most people were having some funny trouble trying to swim it. once we got going all was well until my right goggle started to leak (booo – it sure didn’t do this on the practice). i just chilled out and decided to swim the line between the bouys and shouldered every one using 1 eye until halfway thru the return leg (#3). Oh well, it happens. I left the water and checked my time, wow. had a pretty good swim. nice! (~35min)

i was mindful enuff to bodyglide up before putting on the suit and it shot right off me (my t1 was horrible in the ridgefield run because my body has changed and is snagging in different places this year). sweet. grabbed the goods and the rig and off i went.

The ride was pretty chill, saw my new bud and crewman Dave Pike in his sweet Champ-Sys kit around mile 5, we chatted for a bit as the refs rolled up on us on a motorcycle and i told him to bolt…. and bolt he did. damn that kid is fast on the pedals. saw him later on the out and back and he ate in a few good miles, also saw his smiling face later on the run too. damn good guy. The rest of the ride we were just hammering along or climbing. around mile 28 i lost my big ring (wtf?!?!) why would it suddenly detune? don’t get it, oh well, it was fundgeable and i just carried on. THEN! at mile 51.38 as i was hammering a mostly legal peloton behind me, my left leg started to wobble and i thought my pedal worked its way loose. NOPE! it was the crankarm! double wtf!!!

that’s why i noticed the milage… i was so close to home. ah man. that sucks. the crankarm swung around 2x or so while still clipped into my shoe and the right arm wanted to slide out with the crankshaft. I quickly nailed the breaks, pushed my still attached right leg into the bike frame to hold it together, and pulled off to the side.

i so thought my day was done. and soooo close to trans… oh man.

I took a closer look at the crankarm to see what the damage was. hrrm… it wasn’t stripped. odd. i was certain it had to be. i quickly opened up the bike bag and started to work on the crank. maybe i could get it on good enuff to just get back. i loosened up the screw, got it back on the crankshaft and whallah! wrenched that mother down as best i could – tho it still looked really shifty to me 😉 but hey, at least it was on! now the moment of truth, can i get back 5 miles?

… it worked, tho i gotta say i was spooked and took it a little less hardcore than the train that was rolling prior to it literally coming apart. (2:55 or 2:59 or so?). I even had the treat of passing Guru in those 5 mi as she was running along like a champ and I gave her a shout, "GUUUURRRRUUU", in my best doppler effect.

I got into t2 and had a pretty good one, just some relay dudes standing in the way looking a little lost as to what to do. gave em a "watch out boys", and did my thing and promptly ran out with Kate, Mom & Pops cheering. (1min or so)

I was moving pretty good for the first mile to hit the portajohn at the first fuel station. ahhh, better and back in motion. At mile 3 the pro ladies were around mile 6-7 and whoa were they hauling up the hill. all the boys were cheering from them and a few that could get a breath in gave cheers back. It was sooo awesome seeing them duke it out for 1/2/3 and to take the effort to cheer back. I saw Dave back out on the run and man, he was throwing down a good effort. the turnaround seemed to take forever with those hills and the burn was setting in, but again… with a cool course and things to look at, the rev3 crew had you fooled into thinking you weren’t hurting as bad as you are ;). Not much to write about on this, it wasn’t my greatest run, but not shabby for the course either. Here’s where I tend to pass people until i hit a gap where i see almost no one, and that was from mile 9 to the finish (well, maybe 3 or 4 that i climbed by or tagged up near-enuff to see). The finish was great, but with that rumpled carpet i was so freaked that with my weak legs i was so gonna dig it for all to see. I hustled in as well as i could and was showered with goodies from the staff there. The cheering squad was in full effect and guru trapped the video of the finish here. (around 1:43ish)

again, what a great event and a blast to see so many friendly and smiling faces… that’s what makes it. all of that hassel can’t even measure up to the joy of a good hard day out in the sun with some great folks.

 
Here’s some of the shots from Kate & my parents and some more from Guru that bring me back.

Note: i ticked this off pretty fast, to just get it out, so don’t be surprised if it’s edited or added to later on 😉

~ by philiplavoie on June 9, 2009.

Posted in races