San Juan Continental Cup 2013



Got to get rested up before the race

               The San Juan Continental Cup was going to be my final draft legal race of the 2013 season. After not being able to race to the potential I believed I had the weekend before in Cozumel, I was eager to end my draft legal season on a high note.  Going into San Juan, I had the bonus of my Mom taking a vacation in Miami and deciding to come with me to the race. It’s always great to have some family around and it made the race more of a vacation for me too.

View from our hotel room

               I spent the week between Cozumel and San Juan in Miami. It kept the travel easy and allowed me to stay in the heat. Landing in San Juan I put my bike together for the 3^rd time in less than a week.

Large Russian community in Miami meant I could get some home style foods!

The race course was all in old San Juan, which meant lots of narrow windy streets and some roads that looked like hadn’t been touched since they were first put down however many hundreds of years ago. Cobbles, broken asphalt and tree planters were all going to make this a very interesting race. Add to that two way traffic to make things extra tight.

Just some of the craziness we would be racing through

               The swim course had its own obstacles too. Floating debris and funky sea water could prove to be difficult come race day. Later I would find out that we were swimming in a busy shipping channel and it was a popular place for ships to dump their garbage, this garbage usually attracted large numbers of sharks into a narrow bay. The local guy who was telling me this was bewildered that the race organization couldn’t have found a better place for us to swim. In the 48 years he’s been living in San Juan he would never even dream of touching that water. All good things to find out after the fact.

Beat down roads and cones to keep us going the right direction

               Race morning came a little early for an ITU race. I was down at the race site around 8:00am for a 9:30am start. It was already 83 degrees with 86% humidity. Staying cool before the start was my main goal, I kept the warm up short and tried to maximize the amount of time I spent in the water. Dumping a few bottles of icy cold goodness on myself helped too. Swimming around race morning, it was nice to see/feel that most of the debris had disappeared over night.

Some road debris that got picked up during the course preview the day before the race

               Of the original ~50 starters on the list, ~40 had made it to the start line. By now, I have accrued a few work rankings points, so I finally wasn’t one of the last guys to line up. The start was off a floating pontoon, which was hard to walk down with everyone else shaking things about. Goal for this start was to not have the pontoon shoot out from under me as everyone started, goal was to not belly flop into the water. A quick reaction time has never been my best quality, but as the gun went off I managed to at least be moving forward off the pontoon.

Pretty birds at the hotel

               Things heated up quickly in the cool waters. With the first turn buoy just 200m out it was a mad dash to get into a good position for the first turn. Lots of kicks to the face later, I found some clean water to round the buoy. Glancing up ahead I felt like I was somewhere towards the front half of the group. But in the water it’s always hard to tell what’s going on. Arms flailing everywhere, heads bobbing around and if you keep your head poking out for too long you risk an elbow to the face. Feeling comfortable in the draft I tried to hold my spot and let things get settle before making big moves.

               Finishing the first lap, I was finally having some open space around me to swim. I felt great sitting in the draft but I didn’t have the speed to get around those in front of me. Between sightings I could tell that a front group was pulling away and I needed to move up to remake contact with them. Others had probably noticed this too and combined with a tight exit out of the swim, we began to battle again. Getting boxed in, I just finished the swim where I was and got ready for a Paris-Roubaix style bike race.

               Hoping onto my bike I quickly grabbed onto the wheels of a group in front of me. There were 5 of us and I had strong hopes that we could work together and catch onto the lead group of ~15. On the first lap the bike course was already taking its toll on some of the riders, as they dropped back unable to keep such a high pace over the rough pavement and cobbles. Our small group was able to take advantage of the tight course and even ride the smooth cement gutters avoiding some of the cobbled sections. After a few laps, we began to take time back on leaders.

Tight carpeted roundabout was our last obstacle before going through transition every lap

               Not all were content working together though. Pack riding in a triathlon is a very interesting tactical battle. Everyone wants to catch the front group, but everyone is also very aware of the 10km upcoming run. Mix in a lack of understanding how to form an echelon and a wide range of cycling ability and you’ve got a very chaotic bunch on the road. A couple of the strong riders in the group would continuously attack our bunch instead of pulling through smoothly. I don’t know why so much of this happens in triathlon, it’s like they think they’re helping the group when in reality they’re not. These attacks not only messed up our rotation and slowed us down, but it also meant that someone had to give a burst of speed to close the gap back up. Things were so aggressive that coming out of one of the tight S turns, I stood up on the pedals to maintain contact with the leader only to have one of the guys in our group put his hand on my elbow and shove me over. This from a fellow USA teammate! Somehow I was able to hold my balance, there was a lot of yelling and after that I was riding pissed. When we came through transition and I saw 4 laps to go, I was gutted. We were only halfway through the bike and I was already feeling really gassed.

Cranking through another corner

               The constant rattle and the death grip I had to hold onto my bars was taking its toll on me. Just when I need it most, I got a big boost of motivation, the out and back course made it easy to gauge how the other groups were doing compared to us and on this lap I saw that we had made a huge gain on the lead group. Seeing this, others from the group began to throw down some vicious attacks. Not wanting to be left behind after getting so close, I threw down too and chased hard to maintain contact with our group. This burst of speed got us up to the leaders with 2 laps to go.

               Finally I was done with putting out massive bursts on speed on the bike and could recover and try to get prepped for a hot and hard 10km run. But it’s never that easy, I was all out of fluids on the bike. All the sudden I was incredibly thirsty and desperate to get to the first aid station on the run. The pace stayed pretty easy on the bike and I found myself coming into T2 towards the front of the group. My legs felt like hollow logs, just getting my shoes on was a feat in itself. I fumbled around trying to shove my feet in and get going. Everyone took the first 400m very fast in typical draft legal fashion, very quickly I was gapped off the back by a few seconds. The first aid station was coming up quick and the guys ahead of me cleared it all out. It’d be another 1000m before I’d get a chance to get some fluids.



In and out transition

               Or so I thought, but shortly after we started running, it began raining hard on us. At first this was kind of nice, the rain was warm, but it was cooler than my body and I welcomed it. Then, it just suddenly stopped, the sun came back out and the humidity returned with a vengeance. Reaching the turnaround point on the first lap I was able to hit two aid stations within 200m of each other. The only think better than a cup of icy bliss was several of those cups, dumped all over me.

Trying to hold it together on the death march

               Coming back across the wet cobbles I was caught off guard, it was like running across wet ice. So happy that the rain waited until we were running to start. Part of the cobble section was up a short climb, and once they were wet the only way up was to do short stutter steps. As the death march continued, others were feeling the pain of starting out too fast and slowly I reeled them back in. But I was running out of pavement and crossed the line with 4 guys within 40seconds of me. So close to getting into the top ten! Full results can be found here.

Ryan Bice stoked to have made the podium and get some champagne!

               I ended up across the line in 11^th and there was no ice bath to dive into, what’s up with that!? Lucky for me the sky came to my rescue and shortly after crossing the line a major downpour began. San Juan was an awesome way to finish out my draft legal race season. I managed to gain some more world ranking points, I’m all the way up to 304^th! Now I’ve got something to build from next year and I know exactly what I’ll need to be working on all winter to come out blazing next year.

Cave exploring, counts as a post race cool down right?

               The biggest perk of having my mom come with was that she could look up fun things to do after the race. Due to the government shut down, all the national rainforest parks were closed, but we did manage to find some cave tours that were unaffected. Climbing through caves with 6,000 year old carvings in them and then playing in 10ft surf waves was the an incredible way to unwind for a week of traveling and racing. Now it’s back to Colorado to get prepped for my final race of the year, the Rev3 Half in Venice, FL. It’s going to be my first attempt at the half distance and I’m stoked to be able to cap the year off at such an incredible event. Thanks for reading!

Surreal landscapes around the Arecibo Indio Caves

 

Cozumel World Cup 2013

 

              I had my eye on another Lifetime series race, I even already had my ticket purchased for Dallas. But then I got an email, 2 spots had opened up on the start list for the Cozumel World Cup and guess who was number 2 on the waiting list….so after changing around some tickets I had a fun race trip put together for myself. 12 days, 4 flights, 3 airlines, a ferry trip and 2 hot and humid races, oh yeah!

Hello pretty beaches and soldier patrols

               It all started early Thursday morning with a flight from Colorado Springs to Cancun via Houston. I knew I was in a little bit of trouble when I was feeling the humidity just walking down the jet way in Houston. I had gotten comfortable with Colorado’s 60 degree highs and low humidity. It’s always a great feeling when the temperature starts to drop and suddenly your run times get way faster. Now I was about to go and experience the opposite effect of that.

A little different than your typical deer crossing

               The trip on the bus and ferry to get from Cancun to Cozumel was pretty simple, thanks to the ITU for putting everything together. I decided to go out for a little jog to stretch the legs after traveling. Even though it was late in the evening it was still hot and steamy. I was quickly drenched with sweat and I started to wonder how people were surviving wearing jeans in this jungle.

Grandstand and transition being put together, notice the road surface

               Previewing the race course got me incredibly excited to rock this race. The bike was a simple out and back loop with half of the road surface a decorative polished (e.i. slick) concrete and the other half your typical beat up black asphalt. Getting out of my sweaty bike clothes, I was desperate to swim around and cool off. Turns out the water temp wasn’t much cooler than the air temp, but the water was crystal clear with lots of little fishies swimming around! It was never deeper than 15ft or so and visibility was incredible, no wonder so many people come down here for scuba diving and snorkeling.

Yeah....Cozumel was awesome

               Outside of some course preview action and some shake out workouts, I spend most of the time just lying in the hotel room. Killing time by looking for english channels on the TV and trying to beat Jarrod and the CSI detectives in solving the case first. We kept things simple and ate our meals at the hotel restaurant, trying to minimize time spent in the heat and maximize time spent in A/C.

Pre-race shake out ride, aww yeah!

               Before I knew it, race morning was upon us. A lazy wake up around 7:30am a little shake out jog and then breakfast. I got to the race site in time to see the women exiting the water. Coming out of T1 and off the blue carpet, I could see several girls slipping and sliding as they tried to maneuver on the polished concrete and mount their bicycle. Something to watch out for during my own race. After getting checked in it was time to get a little warm up in. Worried about the extreme heat (air temp 29C 84F, water temp 27C 81F, with 90+ % humidity) I made a makeshift ice vest by soaking my t-shirt in an ice bucket and heading out for a little jog. Being so hot out, it was more important to just get the muscles a little prepped while not raising the core temperature. Although that strategy failed the moment I had to use a port-a-potty. It was worse than a sauna in there and while doing my business I lost a lot of fluid quickly.



Spectators packed the course for both races (photo thanks to ITU media triathlon.org)

               Soon it was time to line up for the swim start. This race was stacked with talent and depth. 71 starters on the list with names like Gomez, Justus, Shoemaker, Polyanskiy, etc. headlining the top of the list. Having a lowly amount of points I was number 61. Having a lowly rank has the perk of not having to worry about where to line up on the start, you just take the last spot available. It was a dive start and I was stoked to get into the beautiful water and smash this swim. Hearing the intense heartbeat music, I took my last breathes trying to blow off the nerves, ‘on your marks.’ Horn blast and we were off!

Diving off to start the race!  (photo thanks to ITU media triathlon.org)

              The first turn buoy was 475m out. Which allowed for plenty of space for things to settle before having to squeeze everyone together. I was positioned well in the middle of the group swimming relatively in the clear. I had a smooth turn and was able to see that I was somewhere in the middle of the race. Although catching a draft from all sides was pretty great it was a constant battle. Elbows to the face, swimming over others, getting swam over and swallowing tasty electrolyte salt water was just normal. With a couple hundred meters left to go, I was starting to really feel the heat and sick of getting elbowed in the face. I could handle one or the other but not both. I pushed on knowing that a good position into T1 would be key for my race.

The final 50m of the swim, I was stoked to be part of the fray  (photo thanks to ITU media triathlon.org)  

               It was such a sweet sight to see several other bikes in transition. Finally I was actually part of the race instead of just playing catch up! I lost a handful of seconds fumbling with my helmet but I would lose more time in a few moments. Leaving the transition area and the blue carpet I remembered what I saw earlier in the day with the women’s race. Unfortunately, the guy in front of me didn’t see any of that. I’m not sure what happened but one second me was up and running and the next second he was sliding around in front of me on top of his bike. I couldn’t tell you how I got around that guy and kept myself upright. But once on the bike I was alone, with a group of five about ten seconds ahead of me. Time to drop the hammer!

               I put in a huge 4minute effort to try and get into that group. At that moment, for me that was the race. Either get into that group or be off the back of another race. I bridged up and realized that our little group was number 3 on the road. With ten seconds to the next group of 15ish, we got to work. No time for me to really recover, I did what I could to help the group close the bridge. We even got a little help by chasing down a media motorbike that was between groups for some reason. He wanted a close up so we gave him one!

Working hard to get to the next group  (photo thanks to ITU media triathlon.org)

               Right when we caught up to the 2^nd group they came together with the front group. And then everyone decided it was hot and no one wanted to pedal. I was eager to get some recovery and finally rinse the salt out of my mouth from the swim. But staying at the back is not a good place to be. Coming around the tight U-turn on the polished concrete the guy in front of me locks up his back wheel mid turn and I T-boned him, causing my chain to fall off. Luckily I got it to catch back on quick, but I had to lay down another big effort to maintain contact with the group. I kept stomping the pedals until I got to the front of the group. We were going slow enough that I was happy to be on the front not in anyone’s draft if it meant I was safe and didn’t have to worry about sprinting out of the turnaround.

Riding through some of the Cozumel scenery  (photo thanks to ITU media triathlon.org)

               The heat was really getting to me, and my hot bottle of water was doing little to make me feel better. For the last two laps I just sat in the group towards the front and tried to relax. This was going to be a furious 5k run. Basically all 70 of us had come together into one big group. So all that work I did earlier on the bike was for no reason, but that’s racing. You just never know what’s going to happen. Getting ready to come into T2 I got my shoes off early, wanting to be able to stay alert and move up as everyone else messed with theirs. I was sitting in the front third of the group towards the middle, watching as everyone kept moving up on the outsides. Boxed in, I kept looking for a way forward. Finally I found a hole to move to the outside and started moving up. Suddenly the guy in front of me darted left as the road narrowed. My only option was going up, I jumped up onto the sidewalk which was thankfully not packed with spectators yet. But my time was limited, and I frantically looked for a place to get back into the group. Unfortunately that place was at the back of the pack. So into T2 I went, at the very back of the group.

               Coming off the bike my legs felt like complete jello. Grabbing my sun baked shoes, I again was fumbling around trying to squeeze my feet in. Starting the run I saw a long line of everyone stretched out ahead of me. A very demoralizing sight, but it may have actually helped me out. Lots of guys went out ridiculously fast considering the extreme conditions. So as some started to drop like flies and walk, I kept building my pace. I was still too far behind though, and not running well. There were 4 aid stations on course and I would take 2-3 bottles from each station. The heat was destroying me and I felt less like I was running and more like I was just stumbling forward. I crossed the line a few minutes behind the winner Gomez in 39^th place. Everything had gone well except for my 17:57 5k split. That just won’t do at the World Cup level. Full results and splits can be found here.

Race Recap Video  (video thanks to ITU media triathlon.org)

               After a long ice bath session, I spent a long time just sitting on the curb trying to put things together. I probably had some kind of heat stroke going on, but I was just replaying things in my mind as I tried to understand what had just happened. Being outside of the top 30 means no WTS points for me. Major bummer because that was the main goal in doing this race. But not all is lost, I gained some more experience racing at a high level in a very large and deep field. There is much more work to be done.

Playing on some local attractions

               Cozumel was a great race venue. The grandstand was packed, the streets were packed and every roof top bar was packed. It was great to have so many people around screaming and putting their energy into us. The locals were out strong and even a large number of tourists had stumbled upon our race to try and give us some encouragement. It’s definitely a race I want to come back to. Maybe the coolest moment for me was walking away from the athlete lounge to go home. I was stopped by some volunteers and a local family who all wanted to get a picture with me. Not sure who they thought I was, but I was happy to oblige. Sometimes it’s the spectators that make the venue, and hopefully I will be coming back to Cozumel next year!

                

Airport lunch on the way home