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!
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| 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.
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| 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.
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| 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.
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| 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.
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| 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.
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| 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!
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| 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.
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| 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!
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| Working hard to get to the next group (photo thanks to ITU media triathlon.org) |
Right
when we caught up to the 2nd 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.
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| 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 39th
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.
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| 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!
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| Airport lunch on the way home |
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