Home-course advantage, my butt: Laramie Duathlon

OK, so maybe I am only posting when I race. That's easy to do when you're racing four consecutive weeks. Let me say that though I'm not traveling a lot for these races -- four straight weeks of racing with no overnight stays? Score! -- I can't imagine crisscrossing the globe for ITU races the way the pros do. It's hard enough to get rebooted for shorter events within two hours' drive. Mt hat's off to those boys and girls.

Saturday's Laramie Duathlon represented the second-shortest I've ever gone from front door to start line. The top honor goes to the F.E. Warren Triathlon, which took place on the F.E. Warren Air Force Base, just outside of Cheyenne. That was about two miles from my house but I did have the added bonus of explaining to the guard what a triathlon was, since there was no advance pub for this race at all. Saturday, I rode my bike 3.5 miles to Kiwanis Park in West Laramie for the duathlon.

But before I did that, I rode my bike for 45 minutes, just to get the blood flowing. Then I rode the 3.5 miles over the railroad tracks and under I-80 to the park, where I got my number, set up transition, and went for about a two-mile jog. Because this race was so short and I was doing it for nothing more than a measured brick, I thought it would be good to get in something resembling a workout beforehand. Overall, I benefited from the extra miles but my race suffered.

So the transition area was set up on a dirt parking lot. Because it's been a rainy spring I would either be brushing mud off my feet or kicking it out of my cycling shoes for the first part of the ride. Eh, I'll run in my cycling shoes, briefly.

Now, the literature for the race -- namely the Web site (cyclewyoming.org/du.htm), such as it is -- called the first run a 2-kilometer run. That was the case the night before when I checked the site to confirm what time I needed to be there. The course map still said 2 kilometers though the course was changed for some reason. So when the race director yelled "go," I was all set for a 2K run. Thus I was a little shocked when people seriously took off sprinting. Turns out it was a 1K run so I picked up the pace after the first turn, and then promptly dialed it back when I felt like the bear jumped on my back (high school track runners who ran a 400, ever, know what I'm talking about).

I was at a jog when I strolled into transition, already thinking "bike." I yanked my feet out of my shoes and with the right one came one of the insoles. Fun. I tried stuffing back in and I'm pretty sure about 20 people passed me in that first transition. That's fine, I thought, I'll just crush the bike. It was a rare windless day so any of the legions riding mountain bikes were ripe for the picking. Indeed, I lost track of the number of people I passed on the 25-kilometer, out-and-back cycle portion, so I focused on keeping my heart rate reasonable. That is, when I wasn't trying to pass more people. The two were mutually exclusive, however.

Anyway, I was about 15th when I made it back to transition for the 5K run. Got my feet into my running shoes with no problem, surprisingly, and I took off on the run, though about three people got places on me in transition. My transitions are glacial and need work.

Oof. Again, the lactic acid set in within a few strides so I dialed it back, reminding myself that this was just a workout, and then end result was not as important as... other things. I felt like I was jogging and my heart rate was in the 180s for much of that second run. What the hell? I finished with a time of 23:35 for the 5K, 2:35 slower than six days prior. The cooldown jog, in barefeet around the three little-kid soccer fields, actually felt better than any point during the race.

Anyway, I got third in my age group and brought home a white ribbon. Now, while I've gotten age-group hardware the past two weeks, this Saturday's Loveland Lake-to-Lake will be entirely different matter altogether. It's Colorado's de-facto state championship and I expect to get my clock cleaned quite nicely. From this race I'm just looking for physiological gains. And maybe some faster transitions.