Connections Duathlon

Will we ever get to spring? All week long my darling wife kept checking the weather forecast for today. Snow, rain, 30's, 40's, 50's, sun, clouds, wind, etc.

Anyway, this morning we woke up to strong winds and a wind warning, great! Another perfect WNY race day.

I chose this race to replace the 6hr Ultra I was going to do today. I guess I made a good trade, 1hr vs. 6hrs in this crap.

This was a bit different from past duathlons I've competed in; only one run, which meant we all started on the bike. They started us out in waves of 15, I was in the 4th wave out of 6 or 7. These waves were set up based on when you registered, so there was quite a mixture of racers in my wave, from full tri bikes to modified street bikes to hybrid touring bikes. One girl wasn't even wearing a helmet, duh!

The bike portion (advertised as a 14-mile route) actually only measured 13 miles, per my GPS watch. It consisted of a steady, but mild climb up for the first 6 miles or so against the wind and a nice downhill with the wind for the second half. I was really able to fly down the decline, and finished the bike leg in 36:40 (21.3 mph pace, maxed out at 34.4mph.)

My transition was an acceptable :40, inspired by the voice of my wife, "Run fast! It's cold out!!"

The run was along the Lake Erie waterfront, with the first 1.5 miles directly away from the wind. This was helpful getting my running legs under me, but dreadful making the turning. I simply held on for the last 1.5 trying to gut it out and keep my feet moving. I finished the 5K in 22:43/7:21 pace. I'm not super excited by this pace, but considering the elements, I guess I'll take it.

All in all: 1:00:03 (timing had me at 1:00:19 and 1 second out of 4th, grrrr). 5/65 overall, 1/4 in my age group.

The race itself was pretty well organized. I thought that the start might be a bit chaotic, because of the bike start, but they actually pulled it off quite well with the wave start. Unfortunately, this wave start threw the usually reliable and fast Score This Timing a loop and we had to wait for almost 2hrs for results. Other than that, a nice race. I'd definitely recommend it for anyone trying their first duathlon.