Short version of the story is that I made a wrong turn and didn't cross the finish line until after about a slow 10 minute+ jog back -- after I realized I missed the turn. With about 300 yds to go instead of making a right, I made a left and embarked to trying to continue my zone 5b pace another lap without knowing it. After 5 minutes I started blowing up then realized why I couldn't continue the pace.. I had ran a hell of a lot more than 10k which leads me to the realization that I probably could have "turned it on" at about 35 minutes and held that pace until the finish (if I made the correct turn that is).
Swim: I tried to follow Grant's advice to draft someone on the way back as the last 750 meters is going up-stream. Problem, the guy I decided to draft was going the wrong way even though he was exactly the pace that I needed (about 10% faster). I ended up swimming about 100 meters more than most other people I reckon but came out of the water at a good time anyway. This means my focus on swimming is starting to pay off. Only problem here is that I got so discouraged realizing I was off-course that my mind started to wander and I panicked a bit. I picked-up the pace too much in sections and as a result I went into the transition zone in an anaerobic state. As a result of that I lost time on the run into the transition zone & the transition zone itself. Lesson for next time; make sure you draft someone on the way back, but also make sure that the person is going in the right direction!! Duh! Duh! Duh! :)
Bike: To make matters worse I panicked again realizing how much time I lost and churned up the first hill on my bike in zone 5c 190bpm in a crazy effort to "make up time" (which you can't really do in this way). The bike ended up being a series of recoveries and too hard efforts. I settled in on the second lap. I feel the bike course is very technical and its impossible to guage the course strategy correctly on the first lap. To some degree my entire bike was influenced by the bad strategy during the swim (going to hard in sections). You have to nail the swim and stay in the right zone to set yourself up for a good race. Lesson learnt. Besides this it was great fun trading off with Steve on the bike leg. This was the only fun part of the race for me. It certainly made me feel like a little kid again racing the kid down the block on my BMX. This is the "up-side" to Triathlon and being on a team..you get to be a kid all over again racing your friends on their bikes.. Women will never understand us men I'm sure of that.. :)
Run: I mashed a little too hard on the bike in some sections where I should have accelerated my pace slower. In other sections I felt I could have employed "spinning" a little bit more. By the time I got to the run my poor swim and bike strategy left my legs in a less than optimal position to make use of the fact that running is my strong suit. My nutrtion was also wrong. I was bloated and my legs were cramping at times. Oh well. Making the wrong turn at the end only made my race a complete disaster instead of a partial disaster. Hope the course stays the same for next year so I can finally get this race "right"!
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