“When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” – Elbert Hubbard
As I had mentioned in the Leon’s blog post, I had lost all of my spring short course plans. To give myself another NQ opportunity, I added the Indy Sprint to my calendar. Even though this race had been a trying one two years ago (with us doing the bike with just the hardest 4-5 gears), I was still excited to do it again. I was able to find a guide through Tri Loco (Indy) and everything else fell into line.
When I met up with Zach on Friday evening, we had a chance to do a decent amount of bike practice. After riding for about an hours and having a chance to talk through the rest of the signals (swim/run), I felt good. I also was confident that I’d be coming back from Indy qualified for Nationals.
However, the swim did not go as needed. At about 150-200 in, I got something caught in my throat and just couldn’t get it out. So for the rest of the swim, I was surfacing every 50-75 to try and cough it out. It made for a draining, long 500m swim…
But having done a lot of bike practice with him and knowing my run had imiproved, I thought there was still a chance to salvage a NQ time. Even moreso since we had the full 30 gear set to work with.
The bike did go well, even with uneven surfaces in places. These were apparently potholes that hadn’t been properly smoothed. So instead of having a flat path, you’d have stretches akin to highway rumble dots. We were able to pick up some time in the downhills, where I’d estimate we were at 30+.
As I was trying to make up time, I headed out onto the run without remembering to grab my visor. The Indy run course is much more shaded on the way out than on the way back. This meant that the first half (not much sun) went much better than the run back. During the hot sun parts, I had to go down to a run/walk method. And even though Zach told me I was more than 10 minutes behind goal going into the run, I still wanted to give it everything I had on the run.
After finishing, Tri Loco provided great hospitality. Thanks to them for that and Zach for guiding for me! And thanks to Tuxedo Borthers for all their help on race day!