2015 U.S. Armed Forces Triathlon Championships – Leon’s Triathlon

Cdn Armed Forces High Performance Triathlon Team

I am extremely fortunate this year to be racing on the CF High Performance Triathlon Team as a Development Athlete. We have an amazing group of athletes, with potential and a vast knowledge of experience. As a result I had the amazing opportunity to take part in the U.S. Armed Forces Championships on the 7 June at Leon’s Triathlon in Hammond, IN. What an amazing experience it was!

The U.S. Armed Forces Championships is a draft legal Olympic triathlon which is also the U.S. selection race for the 2015 World Military Games.  So this was my first draft legal Olympic race. Going into the race I knew I’d need a good swim or perhaps more importantly come out with a group of athletes.

Swim

Going into the race I knew I needed to come out of the swim with at least a small group to give me a chance on the bike. I was able to find a good set of feet after the first couple hundred meters and then I just held on for the remainder of the fifteen hundred meter swim. I could have perhaps gone a touch faster but I was putting in a hard effort to stay with the small group. I was extremely happy to be exciting the water with three marines. My time wasn’t great at 23:36 but so be it…I was with a small pack!

Practice Swim Complete: (L to R) Phil, me, Eric, and Dave S.

Bike

Despite being excited coming out of T1…my excitement quickly turned to disbelief as I managed to be the first of our group out of transition but stumbled as I climbed onto my Argon 18 Gallium Pro. I subsequently dropped my bike, my right shoe came off the bike, I put it on, climbed back onto the bike, only to realize that I dropped my chain. By the time I was back on the bike the three U.S. Marines were already two or three hundred meters up the road. Ok, I though no need to panic put a big hard effort in and see what happens….we’ll that gap never closed. Left in no man’s land with no real pack behind me and without the power required to bridge the gap in front I was left to a solo effort for four 10-kilometer loops. The result 40 km solo efforts in a draft legal triathlon…that sucks! 1:04:37

Transition Setup

Run

Well despite my hard solo effort on the bike I was still optimistic that I might be able to turn in a respectable run. The downpour of rain and the high winds made sure that that you couldn’t overheat on the run. I settled into a solid effort and slowly reeled in a few of my fellow competitors. Despite the hard effort on the bike I still managed to hold on and run a 37:33.

Overall

An ok race, a great experience, and hopefully this’ll motivate me to work harder on my swim. Final position 29^th in a time of 2:06:46. The greatest news of the day was hearing the Alex Boulé one of my team mates had stormed his way to 2^nd place Overall (thanks to a monster effort by Marc Prudhomme on the bike) and Phil Reynolds had ran himself into 7th place!

As an added bonus this weekend we got to meet Brian Mansker the genius behind the T1 Pro Race Belt. If you are looking to save a few seconds in transition that you've got to check this out!

Reality Hurts - Cdn Armed Forces Running Championships 2015

Prerace with my best buddy!

So today I raced the Half-Marathon at the Ottawa Race Weekend. The Ottawa Race weekend also serves as the Cdn Armed Forces (CAF) Running Championships. I finished in 1:17:42 which was good enough for 1st in the CAF, 2^nd in M30-34, and 10^th Overall. I was satisfied with the overall result, given my lack of training over the last 6+ weeks. 

Receiving the Gold Medal from BGen Pelletier, Cdn Armed Forces Running Patron!

To be honest the last 6 weeks have been very frustrating due to a lack of training and have been a constant mental battle. The lack of consistent training was the result of three events: 1. we welcomed our 4^th child, Abigail Grace, into the world on 31 March, 2. I was the Race Director for the St Albert Road Race on 19^th Apr, and finally 3. spent 1-15 May deployed to the field on exercise. During that period of time I managed very little training. It’s pretty frustrating when you know you’re not at the level you know you were at last year…but life goes on and it’s a constant balancing act between family, work, community participation, and training. Sometimes you feel like you're failing and it simply sucks. 

I was fortunate to be able to travel to Ottawa on Thursday 28 May with our son, James. It was a great opportunity to have a father/son weekend and also an opportunity for James to spend time with his grandparents (my parents). During the weekend I also had the opportunity to spend some time at the Expo with the crew from A-1 Imports (distributor for Compressport Canada) – it’s always great being able to give back to my sponsors and supporters.

The actual race was just ok. I knew I did not have the same running speed/fitness as last year and realistically needed to have my sights set on an attainable goal. I had 3 goals. #1 break my time from last year (very optimistic), #2 match my time from last year (attainable), #3 run sub 1:20. At the gun I went out hard (intentionally to get away from the crowd) for about 400m then slowly attempted to settle into my race. I was running ~3:30/km for the first 6kms and knew this was simply too fast for my current fitness level. I mentally lost the race at around the 6km mark…I knew I was over extended. Thankfully there were a few kids out on the course looking for high fives and I used that exchange as an opportunity to refocus. Wearing the Canadian Forces Singlet also always helps to keep going – I’m not just representing me but also the men and women of the CAF. I dropped the pace to 3:40-3:50/km and figured I would just do what I could to make it to the end…I managed but it was a brutal struggle!

To the finish!

There was nothing pretty about today’s race, but sometimes you just have to gut it out. Reality sometimes hurts.

Day 11 - Clermont Draft Legal Challenge - Sprint Race (draft legal)

So yesterday was my first ever Sprint Triathlon which just happened to be draft legal. The guys headed down to the race at about 0900hr as the park was opening to traffic at 0940hrs. I rode to the park with Dave D, Alex, and Marc. The remainder of the guys drove down. Shortly after we arrived the girls race started. (The girls AG race was incorporated with the EDR 25 race.) So that enabled us to cheer on Leslie, Sarah, Stephanie, Lucie, and our unofficial team-mate Elvy (Martin's spouse). The girls all had a good race with Leslie finishing 1st in the AG race and Elvy 2nd.

After the girls had removed their equipment from transition we were able to enter and place all our stuff. The have two transitions setup so they can keep the races moving quicker - the EDR men's race followed after the girls race and before the AG men race.

Transition Setup - Dave L is on the right.

After tranistion was setup we headed down to the water for a quick warm-up swim, pre-race brief and huddle, and then we were off. I knew I was going to have to swim well to be able to catch any of the CF guys on the swim. Unfortunately with a 12:44 swim that put me about 45s behind John and 60s behind the group that I really needed to catch. I soloed on the bike for almost the first half of the bike before latching on to another guys wheel. We started to work together (I did most of the pulls) and by the half-way mark of the third loop we had reeled in John's pack.

Unfortunately for me, Marc Prudhomme was pulling the first pack with Alex and the remaining CF guys were all in the second pack. With the likes of Dave D, Dave S, Dave L, Eric, Martin, and Phil all in the same pack there was no way I was going to make up any ground in fact I was losing about 30s+ per lap. And the third pack which I was leading had very little firepower. Despite my best effort I couldn't get that pack to start pushing the pace. John realized that I was doing most of the pulling and so made sure to pull through near the end of the fourth lap to give me a little break prior to the run. Bike time was 32:33.

On the run (Photo Credit - Martin's daughter)

Coming off the bike I was about 4 minutes down to the first group and 3 minutes down to the second group. I just ran as fast as I could hoping to at least reel in a few straglers. My final run time was 19:24 which was slower than I wanted. However, given my effort on the bike and the fact that run was ~250m long that result is understandable.

Total time 1:06:38.


I was 9th Overall and 7th out of the CF Athletes.

I wish a speedly recovery to Dave D who crashed hard during the second lap on the bike course.

Day 10 - Activation Day & Watching the ITU CAMTRI Event

So today was an activation day in preparation for tomorrow's Clermont Draft Legal Challenge. I did my bike/run activation as soon as it was light out. I spent about 30minutes on the bike which was mostly easy, but included 6 intervals of 15-30s at above race intensity. After the ride I put on my shoes and went for a transition run of 4km. During the run I included 5 accelerations to above race intensity for 15-20s.

At shortly after 0900 we headed down to Lake Louis Park to wark the Men's and Women's ITU Pan American Cup race. Catherine Desmarais, one of the CF High Performance Athletes, was racing in the women's race so it was a great oppertunity to go out and support one of our team mates. She had a tough race but slugged it out to at least complete the race and not get lapped out.

After the Elite Men's race was out of the water we switched into our wetsuits and jumped in for a quick swim around the course. The water was quite choppy but we still all managed without incident. Hopefully tomorrow the water is calm or at least calmer. 

We arrived back at our accomodations and the rest of the afternoon was our own time to recover or do whatever we wanted.

Eric assisted me with dinner this evening for our house. We made oven fried potatoes & onions, broccoli, honey chicken, and caesar salad. All those cooking lessons from my mother have paid dividends this week.  

Up tomorrow my first sprint and draft legal race. Despite having raced triathlons for 7+ years I have yet to do a Sprint Triathlon. I have to say I am very much looking forward to it.

Day 9 - Prerace Recovery Day

So today was our recovery day in preparation for Sunday's Draft Legal Challenge in Clermont. Our coach Dave Harju left it up to each individual to decide what they needed to do. I opted to run, swim, and bike today.

I woke up early and started the day off with a light 7km run. During the second portion of the run I included five excels to race intensity each lasting between 10-30s seconds.

After the run I had breakfast then headed with a portion of the group to the NTC for a swim. The pool was setup for long course today which is definately nice. The workout today was relatively easy with the intent of focusing on form. All total I swam 2400m.

After the swim it was back to the houses for some rest and recovery. After lunch I headed out with Dave H. Alex, and Dave D. for a light recovery ride. During the ride Dave D. spotted an alligator so we of course stopped to check him out.

Our little friend - the alligator. (Photo Credit - Dave D)

This evening I went to the athlete pre-race mtg with Sarah, and Marc (Geoff, Dave H. and Jason also went) as none of us had done this race before. Once we got back from the pre-race mtg we had our own team meeting. After the team mtg the team surpised me with a B-Day Cake seeing as it was my 32nd B-Day. I think Dave D. was the mastermind behind the cakes. It was greatly appreciated.

A couple B-Day cakes for this old man! (Photo Credit - Martin)

Up tomorrow is some activiation and watching the Elite Race!

Day 8 - Run / Swim / Bike Intervals + Team Dinner!

Today started off with an early morning easy 7km run with Eric and Alex. After a little breakfast we headed to NTC for our group swim.

Today's swim was shorter but with faster intervals. The main set consisted of two times through of 4 x 100 fast, 100 ez pull, 4 x 50 faster, 100 ez pull. Dave S. and Phil convinced me to swim with them despite the fact that they are substantially faster. It worked out ok for the first set of intervals but I opted for the pull buoy and paddles for the second set.

After the intervals we each had an oppertunity to have our swim recorded and then Dave D. spliced the underwater and above videos together. Clearly there are a few items in my stroke that I can improve.

Post ride photo of the guys who road today! (Some of the guys were resting!)

After some lunch we headed out for bike intervals. Since we are racing on Sunday the intensity was high but the volume was low. The main set consisted of 2min hard, 2min easy, 2 x (1.5min harder, 2.5min easy), 3 x (1min even harder, 3min easy), and finally 4 x (30s sprint, 3.5min easy). We had the choice of doing the intervals in a pace line or solo. I elected to ride solo as I wanted to put in some hard efforts. It was an especially tough workout as it was hot and the wind was quite intense.

And tonight we went out to Olive Garden for a group dinner!

Day 7 - OW Swim + Bike/Run Transitions

So today was yet another fantastically sunny day in Beautiful Clermont, FL. And as a result when the sun had set many of us had some red/pink (suntan/sunburn) to show for it.

Getting ready for the OW swim!

Today started at 0830 with a light bike ride to Lake Louisa Park. Well it was supposed to have been a light bike ride, but it ended up being a Tempo ride. Martin had problems with his rear free wheel so I returned to the house with him to change his wheel and then I rode at a tempo effort the 12kms to the park to meet up with the rest of the group.

At the park we did an open water swim. We started with about 20mins of warm-up then went into a bit of drafting practice. I swam with Eric, John, and Dave D. We did 4 x 40 strokes each leading our group with each interval being slightly faster. After that we did 4 x 20strokes. I had to work hard to stay with my group (I am the weakest of the guys on the swim). That was supposed to have been the warm-up but by the time we were done and back to shore we were already close to 2km of swimming. The main set of the open water swim was two laps of ~400-500m. The first was with wetsuit and the second was without. Overall it was a great workout and the drafting practice provided to be difficult given the poor visibility.

Bikes are lined up and ready for transition from the swim!

After the swim we did 3 x 5km of biking and ~800m of running. The purpose of this workout was to practice our transitions and also get some pace line work in on the bike. The first interval was at a crazy pace, the second was a steady effort, and the third started steady and ended up fast. All the intervals were supposed to be done at Zone 2, but we were clearly above that on the bike.

We had the afternoon off which was great. It provided an oppertunity for a little extra rest and recovery.