Joliette Sprint Tri

Use this to post your race reports, posts must contain references to your obligatory mid pee fart...

Joliette Sprint Tri

Postby SickBoy » 15 Jun 2016 19:19

Where: Joliette, Québec, Canada.
When: 5th June 2016
Organiser: JET Triathlon
Cost: About $100 CAD excluding race day fee (entered late)
Course details: Downriver swim, closed roads bike, footpath run
Distance(s): 750m river swim; 20 km bike; 5 km run
Marshalling: Good, including Bike and Motorbike marshalls on the bike course
Facilities: Sports centre facilities, Canteen, Subway, Portaloos, Bag drop, Lots of club tents, Wetsuit hire, bike mechanic, Physios, massage, medic
Technical: Chip timing
Freebies: Finisher medal, Tech t-shirt (for Québec cup competitors)

I decided to do this local tri about 3 weeks before after running into my triathlon friend/nemisis Romain at the pool. It's about a 45min drive from my appartment in Montreal.Pretty relaxed start time of 10:15 meant no need to get up at the crack of dawn. I drove myself down to Joliette and got parked up in the overflow carpark near the sports centre. Lots of other triathletes arriving - all on very fast looking bikes. This is the first race in the Québec cup, a series of triathlons in the province where you can get an overall placing (including a club competition). Looks like it's a pretty high quality field. Lots of races on today including an Elite youth race for Triathlon Québec (which is draft legal) they had a proper pro looking transition area too! Get a bit nervous that I'm out of my depth but then remember I have a fast bike too so at least I look the part. Training has been pretty consistent over the last month but only been out on my TT bike twice (the last 2 weekends!) Not long since I started heading outside as it seems winter only just finished. Avg training this year has been 2:30 / week - which I believe is less than recommened for people who don't even do sport! I also ended up going on a 10km hike up Mont Saint-Hilaire with the family the day before so not my preferred prep but that was booked before the tri. I have no expectations of myself for this race - just going to go out and enjoy it!

Get myself registered, a bit disappointed that I don't get a t-shirt freebie, I am not entered in the cup, same course, same race effectively just puts me in a different group and probably explains why I am in the last swim wave (3 waves 2 mins apart). I've timed my arrival well and apart from a little anxiety at having to leave my bike unattended while I register I get my stickers and number and head back out to put everything together and go rack the bike. Just enough time to do that, and check the entry/exits for transition before I have to drop my bag (no bags/boxes allowed in transition) and get to the briefing.

Briefing, in French but I understand. It's all pretty straightforward. Swim between the buoys, raise arm if in trouble in the water, put your helmet on before you touch your bike. No drafting, something like a 10m zone with 20 secs to pass? Can't remember but it seemed big. Keep right, pass on the left and a little bit of info about the technical twisty bit on th bike course and how to get in position early to exit. If you do get done for drafting, soundsl ike there's no warning you have to stand in the penalty box for a bit during the run!

Get someone to zip up my wetsuit, light rain starts. Wait for my wave to be called. Amusing moment where someone in a blue hat misses their start and gets called forward being told his wave has already gone. Decide to change my goggles over so their under my hat instead of on top.

Swim - River swim, downstream. Get a position near the front as I'm in the last wave. Need to actively work to stay in position at the start. Water nice temp around 19 deg, was close to having a no wetsuit swim (23 deg two days before) but the weather's turned gray last minute and a bit of rain yesterday cooled things off. It's funny because the start of May it was only 6.7 deg!

I get away well and head between the buoys, sighting reasonably well, need to make some minor corrections now and then. Not long before I catch and pass stragglers from the two waves ahead (2mins intervals). Left shoulder starts to hurt after a little while, think my wetsuit is too tight - I'm still using my suit from the Great London Swim 2010 that I hired for first OW swim and opted to keep after. I concentrate on body pos, steady kick, good breathing. Generally swimming steady, on someone's feet for a short time.

Out of the river and up some steps - hit a timing mat on entering transition, I have to run almost all the way through transition to my bike. Make the mistake of taking hat and goggles off before going to unzip suit (need to use both hands to stop zip sticking) but a bit of faffing and I get it done, a first example of being a bit rusty

Not the most speedy transition, a little slow getting the wetsuit off my ankles but not too bad. Slow to get clipped in on the bike though, I run past the mount line and get on with shes already on feet. Feeling OK at this point - just out of practice!

Bike

Slight climb out of transition and zig zag to join the road, get up to speed and on the bars, set a good pace on the bike. course is 2 x out and back, mostly flat, mostly straight with a dogleg descent, turn, climb just at the end of the out, then a hairpin turn and back the other way.

Bike course goes pretty good, I end up going faster than a lot of people (I guess the riders faster than me are ahead already so I don't see them) Only one or two come past and I def caught one of them later on. I stay in the big chainring, jumping between two gears on the cassette, cadence generally high but I drop to try some phases in bigger gear, when I feel like it's a bit too much I drop back a gear and up cadence.

Aware of not wanting to be done for drafting so I'm pushing past people. The bike course goes around pretty quick. Hitting the hill at the end of the first lap is a bit tough the second time. I make an effort to try to push on the second lap, esp. on the final return leg. At the end of the bike course I get blocked in a lttle by some bikes who are slightly slower than me - I chose not to push past as I know the end of the bike course is coming up but turns out a little furthe than I thought, another few seconds wasted perhaps.

As I turn into the entry to transition I start to undo the velcro on my shoes. Make a bit of a hash of this as usual it's not something I've practiced lots and I find my foot hard to reach on the TT bike for some reason. Also when I go to put my foot on the top of the shoe it's so wet and slippy my feet keep slipping off. Feel like I waste a lot of time here.

Head up to the dismount line, stop and dismount, it's a long jog through transition to my spot again, need to cross the whole area (timing matt on the way in) Make an effort to jog fast, legs OK but a little tired but going faster than some around me. Pretty smooth transition, gone sockless - put my BCTTT hat on and head out of transition to join the run course.

Run is 4 laps of footpath type, still light rain. I set off maybe a little bit too slow (faster than most people around me), Some guy with a PT tri suit comes past so I decide I should maybe go with him but don't, try to increas a little to keep him in sight I'm certainly not going full on but I'm trying to go at a pace that feels like I won't blow myself up. After 2 laps I start to accel a little, more again on the final lap, I probably leave that too late although I am going at a pretty good pace toward the end - passing a lot of people. Don't have enough energy to fully sprint for the line, when I try to call on more speed it doesn't really come but I'm on my own here, two runners about 30m ahead who I won't catch.

Swim - 12:59.0
Bike - 36:06.1
Run - 21:01.6

Total - 1:10:06.6 - Sprint dist PB! So close to a sub 1:10!

Finish 4th/191, 2nd AG (In the Open Sprint category!)
The results are split from the QC cup of which Joliette is the first race.
Transplanting the times to there (including the people who beat me) I would finish 45th/289 overall (212 men wasn't chicked!)
Would have been 6th AG (35-39)
My AG winner was 5th overall - 12:01, 33:16, 18:14 (1:03:29.5)
The race winner did 12:19, 31:04, 19:03 (1:02:24.1) avg. bike speed 38.64km/h -inc transition!

My bike avg speed from the times was 33.24km/h but looking at bike computer after race showed 34.9km/h and that included time for running in/out of transition. I was doing 40km/h on the flats at some points so respectable I think!

All in all a good day out - races here are really well organised and all have been closed roads (or racetracks!). Really pleased with my result - it's a PB (previously I'd done 1:13 a couple of years ago at Verdun, which included my crashing my bike :(

Time to put a bit more effort in to improve on all 3 disciplines if I want to break into the top 10% on serious races. Sub 1:10 is easily doable now so on a fast course I think aiming for something like 1:05 would be the next goal. Never expected to be that fast starting out 6 years ago! :)




Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

Globally dominating Canada
User avatar
SickBoy
 
Posts: 805
Joined: 08 Mar 2011 14:00
Location: Montreal

Re: Joliette Sprint Tri

Postby SickBoy » 15 Jun 2016 19:27

Image

Swim start, that's me top left, count 3 in from the buoy on the left. White text on the back of my wetsuit. Left arm forward!


Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

Globally dominating Canada
User avatar
SickBoy
 
Posts: 805
Joined: 08 Mar 2011 14:00
Location: Montreal

Re: Joliette Sprint Tri

Postby Jack Hughes » 16 Jun 2016 19:08

Well done! Sounds pretty encouraging!
Omnia Vanitas

Immortal (for a limited tme).
User avatar
Jack Hughes
 
Posts: 11085
Joined: 05 Jan 2010 17:19
Location: God's own county

Re: Joliette Sprint Tri

Postby King Sad » 16 Jun 2016 23:27

Excellent, well done. Good result there.
It seemed like a good idea at the time :? .



http://www.KingSad.UK
User avatar
King Sad
Clearly spends too much time on forum
 
Posts: 2138
Joined: 28 Mar 2011 07:05


Return to Race Reports

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 13 guests

cron