Race Day Part 1 – Setup and Swim

 

The morning started early with a 4am wakeup for shower and prep.  My race partner David and I rode our bikes to the transition setup at about 5 am, it was quite a scene with the dead quiet downtown streets except for a bunch of cyclists.  We took to transition and setup, and thankfully they had numbers on rack positions, not just a range so you knew exactly where to go.  Of course the guy next to me racked his bike backwards, but there was plenty of room to get setup.  Coffees of Hawaii was there bright and early, and before we loaded the buses I was able to get my hands on a cup of joe.  We left for the loading pier and had about an hour before the boat was leaving to hang out on the pier and chat about our prep and mentally prepare for the day.  Boat loading was a breeze, and although they had different areas corralled for age groups, it was pretty much a free for all on the boat.

We circled the island once before parking, and I was a bit surprised at how close we started to the shore.  We were only about 20 yards from the sign up top, so you had a pretty good view to start.  Helicopters were hovering, the national anthem was played and we were ready.  The pros queued up right outside the window we were sitting at and the horn went off at 8am sharp.  It was crazy how fast those guys moved out and in a matter of minutes all you could see was a rooster tail from their pack in the water.

Our rookie mistake here was we were directly in the center of the boat, and it turns out that we were some of the last to get off the boat.  It took almost 7 minutes from the gun for us to get out the door and then the leap of faith.  The guy in front of me took a bit of time to jump, and once they told me to go I took off, unfortunately he was still taking his time coming up form the water and I nearly landed on top of him.  It surprised me how crowded it was in the water to begin, I figured everyone would spread out pretty quickly but for the first 5 minutes it was full contact open water swimming and climbing over people.  Another 5 minutes after that I was able to finally find some open water and lock in on a good rhythm.

The suggestions for sighting and directions tell you to point way left of where you will eventually come out of the water and let the current drag you to the right and towards the finish while you swim across the current.  After about 15 minutes of following this suggestion I stopped in the water to take in the sight and sound of being in San Francisco Bay with the Golden Gate Bridge to my right, San Francisco to my left, and Alcatraz Island behind me.  I also wanted to get a good idea of where I was in relation to the finish and pick a new line.  I had made a pretty good clip and decided then to bear right and take an aggressive line just to the left of the swim finish.  I took off, started swimming very aggressively and was surprised to get out of the water at a 29:32 split.  You run up the sand an into a mini transition area where your bag awaits for you to leave your wetsuit and put on your secondary pair of running shoes.  Once the shoes are on it is about a half mile run to the main Transition area and I managed to get in there and out on the bike for a total T1 time of 6:33.

My swim goal was anywhere between 42-44 min, and my T1 goal was to be under 7 min if possible.  Even with the very fast swim conditions I blasted the swim and ended up with the 255th fastest time out of 1,564 finishers (1800 started), so I was solid at the 14th percentile there.  Combined with my sub 7 min T1 I started off well toward my “excellent race” goal of a sub 3 hour finish.  Next up the bike.