| title | author | date | aliases | dsq_thread_id | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Copenhagen 4:18:4 triathlon |
svrist |
2010-08-13 |
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Today was the day of Copenhagen 4:18:4 Tri. I had the number 931 sponsored by my employer. The triathlon was roughly a 1/10 of an ironman designed to allow everybody to have a go at a triathlon. I have been flirting with the idea of triathlon ever since I found out how much I like bicycling. My trusty MBK bc7r and me have been around copenhagen for lots of fun as well as the sweaty spinningbikes in Fitnessworld. The last couple of months I have been trying to add some swimming to my weekly training routine. My front-crawl currently only gives me 30-60m before I’m left gasping for air and after 20-30mins of that ok tired, but I might learn it some day.
Today I went ahead and gave it a try anyway. 1000+ contestants was registered and the swim-start was designed to be “start when you want” as in: 50people gets sent of every 3minutes from 17(5pm). Time starts when you run for the water. 4 coworkers and I was signed up and lined up for start around 17.35 and went into the water 17.42. I knew my swim wasnt the good, so I tried to give people space to get into the water in front of me. Nevertheless did I end up in the middel of lots of people and enjoyed the strange feeling of being eaten alive and spit out the back. Very fun, and my crawl (switched to unilateral in 5seconds) was way better than I dared to hope. Direction was hard but fun as well. The swim route was from the beach in the Amager Strandpark Laguna and 200meters out around two bouys and back in.
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| Leaving the water after 400m |
The water was just above 19degree. Neither of my coworkers or I owned a wetsuit so it was just speedo-style.
Somewhere on the swim route a person crossed right in front of me in a leisurely back crawl. What a sight!
The water was greenish but it didnt feel too cold. I didnt really have time to ponders such matters at that time anyway.
My swim took 10 minutes and 37seconds. almost 5minutes better than my estimate of 15minutes and it felt ok. My heart was racing and my shoulders could feel that I did actally put some effort into it.
From there I ran straight through the “changing zone”. Nude people werent allowed so if you wanted to change into something else after the swim you had to do it in a tent in the transition zone.
Already yesterday as I was mixing sportsdrink and preparing my bike helmet I decided that my speedos were fine for both biking and running so I ran straight through the chaning zone and on to my bike.
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| 10meters from T2 – From Cph4184 |
My bike is a normal city-bike so I had no dedicated bike-shoes and therefore spent the time in T1 tightening my running shoes before I headed out the to the bike course – 5m46s
The bike course was 4.5km down a road with a couple of turns and back again, repeated twice. I have never done any cycling races so this was very exiting for me. Lots of bikes on the road (due to the loop) and no official no-draft rules made for a very fun ride. I rode on as hard as I could while trying to steady my heart – still pounding from the swim. The road was filled with an extremely wide variety of bikes. All the way from granpa-bikes and even a bike with a loading case(christiania bike) and to high-tech disc-wheel time-trial bikes and aero-helmets and everything. Yet another sight.
My legs felt excellent and I love to ride my bicycle so I rode as hard as I dared. During the bike course I caught up to one of my coworkers and took him along on my wheel for a couple of kilometers before he fell behind in a turn. Just after that a “train” of three “real roadbikes” and a tt bike passed me. But not fast enough to frighten me off so I caught up with them. What a feeling: When I got into their slip-stream it felt like the dropped the speed but as soon as I went either side or in a turn the wind hit me hard. I followed along for a couple of kilometers but got cocky and decided to “take my turn” and pass all the way from the back and to the front. 10-30seconds and I was gasping for air again but it felt great and when they soon after overtook me again I was able to hang on to the back again for the last km before T2. The ride took in total 34m33seconds with an average speed of 31.2km/h. Pretty much what I was hoping for.
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| Leaving T2 going for 4km run |
T2 included a pee-break but no change of clothes and took only 3min20sec. Then the run. During the week my right knee area had been bothering me – symptoms somewhat resembling IT-band syndrome which made me back off from any more runs and added lots of streching of the IT-band and icing when possible. Today I felt no problems and the run went fine. I was very glad that I actually had tried to go for a bike-ride and then immediately after go for a run. The feeling of the legs as bricks was recognizable and induced no stress as I was prepared 😉 The run was pretty uneventful, but felt somewhat more lonely than the bike-ride. Passed lots of people walking. I run all my runs in a run/walk protocol but had no watch with me. Took a single walk when I felt like it and stretched out my torso a bit to alleviate the side stich that appeared immediately when I started running.
20m12seconds and I passed the finish line. Total time was 1hour 14minutes and 25seconds and I was tired but felt elated and happy.
Drank lots of water and found my coworkers and went for a dip in the water to cool down a bit.
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| The team – from left: Jan, Mikkel, Daniel, Tue and me |
All in all a great event and I was very happy to be able to complete my first triathlon ever! If I had to suggest some improvements I would request some way of getting the overall time somewhere in between as well as a couple of distance markers on the bike and run course.
Apart from that it was fantastic! Thanks to my wife for the support and photo-duty!