Does A Bear Crap in the Woods?

A Langley Pond International Triathlon Race Report

Evidently, and so does Wes, but that's the rest of the story...

After I wrote my last post prior to race day, it began to hit me that the race was coming up fast :-) I know. It was only two days away. I could feel the dread of the swim building in my mind like the tightness of a rubber band. I took some small comfort in the fact that this swim would be wet suit legal, yet I couldn't shake those feelings that resurfaced unbidden from past races.

I had managed to bank three extra hours of work before Friday, and I got up before the butt crack of dawn to get in early. I'm quite surprised at the morning person I am becoming. I still hem and haw about dragging my carcass out of bed in the morning, but once I do, I'm full of energy for the entire day. I left work around 11:30 AM and got home around noon, another benefit of leaving work early. No traffic. I took Bags out for a twenty minute ride and followed this up with a ten minute brick. I was starting to feel pretty good, but my thighs were still tender from all bike mileage I had been putting in the past three weeks.

The sun was shining as we left Atlanta. We hit a little traffic in downtown Atlanta, but for the most part, the ride was very pleasant. We arrived in Aiken, South Carolina between four and four-thirty. We went directly to the hotel and checked into our room. Did we score a doozy of a room too! We basically got a suite for the price of a room with a king sized bed. We had a den, a kitchen, a separate bed room two baths, all for little ole us. We decided to give Aerowyn her own room :-)

After settling in, we were off to Langley Pond to pick up our race packets. I was pleasantly surprised at the number of triathletes already at the park. While picking up my packet, I made sure the race officials knew I had put my chip number in my profile incorrectly. I would be racing with the ChampionChip I had acquired for the Disney Marathon.

We knew we had a couple of hours before Dave and Mendy would arrive in town. Dee Dee and I decided to take a tour of downtown Aiken. We both loved the small town atmosphere. Downtown basically consisted of two to three streets of little shops, cafes and restaurants. We made it back to the hotel around 5:30-ish or so, and settled down to watch the TV.

Around 7 PM, I texted David to ask them if they had left Greenville yet :-) He immediately called me back to let me know they were at packet pick up and would meet us for dinner. I asked David if they wanted to mosy over to downtown Aiken, and he and Mendy were up for it. I was excited when David, Mendy, and Grace pulled into the parking lot!! I went downstairs to meet them and gave Mendy the big ole Georgia bear hug that I am, evidently, becoming famous for :-) Then I got to meet that l'il angel, Grace. She is just as cute in person as she is in all those great pics. Mendy, is of course, a sweetheart! When she says that she is a "Girl raised in the South!" You can believe it!!

David and Mendy decided they would just check into our hotel, and they scored the last available room. Evidently, there was a college baseball team staying in our hotel. We then drove to downtown Aiken and scored a few parking spots on the street. We managed to park pretty close to the local brew pub, and that's where we ended up eating. The idea of sampling the local brew was too much for David to pass up :-) I, personally, decided to abstain from alcohol, but it didn't, as will soon become apparent, help my GI system at all.


While we were waiting for dinner, we managed to snap a few pictures...


David decided he would literally rub his beer in my face! Telling me how awful it was an all :-) He tried the same mental torture with his second beer too, but I was so over it by then! LOL!! All four of us decided on salads for dinner. David had salmon, and the rest of us had steak salads. Grace decided a grill cheese sandwich with fries was the bomb, and I think she got the best meal of the day!


We really weren't in a hurry to leave. We sat around chatting a bit after dinner and enjoying each other's company. We managed to get the technically challenged waiter to snap a couple of pics of us before heading out.


David and Mendy needed to stop off at the store on the way home. We said our good byes outside the restaurant and headed back to the hotel.

I am definitely getting better at this triathlon stuff. When I went to West Point for my second Oly, I had too much stuff, almost, to carry into the transition area. This time, I fit everything into one workout bag. It took me all of fifteen minutes to setup my race belt, recheck to make sure everything was there, then settle down to watch some more TV. Before we finally settled down to bed, there was a few things I needed to get done.

First, I had to tuck Aerowyn in:


Then, Dee Dee and I wanted to send Marcy a small gift :-)


Finally, we settled into bed. Dee Dee decided to watch basketball for a bit, while I dozed off. I slept rather fitfully, off and on all night, but over all, I felt rather rested when the alarm clock went off at 5:30 AM.

After Dee Dee took her customary shower, we went downstairs, ate breakfast and headed for the pond. We ran into David in the parking lot on the way out. Grace was still sleeping. He and Mendy would be coming along shortly. The parking lot at the pond was about half full. I quickly grabbed my stuff and headed over to transition. Evidently, there was no need to hurry. Most people were either at registration or packet pickup. I was the second bike to setup in my rack. I didn't score the end spot, but I was happy with my placement. I spent about 10-15 minutes getting everything setup, including my two bottles of G2.


I grabbed my wet suit and goggles and headed down to the beach to look at the swim course. They decided to change it this year. Rather than doing two laps of the 750 meter course, the decided to convert it into a big "L". The benefit of this is that the Oly participants did not have to merge with the sprint participants until the end.

Promise me you'll move on with your life, but never forget me!!

Ever since I read these words for the first time, I have stepped up my efforts to support the fight against cancer. I still brings tears to my eyes when I think about my wife ever having to say those words to me. The hurt (would be) is profound. I can only imagine what my friends are going through.

Dee Dee and I paused on the way back at the wall to snap the picture in the post below. If you want to buy your own pair, Google "Cancer Sucks socks" and you too can have a fancy pair of these wonderful running socks. I could have opted for the black ones, but who would have noticed?

With about thirty minutes before race time, I suited up and headed down to the beach for a swim. The water felt good, much warmer than my OW swims at home. I swam out the first buoy and practiced floating a bit, both straight up and on my back like an otter.


I felt all the nervous tension leave my body. I was ready. I swam back to beach, climbed from the water, and walked back up to the pavilion with Dee Dee to wait for the race to start.

About ten minutes before race time, the first crack of lightning flashed across the sky. Then the skies opened up and the rain came pouring down. Every time the RD announced when the race would start, a new flash of lightning would ruin our plans. We waited, and waited, and waited.

The RD finally announced the 9 AM was the cutoff time. If we didn't start the swim by then, they would have to change the race to a duathlon. Lucky for us, the rogue cloud hanging over the lake had moved off down the lake and was no longer causing a problem. The sheriff's department notified the RD that part of the bike route was flooded. The bike route would be shortend by four miles for each loop (it ended up being three). I was relieved when they called the elites down to the water and "Lose Yourself" by eminem began to play over the loud speakers. The air horn went off with a blast and the dozen or so elites entered the water and began the race.

David and I donned our goggles and moved into the starting area.


The RD shortened the pause between waves to two minutes. Before you knew it, he blew the horn, and our wave entered the water for the swim.

The swim course was basically an inverted L. We were swimming along the dam to our right, then we would make a left turn to the top of the L. I had decided that I would take it easy out to the first turn, then I would kick it up a notch. It was pretty crowded from the start. I was careful not to pound anyone, nor did I get pounded. I drafted off a few feet for a little bit, but I wasn't really comfortable, and I didn't like accidentally touching the feet of the guy in front of me. By the time we hit the first left turn, I had kicked it up to race pace.

I was actually pleasantly surprised when I reached the first yellow buoy. I thought I would be like half way. Instead, the turn around was right there in front of me. I sighted on a group of swimmers in front of me and swung wide around the turn. The turn wasn't an exact right angle. I ended up taking the turn to wide and headed for a point to the right of the next yellow buoy. Next time, I sight for myself :-) When I realized my mistake, I took a sharper angle towards the second yellow buoy and joined the rest of the swimmers on a straighter line. I had plenty of open water to swim in, and plenty of athletes to keep me company. The second turn around took longer to reach. I made the left turn and headed for the third yellow buoy, about fifty yards away. An abandoned house stood on the shore behind the buoy. It was a definite Kodak moment.

I began to swim harder. I wanted to turn it on for the last section of the swim leg. I passed the final yellow buoy to my right and made the right turn towards shore. I gave it everything I had.


Another athlete and I were swimming body to body, stoke for stoke. Every time I came up for a breath, I was staring right into his goggles. Towards the end of the swim, we broke off and finished on our on. For some strange reason, the swim ended at pier in waist deep water. Talk about retarded. Tired and sore swimmers had to lift themselves out of the water with their arms on the pier, then get up and run to transition. I had no problem getting on the pier, but some athletes did. Dee Dee was waiting for me on the beach.


Dee Dee hollered at me that David came out of the water like thirty seconds before me. I could see him running ahead of me. Well, I was in no mood to run. I stripped off half my wet suit, allowed the blood in my body to redistribute itself, then began running to transition. As I reached my bike, I saw David heading out of transition. That dude is FAST!!!

My wet suite was not cooperating. I got one leg off just fine, but I got my first and only cramp in my left calve getting the left leg out. To be honest, I really wasn't in a hurry. By the time I got out of my wet suit, put on all my bike gear, and exited transition, like five minutes had passed. Oh yea, my swim time was 29 minutes and some change. I'm not really happy with that, but I'll ponder it with you at the end of this report.


My glasses were so foggy as I exited transition, I could barely see. It took almost three miles for them to dry out completely. The race route was a big circle. The sprint was doing one lap, the internationals two. Picture an inverted plate if you will, with the bottom part of the plate lower than the top. That's how the route was. The left side up the plate was mostly up hill with a few down hills, then the opposite side was the reverse. I took the first half of the first lap pretty hard, and hammered the reverse side. I reached thirty-seven miles per hour on one long downhill stretch and was just flying. Near the end of the first lap, I felt my GI "issues" begin to manifest itself. I either went harder than I should have, or my legs were really shot. Either way, I tired significantly on the second lap. I only managed 7-8 mph on the uphills, then I decided to for go pedaling on the downhills and just coast. I was very grateful when I completed the second lap and turned back to the pond.


At the end of the race, I checked my mileage. The distance was 19 miles and I averaged 17.1 mph. That was not what I wanted. Again, I was disappointed.

My transition from bike to run was a lot faster. I geared up and was out the door in two minutes and some change. I was wondering what to do about my GI issues when, lucky for me, the run route went right by the port-a-pots. I made a quick detour to take care of business, then headed out on the run again.


When I reached the first mile marker, I hit the lap button and was surprised to see a 10:45 pace. I was really running fast cause I knew I musta spent at least a couple of minutes in the bathroom. The run route was nice and flat. We were doing an out and back with two water stops. I turned in a 8:49 pace for my second mile, and then a 9:24 for my third mile, which included walking both ways through the water stations. Some nice couple was out on the race course hosing down the runners. I was very thankful for that, despite the shock of the cold water.

During mile 4, the GI issues return and quickly reached unbearable. It was so bad I had to resort to walking some portions of it to keep myself under control. Despite this, I still managed a 9:48 mile. At this, all I wanted to do was run by the port-a-potties again. The road back to the park is lined with forests and uphill. About half way up the hill, we had a code ocher with a breach. Once you have a breach, all humbleness and modesty goes by the way side. For those of you who are sensitive to this kind of stuff, skip the next paragraph.

I quickly dove off the road into the woods and struggled about 8 yards into the forest. I quickly realized that crapping in the woods presents some new challenges. The first and most obvious is not to crap on yo self. I managed that part just fine. Once that was finished, the second challenge was how to get cleaned up. Just for all you new people who have never done this before, here's some sage advice. Do NOT wipe your butt with live or green leaves. If you happen to accidentally pick something poisonous, well, you get the idea. You will pay for an uncomfortably long time! Lucky for me, the leaves were wet, and there was plenty. For a few minutes, I had a oh crap (LOL!) moment trying to figure out which ones I had already used. I know. That's just gross. I haven't wiped my ass with leaves since I went turkey hunting in eigth grade :-)

I quickly pulled up my pants, exited out of the forest, and kicked it in. I turned in a 10:53 fifth mile.


For the final mile, we ran through the transition area, past the finish, then out onto the dam. They evidently shortened the run too, cause the turn around was supposed to be further out. I guess they ended up cutting off the final 0.2 miles of the 10K, cause I measured :-) I was very, very happy to turn in a sub-8 minute mile for my final mile. My pace on the final mile was 7:42. That just totally blew me away. As a matter of fact, I thought the last mile was short until I measured it on g-maps :-)

As I turned into the finisher's chute, I couldn't see Dee Dee, but I knew that she would be there waiting on me to snap my picture.



I raised my arms in victory and crossed the line in 2:41:41 (official).

David, Mendy, Grace, and Dee Dee were waiting for me at the finish line. David kicked some serious ass on the bike and run, finishing about thirty minutes before I did. High fives all around. I was a bit wobbly after my run, which made David chuckle, but hey, I ran hard :-)

We opted not to hang around for the entire awards ceremony. We had chilluns at home that needed t aking care of. Jimmy did a fantastic job of caring for Matthew while were gone. He is such a fine young man. Both Dee Dee and I were very tired on the trip home, but we made it home safely, getting into Atlanta around 4:30 or 5 PM.

Now, I'm trying real hard to keep this race in perspective as a "B" race. First, I swam hard. I know I was hitting close to my T-pace for part of that swim AND I was in a wet suit. There's no way I should have come in that close to 2 minutes per 100 meters. I did swing out to wide on the first turn, so maybe that's the reason. I don't know, but I'm not going to dwell on it. Just accept it and move on. I am also disappointed in my bike performance. The route wasn't that hilly. I just totally sucked wind on the second lap and couldn't give it everything I had. This has me rethinking my strategy at Florida 70.3. The run was my silver lining. Despite the GI issues, I believe, had I not stopped twice, I could of PRed my 10K distance at this race, despite having to stop 2 times. I am very excited about that. In addition, I had zero cramping during the race, with the exception of the cramp I got taking off my wet suit. I'll definitely have to work on my race week nutrition before Florida 70.3. Overall, I'm very happy with the fitness of my body.

Dave, Mendy, and Grace, we had a great time seeing you guys in Aiken! I hope our paths cross again sometime soon. Maybe you guys can come for a destination race in Atlanta some time :-)

It's time to get serious, now. Just a hop skip and a jump until my first half ironman!

Wes