Eagleman70.3 2021 Race Report
Date: June 13, 2021
Location: Cambridge, MD
2021 Triathlon Race Number: 1
Career Triathlon Race Number: 160
Conditions: Outstanding for Eagleman. 70s/80s, very humid, 5-10 mph wind, overcast for the bike and part of the run, 73-degree water with a hurting tide
Background
I originally signed up for Eagleman 2020 and the race was deferred until 2021 due to CoVid. I’d previously competed at EM 4 times from 2005-2008. In May, Anders decided to fly out and have a go as well. He spent the week with us in New Jersey and we took the ferry across on the Friday before the race. We stayed up in Easton, MD about 20 miles from the race site. We did our usual pre-race stuff, went to bed early on the 12thand got up about 3:45am on race morning to begin our adventures.
There were 1,617 triathletes entered in the race with 158 in Anders’ 35-39 YO AG and 46 in my 60-64 YO AG.
Swim
The swim was in the Choptank River, which is brackish, subject to tides, and frequently choppy. It’s hard to compare swim times here from year-to-year due to the tidal effects. My best time was in 2007, when I swam 32:45 and my worse was in 2005, when I swam 45:33. Despite this, I targeted 38 minutes with a range of 35 to 42 minutes.
Anders and I wanted to start the swim together and given he has had 25 to 27-minute Half-Ironman swims, we elected to start towards the front of the time-trial format swim. I expected to be about 7-9 minutes slower than Anders on this morning.
Anders started 5 seconds in front of me and immediately tracked towards the swim buoys. I went right, intent on minimizing any other swimmer drama, and making sure I didn’t impede the faster swimmers starting behind me. I had a rather uneventful swim and pretty much had clean water the whole way. It was a bit choppy, especially as we headed up stream towards the finish line. I felt pretty solid, neither particularly fast nor slow.
I was disappointed (but not surprised) to hit the swim exit ramp at just over 40 minutes. My official time was 40:27, which is slower than I expected, and I don’t think is very indicative of my swim fitness. I was 5th(91.3 %-tile) in my AG and 532ndOA (67.2 %-tile). Both of these relative stats were the best I’ve recorded at EM (prior AG best was 78.3 %-tile in ’07 and prior OA best was 66.0 %-tile in ’06). The best guy in my AG only swam 36:56 and given all of this, it’s hard to feel particularly bad about my swim.
Anders swam 32:36 officially which was good enough for 101stOA (93.8 %-tile) and 10thin his AG (94.3 %-tile). This time was slow for Anders but given his relative performance and the fact we were about 8 minutes apart I do think it’s reasonable to believe the conditions were objectively slow today.
Here is where I stood in my AG race after the swim:
1. Collazo --------
2. Miller + 0:08
3. Lewellyn + 0:46
4. Hanlon + 2:31
5. RC + 3:31
Transition One
The transition area at EM is large to accommodate the field size and given my challenges running this tends to lead to relatively slow transition times for me. My official T1 was 4:13, which was my slowest T1 at EM. Despite this, I actually had the 3rdfastest T1 in my AG. Anders, of-course was much quicker through T1, taking just 2:45. Here is where we stood in my AG after T1:
1. Collazo --------
2. Lewellyn + 3:00
3. Miller + 3:56
4. RC + 4:22
5. Coquelin + 5:35
Bike
I, of-course, had no idea where I stood in my AG, but probably would have been surprised, as I started rolling on my bike, to learn I was in 4th. I felt very good on the bike and was immediately riding in the 20-23 mph range with a great deal of ease. This was faster than I expected as my target was 2:44, with a range of 2:38 to 2:58. Pre-race, Anders had told me he thought I would ride faster than this. Indeed, these are modest targets as my prior four rides here were all 2:24-2:28 (albeit I was in my 40s/early 50s when I did this).
It turns out that I was riding quite a bit faster than most of my AG competitors and by 10 miles I had moved into 2ndand within 4 minutes of the leader, Collazo. About 10 miles in, I decided to “push send” and to really go after this ride. I knew this would hurt my run, but given the state of my run, it didn’t really seem to matter. The road was smooth in some places but not that great in most and this slowed things down a bit. Also, the wind, although modest, helped and hurt in various parts of the bike. Despite this, I was consistent throughout and my slowest 5-mile split was my first at 20.3mph and my fastest was between 40 and 45 miles where I averaged 22.9mph.
By 32 miles, Nowakowski, on his way to his AG win and fastest bike split had passed me. I ended up with a 2:36:41 (21.4mph) and this was good for 3rdin my AG (95.7 %-tile) and 300th OA (81.5 %-tile). My AG relative performance was in-line with past EM rides where I’ve come in at 94-98 %-tile, but age has slowed me down relative to the OA field (in my 4 prior EM rides I was 92-93 %-tile).
Anders rode an amazing 2:16:46 (24.6mph!!!) and rode himself into 3rdin his AG with the 3rdbest AG ride (98.7 %-tile) and 22ndfastest ride OA (also 98.7 %-tile). Here is where we stood in my AG after the bike:
1. Nowakowski --------
2. Collazo + 3:12
3. RC + 7:08
4. Coquelin +12:27
5. Gordon +14:21
Transition Two
I was pretty fried after my bike (rode faster than my fitness today) and as a consequence I took it pretty easy through T2. My T2 was 6:11(13thin my AG or just 74 %-tile). Anders blasted through his T2 in 2:18. Here is my AG after T2:
1. Nowakowski --------
2. Collazo + 3:00
3. RC + 8:27
4. Sajonia +15:10
5. Gordon +15:34
The Run
In times past, before my left knee fell apart, leaving T2 with 7 minutes over the 4thand 5thplace guys, I would have been confident in my ability to run home to a 3rdplace. However, that was definitely not the case today where the better question was how much of the run could I actually run.
I donned my off-loader brace in T2, and this led to quite a few amusing interactions along the way. I either got “you’re inspiring” or had people tell me about their medical issues. By 4 miles I had dropped to 5thin my AG as I alternated running and walking. It began to feel pretty hot out there, so I really didn’t push it much and basically persevered to a very slow 2:51:37 (13:05/mile). I had targeted 2:48 with a range of 2:42-3:05, so in-spite of being slow, this run was pretty much what I expected. I was 30thin my AG (31.0 %-tile). My overall race time was 6:19:07, which was just 4 minutes off my target and given the slowness of the swim, I’m generally pleased with this race. I finished 14thin my AG (71.7 %-tile) and 872ndOA (46.1 %-tile)—true middle of the pack performance.
Anders blazed to a 1:28:26 on his run which netted him a 4:22:51 H-IM, which is his best IM branded Half-Iron distance race. He finished 3rdin his AG and a very impressive 16thOA (99.1 %-tile).
All-in-all, a good day for the Christoffersons and positive step towards Kona in October!
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