Race Coverage

YeeeeeHaw!

Thursday, 03 November 2011 03:00

By Kortney Haag (from kortneyhaag.blogspot.com)

Austin 70.3 - What a fun way to end my season in warm and sunny Austin!

Derek and I left for our trip on Friday and I had already shipped my bike to the hotel so it was there waiting for us to put together. This is what it looked like before so I was a little nervous about making sure my fit was perfect, but I knew Derek would be more anal about putting it together than I would!

Friday night we walked around 6th street and could hear the music outside of the bars desperately wanting to go in and party but I knew I would have my chance come Sunday night....

Saturday we headed to the race site to drop off my bike, check out the course and do a little pre race warmup. I was very happy to hear that the water was around 72 degrees so that would mean wetsuits would be legal. As I was heading toward the water to swim I saw fellow coach and triathlete Kris Swarthout and his brother in law Kris. It was so nice to see a familiar face in the mass of people there. Kris told me some more about the bike course and how there was an area in which it was gravel and that the bike course elevation was somewhat similar to Ironman Wisconsin. I was excited to hear this since I will be doing Ironman Wisconsin next year. The run course was also very hilly and with portions of trail running. However, the trail had huge rocks and divots in it so you really had to watch where you were running. I slept great Saturday night and woke up Sunday ready to race!

When I got to the swim start our bikes were already there, but it was still dark out and difficult to setup transition and pump up your tires. T1 and T2 were also in different areas so you were given transition bags to put all of your gear into after each transition.

I was in wave 10 - about 25 mins after the pro men started. When I had swam the day before the water was pretty choppy because of the wind so I was expecting the same that morning, but luckily the wind was holding back until later in the day. I wanted to find some feet to draft off of but the waves were 5 mins apart, so that made it difficult to catch faster swimmers in earlier waves. I had a great swim for me - 30 mins! I didn't start out fast at all but built into the swim - this is what Dan wanted me to do so I listened!! I stripped off my wetsuit, threw it into the race supplied transition bag with goggles and cap and off I went on the bike. The bike was definitely challenging because of the number of people on the course. For about the first 20 miles I rode on the right side yelling on your left continuously! There were parts of the course in which you couldn't pass anyone due to construction and road conditions so that really brought my mph down. I was happy with my time on the bike considering the pros didn't have to deal with the traffic and the wind that seemed to pick up the last 20 miles on the course. I did have one mishap on the bike though - as I was running through transition to rack my bike a huge gust of wind blew through and I lost my footing and fell down pretty hard scraping up my knee and side of my leg. I don't think that caused me any issues on the run but it did hurt!

I knew I was in a good spot coming out of T2 and Derek yelled that I was the number one or two amateur out there. The run course was changed this year from 2 laps to 3 due to the drought in Austin. It was tough to run around the same path 3 times mentally and physically! The wind had definitely picked up and so had the heat. I just tried to maintain my pace and not go out too hard the first lap. I wanted to run harder the last 4 miles but didn't have much left in the tank to negative split. I was so happy to see the finish line and also see Derek and my friend Jacquie waiting there for me. I finished 6th overall and second amateur for the day.

In all, I was so happy with my performance and a big thanks to Gear West for all their support, Dan at OptumHealth Performance for being an amazing coach and friend, and to my family for their support as well. Derek's parents took care of Owen and Keaton while we were gone and the kids had a blast with their grandparents. I asked Owen if he missed us and he plainly said no I didn't miss you. I also gave Owen my trophy from the race and he asked Derek why I got second place! I guess I better step it up for him next year!