Port Dickson Triathlon 2010

PD Tri is quite a nice race. For the price of the entrance fees, it is relatively well organized and pretty established. The route was the same as last year so those who have done it before have a bit of an advantage. My only comment,I guess is,  for those who are used to the Unlce Chan triathlons, its great – but there were some first timers who could really have used a bit more information about the event. The website could be a  bit more informative on rules and regulations as well as the course route. I had no complaints but if it was my first tri – I'm sure i would have been unnecessarily nervous due to not being very clear on things.

Right. On to the race .

Swim. I weaselled myself into close to  the 2nd row at the swim start. Right behind  the usual suspects(winners) and some proper looking swimmers. It was a bit of a mess, but i didn't have much trouble swimming into people because the front row took off pretty quickly. Well, not surprisingly visibility was poor, goggles fogged up and I lost my way.

I followed  a swimmer on my left and after the U-Turn, i thought i must have cut a corner. Well i was not the only one…so i did my best to get back on track and was in my lane not too long after.

My bike transition was ok. Helmet , belt and go. Everything else was taped to the bike. That works well – ill stick with it.

It took all but 10 minutes to get into a group i caught up with and i stuck with them the whole time. On the way back into bike transition, one guy in my group lost control while undoing his shoes and ended up in the bushes by the road. I’m sure he was not hurt, but a pretty unfair deal considering he did a lot of the pulling.

In the run transition i noticed that a lot of people were really fast in and out. I was ok but the socks did slow me down a bit. I need to think about getting some non blistering shoes to run in and cut down transition time.

On the run, I gained 5 positions. I was running with my one piece tri suit and it was getting kinda hot. So I took of one shoulder . Didn’t help much and doesn't look too good either. Next time ill leave it on. 

I guess the lessons from this race are :

• Use New Goggles (this time i was lucky not to get Disqualified )
• Use 2 piece Tri Suit. Its cooler on the run.
• do Speed work for the run. even at less than 5MinKms, its not enough for a good placing
• I need to get strong enough on the bike to drop the pack- at least a fair distance fr0m the end to have an advantage for the run( even my fast run only got +5 placing)
• tape power gel by the top of the pack to the bike so you can rip it off and consume immediately
• Don’t use the Polar 800PTE for racing ( or figure out how to make it work during the race).My current setup was too complicated and distracting. The HRM does not work during the swim.
• For these OD don't stop at the drink station if not needed. its faster to run with my own water from the transition.

Well thats it. Hope i get to race again soon. family matters will require my priorities in the months to come.  Will see how my run to work plan works out. I hope it does.