Training for the US 10K race in Atlanta

Started training last week for the US10K race held each year on Labor Day in Atlanta. The race starts at Cumberland Mall and goes straight up Hwy 41 and finishes at White Water, 6.2 miles. It is touted as the hardest 10K in America because of its monster hills, 6 of them to be exact!!! This will be my 3rd year in this race. I placed 5th in my age group in 2006, 3rd in 2007, so guess what I am going for this year.



Of course our training must consist of the hills. It doesn't matter what hills as long as they are long and steep. We reach speeds of up to 45 miles per hour going down them! Oh, did I forget to tell you that I am inline speed skating this race? Yes I am an inline speed skater. I am a member of GT Speed skating team in Columbus, Ga. So we started training over at the Northside Elemetry School entrance road last week. It is a 1 mile loop or lap, meaning that it is a 1 mile round trip up and back down. And it is a killer to say the least.



I did 4 laps on 2 different days last week and did 7 laps last night. I felt pretty good except for my heart rate getting as high as 187. It averaged 166 for the entire 7 laps which took 35:42 minutes. This is what I call extreme training, but it has to be done for this race.



Some of my fellow skaters joined me last night to train. They included Matt Stewart, JD Coleman, Teymur Etimadi, and coach Steve Stewart. They only did 5 or less laps (ha, ha, ha). I thought that Steve was going to puke!



I am really looking forward to this race because I really want to try to inprove my time from last year. Even though I finished 3rd in my age group, my time was 1:30 slower than in 2006. I attribute that to not being able to get into a pack or pace line early into the race. Oh well, I guess I will have to wait to see what happens this year.



I also just signed up for the North Shore Inline Marathon held in Duluth, Mn. on September 13, so this training will be a good start for that race also.

Georgia Veterans Sprint Triathlon 2008

For some reason this triathlon was very hard for me. I thought that my times sucked as compared to what I wanted to accomplish. Of course my training was lacking due to other commitments and training. It all started with the 400 yard swim. I was in the 2nd wave and started on the front line. My start was good, so I thought, but quickly turned into a nightmare! It felt as though I was in a hurricane! I couldn't breathe and was constantly being run over, hit, kicked, and bumped. Anyway, after 9:20 minutes of pure agony it was all over and I came out of the water 15th out of 18 in my age group. I was hoping for an 8:00 minute swim. So off to the transition area for the bike.



My first transition time sucked and was very frustrating at 2:54 due to the fact that I couldn't get my cycle jersey on. Plus I almost ripped my race number totally off of it (required by USAT rules). But I survived and ran out to get on the bike. Was hoping for 1:30 time.



So I get on the bike and take off like a bat out of hell. 13.6 miles. This being my strongest event I knew I had a lot of ground to make up. I immediately realized that I forgot to reset my cyclometer so I reached over and reset it. So after a few minutes I noticed that I was only showing 0.0 and I couldn't figure out why. So I took it off of the mount and remounted it. It started working then and to my amazement it was actually recording even thought it said 0.0. I thought that the course would be somewhat flat so I was hoping for really fast time. The first half was very technical with a lot of courves and turns so my pace was only around 19 mph. But once I got into the flat straight area I put the hammer down and averaged around 22-23 mph. I knew that I needed to get some fluids into my body so I drank probably half of my Gatorade in 2 separate occations. The second occation was not very pleasant and I thought that I was going to puke. I also brought 2 gel packs with me but couldn't/wouldn't attempt them after the Gatorade event. Anyway, I averaged 21.1 mph with a time of 38:45 and finished 5th in my age group. Must have passed at least a couple dozen people and only 3 people passed me, including the winner of the womens division! That sucked because I had a 9 minute head start over her, but I knew it was coming at some point. Anyway, I was pretty happy with my cycling and headed back to the transition area for the run.



My second trasition went really smooth. Out of all of the the parts of this race, I am most proud of this time, 0:50 seconds!!! I actually got my feet out of my bike shoes before I dismounted the bike. I ran into the transition area, slid on my running shoes and took off. A proud moment.



The 5K run started out pretty well considering that I pushed almost as hard as I could on the bike. I had only ran a couple hundred yards when the inevitable happened, again. Both calfs started to cramp! If only I could figure out why and how to fix it. So I thought that I could slow down and suffer for a while and hoped that it would somehow go away, but it didn't. It actually got worse so I had no choice but to stop and walk. This was actually a good thing as my heart rate was way too high and needed to come down too. So I walked for probably 200 yards and it felt pretty good. Hoping that my cramps were gone for good, I start running again. To my amazement the cramps never came back and I fell into a good pace. I did not know this at that time, but I was currently in 6th place in my age group. But I soon started getting passed by all of those guys that I passed on the bike. A total of 5 guys in my age group passed me before I reached the finish line. The last quarter mile was kind of a funny moment for me. A guy in my age group passed me and I was determined to not let him get away. I thought that I could draft him and get him at the finish line. To my amazement I actually had enough reserve energy to make an attempt at this. I figured that beating at least this one guy would somehow have a redeeming effect for me. So we are going down to the last few hundred yards and I pull up beside him, hoping that he is well spent and won't make it a race, but he does! So we are now off to the races like a spring chicken. He also knows that I am in his age group and has the same thoughts as I do. So we are coming down to the wire and he starts to pull away and I have nothing left to give or take. He beats me by :02 seconds. Damn! I did finish though and better yet I survived! My run was the second slowest I have ever run in a 5K race, 28:54, barely surpassing my very first first 5K of 3 years ago. Oh well! The end to a rather frustrating race.



In the end I finished with a time of 1:20:45. 11th out of 18 in my age group and 173 out 347 total participants that finished. Not too bad but way worse than I had hoped for. The best thing out of the entire weekend was spending time with my girlfriend, her family and friends. There were actually a lot of people there from the Columbus area. We went to Wild Adventures Park in Valdosta after the race and on Sunday to close out a good weekend.

Check out the results