Race Sim

Whew! I really wore myself out this three-day weekend. I guess with Jose gone, I decided to distract myself with a series of tough workouts! Long run on Friday, long bike yesterday, and today I joined some BAMmers for a "race sim" ahead of the Webster Duathlon coming up in two weeks. One of the (very fast) gals on our race team invited everyone to come over and use her driveway in Seabrook as a transition area. We had about a dozen people show up for the workout, which involved doing exactly what the race will involve -- a 2-mile run, 12-mile bike, and 2-mile run.

The weather theme for the morning was similar to the past few days -- on the cooler side, around 80 degrees, but so very, very humid. We all took off down the street, which led to Meador Park and the Seabrook trails. By the time we reached Todville, we were right at a mile so it was easy to turn around and head back exactly the way we'd come. The first run went very well for me. I averaged about 10:30 pace and didn't even feel too awful doing it.

The bike was another story. I managed to average just under 18.5 mph, but I'd expected to be about a mile per hour faster than that. Then again, my legs were feeling pretty darn tired from the start! I'm already looking forward to taking the day off on Monday. As I was coming back down Todville, I got passed -- WHOOSH! -- by a huge peloton of roadies. They came out of nowhere!

The second run actually went pretty well too! My pace was still decent and I finished just under 11:00 pace, but man was I tired. That's my "hooray I'm done" wave in the photo above. :) My total time for the workout was 1:29, and the bike was a little more than a mile more than what we'll have to do at the Webster Du. Two years ago I did the Du in 1:23. This year I'm faster on the bike but slower on the run, but hopefully I can eek out an improvement of a minute or two in two weeks.