Thermenlandtriathlon in Fürstenfeld – Olympic distance

dertriathlonLast Sunday the last test, kind of rehearsal before Ironman 70.3 in Zell am See took place. Thank’s in the first place to dertriathlon.com who organized a triathlon over sprint and olympic distance as well as a kids aquathlon.

Exactly at 10:00 the start signal rang and my wave started with the 3 and 3/4 laps of swim in the outdoor swimming pool of Fürstenfeld, which is by the way very shallow at some points. First meters were the same as usually…hard fight and lots of hits until I cam to the first buoy. After turning at the second buoy I finally had something that I would call a rhythm. But somehow I recognised that my speed was not high enough for the chosen starting intervals. It happened that the kind man at the edge of the pool pressed his signal horn exactly at the same moment when I arrived at the turning buoy where the starting area was located..what the f*** I just thought!!! I was not very happy participating another round in the middle of a starting swimming round/fight. After loosing a lot of time and of course energy I managed to swim the last 3/4 of a lap and got somehow from the center towards the outside where the swim exit was. After 28 minutes and 21 seconds I arrived in the transition zone.

© www.tribild.at
© www.tribild.at

The course with the bike was very nice. Two laps, each 23km, must be executed by the starters of the race over olympic distance. Already at the beginning of the first out of two laps two accidents occurred almost in front of me. I tried to stay focused and concentrated on the biking and not being upset with the things that happened during the swim.

I changed a tactical aspect for nutrition as a kind of experiment for the Ironman race. My plan was to eat two Powerbar gels and to drink as much as possible out of two bottles of Powerbar isodrink. In the past I drank the gel with water instead.
But…during first lap I recognised…it was to less pure H2O!!!

The route was not very hard to race besides one short but hill as far as I can rate after a few races.
After finding the exit at the last circle (really confusing situation there) I arrived at the transition zone the second time after 1 hour 20 minutes ant 51 seconds.

© www.tribild.at
© www.tribild.at

The last transition was very quick and I could immediately start the 10km run. At the first round I got a bad response from my stomach reminding me of my experiment during biking!

I felt a stinging pain in the right side of my underbelly. I tried very hard to bear down the pain…opening my suit, putting the top upwards…breath in deeply, breath out deeply…no way getting rid of this bastard!!! It became worse and I had to decrease my speed. The problem got a little bit better at the end of first lap when I arrived at the area of the swimming pool again. So I decided to increase velocity again but turned out that this decision made the pain come back again immediately. After the last turn I had to walk some meters because the pain was too big.

After 2:36:36 I finished my race at rank 49th in the overall and 17th in the elite class.

I am not really happy with the result at all, but I can also take something positive out of the whole. All in all the rank is not that bad considering my struggles during the race (also thinking of the fact that it is just my 5th race).

I am looking forward to racing a middle distance at Ironman 70.3 Zell am See.

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