Race report: Layton Tri 2012

This is a really weird race run by a really weird guy. First of all, it’s a pool triathlon in an outdoor “wave” pool. That’s not the weirdest part, though. The really weird part is that you do a mini-sprint (300 yd swim 5.5 mile bike and 1.55 mile run) and then you run from transition back into the water to swim and start the whole race all over again.

The guy who runs the race is not an athlete himself. He made one crack about how next year he’d be almost as “old” as the guys on the medals podium, and how that was “really old.” Dude, they all look better than you do. He is getting better than a few years ago, but he takes a long time to spit things out. This makes me tend to tune him out, even if he might be giving useful information. He made one big mistake explaining the rules about passing on the bike. He said that if you can’t pass in 15 seconds, you have to “fall back.” In fact, once you have moved into the passing zone, you cannot fall back. You must pass, no matter how much it costs you or you will face a time penalty. This is to encourage people not to move too close unless they can really pass.

I did the whole race in just my swimsuit again, and as far as I could tell, was the only person who chose to do that. I would be more comfortable running and biking in shorts, but I can’t find a pair of tri shorts that don’t gape just a little in the pool when I kick off the wall, and that makes me just a bit slower. I don’t think the swim suit makes me slower on a little race like this. It just makes me uglier. Even though I am in good shape, there are parts of my body I would prefer not to show off. Ah, well.

The bike is so short and so full of turns that it is almost more like a track race than a road race. I have aerobars and an aero helmet, so I used them but I always wonder how much time that saves me in a race where you go a maximum of a half mile before turning.

I felt like I was running lousy, but it turns out that every one of my splits was faster this year than 2 years ago when I last did this race. That hasn’t happened to me in a long, long time. I suspected my transition times would be faster, because I have since gone sockless and leave my bike shoes on my pedals for faster transitions. I’m not sure there’s much left for me to do to get faster in transition. There’s still lots of room in other areas.

One of the disadvantages of this type of race is that because it is a staggered start, you have no idea what your real placement is. I crossed the finish line in second overall for women, but a woman who is a slightly slower swimmer but faster runner came in behind me and beat me. It might have made a difference to both of us to see the competition.

However, this is a great race for beginners. You get lots of practice doing transitions and it’s so low-key there’s little stress. I thought that the race organizer has done a good job of responding to problems in the past and this year, I didn’t have any problems passing people in the water or being passed. A couple of guys played leapfrog with me because I was faster on swim and transition and they were faster on bike and run, but the course was much less congested than it has been in the past.

This year, I have been killing the bike in almost every race I’ve done. As I try to analyze why that is, I have to give credit to 2 factors:

1—My computrainer, which promises to drop 20 minutes off an Ironman bike time. Being able to control power/watts really does help. You can dial in every workout perfectly.

2—I spent a lot of hours on it this winter doing easy aerobic miles and I’m reaping the reward now. Clearly I need to do this for my run next winter.

Final results: 3rd place overall women 1:14.39