I took this shot with my cell phone on our property a while ago, but it is fitting for my blog title today! I raced my first race of the year today: the White Sands Duathlon. It is a great race. It is put on by the military, so it is organized, well-marked, and precise. The base roads are also empty, so it is great for the bike portion. And the backdrop of the Organ Mountains is amazing! It is weird that the first atomic bomb was tested here. It is hard to fathom.
The White Sands Duathlon was my first-ever multi-sport event of my career last year. I won the race last year, and really wanted to improve my time this year. I did improve my overall time by about three minutes, even with a pretty decent training week this week. Not bad! The course was altered somewhat on the bike, but was the same distance, so I will take it as an improvement:-).
This year, Chad and I stayed in military lodging on base at the White Sands Missile Range, which was awesome. It was a really nice hotel-style suite with a kitchenette. That way, we didn't have to report to the base entry to race at 6 am. We felt out of place on base, even though it was really scenic and pleasant. I had the same feeling as I do when I travel to Europe: I was in a different culture, and was paranoid about offending people by not knowing etiquette. Even so, it was great to see how people live on the base, and how the base functioned. The experience made me appreciate our military even more. People there were so friendly and helpful, and human. It is not always the image we get of the military.
As far as the race, yes, Chad and I both improved our times, but our heads were in the clouds! It started this morning: we thought since we were staying on base, we had tons of extra time, and did not have to hurry to the start. I think we got too relaxed. We showed up about twenty-five minutes before the start. We looked like two fools! We were running around, scrambling to hastily pin our numbers on, and put our numbers on our bikes. Our bikes were the last ones in transition, and we were the last ones to get our packets and numbers! We literally had a two minute warm up jog. Not ideal, but we rolled with it.
As far as the race, we both did well, improved our times, and put in steady efforts. As I turned the final corner, I started looking at the race clock, and said to myself, "Cool! I went faster than last year. I wonder which set of cones is the finish line?" Just then, literally two bike lengths from the line, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a pony-tailed figure sprint past me. I had no idea someone was right behind me! I thought I was all alone, and was cruising to the line.
I have never made that mistake before! I have had cycling teammates put their arms up too early in criterium sprints and lose, but I have never eased up early and lost before! It caught me off-guard, and really surprised me. It was my own fault: I was not focused and did not push it to the line. Afterwards, I talked with Chad, and he reported that the girl had been drafting off a guy in front of him for a significant portion of the race. He could not believe what he was seeing. The last I had seen her on the course, I thought I had enough of a lead that I could cruise to the line. Regardless of her making up ground due to drafting, I was spacing out, and that is my own fault!!! I did not have the correct mentality to win a race.
Chad and I talked a lot on our drive home. We feel hopeful for the season after the race. We did not feel like we killed ourselves, still improved, and ran another 20 minutes with ease after the race. So all that is great! But we are a little worried that our heads were in the clouds due to overall life overload: I am adjusting to working full-time in the demanding field of special education. I have not had a "real job" for the past several years of competition. Though I love it, it is a huge adjustment! I am also making major progress on my master's thesis from Boise State (I had put it off while full-time bike racing), and on top of that, I have started another master's program here, part-time. And we are building a house, that is behind schedule and ahead on price, which has worn us out. All of these things have been rewarding, though draining.
I enter a lot of my workouts feeling worn out, even though the training has still been going well. Chad and I were not making excuses on our drive, but wanted to be aware of our lives and the stressors that are present. Every year, I state that I do not want to start my racing season early, because I always seem to burn out. Somehow, though, every year, I race early, and do end up cooked later on. After our talk, I think I am really going to stick to starting my "real" racing later. I am leaning towards saving my big races until after school/work gets out in late May. I will race local, fun races until then, stay relaxed, and hopefully improve in training. Then I will aim to have a great summer of racing, and maybe continue racing in to the fall. This would be a nice change from burning out by August!
So the race was a success: we had a great physical effort, we had a car drive to analyze our goals and life situations, and feel like we will be on track for 2009!
