Race Report of the Silver Springs Duathlon, Stow, Oh. (5/4)

Kayla once again accompanied on the way to Ohio (I could get used to this) as I headed out for my first duathlon.  I was a little nervous because I had heard that running before biking, as opposed to the opposite order, causes quite a bit of soreness.  The only time I had done these sports in this order was at least a year and a half ago and I remember my legs not being too happy about it.  I didn't really intend on doing one, although I was never opposed to the idea, but with a half iron race about a month away, I needed to find a race to do somewhere and finding triathlons in the northeast in early may is a little difficult because of the water temperature.

The morning was chilly, but not unbearable (especially after Allison Park) and things were looking up as we didn't get lost on the way.  After checking in and racking my bike, time seemed to fly by and we were lining up.  I really didn't get in a warm-up, but just a short ride up the road to make sure everything was in working order on the bike.

The gun went off and we started on the first 5k lap of the race.  About the first mile was uphill and put us all in check.  The pace was pretty high to start out with and two of us jumped on the heels of the guy in the lead.  We hit the first mile marker in 5:37.  This was officially the fastest mile I had run in my life and I was doing it in the first leg of a multisport race.  This might have been cause for concern, but I felt pretty good.  I had a look behind me and already pretty much saw nobody.  It looked as though the race would be between the three of us and we were only a mile in.  Over the next two miles, the other two slowly put a few seconds in to me.  By the time we finished the first run, the leader had around a minute on me and second place had about thirty seconds.  I knew the leader was obviously pretty strong, but I felt confident that I could do something on the bike.  I finished the first 5k in 17:30, nearly a minute faster than I had run a straight 5k the year before.

I could see second place on the road in the distance in front of me at the beginning of the first of two laps.  I was ever so slowly reeling him in and I ended up passing him just before the beginning of lap #2.  First place was very far off in the distance, but I could see him so I put everything into the second lap but couldn't pull him back.  From talking to Kayla after the race, it sounded like we were biking about even times so he was still around a minute up on me.  As I made the turn into transition, I could see him starting the run.  Although I put a good thirty seconds on him in the first lap of the bike, I couldn't put any more time into the guy behind me during the second, really.  I had maybe ten or fifteen seconds on him into transition.

I knew starting the last run that he was a better runner than me, and he closed the gap pretty quickly and started to pull away.  I was heaving pretty hard and was doing my best to at least limit my losses.  Not much changed in the last 5k.  The three of us finished about a minute apart from each other.  I hit the time goal that I was looking for (which would have won the race a year ago; story of my life) and was pretty impressed with myself and the run times I posted.  Just as an aside, fourth place didn't come in for over three minutes after I had crossed the line.

I picked up another piece of hardware and Kayla and I hopped in the car to find something to eat.  Normally the story would end here, but we were unaware of the wonder of Ohio and its lack of restaurants where the amount of deep fryers outnumber the employees.  We eventually got back on the turnpike and stopped at a huge rest stop.  Not fine dining, I know, but it was better than Arby's.  Once again the story would normally end here, but we were unaware that there must thoroughly be nothing to do in Ohio.  How could we tell?  Because there were at least fifty high school kids in the rest stop.  What were they doing there?  Were they on a field trip?  After a while, we came to the conclusion that, no, they were not on a field trip.  They do this for fun.  High school kids in Ohio hang out at rest stops, apparently.  The story ends here.