andy reagan only the interesting stuff

The Great Race!

This year marks the 6th year that Lindsey and I have teamed up in Auburn's annual team triathlon.  I think the full name is the Captain Myles Keogh Paddle, Wheel, & Run.  We had won our first three years in the under 18 age category, and even our first year in the 18-39 category by a narrow 13 second margin.

There were 8 teams in our age group now, and it was a close finish.  My Mom ran for the second year, and did awesome with a 7:27 pace making her the second woman over 50 yrs old! It was 151st place overall, and I was even suprised to see her so early at 23 minutes, and congratulated her before taking off.

Going out of the changeover zone is always a little scary, and you have to go really slow but after I was out of the gate I hit it hard.  Accelerating in a sprint to over 30MPH into the headwind, I was trying to keep up with some guy in full aero gear on a P3.  Eventually I caught him, and stayed with him for a mile or so before we caught a Bike and Build alum!! I was super excited to see that jersey, and shouted "bike and build!!" like we always did before catching up to him.  I talked with Max for a little while, and then we got to the steeper hill and I took off again.  I had lost the cervelo guy which felt good, and was passing people by the truckload going up the gradual incline at 25MPH into that headwind.  I lost steam pretty quickly though, and hung on to 18MPH over the rest of the hill into that wind before me made our left turn.  From there, I just went head down in the aerobars and hammered.  I was still passing people but it was thinning out.

I flew by the guy I had seen before the race on a Pinarello and thought about asking him to trade with me haha.  I knew the course well, and sprinted hard up the two steep little hills before the gradual downhill to the finish.  Never leaving my big ring the whole race, I felt like I was going to throw up at the top but relaxed approaching the second and made it over, never seeing below 20MPH on either of them.  I could hardly see anyone in front of me, and figured that by now I had to be near the front.  The gradual downhill to the finish had a tailwind, and I was going over 40MPH for a while which felt sweet.  It was not too long before the end that I passed Mike's girlfriend, who'd had a 6 minute head start on me after Mike ran a 17minute 5k.  Going into the changeover I sat up, and looked at my computer which read an averaged pace of 24.3MPH without the transitions, and that felt good on this windy and hilly course.  I was tired coming into the finish, by the time I left the changeover I felt like I should've gone harder...

I had a really good feeling about how I did, since I didn't get passed at all, and looking at numbers now had passed 133 bikers on the course.  After cooling down I couldn't find my parents and had actually missed Lindsey finishing, but found them after a long search at her car loading the kayak.  It was about an hour after the race before I finally got some water (which I hadn't taken with me) and some food.

It took a really really long time for them to post results of the bike leg, like three hours, but after I saw that they were up, I rushed over.  Able to see over the crowd, I started scanning down from 10th place for my name but didn't find it.  So, I started at the top where Parker's name was.  He has won every year that I have done the race, and his family's team I don't think has ever lost.  But directly below his name, was mine!! I got second!!

Second place baby!

3rd place team!

I was super excited, with the continual improvement every year since I started leading up to this.  My dad had seen Parker finish and he was on a TT bike, with an aero helmet, disc rear and deep front wheel...and I (with just aero bars, no helmet or bike or wheels) had lost to him by a mere 7 seconds! With equal gear, there is no doubt I would've won and it felt great knowing that I was likely the strongest rider on the short course of the 394 teams.

Lindsey had a strong kayak leg, I had our best biking time yet by a full 3 minutes, and my Mom had run well, and it was our best time ever in the race! Beating 2007 by 11 seconds, 2005 by 17 seconds and 2008 by 38 seconds haha.  We were third this year in our age category, out of first by only 30 seconds...

Aquanubs 2010!!