Lifetime Fitness
Indoor Triathlon
April 24, 2016
Raleigh, NC
Lifetime Fitness hosts an indoor
triathlon twice a year. I enjoy participating in them. I signed up for the
spring triathlon which was being held at the Raleigh location, which is my home
club. Super excited. It takes me all of a few minutes to get there. SCORE!! I
wasn’t sure if any of the TRI tribe was participating. Racing is always so much
more fun when you do it with friends. I found out that one of my TRI sisters
Barbara Farrell was in my same wave. Lo and behold I didn’t even know her
lovely daughter Heather was in our same wave. We are the 3 amigos for this
race.
It is a lot easier packing for
an indoor triathlon versus than an outdoor triathlon. There is no bike and no
bucket. Since I know the gym towels are a little smedium, I brought my own. My
TRI bag is packed to the brim with all of my race day essentials. I make a pit
stop at Panera for some pre-race fuel. I was all set to get my customary
cinnamon crunch bagel with hazelnut cream cheese. When I pulled up to the
drive-thru menu and saw the pictures for the egg soufflé I quickly changed my
mind. They are life-changing delicious. I order the spinach and bacon egg
soufflé and head on over to Lifetime.
As I pull into the parking lot,
I spy with my little eye one of my TRI sisters Barbara, who for the record is a
ROCKSTAR athlete and triathlete, walking towards the entrance. She asks me if
I’m ready. I’m like oh yeah. After I check into the gym, I head over to the
check-in table for the indoor tri. I receive my race bib and swim cap and race
shirt. I opt for the red race shirt completing forgetting until after the race
that I already own the red triathlete shirt. I later email the race coordinator
about switching my shirt for the grey. I am still waiting on a reply to that
request. It is a requirement to wear their swim cap which I think is going to
be very interesting to see if ALL my hair will fit under it. Barb asks where
the locker rooms are and I tell her they are around back similar to the Cary
location. There is one set of stairs upstairs which is right by the women’s
locker room.
I head over to the locker room.
When I go to the gym to swim I opt for a locker closer to the pool area. I head
over to the 2nd to last row of lockers. I start getting my stuff
out. I have seriously packet a lot of stuff. I must have thought I was going on
an overnight trip. All of a sudden my stomach is doing it’s normal pre-race
dance. I make a beeline to the restroom. I opt to go to the one by the pool to
see the folks who are already on the swim portion. I see a TIFL athlete waiting
for her wave to start. I can’t tell you her name to save my life. I know she is
one of our advanced swimmers. That’s all I got lol.
I get ready for the swim. I
stuff my hair into the tight swim cap. I head out to the pool area and wait for
my wave to start. I talk to a few folks who are in the 9:40 wave. One lady I
met told me this is her first triathlon. We talk about the swim portion. I
think the swim is the easy part of a race. She thinks it’s the hardest part.
This is her first race so I can totally understand her thinking that. I ask if
she plans on doing any more. She is thinking about doing one at the end of June
in Philadelphia. Kudos to her.
Each wave has 10 participants.
Our wave has 5 so we all get our own swim lane, SCORE. As soon as we get in the
swim lane, we literally have about 15 seconds before the swim starts. Swim lead
volunteer yells GO and I take off. Apparently I went out way too fast because I
for the life of me can’t breathe when I go under the water. I’m really flaying
in the pool like someone who does not know how to swim. Trust me I know how to
swim but you couldn’t tell today. I manage to squeak out 14x25 meters by the
grace of God. Angela came up to me after I got out the pool and asked me what
was wrong. She could see I was swimming like I was shook. I don’t know what it
is when I get to swim portion of a race but I get straight SHOOK. The exact
same thing happened in Huntersville last fall. I got in the pool and couldn’t
feel the bottom because it was 6 feet and that FUCKED my head up for the first
lap. After I got to the end of the lane, I calmed myself down and remembered oh
yeah I do know how to swim. I head to the locker room to change for bike. I’m
dropping stuff left and right. Can you say frazzled? I’m changed into my cycling
gear. Smart Johanna packed gel seat cover for that tiny spin bike saddle and
brought my cycling shoes. I have mastered the art of clipping in on a spin
bike. I have not done as well on my road bike AKA Blue thunder. That’s a work
in progress. We head to the spin studio. Angela takes the elevator and I tell
her I almost want to ride with you. Brittany, indoor tri coordinator, walks by
me and tells me I’m so glad you didn’t get on the elevator. I tell her I was
really tempted but that would be sad to be taking the elevator while doing a
race lol. Seriously I was really considering it. I chug up the kabiliion stairs
to the next level of the gym. Barbara and Heather tell me they are following me
because they have no idea where they are going. We head into the cycle studio
and the spin volunteers tell us to find our bike based on our race number and
that we are 3 minutes behind, like I care I have lost 3 minutes on the spin “death
trap” bike. I get my bike adjusted. I put on my gel cover. I get my water and
sports beans out. Hydration and nutrition are very important. I hop on the bike
and attempt to clip in. Right clip is in, let’s get the left clip in. Volunteer
turns the computer on and off I go. It’s been a few months since spin class. I
got to tell you it is nowhere as bad as it was about 15 months ago when I was
on the spin bike for the very first time and I thought I was going to DIE.
Apparently I didn’t because I’m still alive. I personally don’t think they have
the air on here on purpose because I am sweating like a sinner in church (princess
and the frog reference). I’m about 15 minutes in and I have knocked out 3
miles. I’m thinking to myself my goal is to finish with 6 miles. Just keep
pedaling. Spin bike is not that bad today. Could be the extra padding I brought
with me to ease the pain. I’m coming up on 6 miles. I hit 6-mile mark. We still
have a few more minutes left. I’m thinking let’s go for 7 miles. I go for 7
miles. Spin instructor tells us we have a minute left. I’m really trying to
make 7.5 miles since I was born in 1975. She calls for us to stop and I look
down and I am at 7.4 miles. I’ll take it. We have 5 minutes to head over to the
treadmills for the run. In the 2 years I have been doing triathlons I have
never run during the run portion. What can I say my body is so happy to be off
the bike we just get on the run course and just move one foot in front of the
other but not as fast as most folks. I head to the treadmill. I get my phone
and headphones out and get my playlist going. 20 minutes on the treadmill. My
normal pace is between 21-22 minutes. I already know that it will be a Sunday
morning miracle if I hit 1-mile mark today. I start the pace at 2.8 to warm up
the legs. After a minute I move it up to about 3.0. Oh yeah we are definitely warmed
up now. I get a little adventurous and move it up to 3.4. The drill sergeant
AKA tall drink told me that 3.4 should be my goal on the treadmill to get to
the pace that I want on race day. I hung out at 3.4 for a few minutes. Once my
heart starting beating and the sweat was dripping into my eyes that was my sign
to cool my pace down and I slowed it down to 2.8 for a few minutes. We were not
on the treadmills in the gym that I am familiar with that tell you what your
pace is so I had no idea what mine was at. I toggled back and forth between 3.0
and 3.4. I noticed my mileage was getting really close to a mile. I also
noticed I was running short on time. The run volunteer was counting down the
stop clock and when we were done, I saw my mileage was 0.95 miles. I was very
close to a mile and that is amazing. I have completed my 2nd
triathlon for 2016.
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