oh the pain, st. croix 1/2 im race report
Geoff Scott

my vacation started out with a bang. i got married on april 2nd and headed for the island honeymoon on the 4th. the race was a great excuse to extend the trip for 2 more weeks (plus my mom gave me the entry for xmas!). cyndi and i had a wonderful time while i got up before she did to get my training in and spent our days exploring and enjoying. i managed to meet several locals and soon had a fun group to swim and ride with. the extended time gave me ample time to acclimate to the heat/humidity.

brief training notes: going from 30's to 80's makes for some slow running at first but i was feeling better after 2 weeks. i managed to run the course several times and try my hand at the full bike course twice. the bike is quite hilly and is capped by "the beast" at mile 21. 7/10 mile climb averaging 14% and maxing out at 21%. after that there are 4 more significant climbs and 18 miles of headwind. the beast found me wanting the first time up but i slayed it the second time so i was feeling pretty good for the race. got a couple of long ocean swims in with a group that meets on saturday mornings.

race day: beautiful sunrise and mid 70's (at 4:30am). the swim start is on a small island in the harbor that we had to swim to (only 150 yards). a small rain shower hit about 20 minutes before the race and gave us a beautiful rainbow over the island. good omen, right? a stiff northeast wind chopped up the harbor on top of a slow current that runs against the course for the first half. not bad, but would slow things down a bit. off we go!

swim: 38:57 (167/505) (includes t1)
pretty choppy and i swallowed a lot of salt water. i wanted to go 30:00 but the conditions wouldn't allow it (the fastest swimmer went 26:04). overall, i was pretty happy with it.

bike: 2:51:14, 19.6 mph (91/505) (includes t2)
my plan was to cruise to the beast and then pick it up from there. i did just that and got to the beast in 59 minutes and hit the granny gear. up and over and even passed a couple of people. the descent was fast and fun. i spun my legs out and settled in to a comfortable pace. at mile 40, up a climb, i noticed that my legs were getting tight and knew that the beginning of the run would be rough. i finished well and was right on my planned time!

run: 2:14:02, 10:14mpm (252/505)
the day was overcast so at least the strong sun wouldn't add to the problems. i took off slowly to get my legs loose and by the end of mile 1 they said "let's run!" i was very happy and started to pick up the pace. mile 2 8:10, mile 3 7:50. feeling good and at this point i thought i could hold a 7:45 pace. about 200 yards later both quads had different ideas. massive cramps hobbled me. i was reduced to running 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile at a time to the aid stations (awesome folks every 6/10 mile) and walking the cramps out while chugging gatorade and water. not happy and in pain i made it to the aid station where cyndi had decided to volunteer and got a kiss to keep going. at mile 8 i started to feel better so i tried to pick up a steady run again. didn't happen. cramped up badly again and then called it a day. did my run/walk for the rest of the day. at one point i actually thought that i should just dnf and forget it. i have never quit a race before and decided that i wasn't going to end my perfect honeymoon that way so i fought to the finish. i ran the last mile through town and crossed the line.

total time: 5:44:13 (162/505)

final thoughts:
i had entertained the idea that if the planets aligned and i had a great race i could be in the running for a kona slot. obviously that was not to be. looking at the results, i wouldn't have had a chance even with the help of astronomy. the winners of my age group took 10 minutes off of the past 2 years (4:33:32). out of my league. i managed to have fun during the race and that's what counts for me. st. croix is a wonderful place and they put on a first-class race.

thanks for letting me share my day with everyone! revenge at tri-shark!!!!!