Executive summary
4:46:xx - 19th in 35-39
36:14 - 1:58 - 2:33:45 - 3:43 - 1:30:36
Long/boring version:
I was feeling very blah going into the race. Just not really into it. Kinda late in the year and training has been a bit spotty. A friend of mine from high school recently got into doing tri’s and signed up for it as his first half. I traveled the 2 hours out to Cuse with him on Saturday mid morning. Kinda let me see all of it through the eyes of a newbie, totally different perspective than hanging out with R10C and/or Murphy’sLaw. Can say whatever you want about the WTC folks but they are no joke. Thing was massively organized. They put of a first class race for 2000 plus as a first time in a new city with a point to point run. Impressive to say the least. For me it seems like a logistical nightmare to coordinate 3 couples going out to dinner. Anyhow registered and checked out the IM store/traveling circus. My buddy natch bought about $100 worth of IM stuff. Seemed like the two of us were the only ones not wearing compression socks. Marketing genius how there is no such thing as a half IM anymore, IM 70.3. Makes it much easier to return to work on Monday and say you did the IM in cuse. Figure no one who does not race understands the difference between the local pool sprint and Kona anyhow so it is not a hard trick really. When you remove the word “half” from the equation it is perfect.
Went out to the race site and checked the bikes. Long run from the lake to trasition and then a steep run up the grass to get to the mount line. Had a pretty good rack spot near the bike out. Naturally with 2000 people the transition area was huge. Ran into Blades of Steel . Drove the course which did not look nearly as hilly as I had been reading here. Did 3 4 PB and hit the rack early.
Got up and it was warm which was great. Had been planning on toe covers, arm warmers and gloves but it was warm and humid. Saw a bunch of EN and ST people and headed down to the water. Water was not warm. 62 degrees announced. Not harriman cold but pretty cold.
Was in the 5 or 6th wave, second group of 35-39. Hate when they split the AG but it ended up not mattering at all later. Weird swim, felt like I was swimming ok and fairly straight but I was clean water almost the whole way. Never had any feet. Also caught the slow guys from the waves in front really fast. Weird. Out of the water in 33:xx. There was a really long run up to transition. That must have been the mat they used. Official swim was a Murphy’s Law like 36:14.
Sat down to put socks on before the bike, did the long run up the grass chute thing to the mount line and I was off. T1 listed at 1:58. In my defense the transition area was freakin huge.
Like I mentioned it was crazy warm for Cuse this time of year. Felt great starting on the bike. Rolled up tons of AG and 30-34 folks quick. It was raining really lightly. Got to the first set of railroad tracks and watched a dude crash and fall on his face. No I did not stop, there were a bunch of people there helping him. Even seeing that still slid sideways a tad on the tracks, those things were like ice. Heard later they were new. Made a mental note to take it really easy as I did not want to crash like a jackass. So about 2 minutes later…a group of 30-34 or earlier wave 35-39 were kinda bunched up before the first turn at that town. Yelled stay right to the one in the middle of the road and went around them. Guess I was going into the turn a little hot. I hit the brakes and in a split second I was upside down. Landed on my elbow and shoulder blade and my knee was hurting. There were 3 national guard guys right there and one picked up my bike. I was thinking my day was over. I was bleeding pretty good and kind of in shock. I was looking right in the eye of this national guard guy. He was a little older than I am. His uniform was not new. He looked like he was in Iraq or Afgahnistan recently. He said nothing but I was thinking that he was thinking “look, ahh, spandex boy skinned his knee and quit, pussy”. Another one said something about a medic. One of them handed my bontrager bottle that had come off. I grabbed the bike which looked ok and started pedaling. The file shows that I went upside down at 1.98 miles going 22 mph and then started pedaling again 37 seconds later. Sure felt longer than that.
Once I was going again I noticed that my bento box was ripped and hanging below the top tube. I was going to chuck it but thought I might want the flat stuff later. I stopped and managed to use the non torn straps to get it back in place. Was pissed and freaked out and figured I would ride for a while and see how I felt. I was bleeding but thought I only had road rash. The first 11 miles or so were hilly and rainy/foggy. Visibility sucked. I was very conservative for the rest of the bike. Figured out pretty quick that my front 808 was out of true. Could see it wobble a bit and using the front brake at all was scary. Vibrated like crazy. Figured out later that it was rubbing the brake pretty bad. Very happy it did not come apart. Managed to cover less than 20 miles the first hour. Was sitting on .87 on the Joule, WTF? A tad after that the adrenaline wore off. Felt weird but did not really hurt. I lost some time for sure on the way back in as I took all the turns like a wuss and did not push the down hills like I normally would. Lead to the biggest VI I have ever had in a race. Previous was 1.07 at AZ . Was a bit pissed to not be off the bike in less than 2:30 notwithstanding the jackassery of crashing.
http://i197.photobucket.com/albums/aa48/chrisgleason/Cuse/63137-271-007f.jpg
Cuse:
Duration: 2:33:56
Work: 2172 kJ
TSS: 178.5 (intensity factor 0.834)
Norm Power: 254
VI: 1.08
Distance: 55.843 mi
Elevation Gain: 3395 ft
Elevation Loss: 3425 ft
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 544 235 watts
Cadence: 30 231 91 rpm
Speed: 0 51.4 21.9 mph
Official bike time was 2:33:45, Ran down the grass into transition. Sat down and for the first time looked at my knee. It was pretty ugly. Looked like hamburger. Did not hurt so I figured I would try running. Sat there for a bit, changed socks hit the porta potty and I was out of there. T2 was a forever 3:43 but I likely wasted half of that deciding if running was a good call.
After the quick out and back the run tracked the bike course for the first couple miles. Ran by the scene of the crash. Had built it up in my mind to be a crazy decreasing radius fall away curve but realized it was just a flat and very normal looking corner. The national guard guys were there and I gave one of them a high 5. There were a couple of up hills but the first 5 miles were mostly downhill. Was running well. My hip was hurting a bit where I landed on it but I felt pretty good. The open flap on my knee was splashing blood on my other leg while I was running. I was scaring the hell out of spectators. You could see the expression change from “yeah, your are looking good” to “holy crap” when I got close. Miles were clicking by at sub 7. Figured I had little to lose and that the bottom might drop out at any moment. My hip gave me something to think about other than running. Pretty lonely run on one of the least scenic run courses ever. Lot of it was down the left center lane of a 4 lane highway. Kinda like “hey I’ve been to that Bruegers, look another Sunoco”. At mile 10 or so I was hurting pretty good and started to think that I was slowing cause I had lost a lot of blood. Total nonsense but I can often convince myself that something horrible is happening to me and I should go slower. Once without any idea what it even means I was convinced I was going to have nerve damage cause my feet were numb after biking in cold weather at harriman. Managed to shake the hypocondriacal delusion and run the last couple pretty well. Thought I had a chance at sub 1:30 and would have had I not forgot about that pesky .1 at the end. Had no real kick left but never really felt that bad while running.
http://i197.photobucket.com/albums/aa48/chrisgleason/Cuse/63137-576-019f.jpg
Here is the run:
Lap 1: 6:53
Lap 2: 6:50
Lap 3: 6:51
Lap 4: 6:45
Lap 5: 6:59
Lap 6: 7:00
Lap 7: 6:48
Lap 8: 6:57
Lap 9: 6:58
Lap 10: 6:53
Lap 11: 7:01
Lap 12: 7:32
Lap 13: 6:55
Entire workout (6:57 min/mi):
Duration: 1:30:37
Work: n/a
rTSS: 140.4 (0.912)
NGP: 7:03 (228.1 m/min)
Distance: 13.019 mi
Elevation Gain: 1115 ft
Elevation Loss: 1407 ft
Grade: -0.4 % (-292 ft)
Min Max Avg
Speed: 3.9 9.9 8.6 mph
Pace 6:04 15:34 6:57 min/mi
Altitude: 383 726 510 ft
Run pr for me by a little bit. Previously I think Timberman was the flattest half run I have done so that was a huge help. Think I had a couple minutes faster in me on a different day. Time will tell.
The medical people grabbed me within seconds of finishing as I was a bloody mess. The med tent people were awesome. Got lots of attention as there was no one else there yet. They were all from the “level one trauma center”. Have no idea what that means but the way they said it made it sound like a “level one” trauma was something you REALLY did not want to have. They said that the hole in my knee was too deep to deal with in the tent and wanted to stick me in an ambulance. As it was a point to point run that meant an ER in Syracuse with no phone or wallet. That seemed like a bad call. Also, I was skeptical. I mean really, if it was that bad I would never have been able to ride 54 and run a 1:30:xx, right? Besides, on MASH they did everying in a tent? They agreed to patch it and let me go if I promised I would go to an ER to get it cleaned, stitched and some antibiotics. Ran into an ER doc friend a while later who told me going when I got home that night would be fine.
The doc was nice enough to send me some pics:
Got some chow, watched my buddy finish. Saw a bunch of ST and EN peeps. It was fun. Went to the urgent care place by my house when I got home a few hours later. Got 16 stitches to hold it all together. For sure impaled myself on the chain ring. Not clue how that happened. Not even somethng I had every considered. The doc that patched up was convinced that there is no way it was caused by the road. Have a semi nasty bit of road rash on my shoulder and a little on the elbow. Could have been much much worse. Overall pleased with myself for finishing and not bagging it. Would be even more pissed if I quit.
Hanging out post race after it was cleaned up a bit. Was pretty funny to take off the road ID holding the chip and have a “tan line” where the blood was missing,
See the ridges from the chain ring? Think a 53 would have done more or less damage than the 50?
All put back together:
Taking a week or so off as I was told not to swim, bike or run, or bend that knee for that matter unti the stitches are out. Should give me the time I need to finish building the cross bike. I hear that dirt and grass hurt less 
Think from memory from EN days we are around the same height at 6’3. I was looking at your Norm power and that is where I need to be for next year no IM’s next year just HIM’s.