Ok I am loving the other thread…so funny! But have you did something dumb and it worked out great? sometimes I think the only way to tell is no, not trying it out in training, just going for it! otherwise, how would you know if it would work or not?
some of mine…
-pacing way too agressively and then thinking WTF am I doing? I’ll pay for this later…then it works out great PR and hardware, and surprising myself.(doesnt always work this way though)
-eating a quesadilla and doing a shot of tequila at mile 38 of a 50 mile race…wow I felt great after that! and that is something that yes, sounds very dumb, but it was a huge pick me up at the time and carried me to the end
-new shoes on race day! sounds dumb, but its a new marathon tradition! if you know your size and shoe, you don’t need to ‘break them in’ like the old days, and cushy feet feel great!
-renting a wetsuit and never trying it before the race. I didnt have the chance to try it, and my old wetsuit was way too big and 8 yeats old…this one made me feel like a fish and had a swim PR and felt great the whole time
sometimes you gotta take a chance. Did yours work out???
My calf compression sleeves showed up the day I was leaving for Madison for my first Ironman and I was so psyched on the concept that I went against my better judgment and took them out of the package on race morning and went for it. My calves have never felt so good the day after a race and I have been a firm compression believer ever since.
I bought a brand new Zipp 808 front wheel just before the SC Half in '07. I was so psyched to get to race this new wheel.
I got to the race and I’d left the wheel at home. What an idiot. On the Tuesday before I’d had a slight crash on a club ride and another rider’s pedal went into the front wheel of the bike I was using. A spoke bent and I bent it back. It was a Cosmic Carbone. I had it in the truck with me on race morning 'cuz I planned to drop it off at the shop after the race. Well, now it was my race wheel.
Turns out it got surprisingly windy that day. I had a number of friends there who were riding their 808s who said they really had their hands full handling their bikes. I had no such trouble and posted my best bike split (to that point) for that distance and that race. I probably couldn’t have selected a better wheel for the conditions we turned out having that day.
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I placed second in a smaller duathlon by 19 seconds which were mostly due to my riding off of the front against a guy who is the master at just matching pace. When I hit the turnaround expecting to be way clear, he is right there. Well, the following weekend I was ready for revenge. Race morning I oversleep and have 50 minutes to get to a race that is an hour away. I disregard all traffic laws and arrive with 7 minutes to go before race start. my warm up consisted of me running my bike to the transition area then running to the registration table. Shoes on my bike, take of my sweats," and the home of the braaaaaaaaaaaaaave!" Go! No warm up, no stretching, no gloves on a chilly morning and worst of al, no nemesis. I won by nearly 3 minutes because I rode so hard just to ensure myself that if he was there, I wouldn’t see him at the turnaround again and repeat the previous weekend.
I had to trim my disc cover a while back to fit a different wheel (a fulcrum 5 - about as deep as a ksyrium). I didn’t do the best job cutting it, but I never had a major problem getting the cover on.
Then at the Redman half last year I just couldn’t get the cover to line up right the day before the race. I decided to tape it on to the wheel with electrical tape. It was tough because there was only a couple mm of the rim exposed to put the tape on. The bike sat outside in transition overnight and when I got there in the morning everything was covered in dew. I thought for sure that the moisture would have caused the bond to weaken.
I had all my tools with me, but since I really hadn’t trained for the race anyway (i focused on my speedskating and cycling last year) I decided to just go for it. I actually forgot that I had to cover taped on for most of the ride…until I moved into second place overall. Then it hit me that any second that cover could come undone and my race would be over. I stressed out ab out it for the last 10 miles or so of the bike but it stayed on perfect. I ended up with a PR split and the FTD for the bike course.