Hungry Jaws of the Freshwater Quintana Roo

Triathlon Forum
1

Let me tell you about the next maneater on “The Crocodile Hunter”, inhabiting the cold waters of Galena, IL. The Devilish Quintana Roo.

The water was nowhere near the alleged 60 degrees. But I sucked it up, and got the guy next to me to zip up my wetsuit. He has a little trouble, but gets it ok. (This will be important in a minute). I get out of the water and wait for the gun. When I hit the water, it actually triggered my mammalian diving reflex, which I learned about in med school. My throat closed up, I watched my heart rate drop. Crazy. I swam the first 200 yds with my head OUT of the water because I couldn’t get a good breath. Scary. But, whatever. My ice cream headache went away shortly and i started swimming like a human being.

Coming out of the water, I’m a little dizzier than usual, and I’m trying to pull down my zipper. It is stuck. I trot towards T1, still messing with it. Stuck. I get into T1 and ask for help. Race guy: “If you get any help, you will be disqualified”.

Now I am on the ground near my bike, rolling around like a trout, trying to get out of my suit like I am goddamn harry houdini. Not happening. I become convinced that my wetsuit is trying to eat me alive. I don’t want to die like this!

8 minutes go by.

Yes, I timed it.

Some newbie guy comes up to me as I am about to chew my way out, “I’ll help you out of that if you pull down my shirt in the back”. Race guy turns around and starts whistling. I take this as consent because he feels so sorry for me.

Deal.

New Guy grabs my zipper and yanks. Hard. It comes down, and tears open the back of my brand new desoto skin suit. “Dude, your shirt was stuck in the zipper.” I didn’t care at this point. I was so happy I could have kissed him.

Rest of my race went as expected…decent bike ride given how hilly it was, okay run given how miserable heartbreak hill was, but the moral of the story is this : Do not underestimate the hungry jaws of the Quintana Roo.

Time in T1: Almost 10 minutes. That has got to be some sort of record.

Philbert

2

That’s quite the image, although I have to wonder about the official…if he was unwilling to let a racer help you early on, why not him? What would the difference be between a little mechanical help with the bike and a stuck zipper? Shoot Emilio an e-mail. My bet is he’ll work out something that won’t hurt you too bad.

3

“Do not underestimate the hungry jaws of the Quintana Roo”

notwithstanding the (errant) view that one doffs a QR suit faster than a zipperless, when you contact de soto to see what can be done about your skinsuit, he’s got another item for sale that would render impossible a reprise of your experience. :slight_smile:

4

SAY WHAT?

was this a USAT race?
You are allowed to get help from race Volunteers or another competator w/o penalty.

Eric
USAT Ref.

5

Hmmm, I really don’t understand that race official. As per USAT rules (to my understanding) your fellow competitor should not have been allowed to help, basically (again, the way I read it) about the only thing a fellow competitor would have been allowed to do was to tell you it was stuck; however, the race official should have been able to help you do it. You did Galena this year, very tough.

6

You guys make a good point about the official. I didn’t even think of that. I was too frustrated to think of just about anything.

Who knows, he may have been enoying the show.

Anyway, I dropped a line to emilio de soto. Hopefully he can help me out with a new suit or something.

Philbert

7

Did you really think the water was less than 60 degrees? It didn’t bother me at all and I’m usually very cold in the water. The thing that was mostly a drag was waiting around for an hour and a half in my wetsuit trying to stay warm while the other waves went off - or worse yet, trying to bike with half the competitors riding on the left. (Seems to be a common occurrence this year.) Did you see any USAT officials on the bike course? I didn’t see any at all.

8

I dunno…I went off in the second wave, so maybe the waves before you helped warm up the pond :^) I’m usually pretty tolerant to cold water, though. We used to surf NJ in the late fall and VERY early spring without too much trouble (including an ill advised half hour on New Year’s Day…you know, so we could show what tough and obviously very smart guys we were). I don’t know why the cold hit me like it did…that crazy reaction as soon as I put my head down. But I know I’ve never felt the “Ice Cream Headache” like that if the temp was above 60 or so.

Your other question…I did not see any officials at all out on the bike course either. Not that there was a lot of drafting…there weren’t many of us on the road yet that early on. And I don;t thin the draft would have helped anyone anyway because it is so hilly. Unless they were REAL fast. However, as you said, there were the more than the usual number of guys riding out in the middle of the road though, which doesn’t get me too upset, I just try to pass quickly and tell them to try to keep right. It was mostly people that looked like newbies though, and they were probably scared of gravel or whatever because we were hitting 50mph + on the desents. There could have been a LOT of blocking violations, though.

I think all the refs were back in T1 making sure no one helped anyone else with their stuck zippers :^)

Overall though, a fantastic race. I’d definitely do it again and it gave me more confidence in my climbing. I was expecting to average around 18 and I made 19 without working too hard (i.e. staying 2-4 beats below my LTHR).

Philbert

10

Philbert -

You’ve got to just let it hang out next year during the bike. Leave the HR monitor at home. Forget about your LT. Let those legs burn on the way up and let them recover on the way down. It’s only 16 miles.

I agree with you that it’s a fun race, but only after it gets started. There are a number of hassles that will keep me from going back. 1) trying to get out of Chicago during Fr afternoon rush hour. 2) driving all over the Galena country-side Fr nite in order to set up T1 and T2. 3) waiting in line to pick up your T1 stuff after it’s delivered to the finish.

Overall, I think point-to-point races are a pain in the rear. Maybe Terre Haute next year.

11

12-25? You are more of a man than me. I was packing a 27 :^)

And yeah, that hill coming out of T2 sucked.

I agree, the logistics were kind of a pain. But I have to say that for as complex an exercise as it was, they did a pretty good job. point to point is always going to be a pain in the ass. And it sucked that my significant other missed the swim start (not least because she could have zipped me up!). They didn’t lose my stuff, though, and hey, the barbeque was pretty good .

philbert

13

I’m surprised the official couldn’t help. In IM there are official “peelers” at the water’s edge. I’ve never seen “peelers” in shorter races but is it a rule?