Phillipines heaven and lessons I learned

This week's blog needs to be fairly short and sweet, as I have some champagne to drink tonight!

I got to race in a little bit of paradise today. I call it paradise, not because of the crystal clear waters (a diving Mecca), nor because of the spectacular Shangri La hotel, where the race is held. Not even because of the amazing WARMTH we escaped from Melbourne winter to enjoy. No, it is paradise because of the people. The Filipinos are some of the friendliest, helpful and accomodating people we have ever met, and this just absolutely made the race. Tens of thousands of screaming school kids lining the bike course was just a sight to behold, and made me smile for a large portion of the race.

I managed to win my age group, was 14th female overall and bagged a slot for the 70.3 WC in S. Africa next year. My time was nothing special, but that's lesson #1: you can't define your performance by times when you choose to race in tough conditions. Kona is the same- one year can be vastly different from another. My real definition of my performance there will have to be based on the question: Did I execute the race to the best of my ability, and give it everything I had? 

A few other lessons came up from the race

Swim: I always thought I could never really produce a good swim result unless I was drafting on feet. But today, I had no feet the whole way round, and still came away with a good result. There was a massive current, so all the times including the pros were slow, but to be around 4 min behind Pete, without being on feet was a big step forward. I think I could improve my sighting though, and be a bit more savvy about reading the current (I got tangled in ropes a few times!)

Bike: In the heat, it is so vital that you are on top of your hydration on the bike. I also find that as the time goes on in the hot conditions, I can't take in as much nutrition, so front-loading a bit seems to work. I think that having a regime of drinking to a set time is invaluable. I usually set an alarm on my bike computer for this - I didn't today, but I'll make sure I do for Kona. I also got through a LOT of salt today (half a tube of the BASE salt). That seemed to help a lot with the hydration status - I got none of the dizziness I often experience in the heat. I'll make sure I'm on top of that for Kona too.

Run: Wow, such a frustrating, yet eventually satisfying run. I set off at a pace my legs told me I was able to do; somewhere between 4.55 and 5.10 per km. But within the first 3km, my heart rate was creeping up, and I was really beginning to feel overwhelmed by the heat. I didn't even question pulling back (which mainly happened as I started walking through aid stations, taking my time to get ice on board and hydrate). I tried not to get despondent as I saw my splits getting slower. Really I had been hoping for somewhere around a 1.50 run, but I knew that if I tried to push, it might blow out completely. So in the end, I ran a 1.56, and my last 3kms were 5.27, 5.22 and 5.18. So muscularly, I felt there would have been more, if I hadn't been in damage limitation with the heat. I took a few lessons away from this for Kona

1. I need to manage my body temperature in the final stages of the bike.

2. The extra weight I am carrying may have contributed to me overheating BUT

3. Some of the extra weight I am carrying seems to be giving me good strength

The upshot is, I will try to go into Kona a little leaner, but I'm not going to chase the kind of weight I have raced at there before. I refuse to make myself miserable by restricting what I eat, and I think there are other measures I can implement to help me deal with the heat.

For now, I'm going to enjoy a few drinks, make sure I get another couple of open water swims in, and prepare myself to freeze when I head up to N. Victoria for work for the next couple of weeks

10 weeks to go