Giant Eagle Race Report

My day started out early when I had to get up at 3:00am to make it downtown for T2 at 4:00am. The day before I dropped off my bike at T1 at Alum Creek for an overnight stay because I took advantage of the shuttle bus that was offered from T2 to T1 the morning of the race. Sitting there waiting to board the buses at 4:30 in downtown, John Sachs joined me for the bus ride to Alum. It was nice to have someone to talk to for this early morning start time of 7am and a HFP teammate as well. After finally heading out to Alum Creek it was 5am, we assumed that the bus driver knew where she was heading until she asked for directions and almost missed the turn at Lewis Center Drive. Then she did miss the next turn into the park. You would think if she was the lead bus driver that she would know the directions to the destination. After arriving at T1, I was pleased to hear that the swim leg was wet suit legal. That is always a plus in my favor. Once again I was signed up for the sprint race and we were now the second race to start behind the Olympic for a change. The Olympic racers had to swim 2 laps and we had to swim 1, which would make us merge into the Olympic swimmers on the course. This was a crazy swim due to this merger. I was swimming over and around all kinds of people, then heading back to the finish we had to swim close to shore and people started dolphin swimming for about 100 meters. I could see that one of my competitors Jim Aust (55 years old) was right in front of me and Todd Ricketts was swimming right next to me. At one point Todd and I looked at each other as we swam around a slower swimmer, I was laughing to myself doing this part of the swim as we made eye contact through our goggles. By the time I got up to the finish line of the swim Jim was already taking off his suit and putting it into his bag. I looked down at my watch and it said 12:10 which was a good swim leg for me considering all the people that we had to swim around and over. My T1 was a little slower than normal to make sure that I placed my wet suit into my bag and tie it off with a double knot. By the time I did this Jim was already out of T1 and I wouldn't see him again the whole race. Once I got onto my bike I was heading out of the park only to hear somebody call my name. It was Rob Lahota,  he had just finished his 2 lap Olympic swim and was heading out on the Olympic course which was in a different direction than ours. Both courses merged at around mile 5 or so for the Sprint course. The course was super fast and I kept seeing Traci Aust with her pink helmet the first part of the race and I just tried to focus on catching her throughout this first couple of miles. After catching Traci, I then focused on the next set of riders not knowing who they were. Once I caught them at mile 11 they tried to stay with me throughout the rest of the ride. Right around this same time Justin Dennen passes me by hammering away. I thought I would try to stay on his tail without drafting the rest of the ride, but he just took off. However, I was able to stay within 100 meters of him the rest of the way. Heading into T2 I noticed that most of the pros from the Olympic course had already headed out onto the 10K course, however I was one of the first Sprinters into T2. I was hoping to see Jim, but he must have had a great bike and was out of the course somewhere. My average mph was right around 25.2 a little slow for me, considering how fast this course really was. Heading out onto the 5K course I felt pretty fresh, meaning that I left a lot out onto the bike. At mile 1 a guy that I never met came up and attempted to pass me. I figured he was in my age group with the grand masters elite, because I noticed him on the swim and on the bike course. I stayed with him for about 400 meters and then went surged ahead of him finally. Just as I passed him, Brian Barker came up on my outside running fast. I attempted to stay with Brian but once again he was just to fast to run with. I did notice that once he passed me that he settled into a pace that was the same as mine and he finished 26 seconds in front of me, I was able to break 21 minutes on the 5K, but felt I could go faster. I finished 6th overall and 3rd in the grand masters elite. 4 of the top 7 triathletes in the sprint was over 50 years old. Overall this was a great race to be able to go from Alum Creek through Columbus and then finish the run downtown. HFP did a great job of organizing and directing this point-to-point race, and I can't wait until next year to do this super fast course again. My next race is East Fork Tri this weekend near the Ohio River.