Radioactive Man
Hickory Knob Triathlon Location: Hickory Knob State Park (near McCormick, SC) Time: 8:00 AM,
Saturday, 10-18-2003 Distances 1500 M swim (suspect it was slightly longer) 26 mile bike (was
actually 28 miles) 10 k run (I believe the distance was accurate) Entry Fee $50 with advance
registration and USAT membership
http://www.set-upinc.com/2002racepages/hickoryknob/hickoryknob.shtml
Since this race was 300 miles from home, I stayed in a motel about 25 miles from the race site. I
got up a while before 5:00, packed up my stuff, injected some fast-acting insulin, hit the road and
started eating a couple of granola bars while I was driving. During the drive, I noticed the
temperature on my car's outdoor temperature display hovering around 50 degrees. I had borrowed a
wetsuit, so I was not worried about the swim, but knew I would freeze on the bike ride. When I got
to the race site, it was still pitch black and about 50 ºF and I was asking myself what in the hell
I was thinking doing a triathlon this early in the morning and so late in the season. Over the next
hour or so, I took care of the packet pickup, transition area setup, etc.
At 7:30, I began preparing to warmup. I first checked my blood sugar and found it to be way too damn
high - 180 (looks like I ate one too many granola bars). So I decided to skip the pre-race snack,
but packed some gels onto my bike and into the sleeve of my wetsuit for later use during the race. I
warmup up with about 10 minutes of easy running, then put on my wetsuit and walked the 1/4 mile or
so down the big hill to the swim area. Water temp was 70 ºF, so it felt pretty balmy in the wetsuit.
I warmed up for a few minutes, rested a bit while listening to the announcements, and then started
with my wave at
8:00 AM (all the men).
Having not done any events or training over 2 hours since I came down with type 1 diabetes in July,
I decided to pace conservatively on the swim and bike ride of this race. That was not a problem
during the swim where I actually picked up speed and started feeling good in the second half,
everything else was a different story. As soon as I finished the swim, I was dragged up onto the
dock and faced with about a 1/4 mile climb up a steep grade. I spent about 3 minutes just making
this climb and was passed by several people in the process. But this was only the beginning of my
torments with the big hills: the bike ride turned out to have almost no flat places at all and
grades as steep as 11%. With my old steel frame 26-lb schwinn tempo bike, I suffered a severe
ass-kicking on these hills. My average bike speed for this race was 18.1 mph, whereas it is normally
20 - 21 on the triathlons I do at home in east Tennessee.
Even though the run was just as hilly as the bike ride, I very much enjoyed this portion of the
race, since it had a 2.5 mile segment of single trail in the woods and I was able to recover some of
the positions I had lost on the bike ride. Since the field was small (< 150, but very competitive) I
spent most of the race out of sight of other competitors, but I had a guy, who turned out to be from
a different age group, force me into a near sprint finish on the run. I managed to finish 5 seconds
ahead of him. My average run pace was
9:34 per mile. This was a bit slower than normal, but the course was a bit tougher than normal, so I
was not dissapointed with my running.
I ended up finishing 6th out of 14 in my age group (30 - 34) with a final time of 2:55:14, which is
not as well as I usually do in the local races. I believe the cooler weather and lack of any other
triathlons nearby had the effect of bringing out the more serious competitors, but keeping the
weaker ones at home.
The selection of post-race food was not at all ideal for me. The only things they had were pork,
potato chips, candy, full sugar sodas, and water. Since I don't eat pork and can't tolerate very
much of the sugary stuff, I ended up just drinking the water and eating some eggs and salad at the
nearby cafe.
Saturday, 10-18-2003 Distances 1500 M swim (suspect it was slightly longer) 26 mile bike (was
actually 28 miles) 10 k run (I believe the distance was accurate) Entry Fee $50 with advance
registration and USAT membership
http://www.set-upinc.com/2002racepages/hickoryknob/hickoryknob.shtml
Since this race was 300 miles from home, I stayed in a motel about 25 miles from the race site. I
got up a while before 5:00, packed up my stuff, injected some fast-acting insulin, hit the road and
started eating a couple of granola bars while I was driving. During the drive, I noticed the
temperature on my car's outdoor temperature display hovering around 50 degrees. I had borrowed a
wetsuit, so I was not worried about the swim, but knew I would freeze on the bike ride. When I got
to the race site, it was still pitch black and about 50 ºF and I was asking myself what in the hell
I was thinking doing a triathlon this early in the morning and so late in the season. Over the next
hour or so, I took care of the packet pickup, transition area setup, etc.
At 7:30, I began preparing to warmup. I first checked my blood sugar and found it to be way too damn
high - 180 (looks like I ate one too many granola bars). So I decided to skip the pre-race snack,
but packed some gels onto my bike and into the sleeve of my wetsuit for later use during the race. I
warmup up with about 10 minutes of easy running, then put on my wetsuit and walked the 1/4 mile or
so down the big hill to the swim area. Water temp was 70 ºF, so it felt pretty balmy in the wetsuit.
I warmed up for a few minutes, rested a bit while listening to the announcements, and then started
with my wave at
8:00 AM (all the men).
Having not done any events or training over 2 hours since I came down with type 1 diabetes in July,
I decided to pace conservatively on the swim and bike ride of this race. That was not a problem
during the swim where I actually picked up speed and started feeling good in the second half,
everything else was a different story. As soon as I finished the swim, I was dragged up onto the
dock and faced with about a 1/4 mile climb up a steep grade. I spent about 3 minutes just making
this climb and was passed by several people in the process. But this was only the beginning of my
torments with the big hills: the bike ride turned out to have almost no flat places at all and
grades as steep as 11%. With my old steel frame 26-lb schwinn tempo bike, I suffered a severe
ass-kicking on these hills. My average bike speed for this race was 18.1 mph, whereas it is normally
20 - 21 on the triathlons I do at home in east Tennessee.
Even though the run was just as hilly as the bike ride, I very much enjoyed this portion of the
race, since it had a 2.5 mile segment of single trail in the woods and I was able to recover some of
the positions I had lost on the bike ride. Since the field was small (< 150, but very competitive) I
spent most of the race out of sight of other competitors, but I had a guy, who turned out to be from
a different age group, force me into a near sprint finish on the run. I managed to finish 5 seconds
ahead of him. My average run pace was
9:34 per mile. This was a bit slower than normal, but the course was a bit tougher than normal, so I
was not dissapointed with my running.
I ended up finishing 6th out of 14 in my age group (30 - 34) with a final time of 2:55:14, which is
not as well as I usually do in the local races. I believe the cooler weather and lack of any other
triathlons nearby had the effect of bringing out the more serious competitors, but keeping the
weaker ones at home.
The selection of post-race food was not at all ideal for me. The only things they had were pork,
potato chips, candy, full sugar sodas, and water. Since I don't eat pork and can't tolerate very
much of the sugary stuff, I ended up just drinking the water and eating some eggs and salad at the
nearby cafe.
