BeerBorg

I was in my first ever triathlon this morning. My goal was just to finish, preferably not last. I finished 6th of 16 in my age group, 227/305 overall, 155/178 men. So i finished and wasn't too close to the back of the pack, so I'm satisfied.

My weakest point was running, which was no surprise. I did it as a run/walk and my pace was about 13.5 minutes per mile, which isn't too much better than my fastest walking pace. That leaves a lot of room for improvement. I think I averaged a little better than 16 mph on the bike portion, which is fairly good for me, but still leaves room for improvement. I could have done better on the swim, but somebody ahead of me drastically overestimated his drinking speed and caused a bit of a logjam.

I owe a big thanks to @mashani for all the advice he gave me as I was getting ready for this.

Congrats on finishing what you started. That can't be, in any way, easy!

Awesome.

In an open water race you would have room to get past the slow people and work your way up. Might get a bit of a pounding though. Open water races can get rough if you get into the more competitive peoples groups, especially going around the buoys where everyone tries to get the inside track. People don't think of swimming as a full contact sport, but it can get like MMA for a little bit in the choke points LOL.

16mph on the bike means that you *can* run a lot faster then you did unless knees/ankles/hips are messed up - it's all just biomechanics and adaptation that has to happen, and that just takes reps and time.

mashani wrote:Awesome.

In an open water race you would have room to get past the slow people and work your way up. Might get a bit of a pounding though. Open water races can get rough if you get into the more competitive peoples groups, especially going around the buoys where everyone tries to get the inside track. People don't think of swimming as a full contact sport, but it can get like MMA for a little bit in the choke points LOL.

16mph on the bike means that you *can* run a lot faster then you did unless knees/ankles/hips are messed up - it's all just biomechanics and adaptation that has to happen, and that just takes reps and time.

My sister told me that the rules allow passing. I told her it wasn't a rule thing. The just wasn't room. I haven't done open water swimming in a long time. I'd be competitive, but I wouldn't worry about trying ti get the inside going around the buoy. I'd probably rather avoid the pounding because it wouldn't gain enough time to make it worth the pummeling.

I know I can improve my running. I only recently started doing any running at all. I need to improve my ability to run farther as well as faster. I'm pretty sure I can get faster on the bike as well. I have less room for improvement in my swimming because I've been doing that longer. I've gotten a little faster recently, but on the order of a minute or two over the course of an hour. That translates to maybe a minute for an Olympic tri. My transition was fairly fast, but could be faster if I got shoes that use velcro instead of laces.

If you start to ride with clipless pedals, you can leave the shoes attached to the bike and then just throw on socks (or not) and stick your feet into them getting out of T1 and then when you get up to speed or the first downhill then tighten up the Velcro straps. This can save you a good bit of time.

mashani wrote:If you start to ride with clipless pedals, you can leave the shoes attached to the bike and then just throw on socks (or not) and stick your feet into them getting out of T1 and then when you get up to speed or the first downhill then tighten up the Velcro straps. This can save you a good bit of time.

Clipless pedals and shoes are on my list, but I'll admit that I don't really know what advantages they offer.

I'm guessing that because they hold your feet to the pedals, you might get a little more speed because you get some help on the upstroke in addition to the downstroke. Is that accurate?

bpgreen wrote: Clipless pedals and shoes are on my list, but I'll admit that I don't really know what advantages they offer.

I'm guessing that because they hold your feet to the pedals, you might get a little more speed because you get some help on the upstroke in addition to the downstroke. Is that accurate?

So yes, they let you pull up and also push forward and pull back on the pedal during the pedal stroke. But that is mostly useful to give some leg muscles a temporary rest or very briefly get a little bit more power when you need it. IE I will do all those things, but it's not something that is "always on" during the pedal stroke, I will do it for a brief burst of power, or to get a short little break from the burn at an opportune moment.

But you (and I, and everyone else) will still get most of the power pushing down on the pedals. But with clipless pedals we just *lose less of it* because you are eliminating your foot from being able to come off the pedal (with the potential of fumbling around trying to get it back on and getting dropped by someone in that instant) or sliding around on it and effectively wasting the energy you are putting out on those things instead of putting all of it into your cranks all the time.

It used to be thought that smoothing out your cadence could help, and clipless pedals are good for helping you get a smooth cadence if you want to practice that. And it may actually help moderate level riders. But it turns out that analyzing most high level pros, they often do not have a smooth cadence, they just put out way more watts then most humans can, so it's not really a benefit for them as much. But they still all use clipless pedals, because that extra efficacy gained by not wasting their watts by having their foot slip around or bounce off makes a big difference over a longer course.

If you were to race a criterium or some other course where you are going stupidly fast and lean around tight corners, they are also useful for moving your pedals so that the inside pedal is up (away from the ground) more rapidly. IE you can "do it backwards" by pulling up, if that's the shortest most efficient way to get the pedals where you want so they don't clip the ground and cause you to wreck in the amount of time you have before hitting the turn and leaning. They basically let you pedal a little bit longer and make a quick adjustment where without them you'd have to stop putting down power sooner to get ready for that turn.

mashani wrote:

bpgreen wrote: Clipless pedals and shoes are on my list, but I'll admit that I don't really know what advantages they offer.

I'm guessing that because they hold your feet to the pedals, you might get a little more speed because you get some help on the upstroke in addition to the downstroke. Is that accurate?

So yes, they let you pull up and also push forward and pull back on the pedal during the pedal stroke. But that is mostly useful to give some leg muscles a temporary rest or very briefly get a little bit more power when you need it. IE I will do all those things, but it's not something that is "always on" during the pedal stroke, I will do it for a brief burst of power, or to get a short little break from the burn at an opportune moment.

But you (and I, and everyone else) will still get most of the power pushing down on the pedals. But with clipless pedals we just *lose less of it* because you are eliminating your foot from being able to come off the pedal (with the potential of fumbling around trying to get it back on and getting dropped by someone in that instant) or sliding around on it and effectively wasting the energy you are putting out on those things instead of putting all of it into your cranks all the time.

It used to be thought that smoothing out your cadence could help, and clipless pedals are good for helping you get a smooth cadence if you want to practice that. And it may actually help moderate level riders. But it turns out that analyzing most high level pros, they often do not have a smooth cadence, they just put out way more watts then most humans can, so it's not really a benefit for them as much. But they still all use clipless pedals, because that extra efficacy gained by not wasting their watts by having their foot slip around or bounce off makes a big difference over a longer course.

If you were to race a criterium or some other course where you are going stupidly fast and lean around tight corners, they are also useful for moving your pedals so that the inside pedal is up (away from the ground) more rapidly. IE you can "do it backwards" by pulling up, if that's the shortest most efficient way to get the pedals where you want so they don't clip the ground and cause you to wreck in the amount of time you have before hitting the turn and leaning. They basically let you pedal a little bit longer and make a quick adjustment where without them you'd have to stop putting down power sooner to get ready for that turn.

As always, thanks for the info.