This is a terribly delayed post (1 year late!!!), but I had this half written out and then totally lost track of it. This was the last race I did before getting pregnant so this post definitely brings back a lot of memories! I cannot wait until I get back to that start line. 

The months seem to fly by and it’s already time for the 2nd race of the season!! This race will be the last race for me before the wedding in August, but for some strange reason I went into it feeling a little indifferent and unexcited. My training for this race was not as smooth as I had wanted. My bike was broken after coming back from Davao, the derailer had run its course. Unfortunately for me, since my bike was an older model, we were unable to just replace the broken parts and we had to get an entire new system and cassette for the wheel. This was a hefty replacement and also took some time to fix, meaning I lost over 2 weeks of training on my bike. Apart from that, I also had a weekend trip to Chengdu, so that also affected my training. In addition, I started strength training with a personal trainer with workouts that specifically target muscles used for triathlon, but I had felt fatigued and was not sure whether the results were showing yet. I trained as much as I could given the circumstances, but overall was not as confident as I would like to be going into a race.

We had a big group of Tritons going to this race, which is always a fun time. On Thursday, we flew into Busan. Then, after shoving our faces with Krispy Kreme, we got onto a bus to take us to Goseong – the land of the dinosaurs. We started getting a little worried when we realized that our hotel was on the top of a mountain with a golf course… maybe there will be cabs and race shuttles to get us up and down? We got dropped at the top of the hill and after a lot of sign language and broken Korean, finally got the keys to our rooms. Getting to dinner was another adventure, I think none of us had anticipated how “in the middle of nowhere” this place was. After more sign language, we were able to call some cabs that took about 20 minutes to arrive. We were starting to get quite worried about the transportation for the race weekend. After enjoying a delicious feast, half of us walked back up to the hotel after giving up on cabs, while the other half got lucky and got driven home by the restaurant’s owner (so kind!).

On Friday, some folks checked out part of the race course and came back saying it was very technical with lots of sharp turns. The bike course had been changed last minute. The initial course only had one u-turn, the new one had 6! The bike leg has always been my weakest leg and while I have been training hard on my bike-trainer to become stronger, I have also stopped for the most part riding outside, which means I have hardly practiced my bike handling skills. Hearing that the new course was challenging and had 6 u-turns made me very anxious, but I had to remind myself that I have done this many times before and if I stayed calm and confident, I would have no problems.

The difficulty of the bike course continued to stay on my mind the entire day. But regardless of how I felt, race day was still quickly approaching and I could either let this eat me up, or get over it and face the challenge. I practiced some sharp turns and u-turns at the hotel parking lot and felt a little better. Soon it was time for bed and I drifted off into a deep slumber.

Race morning! We were delighted to see our booked cabs at our doorstep at the appointed time (we were worried after all the transportation issues and things lost in translation previously). We hustled into the cabs and got to transition to handle some race morning items such as bottles, bike computers, and checking bike tires. When transition closed, we were directed into a courtyard to do a fun little warm-up to music… definitely a first in a race! There was no opportunity to get into the water for a proper swim warm-up, which sucked. Maybe the race organizers thought the musical warm-up would be more helpful (not really).

In the blink of an eye, it was GO TIME. I always had problems with sighting, causing me to swim extra distance, so I was going to make sure that I was swimming with the buoy lines on my side the entire time to guide me. The swim was brutal with people thrashing around and I got a elbow in the face at some point. Another frustrating thing was that lots of people were cheating. I saw numerous people grabbing the buoy lines and pulling themselves forward. I screamed at a few of them to stop, but soon had to focus on my own race. I felt great on the swim and was mostly able to swim along the buoy line without loosing too much direction. It was a rough swim with a lot of arms and legs everywhere and people trying to swim on top of me, but I checked my Garmin when I got out and was thrilled to see that I had gotten a PB.

T1 was pretty smooth and now it was time for the dreaded bike course! Everything was going smoothly and I was relieved to see how wide the first u-turn was. Just to be extra cautious, I slowed down and really took my time with the u-turn. I was shocked when I heard someone behind me go “hurry up there Triton” (my tri suit has my club name on it) and whipped my head around to tell the asshole who hustled me to just pass me if he was in such a rush. I was PISSED. It is good practice to slow down during a u-Turn and if someone is trying to take their time the last thing you should do is to try and rush them. If this jerk was so fast, why was he behind me in the first place? After spending some time thinking about what a douchebag he was, I got back into my zone and focused on my riding.

This bike course was definitely one of the most technical ones I’ve ever been on with lots of sharp turns and hidden corners. There were volunteers everywhere with signs to make sure you didn’t get lost and also to warn you of upcoming turns. All the u-turns ended up being super wide, which was great, and I was zipping down a downhill when suddenly my pedals locked! My chain was stuck!! I was in a bit of a panic since I was going at a decent pace but I tried my best to stop before I was going too fast and I was able to unclip safely and get off my bike. Annoyingly, it was clear that tons of people were drafting right behind me because I heard a lot of panicked shouts and a bunch of local Korean racers zoomed by, narrowly missing me. If they had been at the official distance of 12 meters, they would have been far enough away from me and there would be no issue at all. Luckily there was a volunteer nearby who helped me with my chain and off I went! Apart from the drafting, a lot of local Korean athletes were also breaking the rules by passing me on both the left and right side. They are only supposed to pass on my left side, because we rode on the right side of the road. This was incredibly dangerous and once again I had to scream at some people (they seemed confused and did apologize, but it was just dangerous and scary). Another annoying thing that happened was when I was going through a water station, some person wasn’t looking at where he was going and went into my lane. To avoid him, I biked into a cone but luckily did not fall off my bike. Overall, the bike leg was much better than I expected and I did not have any major issues amidst all the anxiety and fears from the night before! I was really happy that I completed such a technical course and achieved a very decent time.

I am always relieved to get off my bike and get into the run leg, because that is where I do my best. The run was described as 3 loops of a “flat course” which was a total LIE. After dropping off our bike, we had to run up a steep hill to get to the beginning of the loop. My legs felt pretty heavy and it was also starting to get a little warm. My legs started to get into the groove of things once I got into the loop, but I was shocked to realize that it started with a huge hill… Once you got to the top of the hill you turn around and you get a nice downhill, but this meant you had to do the hill 3 times! I have no idea in what world the organizers thought this course constituted as a flat course. Even though the course elevation was unexpected, my legs felt powerful and I was able to pound up that hill with lots of energy! I felt amazing and it was probably one of the best runs I’ve ever done in my racing career. I felt ecstatic and as always it was amazing to see Jerry cheering for me at different parts of the course.

After the final loop I revved up my energy even more and sprinted towards the finish line. I was so happy to find out that I had a PB again after Davao at 6 hours and 9 minutes! I am getting closer and closer to my goal to getting a sub 6 Half Ironman time and I cannot wait until the next race (even though I will later find out that I will be taking a break to make a baby!).

The race was actually great and the volunteers were super helpful, but the lack of transportation was quite difficult and I also felt that the course description was very inaccurate. It is the first time they held a race here, so maybe they are still trying to work things out. The level of cheating and breaking of the rules from local Korean athletes were also incredibly frustrating and it was something that many of my teammates reflected in our Ironman Feedback Form. I did not see this on the run, but one of my teammates said that people were cutting corners and circling back before completing the loop. One of the things I hate the most is people who cheat and are not honest. If you are going to compete in a race, don’t you want your results to reflect how you truly performed? I hope that these athletes will learn that importance of integrity and also for race officials to be much more strict and alert so that these things do not occur again. These rules were emphasized during the race briefings, so no one should be confused about it. However, it is also a new sport in that town, so maybe people don’t take it seriously or lack some type of understanding. I definitely don’t have a problem screaming at people who break the rules, but I also don’t think it is my job to do that.

In the end I was extremely pleased with my result and even though we had some issues with transportation and cheaters, it was another awesome race with my Triton teammates!