My "C" Race

After The Race!

I am currently training for Ironman 70.3 World Championships in Las Vegas on September 9th.  I decided to add an Olympic race into my schedule this past weekend.  I figured it would be a good training race and good to get out of the heat in Vegas.nCurrently it is over 110 degrees in Vegas so we thought we would get to cooler weather in Flagstaff Arizona.  It was a super idea and I must say Flagstaff is a great place to race or even just train in August.  The weather was perfect in the morning and afternoon.  Each day we got some late afternoon showers but by that time training was over.  I told my boyfriend I wish I could live up there for July and August each year.  It was incredible.  A lot of people come up for this race from Phoenix so the competition is pretty tough.  I felt pretty good throughout the race and started my run with a 7:30 pace.  That is really great for me and at 7000 feet I felt good about it.  Keep in mind I did NOT look at the course at all before the race. I went into this race with a very casual attitude considering it a training day.  At mile 1.5 on the run we made a right turn which turned my 7:30 pace into more like a 9:30 pace.  It was a 6% hill for about 1.5 miles.  Way to put a damper on what I thought could be a PR run.  But the good news is that I run pretty fast downhill!  I decided to go without socks for this race.  I always do this for sprint and only sometimes do this for Olympic distance races.  I started getting a blister around mile 4 that was hurting pretty bad.  Once down the hill I had just under 2 miles to go.  This part was pretty flat and I was keeping between 7:30 and 8 min. pace.  I finished with a total time of 2:25.  I was 6th overall for women 38th out of about 300 people and 1st  in my age group.  I will take that for a C race! Now we head back to the furnace of Las Vegas.  I feel like I have had a pretty successful year with 2 more races to go.  I have 2 more big training weeks left for the race on September 9th.  Next year I have started to build my race schedule already.  So far my A race is IM Couer D Alene.  We are considering a destination race in St. Croix in April to prepare for IM CDA in July.  The best part about racing away from where you live is seeing new places.  I love riding and running in places that I have never been.  It is great to see sights from your bike or on a run.  You get to see things up close that you can't see from a car.