Hard to believe that my last "scheduled" race of the year has now come to an end! I have been so focused for the past 1/2 year, longer actually, come to think of it, considering that I trained right through the winter in prep for the Costa Rica race. This past weekend was Ultraman Canada and I gotta say, it feels like the weight of the world just lifted. I know that sounds a little dramatic but when you are not a good swimmer and you have to go and tackle 10km, it's a little daunting and it has weighed heavily on my mind for the past few months.
A few things to note: First, I only just recently learned how to swim freestyle, as apparently doing breast stroke is not the way to race! However, I HATE pool swimming so I made the choice not to swim inside this winter (well, also a time issue as I was busy opening up my new Challenge By Choice Training Studio) and knew that all my training would be crammed into the few short months of lake swimming that were available. I did not have a very successful first triathlon back in June when I hit the Oliver 1/2 Ironman. I had the full panic attack in the water and feared that this would happen again at Ultraman. Second, I also chose to not train at all on roads or on flat terrain for the run. Because trail running is my priority and I had some goals to chase down in the mountains this summer, I didn't want to, nor have time to, run road and hence work on leg turnover and cadence. As a result, my hip flexors took a beating during the 84km run on day #3 of this race and I lacked the leg speed to go fast.
Let me get into what happened during Ultraman Canada:
Mary, Barb and I made the trip to Penticton early on Thursday morning. I had rented us a suite from Chris and Cathy - 2 local triathletes - in order to make sure that I got really good rest and could cook my own meals. After some meetings on Thursday, I got out that evening for a spin on my bike through the beautiful wine region! Good thing I did as my bike needed a bit of a re-adjustment from the travels. Thanks to Mary and Barb for being Crew Awesomeness, I got a great night's sleep, something that I was definitely needing after all of the Tour de France early mornings!
Early Friday morning we drove down to Skaha lake so that I could get a feel for the water and put some of my nerves to rest. This really helped. The lake was super clear, flat and calm. Therefore, I was calm, too. There was am Ultraman welcome breakfast, a great opportunity to meet all the other athletes. This was followed by more sitting through meetings regarding the race course etc and how each stage would work. I snuck in a quick 25min easy jog just to loosen the legs in the early afternoon.
That evening, as I started to pack my gear, disaster struck! I realized I had a big hole in my wetsuit - OMG - never had this happened, didn't what to do!! I quickly find out that this is common with wetsuits as they have a lifespan of about 2 years. Hmmm, I've had my BlueSeventy one for about 6. Oooops! And yes, it was totally going into disintegration mode. Luckily Cathy was on the phone to help me with this and within an hour there were all kinds of wetsuits being dropped off for me. Tracey (bless her heart), last year's Ultraman female winner, came right over with a repair kit and helped me patch it!! C'mmon wetsuit - you just got to hold for 1 more swim - undoubtedly the biggest swim of my life!!! JF arrived later that evening too, as he was crew member #3. Being the awesome guy that he is, he had stayed to teach the last few classes of the week at CBC before driving out. JF would be my paddler in the morning and take care of my bikes, amongst a million other tasks! I decided that because we could only ride 1 bike, I would keep to what I was most comfortable on - my Cannondale Synapse (female road bike - awesome machine), and leave the Slice (top of the line Tri bike) as back up. I didn't think that I could hold aero for 270km on day #2 so I had to be smart about this.
RACE DAY - up at 4am - ready for the 10km swim followed by 150km bike! I went easy on my coffee which didn't seem to matter seeing as I still peed 2x during the swim. We got down to the start line at Skaha Beach, where we weighed in, got introduced by the legendary Steven King (voice of Ironman Canada) and took part in a really nice Ohana circle together. The start was super calm which is exactly what I needed. At 6:45am we were off. I started in waist deep water, took a breath and then just began to swim easily out. JF picked me up about 100m from the start and stayed by me for the entire 10km, holding the fastest line down the lake. There was nothing to navigate off of until the 8km buoy so it was critical that he stick to the compass and get me there without making me swim added miles. The lake was a great temperature. I had problems sealing my goggles which sucked but other then that, we just kept a steady pace from start to finish. At the 40min mark I began in-taking calories and liquid. I had pre-made my super Udo's Oil power smoothy and this worked great!! We had an assortment of other food in the boat as I really wasn't sure what I would want. JF would call me to the boat every 20mins thereafter and make me drink! It worked brilliantly and the key was staying on top of this from the get go! I had the best case scenario I could imagine and finished the swim in 3:30. YEAH me - hardest part over! Fears now gone - let's get on the bike and hammer! First things first - make the vertigo disappear before I could sit on my bike!
I spent the next 150km playing catch-up. I wasn't stressed about making up all the time in one go but rather, I just chipped away at it, knowing that if these ladies could all bike well, it would take me some time. My traps were killing me from the swim and I could barely wait for Pierre to give me a massage that night to relieve them. I completed the bike in just over 5hrs (due to a 7min swim to bike transition). This left me sitting in 5th place for women - 10mins to catch ladies #2, 3, 4 and 20mins outside of 1st place.
Day #2 - long time on the bike with a 275km ride. Started out feeling great, legs firing well. As much as I didn't want to eat right away, I knew I had to start getting the calories in. My crew were doing awesome for me and I knew that Joni (the next female) was only 3mins behind me. She held this for the first 170km which means I couldn't stop for the bathroom, to apply sunscreen or anything! Finally, on the flat to rolling section from Keremos to Princeton, my decision to not ride my tri bike bit me in my aching butt! Joni passed me and all I could do was watch her ride away with her head down, in great form, as I battled the high winds. I did my best to make up as much time as I could on the 60km out-back section from Princeton to Alison Lake. After 9:45 of riding, I finished 8mins back of Joni but had moved into 2nd place female. Hard to believe that I didn't stop once, NOT ONCE that day, on my bike. I've never ridden 275km without giving myself a reason to stop (and trust me, I had a million reasons why I needed a break). With day #2 rapped up, I was feeling confident. The 8mins Joni had on me on the bike plus the 15mins from day #1 meant that I would go into the 84km run with a 23min deficit to her. Do-able I told myself over and over.
Day #3 - my day!!!! I had been waiting for the run day. The distance was nothing compared to what I am used to running but I knew that my lack of road running and flat terrain would catch up with me. The run started at 6am and I was focused from the get-go! By the 21km mark, I had made up those 23mins on Joni and so now we sat even. I continued to push as hard as I could, aiming to keep any stomach issues and heat issues at bay. By the 50km mark though, I was pretty worked, everything hurt including a bad cramp in my ass (something I had not experienced yet but must have been from the big bike miles.) I assumed, however, that if I was hurting, Joni would be. too. We were all hurting, just trying to push through. I tried to stay in the moment, tell myself that this was my last race for a long time and then I'd be on R+R. It worked to some degree. My crew were on me, motivating, encouraging and putting up with a grouchy runner!!! I have to laugh now looking back at some of things that I said (sorry guys, you rocked it.) Finally, as the finish line came near, I actually missed the turn and if it wasn't for my mom (who had surprised me by coming out to watch on day #2 - thanks mom - that was awesome) who knows where I would have finished!!! Anyways, it was a great feeling to be done and then we had to still wait out the next 23mins to confirm that I had indeed won. It was equally as great to watch Joni cross the line 40mins later - she is a rockstar, an amazing athlete!! She pushed me hard and made me stay focused, so my biggest congrats to her and the incredible athlete that she is!
(with male winner John Bergen at finish line)
I'm really happy with how the race went overall. I had been told over and over that for me, this race would be won on the run. People were right. Perhaps what I am most proud of, though, is my swim. Not the actual swim on the race course (ok I didn't drown, bonus!) but the journey to actually be able to swim 10km. I had put lots of time into the water and had made the effort to get out to Vernon as often as I could to swim with the Sellars and learn!!! I realized once again that when you want something bad enough, you will figure out ways to make it happen for yourself!
I owe some huge thanks to several people for this win. It was a team effort all the way. Mary, Barb and my co-coach at CBC, JF, were so awesome. Thankyou guys for being a part of this journey so that I could accomplish a bucket list item! Hats off to the Ultraman Canada staff - Steve Brown and his entire team. What a great, very well organized and special event. This was an experience of a lifetime for sure! Going back to the swim, thanks to my daily swim partner here in Squampton - Jenni Chancey - who taught me so much each time we went out. I watched her beautiful glide and did my best to mimic that!! Andrew and Ginny Sellars - you guys opened your house to me in Vernon all the time so that I could come and do swim camps with you! Thank you so much for the confidence that you instilled in me, continually telling me that I wasn't as bad at swimming as I felt! Sorry to say though, no more swim camps for a long, long time :) My best friend and partner Norm - words aren't enough - you've always given me the support that I need to chase these dreams. I'm equally as proud of you for how you inspire all of us through Standup4GreatBear and for going after your own race goals. I thought about you out there in the big waters of Hawaii as I tried to move myself through 10km of swimming :) Mom - awesome to have you travel all that way just to drive about and cheer!! You've always been my biggest fan and that means so much to me. And it goes without saying, thanks to all my athletes at CBC and around the world. We've built a great community of people who support one another no matter what each person's goals may be! I know you were cheering me on from back home! Thank you friends and family for the non-stop words and emails of encouragements - that goes further then you will ever know!
Without a doubt, a huge key to success and recovery is found in a bottle and by that I mean my
Udo's Oil. Smoothy after smoothy, during and post race, this was my magic!!! Thank you Flora for creating just an incredible product that I know is so critical to an athlete. Just ask my crew how many smoothies they had to make for me out there. Yikes!
Visual Realty - thanks for getting me to the start line of this one! With the expense of this race being huge, I often wondered how I could pull it all together!
Lastly, thank you to all my sponsors who support my dreams and goals through racing and adventures!!!! It has been a fabulous year!!
Photo Credit: Leslie Zednai
Pique NewMagazine Article:
http://www.piquenewsmagazine.com/pique/index.php?cat=Sports&content=Segger+ultraman+1831
Saturday morning I was joined by CBC athletes John and B for a quick run up to Elfin Lakes. The trail was clear of snow up until the ridge but the final 3-4km was still pretty white but very runnable! Great views of The Tusk and surrounding mountains - I had my piece of paradise. We ran at a nice comfortable talking pace, stopped for 10mins once we reached the lake and then made our way back down. I'm not a fan of crowds when I'm running so I was happy to be back down to Red Heather parking lot just as all the day hikers were arriving! My spirit feels so alive in the mountains, it was a good reminder of the awesome place that I am so fortunate to live in and the terrain that I have access to!
I then hopped in the car Saturday afternoon and blasted down to Seattle, picking up my adventure racing team mate on Nuun-Sport Multi, Aaron Rinn on the way down to southern Washington. The plan? Run the 55km+ trail that goes around Mount St. Helens. I've had my eye on this adventure for a years now and with the great weather window for the weekend and finally a free Sunday to just get out and play, I couldn't pass this one up. On our way out of Seattle, we stopped by good friend Erik Nachtrieb's house to pick up a topo map of the area and some great notes that he had personally written regarding the route. It was a bit of a late night haul as drove another 4hrs to the June Lake trailhead. Exhausted, we crashed hard at midnight in the back of the old subaru and didn't wake until 5:50am after 2 hits of the snooze button. By 6:30am, after a thermos of coffee and my home made gluten free banana bread, we were on our way. The goal wasn't to set a new speed record. Rinn has a big adventure race coming up soon and I was just out to enjoy the experience (nice to just cruise and move as we felt.)
We ran the route counterclockwise. The "flat" sections came first (if you want to call them flat) but it didn't matter, once that sun came up, it was hot. Luckily the first 3/4 of the route had lots of rivers as during the last 1/4, we were eating snow as we passed over patches located on the north facing slopes. However, made a great new discovery, grape flavored Nuun 
when paired with freezing cold ice water and snow is AWESOME!! We saw a handful of hikers during the first half of the run and only bumped into 1 other runner who had started 75mins after us but was going in the reverse direction. Erik's notes were great as we did go off course twice, costing us about 30-40mins total. Ahhh well, no worries, we were having a great adventure! The trail was in great shape, just a few tricky intersections that were either not marked or didn't quite go in the direction that you would anticipate. We stopped at lots of the rivers to re-hyrdate, wet our hats and cool down. Much of the run is very exposed except for the one 1300m climb out of the Toutle River. The great thing about going around Mt. St. Helen's is that the landscape and environment changes continuously. It was super engaging, never really allowing us to get bored or anxious to be down. I also love going around things as oppose to out and backs.
It took us 9:45 to go around including our navigational mistakes and stops! I think we could have done it in 8:30 or 8 if we had pushed the pace a bit more. Some of the lava fields get really tedious as you rock hop along. I used the opportunity to test out a new Salomon pack (XT Pro 14+3) which carries more gear and is larger then the XT Advanced Skin 5 pack. I think this new pack would be great for past packing an overnight trail. Hmmmm.....I'm in love with it anyways. I used my XT Wings as well, just wanting to take extra good care of my ankles and ensure that I didn't role. They seem to be getting stronger on a weekly basis. We finished the run by soaking our legs in the river at the parking lot - great way to end the day. Thanks Rinn for a great adventure!
