Kerrville is a nice little town in the Texas Hill County so I had some reservations about the bike course. I wasn't sure if it was going to be too hilly for me, but my worries were for nothing. The course was mostly flat with just a couple short, steep inclines.
The day before the race, my friends and I met up to pick up our packets and then do our pre-race ritual of swim/bike/run warm up. This is just to get a feel of the course and make sure the bike is in tip-top shape before we checked it in for the mandatory bike check-in. After that we got some food and then went off on our separate ways with plans to meet back up in the morning.
Swim: 0:51:36
This turned out to be the worst swim of my whole season. About halfway through the swim I got the worst burning sensation in my chest. I had to burp!! I probably spent the next 600-800 meters burping as I swam. I’m not sure if it was the Gatorade I drank or the banana I ate before the race but I made a decision never to do that again! After exiting the water we have a humongous hill to run (shuffle) up to get to T1. Luckily they have a nice carpet down so you can run on that instead of having to worry about stepping on stickers or anything in the grass.
Bike: 3:25:58
This turned out to be my best bike time in a 70.3 race. I was super excited about it. It’s a two-loop course that takes you from downtown Kerrville out to a little town named Comfort and then back to Kerrville on some back roads. The first loop of the bike went great. I was having a great time and was super excited to see all my friends out on the course. As I was about the 20 mile or so mark, the lead male, James Bonney, came flying past me as he was finishing his second loop. I tried to pick up my pace to hang with him, but that didn’t last long J Heading back out for my second loop was a different story. I started to feel fatigued and noticed my speed dropping every mile. At this time, I realized I hadn’t been taking in enough nutrition and tried to eat something but it was too late, I was already spent. I just kept pedaling away and when I got to 50 miles I looked at my time and realized that I could still have a PR. This added some fuel to the fire and I beat my previous best bike time by 10 minutes.
Run: 2:43:15
Oh, the run, what can I say. It was a four-loop course that was on the street and then you turned and went down what looked like to me a creek bed. It was a pretty rough trail that was mainly uphill on the way out to the turnaround when you went back onto paved trails. The first two loops of this run where not kind to me. My legs had nothing in them. I was walking every aid station and every uphill. I was barely shuffling on the flats and the downhills. My friends looked like there were doing great and that kind of further deflated me. I downed tons of Gatorade and took in some caffeine and by the third loop, lo and behold, my running legs showed up! I was so happy they finally decided to join me. My pace picked up and I was able to finish the race with a smile on my face.
For all the ups and downs I went through on this race I still managed to PR by 2 minutes. I was happy about that. Still didn’t break the elusive 7 hour mark but I was 2 minutes closer!
Total Time = 7:06:44
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