Small Texan Tri Relay - San Antonio Smash



Me, Shelly & baby, and Kris.  Thanks Roland
for taking our pic!



This past weekend I competed in my first ever triathlon relay.  My friend Shelly is a soon-to-be mommy and has been doing very good at taking care of herself once she found out she was preggers.  Her go to activity to stay fit has been swimming and it was her idea to do a relay.  When she and Kris were talking about it, I told them that if they wanted a 3rd person I would be willing to do the run if they were looking for a 3rd person since I wasn't sure if Kris was all geared up to do the bike/run part of the relay.  Luckily they were down with the idea and that's how San Antonio Smash was born!

I set a pretty lofty goal for myself for this race and decided to see if I could run a sub 9-minute/mile 10k.  I'm not quite sure what I was thinking since I've never been able to do that in any of my training, or any races for that matter, but I wanted to see how well I could do.  And truthfully, my run training leading up to this race was pretty pathetic.  I just couldn't seem to hit any of my targets during training and I was getting worried about letting my teammates down.  Luckily, I did have one great run before the race that gave me a boost of confidence that I did, indeed, have speed in my legs.  I just wasn't sure if that speed would last me for 6.2 miles.

Come race morning we talked about our goals so we could be sure to be in the transition area ready and raring to go.  Shelly had an amazing swim of 31 minutes for the 1500m swim.  Even 20+ weeks pregnant she swam what is my fastest ever Oly swim time!  Way to crush that swim Shelly and baby!!!!  Kris took off on the bike looking to crush those hills and chip seal out in Boerne.  We had estimated her bike to be around 1:30 so I had some time to wait around and get more and more nervous for my run.  As we were waiting for Kris to come back, I was able to scope out my competition for the run.  I was able to see the runners for the teams I was guessing were in 2nd and 4th.  I'm not sure where the 1st place team runner was, but it was all male team of Marines, so I wasn't worried about them because - come on - they're Marines!  There was no way I was going to catch them, lol.  The next two teams had two females who looked like they would be some fairly tough competition.  I was trying not to let their physical appearance get to me too much because I know runners can come in all shapes and sizes and that maybe I had more experience that would help me out.  I never saw the first place team runner take off, but I did see the 2nd place biker come in and the girl take off.  Her husband crushed the bike course with a 1:18, so I knew it would probably be coming down to between me and the girl from the other team.  Kris came into the transition area next and we had a swift exchange of timing chip and race belt and I was out the gates flying!  She had an amazing bike split of 1:32!!!  Only two minutes off her goal time and averaging 18 mph.  Amazing!!!

It was all up to me now.  I wasn't sure how much time I had until the girl on the other team would take off, so I decided to try to crush that first mile because it was flat. I flew up the dirt hill to the top of the dam and ran. I glanced at my watch and saw 6:41 pace!  Okay, slow it down Orissa. There's no way you can maintain that. Brought it down to 8:30's and stayed there until I hit the hills on Ranger Creek Rd.  Let me tell you, that course does not have one spot of shade on it at all. The sun had broken through the clouds and was out in full force.

Every time I heard footsteps coming up behind me I tensed fearing it was going to be "that" girl. But luckily I was only passed by a couple male athletes. I finally saw the other girl from the 2nd place team, and she was walking (!) up a hill. I calculated she was maybe 1/2 mile to 3/4 mile ahead of me. I hit the turn around and told myself to catch her. Unfortunately, my worst suspicions were confirmed when maybe only 1/4 mile behind me was the 4th place girl. Crap!!  Don't let her catch me!!  I'm not loosing 3rd place for my girls!

I've always wondered if I could run like me life depended on it. Like, if I was being chased by a serial killer, if I could run away from him. The answer is: YES!  Those last 3 miles were a terrified run for the finish line. I finally made it back to the dam (and saw the 5th place relay girl heading out) and ran up the last hill of the run. Once it flattened out again I was sure she was going to catch me. In my head I knew she was right there just waiting to pass me at the finish line. I was to scared to look behind me because I didn't want to see how close she was. If I would have seen her, I think it would have mentally done me in. So I ran. I came up to Brian, Kris, and Linda and they all shouted at me to dig deep, push harder, the finish line was almost there. I wanted to tell them that the next place girl was right there but I had no extra breath to talk.  They were so confident that I had this, but in my head she was still right there.

Finally the finish line was there and I crossed it!  I didn't get passed!  I managed to hang on to 3rd place for our team!!  Best feeling ever!!!  I walked around for a bit and Kris came over and doused me with water and that felt so good. What seemed like seconds later but what was probably a couple minutes, the 4th place girl crossed the finish line.  I went over and high-fived her and told her good job.  She probably had no idea why I was doing that but, to me, she's the reason why I was able to run an 8:56 average.  Not that I wouldn't have tried my best to do that regardless, but with the added pressure of knowing that I was being chased it made me do something I didn't think was possible.  After looking at the final results, if the course had been longer she eventually probably would have caught me because she ran the 10k 3 minutes faster than I did.  It was good to see that my fear was legitimate and I wasn't making it all up in my head. 

I took a quick dip in the lake to cool off even more and then grabbed some yummy sausage and potato salad to eat and waited for the awards.  At the awards we found out that we had held on to 3rd place by 40 seconds!!  Holy cow that was a close race.  Thanks to Shelly's 5-minute swim lead on their swimmer and our super quick transitions, we were able to hold them off!

 

With our medals.  Even baby got one :)

This relay was so much fun to do and I'm glad I got to do it with Kris and Shelly.  I would highly recommend doing a relay to anyone who hasn't done one before.  It's a totally different way to experience a triathlon but such a great way to still compete and cheer each other on.