Hi everybody,
It's been a while since I last updated my blog. There are normally just two options why this is happening a. I am not motivated to write something or b. I am too busy to write something. Looking back I would say it was clearly the B option this time!
I was racing a bit, worked a bit and moved a bit... Everybody knows that a move should be a thing that is done in a few days but unfortunately the reality is bit different. Jenn and I moved almost 3 weeks ago and we are still living with a lot of boxes around us as we just don't find the time to unpack them (I could do it right now but I set my priorities for today). Leading up to the move the packing and all the things that come with it are not so much fun and fitting it in to a almost full 40hour coaching week and the own training is not so easy. Unfortunately the training was the part that I had to let go for a few days as I wanted to get the move done as soon as possible. We hired a company for the actual move but we still had to invest many hours packing and unpacking.
In between of all the packing I did my first bike race after a 13 years break of road racing the weekend before the move. It was in Devon just outside of Edmonton and we used the time to visit Jenn's parents who are living close to there too. The race was a lot of fun. We rode with 6 guys in the team and we all worked for our captain of the day. It started fairly slow and my job was it to keep the field together. I brought back the attacking riders and the most fun part was to ride the last 10km so hard that nobody would even think about attacking again. I wrote about 8km alone from the front and kept the pace around 50km/h. My legs started to cramp but the yelling of my team mates made me keep going till I totally blew up 500m before the finish. The sprint was open and our captain finished 3rd. and could collect important points to move up into the next category.
As I said the weekend after was all about moving and we finally moved on Monday. On Tuesday, July1st, Jenn did her race comeback after an almost 3year break due to her concussion she got during a bike crash. It was so great to see her back on a race course and I am happy to switch sides and support her during her races as she is always there for me when I am racing.
The next day we left to St Andrews in New Brunswick to be a part of the first Challenge race in the beautiful little ocean town. We were welcomed by Pat and Peter, our wonderful homestay hosts. The weather on Thursday and Friday was nice and we had some time to get familiar with the course and the area. I think there are not many places in the world that have a better set up for a race like St. Andrews. With some rain on Friday evening the weather shifted and during the night I experienced my first Hurricane. The wind and the rain were crazy and most parts of St. Andrews were without power for at least 24hours and many trees fell and crashed onto cars, houses and many fences. The whole race set up that the Challenge team put in place had to be set up again once the wind calmed down on Saturday evening and with lots of volunteers they made the impossible happen and the race could start as planned on Sunday morning.
My race performance was pretty much like I expected it prior to the race. My swim was solid and I was 4th after the swim. I can swim faster but with being alone for 1800m or the 1900m it was hard to pace myself all the time. Having a group around you would have had helped! The bike was a bit frustrating. I knew that it wouldn't be great as I have not spent much time on the bike the 2 weeks before the bike but of course you always hope that you can pull it off on race day even if the training wasn't great the weeks leading up to the race... well it wasn't the case and I got dropped and was 7th or 8th or something like that after the bike. And than the run. With 6 months of no running at all I just can't expect to run a sub 1:30hrs that's why my goal was to run solid and under 1:40hrs. I started and felt pretty good and was hoping that I will not blow up like I did 4 weeks ago in Oliver. I ran solid, had not too much pain and finished my longest run of the year in 1:39hrs. Not an awesome time but realistically all I can expect at the moment. I am very confident that I can work on my run shape in the next weeks and I am looking forward to it!
We are back in Calgary since Monday night and spent the last days with work, a bit of training and (big surprise) unpacking boxes. We will leave again on Sunday to head out west to stop first in Canmore where I will race at another bike race in the morning before we continue on and drive out to Penticton for a week of training. I want to be as much as possible on the race course of the Challenge course to know every pothole and just know the course inside out!
I will keep you updated how the next bike race was and which races are coming up between now and the big day at Challenge Penticton at the end of August!
cheers,
Elmar
