Barb’s Race – Race Report

Barb’s Race (1/2 Ironman distance) Report

http://www.vineman.com/ | http://www.vineman.com/Barb_s_Race.htm

7.31.11

Barb’s Race is an all-women’s half Ironman race that’s done the same day as the full (Ironman distance) Vineman, the Vineman AquaBike (Swim + Bike, no run) and 1/2 Vineman AquaBike. As the name implies, it’s in Wine Country – Sonoma County. The start is in Guerneville and the finish is in Windsor. Barb’s Race has a very interesting history, which I recommend reading about here. The condensed version – race is named for a long-time Vineman volunteer as a means of helping to raise money while she was undergoing cancer treatment. Barb successfully fought the battle against cancer and the race has been going on now for 11 years and continues to raise money for local cancer charities.

Here’s what I had heard about the race (I didn’t get to do any recon ride/run for this one):

• The swim is in the Russian River, which is so shallow you can walk some stretches.
• Bike has been labeled “flat,” which can mean a lot of different things to us Bay Area bicyclists. Chalk Hill is the biggest climb on the ride and I was expecting it to start-up around mile 42.
• Similarly, the run is also supposedly flat and kind of boring, as it’s an out and back. (Full Vineman is THREE out and backs. Ouch.)

I had a bunch of friends do Vineman 70.3 two weeks ago and heard that the hills on the bike are nothing to worry about with all of our hill training. Seemed like pretty much all of them PR’d (Personal Record), so I went in to this one (it’s essentially the same course – slightly different run toward the end) hoping to also do well. I’ve only done three half IM races and two of those were Wildflower, which is notoriously difficult, and then last year I did Big Kahuna – a much more flat course, but also with cooler (Santa Cruz marine layer fog) temps. Sonoma County can get really, really hot in the summer (100 deg, nothing but sunshine) and I was worried about the heat. Melting is no fun. Plus, it’d be nice to PR like my friends. That means sub-5:42.

For reference, my times at BK were:

Swim – 37:50 (salt water)

Bike – 2:58 (also a fairly flat course)

Run – 1:58 (again, pretty flat)

Pre-race:

• Only two bathroom stops. Could have used one more. Luckily, this did not prove problematic.
• Bread w/pb, jam, banana
• Half a Clif Builders bar
• Sipping from a bottle of Gatorade Endurance the whole morning
• Also, always nice to race with Cara Peck, who’s got a great attitude and likes to take goofy pictures. Helps keep me from getting too nervous.

Swim:

Another “deep” water start. Good practice, again. River made sighting really easy! I couldn’t possibly get *that* far off course. Score!  Super crowded, just four minutes between wave starts. Ok now, even *I* ran into the group that started before us… and, of course, got seriously run over — one time, to the point of yelling at someone to let go of me — by the group behind me. Why not more time between waves? I do not understand. The shallow parts of the river were pretty comical, because people would just stand up and start walking for a few yards. Couldn’t really see the finish, so that was pretty anti-climatic, but whatever, it’s not like I have a big sprint ending or anything like that.

Official time – 37:44 / 1:58 per 100 yd

T1:

1. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Rocks hurting my feet.

2. Yes, mat is slippery, I will walk slowly. Lady, get some of those shower sticky things on that mat – some of us have some time to make up after splashing around in the water for much too long!

3. “Would you like help with your wetsuit?” “F*ck yeah.” I am surprised I did not get penalized for that F-bomb. It was just such a natural reaction. Why wouldn’t I want someone to pull this neoprene sausage casing off of me?

4. How much farther to my bike???

5. Success – put all of my bars, blox, etc in a bag and shoved the whole thing in a pocket. Much more efficient than picking up each thing individually.

5. Get out of my way people – you can get on your bike and ride up this weenie hill… or stay to the right. Again, some of us are making up time, here.

3:44

Bike:

Oh dang. I went out way too fast. I am not in the Tour de France. I am not a professional cyclist. I’m barely even a decent rider. But C3P), my  Garmin and kept on seeing 20+ mph, 19+mph average. Uh oh. I can’t sustain that for 56 miles and then go run 13.1 miles. But… I was in a group that was quick and did quite a bit of leap-frogging with four or five other women – mostly just trying to stay out of everyone’s draft area (I think some of them did get hit with a penalty at one point, but I luckily managed to stay clean). Again, this might have been helped by more time between swim waves… I think some of them were Barb’s Race people, others may have been doing the AquaBike. Whatev.

Mile 40, bottom of a fairly short, steep hill – I vaguely remember seeing someone veer off to the right up ahead of me. When I got to the bottom of the hill, I saw exactly what happened. A woman lost control of her bike and was now laying, kind of folded up, in a ditch off the side of the road, her bike on top of her. I stopped and pulled her bike off her. She was conscious and didn’t have any visible broken limbs. I found another rider who had a phone. He called her husband and the paramedics. Once another guy stopped and said he was a first responder, I just gathered everyone’s bikes off the road onto the grass and took off – I wasn’t of any help. Scary stuff. Needless to say, I was shaken up and it took a while to get back up to speed and form. I don’t know how much later – it’s all a blur – I saw the ambulance come down the road and it was good to know that she was getting help.

When I got to this “Chalk Hill,” two miles later, it didn’t really matter. I kind of knew I was climbing, but still kind of out of it. Guess that means it wasn’t too bad. I eventually decided to get myself back into “race mode” and make up the time I lost when I stopped, which turned out to be about two minutes. Stayed down in my aerobars for a while and put in a pretty big effort (PowerTap data would be interesting for this race). Thought about how it might mess up my run… but this is a training race, what better time to mess up by going too hard?

Eats:

• Mocha Clif Shot at T1 – forgot to have it before the swim, wanted the caffeine buzz
• 1 Clif bar, consumed between miles 18-35
• banana halves at aid stations 18 and 38
• ~2.5 bottles of drink, Gatorade whatever
• Gross, nasty PowerAde gel shot – wanted the caffeine again (around mi 50). Do not get green apple flavor. Also, weirdly liquidy. (It was a freebie.)
• May have had a few Clif Shot Blox, don’t remember
• Tried to have another Clif bar, only got down a bite

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/103236335

Time:	02:58:23
Distance:	55.41 mi
Elevation Gain:	1,509 ft
Calories:	3,115 C

Official time – 300:42 / 18.6mph

T2:

OMG. How far are you going to make me run with my bike? Seriously. FAR. New for this race – put Body Glide under my arms. I hate underarm chafing. 3:05

Run:

Grabbed a sip of Coke on my way out and just started running. Legs felt pretty good (Wednesday bricks must be doing some good!) Streets were mostly empty and I was pretty much on my own between the aid stations – spaced about a mile apart. Tried to make it a little interesting on the first out and back by cheering for the winning ladies and then chasing down runners when possible.

No Garmin, just my stopwatch… first five miles indicated that I was somewhere between an 8-9 mi/mi pace. Pretty sweet, I’ve never managed to break 9 min/mi for a half-Ironman! Eventually, I had to stop looking at the time (Barb’s Race distance wasn’t marked for the last  and just go off perceived effort (um, hard) and try to keep things steady. The run was not totally flat, just a few rollers that weren’t really bad… but I could see this being a completely different story if it was a very hot day. The sun came out somewhere during my second lap, but didn’t really warm it up too much.

Got really annoyed when no one could seem to tell me where the turnaround was for the second loop (full Ironman did 3 loops, so we did 1.5) Good thing I kept asking though – when I got to a spot where “BARB’S” was painted on the ground, the nearby volunteer said that was, in fact, the turnaround. (This was probably noted in the race guide, but I didn’t really study that – and I kind of like how you don’t have to think about anything while you’re racing. People tell you where to go. It’s nice. I also really like how usually there are mile markers. Last 2-3 miles of Barb’s were not marked.)

Generally had water at the aid stations, went through about four Clif Shot Blox. Stomach was mostly okay. Nice preview of Ironman aid stations – they were fully stocked with all sorts of fruits, cookies, candies, water, gatorade, Clif Shots, Coke – I’m sure I’ll be needing that stuff when it comes time for my full.

Got to see Steve and Zach twice out on the run! Loved running through the neighborhood right next to all of the spectators – especially after being out in no-man’s land. I tried my best to give them a smile and wave. Also got to see Cara out there, looking really strong – no surprise there!

Right hip, left glute were kind of sore. Need to get those worked out sometime soon.

Official time – 1:48:51 / 8:18 min/mi

Total time – 5:34:06 (PR)

All results: http://www.onlineraceresults.com/event/view_event.php?event_id=7015

Let’s keep in mind that this race is not nearly as competitive as Vineman 70.3, or any other big race. Still, it felt really good when I went to the results tent to pick up my print out (I was actually checking to see if I had gotten any penalties) and read that I was 4th in my division! I was 142/447 in the swim. 48/442 bike, 15/442 run. Man, I need to learn to swim. 4/68 in my age group, 18/447 overall.

And yes, I did, selfishly, think about how my place might have been impacted if I hadn’t stopped to help the rider who crashed. The third place person in my AG finished in 5:18, so my two minute stop did not hurt there. I might have climbed a few spots in the overall rank, but whatever. I feel like I did the right thing in stopping and would have wanted someone to help me right away  if I had crashed. Karma.

Shout outs! To Steve for being so wonderful and coming up to cheer and take care of me, even though that meant he had to work all day Sunday. Zach opened up his family’s cabin in Healdsburg for us and Cara was, as always, a very fun race buddy. I am so proud of her for finishing her first half! She totally rocked it and finished with a big smile.

---