Ryan Bickerstaff

A lot has happened since Elite Nationals a couple weeks ago.  That race ended up taking a lot out of me physically…at least as much as the Wildflower Half Ironman, which is a pretty tough race and twice as long.  Knowing that I’d need some time to recover afterwards, I had dental surgery planned for two days after the race.  Now I have two titanium screws fixed in my jaw where I never had teeth to begin with.  In a few months I’ll be ready to get some crowns attached to the screws and then will have a full set of teeth, more or less.

Having the surgery and feeling tired from Nationals led me to take it easier for much of the week.  I was keeping things aerobic and didn’t start to pick up the volume to around normal levels until the end of the week.  I did a 400 and 800 test on the track for running (my first harder running besides races since the first of June!).  I went around 61 and then 2:15 seven minutes later.  That was actually pretty slow for me (had done 58 earlier this year and 1:58 back in high school), but I think it had something to do with the antibiotics / pain / anti-inflammatory medicine from the surgery, not to mention still being a little tired from the race.

I tried to maintain steady training through Wednesday, as this Saturday (yesterday) I was racing at Scott Tinley’s triathlon down near San Luis Obispo.  The San Francisco Triathlon in November is a more important race for me, so I didn’t want to take additional time to taper for this race.  The race this weekend was non-drafting, which is a nice change of pace for a couple of reasons.  You get to go your own pace for the most part, which is pretty steady, and you can more easily see where your competitors are at fitness-wise in each of the swim/bike/run.

The morning of the race it was raining pretty strong.  It was not super cold, though, and by the run the rain had stopped.  I’ve had some of my best races immediately after it has rained, so I was happy.  The swim started out ok.  I was actually at the front for the first 50-100m.  Then, I just gradually kind of lost touch.  A lot of it was just mental - with the swim not being as important for bike positioning, I didn’t care as much if I lost a little more time if I kept things steady.  But I was also still physically drained from Nationals, and it was hard to will myself to push through the pain to keep up.

My first loop on the swim was in about 9:30, and I was only about 30s down, I think.  The next loop was in about 10:00 and included weaving in and out of the age groupers that started while we were on our first lap.  My transitions weren’t the fastest yesterday.  There was steep, uneven ~1:00 climb up a boat ramp to the transition area after the swim, and with all the rain and no carpet, I was pretty conservative.

There is a fairly steep climb right at the beginning of the bike.  Two years ago when I did this race I put my shoes on in transition.  This time, I figured I would get up the hill fine and put my feet in the shoes on the first descent.  I fumbled around a bit more than usual doing this, though, so I’m not sure if it was any faster.  I think the rain and cold hampered my coordination a bit.  I got into a steady rhythm on the bike.  I felt like I was going hard but not very fast.  It didn’t help when a competitor passed me going pretty fast a few miles into the race.  I couldn’t see anyone else up ahead due to all of the curves in the road, so I wasn’t sure if I was gaining or losing time.  Around half way through the bike there is an out-and-back section, and I could see that I was actually about to pass a couple people and most of the others weren’t that awfully far ahead.  By keeping a steady rhythm on the bike, I was able to breathe through my nose for the majority of it, and I think that helped keep me relaxed going into the run.  I passed a couple more people by the end of the bike, and entered T2 in around tenth place.

Going into the run, I didn’t have any expectations.  My volume is still half of what it was earlier in the year, and I’ve done almost no hard running since June.  My run at Nationals was pretty much a jog because of that, and I wasn’t sure how yesterday would turn out after I went pretty hard, but steady, on the bike.  I actually started the run just waiting for people to start passing me, but I started out running with one guy and was able to keep up and get my breathing under control.  I dropped him and caught up to another guy who I ran with for the rest of the first loop.  At the beginning of the second loop, I really started to feel pretty good - no real breathing or cramping issues seemed to be creeping up.  So, I picked up the pace a bit and passed another guy.  Everything was great until the last mile when cramps in my quads did start to happen.  There is a really steep long hill towards the end of each lap, and I was fearful that it would be my undoing.  Luckily, I switched over to a more conservative running pace and made it up the hill barely ok.  Then I realized there was another guy just in front of me.  I tried to speed up and pass him towards the end but ended up 4 seconds behind at the finish.

I ended up having the fourth fastest run split, 36:30.  That’s not a very fast time by itself, but it was faster than several guys who had beaten me at Nationals.  So being relatively faster with the little amount of running I’ve been doing was a definite plus.  I’m not exactly sure where it came from…maybe from going steadier on the swim and bike…but I’ll definitely take it.

With the 7th place finish (only ~1:00 behind 4th) came a $300 prize, bringing my total lifetime professional earnings to $400.  Not quite ready to retire, but it’s a start.

Next up is the race on Treasure Island.  I had been hoping to start some faster paced running training, but my foot has still been bothering me for the first few minutes of each run and even more so if I do faster running.  I called on Thursday to get in to see the doctor, as it can take a few weeks sometimes.  Luckily there was a cancellation, so I saw him on Friday.  I had marked on my foot where the pain was happening (different from where I got an injection two months ago), and he looked back at the MRI and saw a little notch on the bone where I was indicating pain.  Apparently, I may have worn away the cartilage in the joint, and part of the bone collapsed, causing an arthritic condition.  I’m going in tomorrow to get an injection, and he thinks that may clear things up once and for all.  The worst case scenario for this condition would be to have to have the joint surgically fused together, but the doctor thinks that because I’ve still been able to run for up to an hour at a time, the injection is probably all that will need to happen.

 

Filed under: Race Recap, Training