This has been the most difficult and frustrating start to a season that I
have ever experienced. My winter went fantastic, I had great workouts and I my
run praces were getting faster. I was looking forward to starting my first full
pro season with some great races! Then I got respiratory influenza in January.
No biggie, I can bounce back from that! Then, just two weeks before my first
race, I got pneumonia. And not just a nice, run-of-the-mill walking pneumonia
that young adults usually get. It was a full-blown, hospital acquired,
resistant to typical antibiotics pneumonia. I tried to recover from it, but no
luck. I tried to race my first race, the Jenison Triathlon which was turned
into a duathlon due to frigid water temps, and passed out after the first 5k.
I had hoped to be recovered for my first pro race in Austin one week later,
but clearly I was delusional. First of all, my lungs hadn't come close to being
recovered yet. I kept telling my family "oh yeah, I'm at 80% so I'm good!"
Nope. Amazing how we can convince our brains that we are better than we truly
are. I have to say, athletes are incredibly skilled at lying to themselves.
Add to my not actually at 80% lungs was the reaction I had to the second
antibiotic I was placed on, which is called Levaquin. This antibiotic carries a
black box warning for a rare reaction called fluroquinolone-induced
tendonopathy. No one really knows why it happens, but it is much more common in
athletes. And it means I was at a very high risk of rupturing my Achilles'
tendon and I was trying desperately to ignore the shap pain in my Achilles'
tendon. Along with the tendon issues, I also suffered from terrible muscles
aches, constant muscle cramps, fatigue, and had a hard time recovering from even
easy workouts. After trying to race Jenison far too early, I had handed the
"power" over to my husband, my coach and my dad. They would each have a vote in
deciding whether or not I would race, thus circumventing my amazing ability to
convince myself I am okay to race. It was a unanimous "no." It
was extremely difficult to watch the race and hear my name announced at the
start of the race only to be standing on the sidelines. But it was a good
experience to watch the race and to cheer on my teammates, Abby, Natasha and
Nick. During the race I became more and more hungry to race, hoping I would be
ready by Grand Rapids, only two weeks away.
Okay, fast forward to Grand Rapids Triathlon! My lungs were now at an
honest 80% recovered from my pneumonia and I was desperate to race! My Achilles
was just a dull ache that really only flared after multiple laps going the right
way around the track and the pain was easily avoided by running the wrong way
around the track (yes, lots of confused looks for doing that). I was still
having more trouble than usual recovering from workouts, so I knew I would be
tired on race day, but all I really cared about was finishing. After a DNF and
a DNS, all I wanted was to prove to myself that I could still finish an olympic
triathlon.
Race morning went pretty well, despite the rain. I woke up very early and
did my pre-race warm up run with my super speedy husband, Todd Kennedy. Both of
us now have the same coach, which means I have the rare opportunity to do a lot
of workouts with my husband, including race morning warm ups. I shared with him
my fears of not racing well and how badly I just wanted to finish. After years
of being together (I'm sure it feels much longer to him), he has gotten very
good at dealing with my race morning crazies. After my typical breakfast, a
Clif bar and a bottle of Generation UCan, Todd and I drove to the race site. We
grabbed our typical parking spot and decided to stay in the car for a while to
avoid getting super drenched. Then out into the rain we went to set up
transition. We opted to skip our typical pre-race bike warm up due to the rain
and because I wanted to get another chance to do a breathing treatment before
the race.
Somehow, race morning always seems to go by so fast. The ritual is
familiar and comforting to me: warm up, chat with tri-buddies, warm up again,
chat, double check transition, find my dad, chat, grab wetsuit, struggle into
wetsuit, then stand near the swim start going through my race plan over and over
in my head. A final good luck to my husband and a fist bump for my dad, then
head to the water. It was a slow rush to get to the water as the large group of
women was narrowed to a single file line. I barely had time for a few strokes,
double check my goggles and then the horn went off for the start. I hurriedly
pushed the start button on my watch and dove into the water.
I ran through transition to my spot, then helmet on, sunglasses on, grab
bike and go. I mounted and heard what every triathlete dreads hearing: the
scraping of my chain as it fell of my chain ring. I looked down, saw my chain
was completley off with no hope of getting back on, and groaned. I slammed on
my brakes and threw my bike down, then began to yank and push on my chain in a
very non-productive manner. After about 30 seconds of this, I realized how
stupid it was, took a deep breath, took off my sunglassed and, finally, pulled
my chain back on the chain ring. I looked at my watch, I had lost 2 minutes.
Yikes! I jumped on my bike and took off, faster than my typical pace in hopes
of catching all those women who had passed me while I fumbled with my chain and
all the speedy fishies out of the water ahead of me. My plan was to hold
between 23 and 25 mph with the hope of biking a 1:05, even with my chain
debacle. The plan worked quite well thanks to a relatively flat course. I was
also encouraged to keep moving fast by the woman who ended up placing 3rd
overall because after I passed her we went back and forth for the remainer of
the bike. Unfortunately, we also picked up some men who don't like being
"chicked." This seems to be a problem that I run into at some races. These men
then drafted off of each other for the remainder of the bike, making it
impossible for myself or the other women to get past them and stay away. Every
time I put in the effort to pass all 6 of them, they would quickly reel me back
in and I would be forced to drop off the back of their group in order to avoid a
drafting penalty. The other woman and I chatted briefly about our frustrations
with these men, but then we were heading into transition and I was jumping off
my bike, hoping I still had some energy left in my legs for the run, but worried
about the cramps that had started to sneak into my hands and feet.
As soon as I turned out of transition I knew my legs were done. The long
week of workouts and my difficulty with recovery compounded on top of a very
fast bike split left me with heavy legs that just would not turn over. I also
had to start fighting with my hands to keep as they start to cramp into fists.
The cramps then spread into my quads and hips. A woman that I had passed on
the bike quickly passed me on the run and I knew I couldn't stick with her, so
instead I focused on running my race, relaxing my cramps and my ultimate goal:
finishing. It was a long, trudging run. At the turnaround, I was happily
surprised to find that the woman who had stuck with me on the bike appeared just
as worn out from our fast pace as I was and had fallen further behind my pace.
I was excited that I might actually be able to pull off a 2nd place podium
finish despite the challenges of my season so far and pushed my pace as hard as
I could... to a blistering 7 minute mile, but hey, good enough!
I was very happy to see that finish line, it was all I had wanted over the
past month was to see that finish line and to cross it. Finally, I had finished
an Olympic tri this season! There was some confusion about me being the first
woman and my arguments that I was the second place woman were ignored and I was
trotted through the finish chute with the banner and all before they finally
figured it out. Hopefully there will be more banners in the future that are
actually for me! Later I met the woman who had finished first and found out
that she was a female pro from the Dominican Republic with hopes of qualifying
for the 2016 Olympics. 2nd place to a pro is not too shabby at all! But the
best part of the podium at this race were the ages. I was the youngest on the
podum, with the first place woman being 33 and the 3rd place woman being 40.
This encourages me that I am just a "tri-baby," as my dad likes to say. I have
so much more room for growth and so many more years to go! And, hopefully, this
off season had the craziest work schedule I will ever experience. My internal
medicine rotation was 70-80 hours each week with only 4 days off in 28 days,
plus constant exposure to all sorts of nasty hospital bugs that apparently have
an affinity for my lungs is not my ideal lifestyle! Now, as I finish my first
year of residency, I am looking forward to psychiatry rotations from here on
out! The work schedule is not as demanding as internal medicine and I am not
exposed to hospital bugs, so things are definitely looking up!
And finally, congratulations to everyone who raced! I have to say, it was
a HUGE pick-me-up to be greated and wished good luck by so many Oak Park YMCA
athletes in their signature blue uniforms. I know there were other Oakies
there, so please let me know how you all did! Congrats to Lynne Hart for 3rd in
her Age Group. My husband had a fantastic race and finished 3rd overall in a
very tough field and I think this means many more great results to come this
season for him! My dad, who I dragged into triathlon a few years ago, also had
a great race and absolutely SHATTERED his goal of getting under 3 hours with a
2:46! And I can't forget the current "Other Todd" Todd Buckingham for his 4th
place overall finish and I look forward to the Todds battling for the honor of
not being "Other Todd." Jimi Minnema continued his west side domination with
1st overall. Also congrats to my MSU Triathlon alumni, Bill Vann, who did awesome in the half and Katherine Pickard who had a blistering swim in the Olympic. Also finishing the half was Eric Abbott from Central Michigan Triathlon, who kept me going on the run. My Tri4Him teammate, Abby Geurink, destroyed it in the sprint
triathlon and finished 1st overall. Note I didn't say 1st overall woman. Yeah,
she finished 1st overall for men AND women, that girl is incredibly fast and I
am blessed to call her friend and teammate!
