On July 30th, I participated in my third Aquabike event. For those of you whom aren't familar, Aquabike is the swim and bike portion of triathlon, minus the run. Last year, the first one was the Vineman Half Aquabike, which was a 1.2 miles swim and 56 mile bike. It was the first time I raced at the 56 mile bike distance and I absolutely loved it. Later in the year, I did the Big Kahuana Aquabike but didn't love that because racing on Route 1 with the traffic and rude male racers was not fun. So for this year, I really wanted to try the Full Aquabike distance, which is 2.4 mile swim and 112 mile bike, same distances as a traditional Ironman, and for me, clearly the best parts of an Ironman.
We got up to Windsor fairly late on Friday due to typical weekend traffic. This year, at packet pickup, they required you to first watch a 22 minute orientation video regarding the event. It went over the basics of the course and the rules. Nothing new but I guess it was a good idea to ensure everyone was presented with the same information.
We stayed in the little town of Rio Nido, which was literally 1 mile or so from Johnsons Beach in Guerneville. So in the morning, I biked into town. I got there just before transition opened at 5:30am. The all female wave for Full Aquabike was at 6:51AM. I was pretty rushed in the morning between setting up by bike and getting my gear bag back to John so that I didn't need to stuff it into the plastic T1 bag which was used to transport gear back to the finish line/T2 area.
The swim was interesting. The river was very shallow for over a .5 mile around the turnaround area. I was swimming and literally seeing many people WALKING. It was kind of a trip. I wanted to say, "walkers, please stay to the right." I know it is not illegal to walk in this situation but it does sort of seem like cheating. In any case, they were walking slowing than I could swim so I knew there wasn't a good benetfit to walking so I continued swimming. I tried to find a couple girls to draft on and off from. It worked for a little but the chaos of the walkers and the turn around made it not as effective as it was at my Ironman race. The swim course was two laps around. Towards the end, I started kicking hard to flush the legs out and bring blood back into that. I think it did help and I felt less of a heavy leg feeling when exiting the water.
Now off for the best part, the bike! I had been anticipating a hot day. I had my arm cooler on and I was ready for the heat. I had hydrated properly and brought extra water along so I wouldn't be stranded without water like I was my Ironman. My goal for the bike was to maintain 20 mile per hour speed. So starting off on the first 5 miles, I didn't pound it but I got to the 20 mark and just held. I realized I could do this with my heart rate at a nice 154 bpm or lower, which is my aerobic base zone. I thought this was fabulous! Just needed to stick with this heart rate for the 5-6 hours and I would be set!
I truly enjoyed racing the 112 miles. It was long but a great exercise in pacing. The rolling hills were nice because they offered you the opportunity to push and then recover slighty on the downhill. And the weather turned out awesome, it stayed overcast for the entire first 56 mile loop and mostly into the second loop as well. PERFECT racing weather for Marlene. Couldn't have been more thrilled.
For my nutrition, I did one gel at the top of each hour on the bike. I lost the last gel (dropped it) but there was only 10 miles and I had some Gatorade Perform so it was all good.
It was also fun racing up with the guys doing the full Ironman. When I did Half Aquabike last year, since we started later, the racers that were on the course were mostly the slower Ironman folks. So it was fun being with the faster folks. Unlike at Ironman St. George, I was not paranoided about getting penalties. If someone passed me, I would fall back but then attack them at the next opportunity. I was much more aggressive. I wasn't giving up my position for anyone, especially the men. :-) The one downside of Aquabike compared to Triathlon is that you really have no way to know how my competitors are ahead of you. With triathlon, you can normally tell once you are running or by looking at the T2 area when you return.
I was able to do the first 56 loop in 2:45, which was only 9 mintues more than when I did Half Aquabike last year and max'ed out my heart rate in the end. I did the second loop in about the same 2:45 so great execution in pacing.
Overall, very happy again with this race and my performance. Cheers to the Vineman!
Ranking: 2nd in Age Group. 5th Overall Female
Total Time: 06:42:52
Swim: 01:06:33
T1: 00:02:35
Bike: 05:33:44. Average speed: 20.1 mph Check out my bike course!
Complete Photo Album!
Video of Vineman Full Aquabike
Katie and Marlene: 2nd places in Age Groups
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