News & Reviews

As I write this I am currently on my way home from the Orlando/Clermont area on Southwest Airlines flight 3846 from Orlando to Denver.  I have done quite a bit of racing and traveling over the years with this being the first time I have flown Southwest.  I am pleasantly surprised with the service.   In an airline market that has become so ridiculous with the petty baggage/snack and TV charges as well as charging passengers more to sit towards the front of the coach class cabin, Southwest has strayed from jumping on the petty airline  bandwagon and kept it real simple with two free checked bags and no additional charges once you are in flight.  I fly for racing a lot and have seen it all, so any time that my flight does not provide any sort of negative excitement, some sort of debacle or turn around mid way through a nine hour international flight, I feel good about things.  On the other hand, one could argue that travel problems are a good problem to have if you are like I am and love to travel and race.
 
Clermont ITU Pan American Championships was yesterday in central Florida which provided a great opportunity for me to come back to my home state and get in one more low key early season race prior to the bigger or more important events coming into play later in March and April.  It was nice to come to Florida and see some of my family while racing some of the best ITU short course athletes in the world.  The start list for Clermont ITU was 75 strong which included a few athletes ranked in the top 20 in the ITU World rankings and other underrated athletes from the US and various countries throughout North and South American, Europe, etc.  When you line up against and full field of 75 with multiple athletes ranked in the top twenty, you are absolutely guaranteed an honest and fast race. 
 
The race was one-half Olympic distance in length which provided for a race that was 50 minutes and change in duration.  The ITU is currently leaning towards creating sprint and team triathlon events in the hopes of getting more triathlon events into the 2016 Rio Olympic Games and beyond.  This is the first year the ITU is making an apparent push to include ITU Sprint Triathlon intermingled with the ITU Continental Championships circuit, etc.  While I had a low key attitude in the days leading up to the race, as race morning approached I felt the urge to make something happen and set my mind in race mode.  Waking up at 9 AM for an afternoon race has its benefits including the ability to eat a substantial breakfast and have the time to digest it properly prior to the race.  After a short wake up jog through the hotel parking lot I proceeded to go back to my room and prepare breakfast which included my typical First Endurance Cappuccino Ultragen Shake with and a bit of oatmeal including added salt and nuts.  As I ate breakfast and filled my water bottles with watered down EFS for the race I was able to visualize the race and what I wanted to accomplish while eating and putting my mind in the theoretical “zone”.

The race provided a swim course that was approximately 750 meters in length and measured correctly.  The only issue and minor challenge or adversity was that the deepest portion of the swim was about 3.5 feet in depth.  As the gun went off and the race begin and I ran the first 200 meters of the swim in ankle deep water, I found myself in great position and even with the remainder of the field.  Once I reached a water level where it became more beneficial to dolphin, I managed to run into some trouble with other athletes and swimmers pouncing on top of me as they were still running or dolphin diving to the first buoy.  As I rounded the first buoy in a vertical position with my feet planted firmly in the muck I found that I was so exhausted from the 200 meter run out and a additional 200 meters of dolphin diving that I decided to swim.  At this point I was beaten so bad by other athletes jumping on me that I had to mentally regroup and asses the situation and plan the remainder of the 750 in my mind while finding some energy and effort after the brutal beatings I had received around the first buoy.  Two minutes into the 750 and half way through the swim/run-dolphin leg of the race I sat in approximately 40th place which is not what I had in mind.  I usually think good thoughts on a daily basis at 7:30 in the morning when I am putting the hurt on my entire body while visualizing myself leading out swims in major events during the main set for the workout.   Not this time.   The joke was on me and all of the other strong swimmers for this race.   I was able to get in about 200 meters of solid swimming and pass about 20 athletes on the outside after the last turn buoy prior to having to start the water entry/exit technique all over again with 250 meters remaining in the swim.  Ouch,  I was passed back and ended up sprinting up the beach in 40th place.  The nine to ten hours that I spend in the water each week will pay off this season, just not in the Clermont ITU Sprint Champs. 
 
Getting out of the water and up the beach I found myself in 40th place and about 30 seconds down from the lead.  This is not a place that I am used to being coming out of the water but I was able to salvage what I could with remainder of the race.  Prior to the event I had decked out my new Kestrel 4000 time trial frame as a road bike with Sram Red TT rings and Profile Design ITU legal bars while envisioning a great swim with some of the top US swimmers and proceeding to put time of the chasers with a few other athletes as I have been successful in the past at doing.  This was certainly not the case when getting out of the water in 40th is what I was working with.  As I proceeded to ride through athletes on the first lap with the front group in sight at the first turnaround, I started to plan for my next move knowing at this time that I would be successful in catching the front group.  The only problem was that the front group was 45 athletes in size.  Plan C came into my mind at the time which was to try to get away from the bunch after the first lap through the transition and technical portion of the course.  I tried, did not work.  I found myself back in the pack of 45 plus and immediately concluded that I needed to keep trying to get away for a few reasons.  The first being that I wanted to start the run with a lead and the second reason would be that there were so many sketchy riders in the tight bunch and I really did not want to end the 2011 season in a pile up for a low key sprint race.  The crash on the first lap around the first turnaround was a fair warning enabling me to come to the realization that I was dealing with the equivalent skill level of a pack of overly motivated Cat 5 riders going for the glory on there first group ride. 
 
Into transition for the run I was able to position myself at the front of the large group and get out within the top six runners onto the run course.  I settled into 3 minute K pace approximately, which is a solid pace for me but in today’s short course triathlon, 3 minute kilometer pace is about 12-15 seconds to slow if you want to win, especially for the first K.  I had a great second lap passing the athletes that went out to hard and managed to get in for a lack luster 21st place and 70 seconds behind Roulette who was the winner of the race hailing from France.  
 
Sometimes things do not always work out the way you want them to.  Think about it for a minute and then forget about it and move on is the best strategy when dealing with failure.  Easily said but tough to do when you race triathlon for a living.  Looking forward to kicking off the Ironman 5150 Triathlon Series in Miami on March 20th.  
 
Sincerely,
Brian Fleischmann