News & Reviews

Maimi 5150 race report - March 20th 2011
 
The 2011 season is in full swing now for me with the first race of the 5i50 series taking place this past weekend in Miami in which I competed in.  I had a good time with family and friends down in Miami.  I stayed in North Miami with Cameron Dye who is also a Kestrel/First Endurance athlete.  Both Cameron and I were happy to stay out of the chaos of downtown Miami and commute into the race on Sunday morning which was an easy 20 minute drive down Highway 1. 
 
Leading into the race I was able to get in some short and sweet sessions in on Friday and Saturday and felt great going into the event on Sunday.  Race morning came early as it always does and I was out the door of my hotel at 5:15 AM.  The event turned out to be fairly small in size with about 500-600 age group athletes which surprised me as I expected to see thousands of athletes heading towards transition early race morning but that certainly was not the case.  Parking was easy and so was getting in and out of transition with the bike on race morning.  Everything leading into the race went smoothly. 
 
Prior to the start of the race I was able to get in a substantial warm-up along the shore line of downtown Miami and proceeded to set up my transition prior to heading over to the start of the swim to finish up my race warm up with a little swim.  As I finished my warm up and waited for the start of the race in the water being that the swim start was going to be a deep water start, I noticed athletes jockeying for position in the water far away from the so called starting area.  There is a phenomenon with the deep water swim starts in that if there is no defined line or barricade holding the athletes back, especially the men’s field, then the starting line is essentially non existent and athletes will move forward as much as they would like.  Race officials yell to get back, “Get Back,” but no one listens and the starting line keeps moving forward till the horn goes off.   I can play that game too, as I did, but what bothers me is seeing athletes start swimming prior to the starter even saying take your mark.  Sneaking a little head start at a major international race is frowned upon by me but what goes around, comes around I suppose.  
 
As the swim started I found myself having to make up some ground after the first 200.  At the first buoy I was in about 13th place taking some hits around the buoy which was not a problem.  I got around the first buoy and then proceeded to get around the swimmers that went out way to hard.  When I got to the front end of the swim I settled into the second row of three abreast.  I felt great and was not in anyway taxing myself.  Out of the water and into transition went smoothly and I was in the mix with the leaders as the shots started going down on the bike.   I rode hard and started to lose contact with the group as the bike headed towards the I-195 bridge.  I continued to push but just did not have the same legs as Cam Dye and a few others on the bike.   I pushed hard on the bike but lost a little focus around a turn and managed to take the Kestrel 4000 off-roading into some gravel on the second lap.  Fortunately, my First Endurance EFS bottle did not pop out of the cage as I made it back on the road.  Oh well,  “just keep plugging and giving 100% and make the best of the rest of the ride,” was what was going through my mind at the time.   
 
Onto the run I knew I had lost some time to a handful of great athletes so I really had nothing to lose by going out hard and giving 110% on the run.  I was able to move up from 12th to 10th with a 32 low 10 K run which I was happy about for this time of the season.  My run let me down last year and I have taken a new approach to my run training this year and have seen improvements thus far.  If five athletes in the race ride under 54 minutes in the 40K and the Olympic Silver medalist gets 2nd then I would say it was a legitimate field and the 2011 5i50 triathlon series is going to bring out the best in me.  After the race I spent the evening at a comedy club with my coach and friends of mine while making the best of the weekend in Miami. 
 
Looking forward to the T3 Kemah Triathlon in Galveston in two weeks. 
 
Sincerely, 
Brian Fleischmann