Mike's Tri Adventure

I thought I would share a recent experience I had which would certainly qualify as being in my "Discomfort Zone". For the past few months, I have decided to put my swimming and cycling training into maintenance mode and to try a run focus block. Focus blocks are a great way to mix up your multi-sport training program and stimulate a significant change in one aspect of your triathlon fitness. In my case, I felt that "becoming a runner" would help boost my leg speed for future triathlons.
After slowly building my volume and then adding speed-work with faster athletes and the local Track and University team, I entered February eager to test myself in a race. Of course, there aren't many races in Ontario in February, so I decided to try something completely different than anything I have ever done before. I entered an indoor track event.

Now I never did track in school, and while my recent foray into road running and triathlon has involved training on the track, I have never raced on one. However there is a first time for everything, and mine was last Friday night in the 3000m event at the University of Toronto fieldhouse alongside a dozen or so collegiate and post-collegiate speedsters. Despite being the slowest guy in the bunch, I told myself that as long as I gave it my all, I was bound to learn something. Here are my top 5 lessons learned.

1. Track races hurt! I don't think I have ever hurt that bad in a triathlon, and this race was only 10 minutes long. 15 laps of a 200m track seems short on paper, but doing it feels like forever.

2. How you run a track race is at least as important as your time or placing at the end. I had to decide whether to follow the pack or just do my own thing. Once the gun went off, there was only one choice. Try the impossible and face the consequences. If I wanted to do an individual time trial, I could just arrange one on my own.

3. Everybody talks about even or negative-splitting track races, but nobody actually does it. I followed the "slow" group through the first 2 laps at sub-9-minute pace, thinking "this seems a bit quick". By the time I hit the 800m mark, all I could think was "uhh, ooh…". At that point I had 12 laps to go. Let the downward spiral begin!

4. Unlike road races and triathlons, tracks are dead flat. While this might seem like a good thing, it offers no opportunity to let up for a bit to catch your breath. You know that guy from the gym who shows up at your local 5k ready to throw down, only to huff and puff his way through the race as if he's going to cough up a lung? That was me.

5. One of the best parts of running in circles is the constant support. Hearing the University girls team I train with screaming at me definitely kept me going, and reminded me how important my own cheering and feedback is when they are racing. I also seemed to attract the cheers of people I didn't even know – being last has its privileges!

Those last 2 km were sheer and utter hell. I was lapped by almost everyone - twice by a few guys. The worst part was, my time of 10:22.58 was not indicative of the running fitness I know I have. However, as someone who has a habit of pacing road races conservatively, going out hard and taking a chance was a choice I can live with. All I need now is to find a slower race, or better yet, to keep working at it until I bridge the fitness gap and can take part in a race like that for more than a few laps!

Thanks to Mike Hay for encouraging me to give one of these things a crack and to Dick Moss, Track North and the Lady Vees X-C/Track team for all the great training and support.

Live your Dreams!



Mike