IM CDA Training Camp For One

I've been back from CDA for days, but just getting the chance to write about it now! What an awesome trip. I am SO glad I went. George the swim coach gave me crap about it, saying basically that he thought it was a silly idea, but I don't care. It was really important to me to be able to see the course before I got there for the race. I think that alone reduced my anxiety factor by about a hundred. Which means it's still at around eight zillion, but hey that's just how I roll.

I was really anxious to see just how killer the hills would be. I had gone back and forth in my mind between "OMG I'm never going to be able to make it" to "maybe it will be kind of fun?" and back again. Coach Neil did say that CDA didn't have anything as scary as Nasty Grade on the WF course, but I didn't know if he was just trying to boost my confidence.

There was a bit of a setback- at the last minute my training buddy couldn't go and I had to scramble around to find someone to go with me. My good friend Mick was sooo gracious to offer to go with me a different weekend even though he really didn't have time for it, but for my schedule this weekend really worked out best. Luckily, after some convincing/coercion/bribery I had Erik lined up to be my sherpa and SAG wagon driver. Phew. Got Stella packed up and I was on my way.


Sing with me now- "It's my bike in a box..."


First impressions- wow they aren't kidding when they say this place is beautiful. That barely begins to describe it. Mountains, trees, lakes, well-kept small-town city blocks, friendly people, sun and sky as far as you can see. Just walking around the town and breathing the crisp air was getting me excited for June 21st.



After settling in at the house on Friday afternoon (if anyone needs a place to stay when visiting CDA, I'll give you the name of the people whose house I rented- fantastic!) and putting Humpty Dumpty, I mean Stella, back together again, it was time for an easy spin ride of the run course. Erik came along, riding one of the bikes the people left for us in the garage. The run course winds through town, zigzagging through the city blocks down to the lake and then up to the Centennial Trail, which runs alongside a main road and winds up down next to the lake again. Almost the whole way on the Centennial Trail, you've got the lake immediately to your right (left on the way back) and you can look out at the mountains and forests on the other side, the misty clouds hanging in the trees, the boats on the lake. Gorgeous. Then the rest of the run is through town, where you can look at the nice houses and cute shops. Much better than my usual run on the levee down here, where the view practically never changes. A trip to the grocery store to get some food for the weekend rounded out the day. Day One- success!

Saturday, the plan was to ride a loop of the bike course (it's a 2-loop course, like the run) then run an hour on the run course. Since I was by myself, the temptation to sleep in was strong but I knew I didn't want to be going until late so I got out there around 9am or so. It was chilly!! Leg warmers, arm warmers, jacket, and gloves were very necessary. I piled my extra water, SE concentrate, extra food, pump and assorted other goodies into the rented Vue (which was a trooper all weekend) and took off. The plan was to meet Erik for the first refuel/map check on the way out of town, about 45 minutes in. I only had two maps. One was the course map from the IM CDA website, which had the route on it but not all the street names. The other wasn't even a map but a list of all the streets you had to turn on. I didn't think to print out two copies of each and there was no printer at the house, so Erik took the route map and I took the street list. Over the course of the ride we met up several times to compare maps and make sure we were still going the right way.






For the first 15 miles or so, the course was flat and I was just spinning easy. So far, so good! I saw some other bikers out and I wondered if they were locals or if they were doing the same thing I was. Or maybe both. After heading north and getting out of CDA proper, I entered Hayden/Hayden Lake area and got my first taste of the hills. A few SCR climbs but nothing bad yet. Approaching Hayden Lake, the roads and scenery started reminding me a lot of the Finger Lakes region of New York, back up at home. There were the cottages along the shore, narrow winding shady streets and awesome views across the lake to the other side. I wanted to stare out at it but quickly realized I better keep looking at the road. I turned onto English Point Rd and started going down, down, down. It was kind of nice going downhill, but all I kept thinking was that every foot I went down was another foot I had to eventually climb back UP! From looking at the route map and profile, I knew that the big hill, called The Wall, was coming up soon. I was nervous but not panicked like I was at WF, for whatever reason. A few more SCR climbs and then I turned a corner and found myself on a pretty long, fairly steep climb. I got down to my easiest gear and cranked up it. Towards the end I stood once, then sat again, and wow I was at the top! Was that it? The Wall?? No way! I didn't even feel like crying! I met up with Erik at the parking lot of the trailhead at the top of the hill, refilled, and headed off again. Made the turn on to Lancaster and started down a sweet downhill. I settled into my aerobars for what I figured would be a nice rest to catch my breath and get my legs back under me. Came around a turn and was smacked in the face by what seemed like a vertical wall of road in front of me. Holy Crap! Oh well, just suck it up and pedal, I told myself. It turned out that as I came up on it, it really wasn't as impressively vertical as it seemed from far away. It was tough, but I didn't even have to get out of the saddle once. There was also a small stretch near the top where it leveled out slightly before continuing to rise, giving me a nice little mini-break. A lot of the hills on the course turned out to be that way.

For a while, the course was pretty similar to that. Some climbing, some flats, some downhills. Nothing killer, but they did keep coming. I counted at least 7 SCR climbs, about half of them requiring my easiest gear (I'm riding a 27 cassette right now). The toughest roads, after English Point, were Dodd, Rimrock, and Hudlow. There were also a few technical parts where you had to make right-angle turns right off of a downhill. If it rains, some of those might be sketchy. After turning back onto Government Way, the road that leads back to town, I was back in the BCR and stayed in it the rest of the way. So almost all of the climbing is in the middle section, and you get a nice breather at the end of the first loop and beginning of the second before you have to start climbing hard again.








Back at the house, I was fairly tired but thrilled at how bad I DIDN'T feel! Quick change and then out to run. Erik took (another) one for the team and accompanied me on a bike. An hour later and wow, my first training day was done! And it was only around 3:30! We went out to dinner that night at a pretty nice restaurant in town called Brix, then I turned in to get some sleep before an even bigger day on Sunday. Day Two- success!

Sunday came around, and due to not feeling so great after waking up I ended up getting started later than the day before even though I'd wanted to start earlier. Oh well. I took some advil and lay around for a while, then was good to go. The agenda for the day was another loop ride then a two hour run. The ride this time went even better than last time. We didn't have to stop as often because we pretty much knew where we were going. It was definitely hard work, but knowing what to expect did help a lot. Coach had said that today was going to be tough, so I did have some worry in the back of my mind about the run even though I was feeling fine so far. Nutrition and hydration worked fine, as it had the previous day. I'm really happy with my nutrition plan. I didn't take too many Endurolytes though because it was pretty cold and I wasn't sweating excessively.

Back at the house again, time for the second half of the brick. I was tired, but not dying. Erik again graciously volunteered as my gel-flask-and-Endurolyte-holder for the run (or at least succumbed to my guilt trip). I kept waiting for something to happen, like my legs to totally die or to hit some kind of wall or something, but it never did. I had been envisioning today to be a day of gutting it out, getting some really hard training in the books, but I ended up just having another nice run. The weather wasn't perfect, it was cloudy and rained a little, but I was feeling fine. After both of the bike loops, I was feeling OK but not sure about being able to do another one. After almost an entire run loop, I was definitely feeling like I could do another. I took that as a pretty good sign.

And then, I realized- I had made it through my weekend! Still standing! And I didn't even cry once! Day Three- success!! I felt SO much better now that I had a pretty good handle on the bike and run courses. Even the tough parts didn't seem as scary now because I had done them and knew what to expect. And even just walking down the streets of CDA, knowing I've been there before and recognizing the sights, is going to have such a calming effect on me come June. And at that point I will need ALL the calming I can get. I'm still partially terrified, but I think I can say that my excitement is actually starting to outweigh my terror. And for me, that's huge! It would've been nice to be able to get in the lake, but the water's still in the 40s so that didn't happen.




Weekly Training Totals (4/20-4/26):
Swim- 7150 yards
Bike- 135 miles
Run- 28 miles
Total Time- 16:31