Mike Schubert

Evacuation plan
Originally uploaded by Iron Mike Schubert

As triathlon increases in popularity, the risks associated with it also increase. It wasn't that long ago that sprint and olympic distance races only consisted of 200-300 people. They were similar to the 5k runs you see on the weekend. Over the past 2 or 3 years this has changed dramatically. Sprint races with 600 people are now the norm but the race venues have not changed.

This in and of itself would not be a problem. Several mitigations can be put in place to maintain the safety of race participants. Properly seeding individuals at the start (not simply based on age group), increasing the time between waves, and creating waves for novice racers at the back of the field are all examples of this. None of these seem to be taking place though, and it is of growing concern.

The primary area of concern is the bike segment. Out there, you have folks going between 14 and 25 mph with different skills and abilities. I remember a group ride earlier this year with someone who was fast on her time trial bike, but had terrible handling skills and caused a couple of close calls between traffic and our group. I don't ride with her any longer. While being a spectator at a race earlier this summer, I heard a racer say "On your right!" to let another cyclist know he was going to pass on the right. This is flat out illegal in sanctioned events and is poor form regardless of the rules. When people act unpredictably on their bike, people get hurt.

What can you do as a participant? First, make sure you are racing in USAT (USA Triathlon) sanctioned events. There are a baseline set of rules and conduct that race directors are held to. You also get supplementary insurance coverage for any race day accidents. Second, report unsafe conditions to the race officials either a) when you see them or b) after the race. Finally, make sure you are acting safely and predictably.

This was the 19th running of this race, and by far the hottest. Temperatures reached the high 80's early in the day and set a record of 90. This did not bode well for me.

SWIM

Race day started off with a 2 loop swim in Lake Minneola. I have no idea what the water temp was, but even with the recent heat in the area they were able to find some place in the lake that was below 78 degrees. Water felt warm to me, especially in a wetsuit. Each loop was 1.2 miles in length, and followed a triangular course. Typically, you'll see swim courses that have yellow buoys along one side, orange down the other, and red indicating turns. This isn't law, but in general there is some colorful indicator of turns, and then consistency in buoy colors between the turns so you know you're on course. In this race, that was not the case. Not the big of a deal but confusing. The biggest event for me on the swim was getting a solid kick directly underneath my right eye socket. A little water came into my googles, but not too much - I dealt with it. However, this triggered a headache that would not go away.

Transition was fairly uneventful. I was stripped of my wetsuit, headed into the changing tent, and prepared to ride. My heart rate was definitely in check. I was ready. I mounted my bike and headed out on the course.

Bike

I thought Florida was flat! Nowhere had I found an elevation profile of this year's course. It amazes me that an event that has been around for 19 years is radically changing its bike course. I found a profile from last year that had 1800 ft of climbing, with most of the hills (including Sugarloaf) being in the first 30 or so. That would've been no sweat under these conditions, but turned out not the case this year. Sugarloaf Mountain was not the challenge. My Garmin shows ~4200 ft of climbing this year. What was the race director thinking??

On top of this, the aforementioned heat began to take its toll. I had a migraine at mile 40. A steady breeze felt like I was pedaling head first into a hair dryer. This was not my day. Throw in not being able to eat any longer and my sweat rate dropping, and I withdrew from the race. It was simply not worth the risk to continue on. Early race results indicated a roughly 40% DNF rate, but results that I looked up just now came in at around 25%. Both are much higher than what you would typically see at an iron distance race. I made the smart choice for me.

Here is this year's bike profile for those of you that are interested. The course rolls a lot and those all add up! 

 The Ironman Florida elevation profile appears below. It is ~1000 feet of climbing for the sake of comparison. 

Run

I can't speak for the run, but my primary concern as an athlete would be lighting. I heard from numerous people that there are places on the run course that were not well lit. My fear would be stepping wrong on something you can't see. Or being chased by an alligator in the dark. Usual stuff, right? Other than that, it appears the only elevation change on the course is to cross two bridges.

That's all for now. Time to finish recovering and get my run back on. For some, it's the offseason. For me, it's MARATHON season.

There is no offseason.

There is no finish line.

Here is another video I found that has helped me visualize the GFT race course. Enjoy!

Earlier today I wrote about visualizing race day and posted a video that contained a montage of photos and video clips from the 2008 Great Floridian triathlon. Later today I found this video of people on the Sugarloaf Mtn climb. If you can put up with the shaky camera work, and incessant chatter about her battery dying, you'll get a good perspective on what to expect when you turn onto Sugarloaf Mountain Rd.

The dude in the video rides down the mountain and back up in the span of the 4 minute video. I'm not going to attack the thing when I ride it on Saturday, but through this video I have now validated that it is no worse than anywhere that I have trained this year.

I am busy preparing for my upcoming iron distance race and thought I'd share one of my tips for dealing with a course you have not seen. Generally there are race maps available online, and you can get a general idea of the elevation profile. But this doesn't show you what the place actually LOOKS like. One thing I do is to check out You Tube to see what videos people have shot in the area.

Below you will see a YouTube video that shows some video, as well as a bunch of stills, from last year's incarnation of my upcoming event. While the bike course has changed this year, the imagery from the race site probably has not. Over the next few days, I will continue to scour multimedia sharing sites like YouTube and Flickr to find more images from the swim, bike and run courses. All of these inputs will add reality to the two dimensional maps I am looking at in the area.

Why do this? So you won't be surprised on race day. My philosophy is that you should train on conditions that are more difficult than the race course itself. Seeing real life images will help you construct a plan to accomplish just that.