Success!

     I had one more road triathlon on my schedule for the year. It was the Cedars of Lebanon Triathlon in Lebanon, TN on August 27. To be honest, I was not excited to do it and wouldn't have gone if I hadn't pre-registered back in June. The River Gorge twilight crit. in Chattanooga was going on that evening and I would have much rather been there, especially with just a week to go before the St. Louis crits. My form seemed to be right on cue with my performance at the crit. on Wednesday. I was hoping the tri wouldn't knock me down a notch. Sometimes the running makes my fitness go backwards. I had no aspirations for this event. I just wanted to get through the short swim, hammer the bike, and then survive the run. I'm still trying to improve my time trialing so I saw this as another opportunity to do just that.

     The swim was short at just 300 meters. It was a pool swim, making for 6 laps of 50 meters each. They had the pool laned off. The lanes were wide, but it still made for a mess with passing. They seeded us by estimated swim time. I had guessed my time back in June when I registered. I had put 6:00 as my time. I haven't done much swim training lately, so I thought maybe I had fudged it a little and was afraid I might get in someone's way. Well, apparently everyone else fudged way more than me. I was seeded back in 275th, which I thought was probably right because I am not at all a good swimmer. Wrong. I was back with people that were drowning for 300 meters, not swimming. I was in heavy traffic the entire swim. People were hanging onto the side and walking after 100 meters. I was a little upset that I had been put behind so many people that couldn't swim. I mean come on! It's a short swim and you are already walking after just 100 meters?! Having 5-10 bad swimmers ahead of you is understandable, but I passed 50 people in a swim that took less than 6 minutes! My time was 5:57, right on my estimate so I guess I didn't fudge it at all. In the transition area, I noticed blood going down my hand. I had taken a significant chunk of flesh out of my hand when I clipped the lane divider trying to make a pass. I guess with all the adrenaline I didn't even feel it.

The scene at the pool just before the start

The pool is full of swimmers now

Me putting on my goggles as I step into the water. Almost go time!

Me grabbing some air during the swim

I'm coming up on some traffic here. Got two swimmers to pass.

I'm the swimmer closest to the camera. Finally made the move by squeezing between the divider and the other swimmer. I think this is where I lost the chunk out of my hand.

     Getting on the bike is always crazy. I think I'm the only one that knows how to clip in and can ride straight while doing it. You really have to pay attention the first 30 seconds of the bike ride or you will get taken out by a crazy. The swim was a great warm-up and I got right into a fast rhythm on the bike. I did make one mistake today. A mile into the ride I realized I had forgotten my water bottle. So I did the entire race with no water, other than one tiny cup at the halfway point of the run.

A rider heads out on the bike course

Me out of the saddle in the middle of two riders

Transition area

     I was blasting by people the entire bike ride. The course had many rolling hills that took 20-30 seconds to climb. I was able to hit them with some speed and stay in the big-ring over the top. I was sprinting by groups of people. The speed difference was even more than it was at the Music City Triathlon. I am not even exaggerating when I say that some people were doing 10 mph where I was doing 22 mph. It was scary to pass people. All it would take is one guy to swerve over and we both would be splattered on the road.

     I was not aware that we could only pass on the right in a triathlon. I just stayed left out of common bike courtesy. That's just the way you pass on bikes. I didn't realize it was a USAT rule as well. I did have to pass a guy on the right though, but it wasn't by choice. He pulled out to make a pass on another rider as we were nearing a 90-degree right turn. I waited patiently behind, trying not to draft. They rode side-by-side for a minute, then the guy on the left (that I was following) just slammed on his brakes. We were still a good 150 meters from the turn. I was not expecting it and had to dart right in order to miss his back wheel. Needless to say, with his loss of speed I went right on by and then passed the other rider on the correct side after the turn. I didn't want to do it, but I was avoiding an accident. Remember this moment because it will be significant later.

      The road that took us back into the Cedars of Lebanon State Park was a fun little roller-coaster. I loved it! There was even a rough stretch of road near the end that played into my strengths. The road was kind of narrow and I had a battle with a car that kept passing me then slowing down. I passed him back twice and yet he insisted on driving next to me and just in front of me. I was so worried that I would get a penalty for drafting the car or that they would think he was with me. My bike time was good, 4th best overall. And again, like at Music City, I was fastest up the hills and did not lose a single position while on the bike. I ended the 16.4-mile bike section in 43:36 with a 22.6 mph avg speed. I got yelled at entering the transition area. The officials tend to freak out when you come in at 20+ mph and dismount cyclocross-style. They don't see that sort of thing at these events. I made sure I dismounted before the line and then set my sight on the run.

Transitioning to the run. It's always a good feeling when there are no other bikes around you. That's when you know you had a good ride time.

And I'm off for the 5K run

    I was feeling good and knew that my swim and bike times were fast. I knew that if I had a good run I might could get a podium in the 25-29 class. I ran hard and lost just one spot while running (and that came in the first 2 minutes of the run). I completed the 3-mile run in 22:18, almost 2 minutes faster than my goal of 24:00. That made for a 7:23 avg mile.

Me catching two runners just after the turnaround on the run course

Almost done with the run

     I was very pleased with my effort, but didn't think that would be good enough to podium. We were about to leave, but Jeff Yeager talked me into waiting for results. And it was a good thing that I stayed because my time of 1:14:45 was good enough for 7th overall and 1st in the 25-29 class! Finally a win in a road triathlon! I had beaten 2nd place by 3:21. I was so excited to be getting on the podium. I thought it was weird that they announced my time as 1:16:45 when I got called up, but I figured it was just a mistake.

Men's Overall Podium. Congrats to Jeff Yeager on his 2nd place overall!

Men's and Women's Overall podium

Finally getting to stand on the #1 box at a road triathlon!

Men's 25-29 podium

    I get home and check out the results the following day and see that there is a 2 minute time penalty listed next to my name. That's weird. Nothing was listed at the race. I was instantly upset because I thought that they had penalized me for coming into transition area too fast on my bike. I knew I had dismounted before the line and there is no rule on how fast you can come into the transition. It seemed logical with all the yelling I had heard when I did it. So I shot an email to the official and he gave me a full explanation. They had penalized me for passing that guy on the right. An official on a moto was about 200 yards behind us and saw me pass to the right. I was less upset about this penalty, but still not happy about it because I felt I had to do it to avoid crashing. The official was so far behind that he couldn't see the near crash, just me cutting right. He went on to say that the oncoming lane was clear and I should have passed there. What?!!! That blows my mind. Never before have I been told to cross the yellow line and make a pass. He had a full write-up of the scene which is what bothered me. It was not correct. He said the guy that brake-checked me completed his pass of the other rider before the turn and I did not allow adequate time for him to pass before I passed. That's not possible because we went through the turn single-file and I didn't pass the guy that he supposedly passed until after the corner, so I know he didn't make the pass before the corner. I didn't argue it because the official saw what he saw and unless he was up there with us, he couldn't have seen what really happened. Still, I am not happy about it (as you can probably tell) because it looks bad on me. I've already heard a few things said about how I'm having to break the rules to do well in triathlons. That's fine, talk some trash. It's going to take more than a stupid penalty to take my win away. Even with the 2 minute penalty I still won by 1:21. Just more motivation to give it 110% in every event I compete in.

    I want to thank my sponsors Maxxis and First Endurance. The new Maxxis Cormet tires were super fast and First Endurance supplied me with the nutrition I needed to stay strong the entire event. I used their EFS Liquid Shot during the race and a bottle of Ultragen afterwards to aid in recovery. And of course, I'm using the awesome Optygen HP daily to help me recover from all this training I've been doing. In addition to my sponsors, I have to thank my wonderful wife, Shannon, for making this married man ride faster than he ever has before!

Wednesday Night Finale

     My mountain training weekends and the Fontana SERC were all part of a build-up for the Gateway Cup in St. Louis. My training plan was for a lot of hard rides prior to our wedding on August 13. Then I would have a rest week and a few tune-up rides following the wedding. The build-up ended with the 11th race of the NashvilleCyclist.com Crit. Series in Nashville. I was little nervous doing a crit. just three days before the wedding, but I knew I needed to dig a little deeper to end this large-volume block of training.

    With the race coming just a few days after the very difficult and draining Fontana SERC, you can probably guess that I was a little off. I was not very active during the race, only following one break that didn't go anywhere. The pace was fast and it kept things together. We would have a bunch sprint for third after 2 riders got away in the closing laps. I was sitting in a good spot on the last lap, but was not aggressive enough to hold a good position coming into the sprint. A few of the other riders came by and just took my spot. I didn't really realize what was happening until it was too late. They basically ran me out of the group. They did it in sort of a weird way, almost acting like I had no business being up there anyway. That kind of pissed me off considering I have been up there consistently. I felt that it was a "get out of my way, you can't sprint" move. I had a good sprint left and weaved through the traffic from about 10th to take 4th in the field sprint. That gave me 6th place overall. I wasn't thrilled with the sprint because despite the fatigue, I still had enough left to take that sprint, but my lack of aggression to hold my position cost me the chance to take it. Though I was still happy with 6th on an off-day, and very happy to be going home in one piece with the wedding on the horizon. A 25.4 mph crit. was a good end to my training block...or so I thought. I ended up riding 57 miles with the group in Clarksville the next night, powering a breakaway for most of the way. After that, I got some well-deserved rest.

Photo by Tammy Richardson. She had to capture my last race as a single guy.

Course layout for Race #11

     After the wedding and a good week of rest, it was time to climb back on the bike and loosen up the legs with some racing. With just two weeks to go until St. Louis, I was hoping to see some progress and good form starting to shine through. I had one day of riding to open up the legs before catching the 14th and final race of the NashvilleCyclist.com Crit. Series. I was excited to see how I would do following a rest break. The night was a hot one. The course was changed up tonight. It featured a gentle climb up to the finish line, preceeded by a left 180-degree turn with 250 meters to go. The rest of the course was fast and open. After a quick pre-ride, I thought that a break would stick tonight. The hill was just tough enough that it would likely split the group up after 20-30 minutes of pounding. Historically, the last race of this series is always fast. If my training plan was designed right, I would be prepared for anything they could throw at me.

     There were some crashes in the early races, including a last-lap crash in the Cat. 4s that caused our start to be delayed. I saw the ambulance get called out at least twice before our race began. I was expecting that last turn to be sketchy during our race as well. We had over 30 riders. Race promoter, Tim Hall, is the cycling coach at Cumberland University. His new recruits were on hand as they had arrived in town with the start of classes just around the corner. Shannon and I both got off work early tonight. Our friend, Pat, also joined us. She had never seen a race before.

New course for Race #14

Pro/1/2/3 group on the start line

Video: Pro/1/2/3 start

    With the delayed start, we were told that most likely we would have to shorten our race due to darkness. Nobody had really tested the LP Field parking lot lights. None of us were sure if we going 30 minutes or 40 minutes when we began the race. It was super fast from the beginning. Attacks were going every lap on the small hill. I was towards the back, but just stayed patient. Sitting in the group for a whole crit and then hammering the finish really helps me hit my peak with training. I didn't plan to attack, just wait and see how things developed for a sprint.

Video: Attacks were frequent during the early laps

     Nobody really got away the first 20 minutes. Then Travis Werts and John Carr got away and nobody really wanted to chase. Those two are dangerous, so I came to the front to help Andy Reardon. We didn't necessarily want to bring them back right away. That would just provoke further attacks. And we had already had a bunch of attacks when we were rolling over 30 mph. We just wanted to keep the duo close. After a few pulls, Andy noticed that we had a little gap. I guess the group just let us go. We bridged across to Werts and Carr, making a strong 4-man group. Apparantly, the group noticed we were a strong combo and decided they better chase. We lasted a few laps, but they eventually pulled us back into the fold.

Video: Travis Werts and John Carr go off the front

Video: Our break of four gets caught by the group

     The break hurt me a little and I had to drop back in the group to recover. The lights came on as darkness fell. They were more than sufficient so the officials let us race the full 40 minutes. It was really cool to finish under the lights. The group stayed together and the bunch sprint was inevitable with 3 laps to go. I was licking my chops at the chance to go for the win. Biker's Choice did a nice leadout the final 2 laps for Tanner Hurst. They set him up perfectly. We almost crashed through the 180 turn coming to one lap to go. That really strung the group out further.

     Matt Schupp set a torrid pace the final lap. I was sitting 4th on the backstretch. I was NOT going to get knocked out of my spot this week. The same few riders tried to take my spot, but I held my ground and we exchanged some elbows going into the next turn. Schupp pulled off just before the final turn, giving Tanner the perfect chance to jump away for the win. But he didn't go, and everybody hesitated behind him. I saw the opportunity and exploded out of the group, leading into the last turn with a gap. Only one rider had reacted to my attack. He was one of the young Cumberland University riders and he held more speed through the hairpin than I did. He had a good sprint left too and accelerated faster than me out of the turn. He would beat me, but I held on for 2nd. The two of us had a nice gap over the group behind that had a tight race of 3rd. We ended up with a 26.1 mph average speed for the night.

Pro/1/2/3 podium for Race #14

     I was pumped with that effort. Being so close to the win and not getting it sucked, but I knew I was right on track for St. Louis. It was also the first time I have done well when Shannon has come with me. I'm glad she finally got to see me show a little potential. It was also a good result to shut up those people who were talking about how getting married had really caused me to get out-of-shape. I don't think so!

Wedding Bliss

     I am now a married man! The wedding took place August 13 and it was great. It was nearly a flawless experience. I don't really know what I was expecting, but it went WAAAAYYYY better than I was thinking it would. We got hings kicked off on Friday with a family dinner after I got off work. My family all lives close by, but Shannon's family had to drive down from northern Indiana and Michigan. She also has family out in Utah. They couldn't make the trip due to one of her cousins also getting married on the same weekend (we called the date first...just saying). Our families got to mingle while we chowed on Steve's Famous BBQ. I met Steve through work. He makes killer BBQ and was more than happy to cook some for our occasion.

Shannon and I enjoying the family dinner on the eve of our wedding

     After the dinner, we finished the set-up of the church. Shannon and I were hoping to go out and do something together, but we never got the chance. The dinner clean-up and wedding set-up just took too long. My wedding morning started early with a bachelor ride. Keith came over to the house. He, my Dad and I went out for a 22-mile ride. It was supposed to be an easy ride, but you know how that goes. It was attack after attack the entire ride. We were all feeling it by the time we got back. Then it was time to get ready and head to the church.

      The wedding ceremony was quick. Our coworkers were trying to guess how long the ceremony would last. They had the Price Is Right rules, closest to the time without going over. Shannon's boss's wife got the closest. It lasted a little over 10 minutes. Pictures were quick and painless. I think that was the part I was most concerned with. We had limited time to get them in before the reception and I really despise taking pictures. Caroline A. Evey did our official pictures. She's a friend of ours and did a great job. I highly recommend her so look her up if you need a photographer!

    Shannon had a great idea to place a different cake on each table during the reception. We had some of the best cakes and one heck of a food spread thanks to the Austins. You guys are the best! My parents surprised us with a wedding decorated tandem, complete with cans and the "Just Married" sign. Shannon and I didn't ride it. We didn't want to get nasty bike grease all over her white wedding dress. But do not fear, it did get ridden, only it was Keith and I on it instead of the bride and groom!

     Here's a few of Caroline's pictures:

The rings on the church sign prior to the ceremony

A group shot of all the people that attended the ceremony

Amber, Shannon and I after the ceremony

On the tandem decorated just for us

You can pretend you signed the guest book if you just rub your finger across the screen

One of the many cakes that decorated the tables in the reception hall

     Some photos taken by my Grandfather:

My Dad with the tandem

Keith and I on the tandem

     Picture of Keith and I riding the tandem taken by Dina:

     We spent a few days in a cabin just north of Springfield, TN. It was a nice cabin with an even better landscape around it. Nestled in a little hollow, a rocky ridge surrounded the rear of the cabin. Two creeks cut through the property, one fed by a spring, the other fed by an undergound creek that emerged from a cave. Of course we brought bikes and were able to explore the local farm roads. The weather was perfect! We followed the ride with some creek and cave exploration. I wanted to go through the cave, but the entrance was a 20 foot vertical shaft. With no rope handy, it was a no-go for cave exploration.

The great sight of bike stuff in the cabin

We went out cruising the backroads on our first ride as husband and wife.

It was a beautiful day on my favorite kind of roads.

Our cabin for the week.

One of two creeks cutting across the property.

The creek leading to the cave

Where the underground creek emerges from the earth

Me climbing the rock wall in search of the cave entrance

Made it to the top!

More than one morning we woke up to the sound of turkeys in the backyard

    One afternoon, we bought a case of root beer and sat in the creek. The water coming out of the cave was cold which was refreshing and good for keeping the root beer cold.

Nothing better than a natural cooler

Keeping it cold as it's enjoyed

     We ended our wedding week with a trip up to northern Indiana to visit Shannon's family and have a reception in Goshen for her Indiana friends. We camped  at Starve Hollow Lake Recreation Area in southern Indiana along the way to break up the drive. It rained the whole time we were there, but it was still fun to camp.

Looking across Starve Hollow Lake early in the morning. The water level was way down due to a project to remove sediment deposits in the lake. Made for an ugly bog in most places.

     The reception felt a little weird since the wedding had been over for a week. It was good to meet some of her friends and friends of the Toney family. The main food was muffins, which is my most favorite food in the world. We had all varieties of muffins and had tons left over to snack on for the next few days. The reception was in a nice neighborhood that had a pond at the back. We got to take a paddle boat ride around the pond which I thought was really cool.

Some leftover muffins

Shannon and I cruising the pond in the paddle boat

After a lap of the pond, we went back to shore and picked up Amber and her two roommates, Victoria and Holly. We almost had more weight than the little boat could handle!

      We ended the weekend in South Haven, MI again. It seems all of our trips up north end in South Haven. We can't stay away from the place! Amber was having a birthday party, and celebrated it with some tubing on Lake Michigan. I enjoyed the tube ride and the relaxation time on the beach.

Dark clouds moving across the lake in the late afternoon

    It was a great week and I am so happy to be married to the greatest woman in the world. I want to thank everyone for the help setting up and cleaning up, for the support and attendance of the ceremony and receptions, for the wedding gifts, and for leaving us alone for a week so we could spend some uninteruppted time together! Thank you all!