Race Coverage

"The Human Body Makes No Damn Sense"...

Thursday, 04 September 2014 00:10

By Matthew Payne (mattew-payne.blogspot.com)

(Friday, August 29) - Well damn... it's Labor Day weekend and the tri season is all but over. My July and August races were a mixed bag, although some of that is due to higher expectations from doing so unexpectedly well in the early part of the season. One of these days I'll get this periodization crap figured out and avoid peaking in early June. But until then, expect more of the following...

Lake Waconia Tri

I don't remember much about this race other than how I felt before and after it. The whole week leading up to the race I had a sore throat and just generally felt like shit. Race morning was no different and I woke up feeling like total garbage, but being a dumbass I decided to go ahead and race anyway.

I ended up racing surprisingly well given the circumstances and took the win. But the real win was that racing somehow miraculously cured my illness. I literally felt better after the race than any time in the 5 days before. And I don't mean after as in a few hours after finishing when I'm cleaned up and fed. I'm talking about standing...

there in the finish chute while the volunteers took my chip off.  Baffling. Illogical nonsense like this is a big part of why I choose to make my living as a mechanical engineer designing inanimate objects. At least there's some logic there. The human body makes no damn sense.

Lifetime Fitness Tri

I raced decent here. Not spectacular, not awful, I'd give it a good solid B for effort. That was good enough for 2nd in the elite amateur race. At the end of the day I doubt it matters much as the winner Steve Mantell is on another level entirely and beat me by 3+ minutes. My A+ best case scenario on that course is maybe a minute faster on the bike and 30 seconds faster on the run, which would have netted me 2nd place 1:30 back instead of 3 minutes back.  Ah well... on to the next one. READ MORE