26th April 2009 Sunday, A "HOT" RAW Duathlon

Today was the inaugural Duathlon, and the organiser called it RAW Duathlon; start from basic.

I think the other reason to call RAW, probably because the hot sun cooked the raw meat out of the most participants. The weather was terrible, almost unbearable especially into the 3rd leg of the race. Fortunately the drink support by the organiser was excellent. Even during the 1st leg which started at 7.30am, I have already felt the heat of the sun. But cycling was not too bad as most part of the route was covered with tree shade.

For this race, I was targeting to do an effective-timing of 60min run, 80min bike and 60min run, that means 6min/km pace for the both run and 30km/hr cycle. Quite an unrealistic target, I knew, due to the fact that I did not really train for this race. Anyhow, I thought it was OK, just like to see how far would I be away from the target.

I started the run with Melvin Jr and Snr at, I think, 5 to 5.5 min/km. I felt their initial fast speed and slow down after less then 1km and decided to keep up with my own pace of 6min/km, not good to pace up with Jr who is young and very strong in his run, even though this was his maiden duathlon race and Snr, a full ironman veteran.

The 10km run comprised of 2 laps of 5km loop, running on high way on a complete flat land, without any trees around and wind, or merciful breeze. I completed the 1st leg at 60min, could felt the heat of the sun that I took 6 min in the transition area to cross over biking. I knew I had to do 30km/hr to clock 80min for the 40km which consist of 4 x 10km loop. Somehow I could not push up my speed to 30, I was constantly doing 26-29km/hr. I was conservative not to push too hard fearing that I would not able to pull thru my 3rd leg run, also because being intimidated by the heat in the 1st leg run. I completed the bike at 92min. Again took 8 min in the transition area to cross over to the run. I started the run with a very slow pace to ensure that I would not have cramp too early into the run, learning from the experience during Powerman in Lumut which I ran too fast in the beginning, got cramp after 600 to 800m and struggled badly with the rest of the distance. Came to the 1st drinking point after 200 m, I topped my my bottle to prepare to battle the heat for next 2 km before the next drinking pt. After 2 km cramp set in, and I had to apply "commonly known by endurance runner as run-rub-walk-run strategy (3-1, 4-2 or 5-2)" to finish the remaining distance. I "showered" myself with ice water at all the water points to cool off the scorching heat, and focusing on finishing off this race.

I crossed the finishing line with another sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. It was not a lustre performance as I was 30 min from my target of 3hr 20min, but I did enjoy this race challenging the scorching heat. Look forward to the same race next year with better preparation and better the timing, may be 3hr 20min, ya??

Breakdown of timing
10km run- 60min
40km bike - 92min
10km run - 78 min
Transition time - 14min
Total time = 4hr 4 min
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