Race week started out a bit wonky as our flight was delayed over 5 hours and we were concerned we would not make it to Nice for another 2 days! They finally fixed the plane and we got a hotel at the Paris airport and managed to find seats on a new flight to Nice the next morning. We did make new friends in the process, so it was all good.
We stayed with Kenny Glah's group and
headed out for a recon of the bike course on the day of arrival which was
great. I elected to do 5K of the final bit of the climb followed by about
2/3rds of the descent. I met some lovely people from Argentina that we
rode with much of the time. The course did look a bit more ominous than I
was expecting, but it turned out to be one of my favorite
courses I have raced on.
Overall, the week was great and I was
excited to see what I could do on race day. I had a perfect lead up to this particular
event as I was injury free and had the most spectacular coaching from Bek Keat that had me both physically and mentally ready to give it my all. I was really ready to leave it all out there.
Race day came along and it was quite
windy out and much cooler than anticipated. They called the swim wetsuit
legal that morning (which wasn't the case the next day for the men). They
started the swimmers by age group with 10 going at a time every 15
seconds. I lined up in the 4th group so was 1-minute back of the leaders
in our age group of about 200 women (an all-time 50-54 record I think!).
After jostling over those pointy rocks on shore, I was off. I felt
fabulous the whole time in the swim and tried to push myself a bit more than
usual as I knew I had the swim fitness to do so. I found some perfect
feet, but they only lasted a few minutes as the girl was going too far off
course for me to follow her. Much of the time I spent swimming solo with
no draft. In the final leg, I was swimming next to another gal and we were going the exact same speed. I decided to
drop back behind her and cruise for a while as it was much easier in the draft
and I was going the same speed as earlier. There was a lot of chop and
currents in the swim and that made for a longer swim for everyone. Regardless, I knew I had a great swim and went flying through
T1, feeling really light on my feet and strong.
The bike leg was really
excellent. I loved it and I couldn't believe how strong I felt on the bike.
It was fun, even on the 90-minute climb. Nobody passed me on the bike
until the final 2K of the climb, when a pack of 3 younger athletes passed me. I
passed one gal from Germany in my AG near the top of the climb who ended up 3rd
in our AG (she descends like a maniac and runs fast!) and got passed by the duathlon world champ at one
point (who I then passed again on the descent). I loved every minute of
the bike course. It was super
challenging and incredibly fun on the descent too! I even set a new FTP on the 90 minute climb
by 15 watts! I had the fastest
bike split in my age group, but not by much, and I had the Olympic gold
medalist from 2002 still ahead along with one other speedy descender.
Starting the run, I felt surprisingly
good! I was digging incredibly deep,
drawing inspiration from my coach and my best friend who was battling cancer. The
run course was flat and fast. It was one
of my best run performances in years despite getting outrun by 3 more stellar
women in my age group and not slowing down one bit in the process. It was truly a performance of a lifetime from
a personal and physical standpoint, but I managed to just miss the podium,
finishing in 6th place. It’s
the proudest 6th place I have ever encountered!
I want to give special thanks to my amazing husband Dean who
had a less than stellar day on the course, but is still my hero always, and
also to the Team Sirius Tri Club, my amazing coach, Bek Keat, AltRed (this
stuff is amazing), the Rocky Mountain Multisport Team and ENVE racing. It was a near perfect end to a perfect season
and I am so grateful.
P.S. I'm an AltRed ambassador, so if you want to try it for 15% off, enter code dhassel-altred.
