Guillermo Guerini

Race Report: Boston Triathlon 2017

Tue, 08 Aug 2017 20:10:03 -0400

Background:

It was my second time doing the Boston Triathlon (and my second Olympic distance). Last year, my only two goals were: to finish it and have a good time. I didn’t put a lot of hours into training but this year I wanted to use this race as a preparation for my first Ironman Lake Placid 70.3 in September. For this reason, I was expecting to do reasonably better.

Goals

Goal	Description	Completed?
A	Under 2:45	*Yes*
B	Under 2:40	*Yes*
C	Under 2:35	*Yes*

Training:

I officially started training for Lake Placid 70.3 in March. I’ve been using TraineRoad’s training plans, but mostly for the bike part. Since I’m a terrible swimmer, I’ve been trying to swim 3 times a week and run 3/4 times. In a good week I managed to train for 6h/7h, peaking at 8h (due to long bike rides), but in a not-so-good weeks I only trained for 3h/4h, or less. You know, life happens sometimes. Looking in retrospect, I wish I had followed a proper training plan, instead of mixing TraineRoad’s bike workouts with scattered swimming and running workouts here and there. I can’t change that now, but at least I was consistent with my training.

Training totals (since March 1st):

Swim: 41.00 mi / 25:34:48 - 47 activities
Bike: 739 mi / 45:58:26 - 46 activities
Run: 295 mi / 42:41:46 - 62 activities

Pre-race:

I checked-in my bike the day before and I’m glad I did that. One less thing to worry about on race day. On Sunday morning, I woke up at 4:50, had my usual race breakfast (toast with peanut butter and banana), had some coffee and drank coconut water. I arrived at the race around 6am and went straight to the transition area to setup my equipment. This is something I need to practice more - more on this subject later. I put my wetsuit on and headed to the swim start.

Swim:

Before I start, I’d like to quickly recap my last year’s race. As I mentioned before, I’m a terrible swimmer. My last year’s swim time was 0:39:21 (average 2:06 min/100 yd). Yes, pretty bad. But I wasn’t training 3x a week nor going as far as I did this year and I didn’t have a wetsuit. On top of that, I decided to start in the last wave, geared towards beginners. That was probably the right decision, but it delayed my start for almost an hour. So, it was a long time between breakfast and the race. By the end of the swim, I was already exhausted, hungry, thirsty and I had a hard time transitioning into the bike because my legs were cramping.

I learned my lesson. This year, I was in the second wave instead of the last. I also had a gel 15 minutes before the start and sipped water throughout the morning. When the gun went off, off I went. The water wasn’t too crowded but it took at good 5 minutes until people dispersed. Unfortunately, I could tell there was something wrong. It felt like my right arm had a restrictive movement and every stroke felt like my shoulder was being dislocated. It’s hard to explain, but it was painful. I must have put the wetsuit on incorrectly. I practiced OWS with my new Roka Maverick at least three times before the race and never had that issue. Eventually I found a stroke that wouldn’t hurt. Besides that, the swim went really well. This year my sighting was pretty good and I was able to follow the buoys closely.

Time: 0:31:50 (average 1:46 min/100 yd). That’s 7 minutes faster than last year!! I couldn’t be happier. I guess all the training paid off (and the wetsuit too!)

T1:

The transition was approximately 1/4 mile from the beach. My legs did cramp again, but this time for only a few seconds. I wasted some time taking the wetsuit off because it got stuck on the timing chip (neoprene strap) that was around my ankle. Next time, I will try to keep the wetsuit on top of the strap. I got my bike, shoes, helmet, sunglasses, a gel and a bar.

Time: 3:25 (25 seconds slower than last year - 2:50)

Bike:

The beginning of the bike leg was perfect because there weren’t a lot of people on the road. Mainly the pros and people from my age group. The race organizers changed the running course, freeing the entire road for the bikes. This was an excellent change and made the course safer and faster. However, I was frustrated because I forgot that my tri top doesn’t have pockets in the back and I didn’t have a place to keep the gel and the bar. I eat the bar straight away and held the gel until the last lap (4 laps total). Bummer.

I was pushing hard on the bike because I thought that all those hours spent in the basement using TrainerRoad and watching Netflix would translate into a better time. But I guess I wasn’t taking into consideration the wind. I can’t remember how bad the wind was in 2016 (I now regret not writing a race report), but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t as strong as this year. I was constantly fighting the head-wind for almost 2/3 of the course.

In the beginning of the last lap, I took the gel in preparation for the run. Right after that, I heard a noise coming from my rear wheel. I decided to stop to check it out but I couldn’t see anything. I kept going because at that point it was only 4mi/6km until the end. The last lap was harder than the previous laps, as expected, but once I arrived at the transition I noticed my rear tire was pretty low. I was glad it was over.

Time: 1:06:03 (average 19.0mph/30.5kmh). That’s 4 seconds slower than last year (1:05:59). I’m not gonna lie.. I was disappointed.

T2:

That’s the moment I became aware that I need to practice the transition more. When I got there, I couldn’t find my running shoes. At first I thought someone took them by mistake… but I quickly realized I forgot to take them out of my transition bag. Face palm. At least I didn’t forget to take off my helmet (yeah, I’ve seen people running with their helmet on). I put my running shoes on, got my race belt and off I went again.

Time: 2:18 (16 seconds faster than last year - 2:34)

Run:

I didn’t run well last year because I was recovering from an IT-Band issue. I’m glad this is behind me now (knock on wood) and I’ve been running consistently and doing my long runs almost every weekend. My expectations were pretty high and I was hoping to keep a 8:15/8:20 min/mi pace. To my surprise, the first 15 minutes I was running at about 8min/mi. At first I thought my Garmin was acting up, but then I checked my heart rate and confirmed the higher than usual number. I was able to keep that pace the entire run, only slowing down twice to drink Gatorade. When I approached the transition area I pushed even harder, to a stunning 6:50min/mi pace to finish the race strong.

Time: 47:59 (average 7:53 min/mi). Another 7 minutes shaved off from last year’s race (55:07). I was stoked! It went much better than I thought.

Total Time

2:31:42

I was 14:06 faster than 2016 (2:45:48).

Conclusion:

I went into this race knowing that I was more prepared and expecting to finish reasonably faster. I’m extremely happy with both my swimming and running improvements. In reality, all the gains came from these two sports. But I can’t deny I’m slightly disappointed with my bike performance. Oh well, the only thing I can do now is to prioritize my training in the next few weeks.

What’s next

My next race, Ironman Lake Placid 70.3, is coming up. This is my 2017 “A” race. It’s exciting and terrifying at the same time. Lake Placid has a challenging course: 4,006ft/1220m gain on the bike and 802ft/245m on the run and it’s my first Half Ironman distance. It hasn’t been easy to find hills with that kind of elevation around Boston, MA, but I’m doing my best. I will keep training hard and get ready for it but I’m confident I have a good training base and I will be ok in the end.

Course video

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Photos

Quitting Social Media

Fri, 02 Dec 2016 08:15:00 -0500

The excerpts below are from Cal Newport’s article Quit Social Media. Your Career May Depend on It.:

My second objection concerns the idea that social media is harmless. Consider that the ability to concentrate without distraction on hard tasks is becoming increasingly valuable in an increasingly complicated economy. Social media weakens this skill because it’s engineered to be addictive. The more you use social media in the way it’s designed to be used — persistently throughout your waking hours — the more your brain learns to crave a quick hit of stimulus at the slightest hint of boredom.

Once this Pavlovian connection is solidified, it becomes hard to give difficult tasks the unbroken concentration they require, and your brain simply won’t tolerate such a long period without a fix. Indeed, part of my own rejection of social media comes from this fear that these services will diminish my ability to concentrate — the skill on which I make my living.

The idea of purposefully introducing into my life a service designed to fragment my attention is as scary to me as the idea of smoking would be to an endurance athlete, and it should be to you if you’re serious about creating things that matter.

Read the full article here

Boston Triathlon Countdown

Sun, 24 Jul 2016 18:20:01 -0400

In less than 7 days, I’ll do my first Olympic distance Triathlon. I can feel the excitement building up and I know it’s only going to get “worse” from now on. This will be my second triathlon. In 2014 I wanted to do something challenging to celebrate my 30th birthday and I signed up for a Sprint distance (0.25mi/400m swim, 10mi/16km bike, 3.1mi/5km run). It was a great experience and I knew I would do more triathlon events in the future.

Last year, to celebrate my 31st birthday, I ran a full marathon. That race was definitely way more difficult than a sprint triathlon but it was the moment I realized I was ready to take bigger challenges and see where my body could take me.

So this year I signed up for the Boston Triathlon, which will take place at Carson Beach, South Boston. I’ll be swimming 0.9mi/1.5km, biking 22mi/35km and finishing with a 6mi/10km run. Still not as challenging as a marathon but this is the first step towards higher goals. I’m looking at you Ironman.

Training

I’ve been trying to focus my training on the swim and bike parts. Swimming is, like many people, my weakest sport. I never thought I’d be able to swim 1mi non-stop, but I’m almost there. I’m aware my technique is ~~terrible~~ not so great but I didn’t have time to relearn how to swim, improve my strokes and get the endurance needed in a short period of time. Lots of room for improvement here.

Cycling is also a “new” sport for me. I’ve had many bikes throughout my life but I’ve never seen it as a sport. The purpose of a bike was to take me to places. That’s still the case but it’s also an essential part of a triathlon. I recently brought my dad’s road bike from Brazil and I’ve been having a lot of fun with the long rides. I also bought a trainer (Tax Vortex Smart) that will allow me to improve my skills right in my basement, specialty during the Boston’s brutal winters.

Last but not least, my favorite sport: running. This is the sport I’m more familiar with. I’ve been running for a long time and I really enjoy it. The only problem is since my marathon back in October ‘15 I’ve been struggling with my IT band. I should have gone to a doctor, but I decided to use Dr. Google instead. It’s definitely better and the pain I feel when I go for longer runs is not nearly as bad as it used to be, if it hurts at all. But I regret not taking care of it from day one.

Overall, I think I’m in good shape and I’ll be able to swim + bike + run, hopefully, without issues. I’m looking forward to next weekend and I’m pretty sure I’ll have a good time.

Doing stuff

Tue, 15 Mar 2016 21:02:04 -0400

I’ve noticed that I’m able to accomplish more when I’m accountable and committed to something and the most efficient way I found is to write down a plan, acting on it and following up with the progress. If there’s no progress, it usually means I’m not following the plan or I’m not doing the right thing. Sometimes it’s not so simple, but pretty much all the things I was able to accomplish lately, always follow this pattern.

For example, last year I ran my first marathon. I’ve been a ~~inconsistent~~ “runner” for a very long time. I used to run the same distance at the same pace for a few weeks or months, then I’d stop for a month or two. Repeat. If you are into running you know it’s hard to improve doing the same thing over and over again, or even worse, not doing it at all. In order to run a marathon (26mi/42km) you need to run a lot. Consistently. How could I go from 3mi to 26mi? Easy: finding a marathon plan and following it. This is exactly what I did. It worked for me and millions of people have done that too.

Have a plan

The most important thing for me was to know how to get to the, lets say, finish line. Everyday I knew the amount of miles I would run that day. I knew where I wanted to go (my goal) and how to get there (the plan). On the other hand, if I didn’t have the plan, I would probably run a few miles a week and eventually give up. I would be lost, because it would be hard to improve and see my progress towards that goal. Running a marathon can be overwhelming, so can be anything else you want to do in life.

This could also be linked to creating habits. I really enjoy reading books. The problem, like running, was the consistency (or lack of). As many things in my life, I would start the job and not finish it. So what did I do? I decided to read a book like I trained for my marathon: having a plan and being consistent.

I usually wake up, drink a glass of water, write down 3 things I’m grateful for, and read 20 pages of a book. For the last 10 weeks, I have followed this new habit. As of today, I’m 100 pages into my 7th book. At that pace (7 books per 10 weeks) I’ll read about 36 books in the next year. Not bad.

I read this article back in December of 2015 and it got me thinking. If I dedicate some time to read 10/20 pages a day, I would be able to read a lot of books. Two months later, I’m already on my third book. If I keep this pace for another month or two, I am very confident to say that 2016 is going to be the year I read the largest amounts of books in my entire life. This is a huge accomplishment for me.

It’s ok not to be perfect

There were days during my training that I didn’t or couldn’t go for a 8mi run. Or I didn’t even feel like running at all. Life gets in the way sometimes. But guess what? I was still able to complete the race successfully. It wasn’t that day or those two days that would jeopardize the entire training. The crucial thing was to keep going and to stay motivated. It’s ok to break the streak, but don’t get too complacent, otherwise you will stray away from the path. If that happens, the chances are high that you will get lost.

Another good example, is this very blog post. It took me less than a hour to write 90% of it, but the remaining part, took me about two weeks. During that time I started having ideas about other things I wanted to write about but I got overwhelmed. I knew I would have to finish this article first, before I started something else. You know, one step at a time.

Use a little help

I’ve been using an app called Momentum. The idea behind the app is very simple: it helps you track your habits. The app suggests the most popular habits like “exercise”, “wake up early”, “keep a journal”, etc., or you can also create your owns. Then you setup the frequency and alerts.

Momentum is the simple, yet powerful, habit tracker that boosts your willpower and helps you reach your goals.

Every time you complete your “habit”, you log into the app. It’s very satisfying to see the streak growing day by day. I know it sounds silly, but many late nights I made an extra effort to floss my teeth to avoid breaking the streak. The same thing applies to the other habits I want to form.

If you don’t want to use an app, ask for a friend, a coworker or a family member to help you out. If people keep asking about your progress, you are more likely to do it. We don’t like to disappoint other people and/or ourselves. It’s important to be accountable!

Take away

We all can accomplish many things if we are ready to accept the challenge. Try to commit to something and follow it through. Have a plan and be consistent. Remember, you don’t need to be perfect, but persistent. Start doing something new today, not tomorrow. Challenge yourself. You will be surprised how far you can go.

Procrastination

Sun, 28 Feb 2016 17:15:04 -0500

Eight months ago I setup this blog. My first and only post was about the numerous times I started a blog that went nowhere. I guess this time is no different. Shrug.

Another blog

Fri, 05 Jun 2015 20:49:04 -0400

I can’t remember how many times I’ve started a blog in the past 10 years. I’m usually very excited in the beginning, but two or three posts later (yes, that much!), I would totally abandon it. Today, for some reason, I feel different. I have some exciting things to share and I’d like to start the habit of writing more. When I’m writing, I’m forced to slow down in order to organize my thoughts. My mind is always busy thinking about everything at the same time and I feel overwhelmed.

Let’s see how it goes. Welcome!