Kansas City Triathlon 5150 Series- Race Preview

Sunday, May 20th will mark my first triathlon of 2012!  The Kansas City Triathlon, part of the 5150 series put on by WTC (the "Ironman" brand), will take place at Longview Lake in Missouri.  I will be doing the Olympic Distance, which officially is a 1.5km swim, 40km bike, and 10km run!

Although not my A-priority race (Ironman Kansas!), I still want to perform well in my age group. With the race being put on by WTC, the top 15 in each age group are qualified to race at the Hyvee Triathlon 5150 US Championships in September.  The "Ironman Branded" race has brought in significantly more athletes when compared to previous years.  Last year, I heard there were about 700 people doing both the Olympic and Sprint distances.  This year, the totals should be almost 1400.  Quite the increase!  And this will be the biggest race I've done!

Packet Pickup:
Packet pickup went really well for me. I purposely arrived at 3:30, in the hopes of avoiding the 'afterwork' crowd.  This was a perfect plan!  There were actually more volunteers than athletes, which is kinda rare...

The packets themselves contained the usual ingredients:  Swim cap, race bib, bag/tote, lots of coupons and other race information, Gatorade water bottle, and T-shirt.  The shirt wasn't "tech", which clearly pissed off some lady in front of me, who apparently was really hoping for a new tech shirt.  I could care less, but they did say they would have tech tees for race participants, so maybe the psycho chick was justified.

I ball so hard 24/7. 356!!!
PS if you are racing and see this, slow down please...

I was more irritated from the lack of information contained in the packets themselves.  If you follow Ryan, aka the Godfather of KC's multisport blogging scene, you are quite aware of the problems with the Race Director/staff communication to athletes.  In the race packet itself, there was no race day information WHAT SO EVER!!! That's just crazy to me!  I've had to rely on a few briefly worded emails from the RD, and their Facebook page!  Thank goodness I spend most of my free time on some type of social media outlet!  Okay, that's enough ranting, but I just hope this isn't a sign of things to come raceday.  I just seems incredibly unorganized for an event this size.

After picking up my packet, I practiced transitions. My girlfriend made fun of me...

Practice makes perfect, daaayummn...

Race Goals:
I have a few goals that I'm hoping to shoot for in the race.

1.  Most Important- I don't want to re-injure my hip... and it hasn't been feeling great since my last 10 mile run on Wednesday... I have been icing, foam rolling, and stretching like crazy, but I'm hoping a 6 mile run won't re-aggravate the injury.  
2. Swim- I would like to see <1:45/100y average, but honestly, I wouldn't be against something slightly slower.  I care more about sighting better, holding a straight line to the course markers, and  drafting efficiently. 
3. Bike-  Although this will be my longest race to date, I would like this to be my fastest bike split at a race.  Currently, my bike split PR in a race is 18.02 mph (average over 9 miles) at the Shawnee Mission Triathlon last year.  The race Sunday will be just under 25 miles, and I hope to break 19 mph, depending on wind conditions and needing to slow down/speed up around other athletes.  I would REALLY like to see something close to 20mph, but I'd settle for 19 mph if it set me up for a good run!
4. Run- See goal 1.  I have a time goal (keeping it to myself), but I want to have the mental strength to back off if I start to feel my hip hurting.  I have a LONG race in June that would SUCK to do injured... Another problem with my specific run goal deals with the amount of people on the run course.  The gravel path the run course takes place on is about 5 feet across, and MOST of the 1400 athletes should be hitting the run around the same time. Could make for some intense traffic jams...
5. Transitions- I will be wearing a wetsuit for the 2nd time in a race, and hope that my first transition (T1) is faster than my first go around.  My T1 time from last year while wearing a wetsuit was 4:41.  I need to be that SIGNIFICANTLY faster. My second transition (T2) usually goes smoothly, mainly because I wear no socks.  Under 1:15 for sure!
6. Overall Time- I need to have a time goal, right?  I'm shooting for 2:37:00.  I wouldn't be surprised if I went faster or slower, depending on what's going on in the race, but that's what I'm gunning for!

That's it for my goals!  I would like to say that I want to qualify for Hyvee, which I do, but that depends on the other athletes. If I do what I know I'm capable of, I should be close to qualifying.  I will say, though, if I see someone in my age group close to the finish, I will be hunting them down... But I definitely would anyway (like a lion...)!

Other than my somewhat achy hip, I feel pretty good heading into the race.  I know finishing won't be a problem, which should allow me to push a bit harder, especially on the bike.  My training has been fairly consistent, and I'm ready to see where I'm at!

Follow me on Twitter for my race status and results!  If not, check back soon for a race report!  

Thanks for reading, and wish me luck!