Race Preview : Chisago Lakes 70.3

I signed up for this race because it's a 70.3 and we've been toying around with the idea of doing an Ironman next year and this is my second 70.3. Due to the recent sprint tri I did, and how much fun I had at it, I suppose it's worth pointing out that I much prefer sprints to any other distance, I like the speed. So the 70.3s are confidence boosters that I can tolerate the distance, but also tolerate the time, and I put them on the schedule for that reason.


Race Info
This race is about 70 miles north of us, originally we planned on staying the night because my daughter will be doing her first traithlon on Saturday, but then we decided to just drive up twice. I've labeled the times we'll be getting up as kid-cracka (race starts at nine) and butt-cracka (race starts at seven.)

This swim is an out and back similar to Liberty, except I have heard a few horror stories about last year's race. Apparently, unlike Liberty, they do not have a "neutral zone", so if people drift across the line they will be heading into oncoming traffic. My first traithlon suffered from this problem, it's not awesome. Also according to the last email they sent out, the waves will be groups of 100. That's easily the largest swim wave I've ever been a part of. As for wetsuits, someone told me they look for a way to make it wetsuit legal, but based on the water temp at the Minneapolis tri, and the weather we've been having it doesn't seem likely.

The bike is a single 56 mile loop. According to the website it's mostly flat with just a few rollers.

I'll have to revise my definition of roller :) That one incline is 300 feet. It's also almost 4 miles.

The run is an out and back, or I guess it is most accurately described as a lollipop. Like Waconia it's along roads and not in a park. That basically means no shade.

Goals
Due to vacations over the last two weeks my workouts feel like they've been lacking, but I am feeling pretty good, at least on the bike, heading into this. My overall goal is to do better than Liberty, and that can be measured in two ways. One is by a better time, the second is by not walking the run. Either or both of those will be acceptable.

	Goal	Pace
Swim	33:30	1:35 per 100 yards
Bike	2:52	19.5 miles/hour
Run	1:58	9:00 mins/mile
Total	5:27

5:27 puts me a bit on the north side of mid-pack overall and closer, but still north of mid-pack, in my AG

33:30 for the swim is a full 4 minutes slower than Liberty, but no wetsuit makes the swim take longer.

19.5 on the bike should be doable. It's approximately the speed I did at Liberty which was also pretty flat, but didn't have the one 4 mile incline which is bound to take its toll.

Similar run goal as last time, the manta of the run will be 10 is faster than 18. Hopefully I won't need it, but if I want to walk that's what I'll try to use to keep from walking. Because running at 10 minutes per mile is way faster than walking at 18, and I know that 18 minutes per mile is quite an amble, but that's how fast I walk :)

I put 4 minutes for transitions, that should be sufficient.

Closing Comments
I'm feeling prepared, so lets see if that translates into results I am proud of. If I can stay with this plan, or close to it, I will do better than I did at Liberty. So we'll see.