Race Preview : Lakefront Days Sprint Triathlon

This triathlon has a special place in my heart. It was my first, and it's literally only three miles from my house. A pretty low key event, but there's still some speed to see there.


Race Info
This swim is an out and back with no "neutral zone" but if I remember correctly there are many buoys down the center line so they have effectively handled the problem they had the first year I did it which was having people cross over the center line into head on traffic. As for wetsuits, I'm pretty sure it wasn't legal last year, and I was just in lake Minnetonka which is enormous compared to this lake and it was pushing 80, so I'm going to say ... no way.

The bike is a 13.5 mile loop, it starts out kinda rolly, then settles down with only one little climb in it with a few miles to go. I am very familiar with this course.

The run is around the lake the swim is on, about 3.3 miles. Its through a park, but there are long sections of no shade due to a lack of big trees. It's sort of rolly, but no really tough hills.


Goals
Due to some supreme tiredness after Chisago, I took most of last week off. I was just super tired the entire week, and basically took the week off to deal with it. It's been brought to my attention that might mean a pretty significant calorie deficit in my diet, so that's something I'll have to work on, so I'm not feeling super confident about my energy reserves. But the goal will be the same as I talked about in December.

My goals for december looked like this

	Goal	Pace
Swim	6:14	1:25 per 100 yards
Bike	39:02	20.75 miles/hour
Run	27:30	8:20 mins/mile
Total	1:16

If I execute on that, that is good enough for top 20, and first overall in my AG.

Based on performances so far this year I might adjust these to be

	Goal	Pace
Swim	6:14	1:25 per 100 yards
Bike	38:30	21 miles/hour
Run	26:20	8:00 mins/mile
Total	1:14

If I execute on that, that is good for top 15.


6:15 on the swim is 20 seconds slower than lifetime. It's possible that at the Lifetime tri I was able to get significant draft advantage due to the time trial start which this race doesn't have. Or maybe I'll go sub six again and have the fastest overall swim split again.

21 is a little slower than Lifetime, but this course is a little hillier. I have been on a couple of rides recently though and felt pretty good. I will just try to stay focused on keeping in aero and holding up a good cadence.

26 is a good guess for reality for me for the run, I could throw down the 7:45 goal again, but honestly I'm tired of not making it, and it's only one minute more at this pace. Its roughly what I did at Lifetime and should be doable.

I took 30 seconds off my transitions from last year, but when I look at them they look pretty slow, so I'm thinking I can probably shave 30 seconds off pretty easily.

Closing Comments
It's easy to feel under-prepared for this due to last week, and honestly last month. My performance at Chisago has me feeling underwhelmed at my current physical level, but I think the reality is that I am in pretty good shape and I should be able to execute this. One sort of disappointing thing about this race, if I miss first in my AG and end up in second, no award :(