Triathlon Collegiate National Championships- Day 1

by Lindsay

For those of you who don't know, over the past few months I had been agonizing over whether to run the Boston Marathon (on Monday, Patriot's Day) or compete at the USA Triathlon Collegiate National Championships in Lubbock, TX.  I had qualified for Boston at the 2009 NYC Marathon and signed up immediately- this was the race I had been training for.  When Nationals came on the horizon about 2 weeks later, I told my team I would be unable to go because I was committed to Boston (props to the guy on our team doing both!).  I had taken Monday off, my parents had taken the day off, and I was going to run that historic race that I was so privileged and lucky to qualify for.

Fast forward a few months to late February.  My marathon training was, well, sub-par.  My longest run to date had been an 8 miler and the marathon was only 2 months away.  I was facing down a punishing school schedule, a full 8 days off from training while on Spring Break in Japan (no complaints there!), and I still had to work up to and add 20 mi/week to my training schedule.  Frankly, it wasn't going to happen.  Also, I've struggled with injuries when I build up too quickly and knew this would put my and my knees at high risk.  The straw that broke the camel's back was that the tri team put out a last minute request for female competitors as they did not have enough to field a full team.  So with about 6 weeks to go before the races, I made the switch.

I had worked up to a full half marathon so I felt confident in my running for the Olympic distance triathlon (which ends in a 10K/6.2mi run).  However, I hadn't swum since late August and had put less than 100 outdoor miles on the bike.  That had to change, FAST!  And it did, and I enjoyed the shift in training away from just running.  While I'm nowhere near peak, I think my bike and swim are now up to acceptable levels, for an early-season race anyway.

So here I am in Lubbock, Texas.  Never been to Texas before and I don't imagine this is the best city to start, but oh well.  It's done nothing but rain and that's not expected to let up all weekend.  The city/town is nothing to speak of but the hotel is nice enough.  I've enjoyed getting to know my new teammates and am sharing a room with 3 of the girls.  We have enough to field a full team on both the men's and women's side and I'm looking forward to seeing how competitive we will be.  There are a lot of tough teams here from triathlon hotbeds like CA and CO, but there are other northeastern schools who also deal with the reality of a harsh winter.  Today was just a travel day and putting our bikes back together, but tomorrow we get more info on the race and do some running and cycling tuneups.  Then we wait...  until the big race on Saturday!  I'll be blogging each day to let you know how it goes, and more on the collegiate triathlon scene, which really is the future of this sport.