Leif Baradoy

2010 Canadian National Championships

This past weekend I raced as an elite male in the 2010 Canadian National Championships for Olympic distance triathlon.

Overall, I am pleased with my effort at this very competitive race. Like many Canadian triathletes, Nationals was one of my “A” races, or focus races, for this year.

This race had some great athletes in attendance—World Champions, Olympic medalists, Olympians . . . The 2010 Kelowna Apple Triathlon saw a record number of elite men and a stacked start-list, including Simon Whitfield, Kyle Jones, and Andrew Russell.

For the 2010 Canadian National Championships, I am the 19th fastest Canadian in the Olympic distance and I placed 37th overall (out of 64 elite men). Obviously, I have a great deal of room to improve but I am encouraged by this race (full results here). Thanks to my coach Noa Deutsch, I’ve come a long way in a single year while being a full-time graduate student (and working here and there)!

Like so many other athletes, I aimed to have my best race of the season in Kelowna. All my training and other races served to lead up to this race. I have one more race this year—ITU Age Group Triathlon World Championship in Budapest, Hungary—which will further improve upon my Kelowna race.

But let me share how Nationals went.

The elite men’s race started at 2pm. I got on race site around 10am, so I had ample time to watch some of the age-groupers finish and see the elite women race. All part of the plan. As usual, I had planned the days leading up to the race and the entire race day in a spreadsheet, which I followed—my own goofy way of staying sane (even though a few of my training mates made snide comments about my tri-geekness).

I was a little nervy before the race, but nothing significant. I’ve gotten used to that feeling. The hardest part was waiting. Once I began my run warm up, body-marking, bike checking, etc. I felt calm.

At my last ITU race in Coteau-du-Lac, Quebec, I failed to bring a wetsuit to warm up in and froze in chilly winds before the race. The weather was intermittently wet and cold at Kelowna so I’m glad I had a wetsuit, which kept me warm right until the race start.

The horn sounded. The race began in earnest. I had a solid swim and managed to get on a few people’s hips and feet for a large portion of the first lap. I felt fairly comfortable holding solid form. The water was a little choppy, but not too bad. Throughout most of the swim, I had people around me. I have a lesson to take away from the swim: I think I held a slightly less aggressive pace than I was capable of simply because I was in with other back-pack swimmers. I am certain I could have pushed myself more but got comfortable because there were other people around me (the logic: “I can’t be swimming that poorly, because there are others around me”). Nevertheless, I still had a very good swim. I suspect one of my best of the year.

After the 23:55 swim and T1, I was in 50th place. I knew I was way back but I didn’t let it bother me. The bike is where I planned to let my inner monster out. Headed out on my first of six loops, Matt Sharpe (who placed first in the Junoir National elite race the day previous) said “go catch those guys.” I smiled.

I caught up with a pack of about seven guys right at the bottom of Knox Hill (see A. Russell’s post on this make-or-break climb here). I stuck with them on the way up and for the first loop. There were few guys doing pulls and a few guys just riding the draft. By the time I was on the second lap, I made a move to drop them. Should have done so sooner.

I was alone for most of lap two until midway through lap 5. I had a strong bike and I find it interesting to see that my fastest lap was a lap I did solo (lap 3). I am very happy with my bike fitness, particularly because I did so much work alone and my bike time was only one minute more than the lead draft pack. I pulled a lot of guys on the bike but also dropped most of them. It wasn’t until the very end of lap five that two Canadian guys from QC caught up to me and we worked together. The hill was definitely a point of weakness for me. Being 6’3 and weighing in around 195 makes climbing hard! Still, the Knox Hill isn’t easy for anyone, so I can’t claim any disadvantage.

I loved the bike and I felt great. Six loops seemed short, even though the distance was actually more than 40km (I think it was 41.3km, if my memory serves). The Argon 18 Gallium Pro made a huge difference for this race and I want to thank SpeedTheory Calgary for helping me out with it.

The Run

I had a lousy T2 as I struggled to get my shoes on. Then the run was on. I went into this race with a different approach to visualization. Instead of visualizing the positive, I gave myself over to suffering and pain. I visualized hurt and pushing through pain to achieve and maintain speeds that properly reflect my fitness and training. I have trained to hurt and hold on and this race would be a test of my threshold. I gave a lot on the bike and I needed to keep pushing for the run.

I held a reasonable pace for the run (3:33/km). I know I can do better, but after a great bike that is what I had in me. Of course, hindsight always makes me doubt whether I pushed hard enough, but I have to take the run for what it was. I took a lot of energy from all the people cheering me on. I cramped up on laps two and three (left calf and stomach), but pushed through and didn’t slow. I managed to catch a couple people, although one guy who came off the bike with me out ran me and another guy from a back pack also caught me.

I kicked things up for the final 400m meters and I thought I was going to fall over. I left it all on the course.

So, I managed to move from 50th out of the water to 37th by the finish. I will continue to work on all aspects of my racing. Improvements in the swim will result in significant gains in my overall placing. And, of course, non-draft legal races will also play to my advantage. I’m looking forward to my final race for 2010 and preparing for the 2011 season.

I have come a long way since starting triathlon in June 2008. I’ve made some huge leaps forward in the past year. While part of me would certainly like to achieve a higher ranking, I need to remember that I can’t rush this process and I can’t fake the years of work it takes to excel in this sport. This is my first year racing as an elite! Not bad for anyone, especially someone pushing thirty with only two years of sport in his background. I feel that I am on track as a high performance athlete and I feel confident about where I’m going in the sport that I love. I will keep putting in the hours, working with my great coach, learning and suffering. Even better results will come. And I will know that I’ve earned them.

For the record, here are my times:
Swim: 23:55 (56th out of water)
Bike: 1:04:57 (19th fastest bike split and only 1 minute off lead pack time)
Run: 35:21 (36th fastest run)
Total Time: 2:06:15 (19th fastest Canadian and 37th overall)

Full results for the 2010 Men’s Elite National Championship can be found here.

Related posts:

• 2010 World Championships in Budapest
• 2010 Ixtapa Race Report
• Try This Tri 2009: First Race of the Season.