Logistics:
We waffled on fly vs. drive and what that would mean for our hotel reservation dates. This was driven by concern about how to get the bike there. Tri-bike transport was no longer operating and it looked like a road trip to see all the parks on the way would be a substantial detour.
By mid-March, we couldn't find any hotel rooms at any price in Salem. We found a peaceful lavender farm on Airbnb a scenic 30 minute drive away outside Silverton. Fri check in, Mon check out. If I were going back, I would try to reserve the tiny home on the property for a night in addition to the guest house because sleeping in a tiny is on my bucket list and it could let me get into an even more reclusive monk mode since my sherpa entourage (Jens and Fallon) stay up later and don't need to wake up as early.
We flew (LAX-PDX, Fri AM-Mon mid-day). We lucked out in that Coach Ingrid had a soft-sided Scion bike bag she was willing to lend. Wayne had experience with it and helpful tips to ensconce it in pipe insulation/pool noodles and remove the derailleur and even shared his packing material. Sherpa Jens elaborated on this approach with zip ties vs. painter's tape (don't forget to pack something to snip them open). He used dynema string to rotate the derailleur into a safer spot within the bike frame and ziptied it secure without needing to remove it. Bike went through oversized luggage undamaged both directions. The gear bags that came with it and wedge into the frame are slick, I could fit my entire transition kit in there. If you fly and there is a Fearless contingent driving, see if they can bring your co2 cartridges for flats ($5/ in expo).
Group check in was an unexpected upgrade. 14 Fearless training buddies "flash mobbed" race check in at 4PM Friday and a helpful volunteer captain was able to assign us numbers next to each other so we would be bike rack neighbors. I was worried I wouldn't be able to find my transition Ikea Bag because everyone on Fearless would be following the same Ingrid tip, but it wasn't an issue. Saturday morning, Fallon ran an Ironkids half mile while Jens assembled the bike (too bulky to fit in a Subaru Forrester rental car fully assembled), did a test ride to check the shifters left it in low gear, and staged the gear bag. It turns out they want you to tie your transition gear to the bike/rack bar overnight but thankfully, the Fearless teammates who came through later in the day could get my bag off the ground.
I wanted to see the swim start, so I walked there. It took almost half an hour each way. If I were new and doing it again, I would suggest biking over to look at it to save time. Some folks were actually swimming the whole route as a preview. If that is you, find one of those high viz swim buoys that doubles as a dry bag so you can drag your phone/minimal gear with you. You will swim it faster than a sherpa friend will need to walk your stuff back. People were also doing check out swims off the dock that is the end of the swim. The current isn't ripping too badly to swim against there. If I were doing it again, I would make sure to have water, a good sunscreen base, and/or Judene's parasol on hand. It was surprisingly hot and sunny and I got a little cooked and dehydrated during the race setup. Saturday, my crew headed to a Salem board game cafe for lunch and entertainment in the shade. I'm glad they didn't serve coffee because I would have partaken and had trouble going to sleep that evening.
25:10 Swim get up at 4AM, shellac self with Zealios sunscreen, choke down a muffin/cold coffee/chocolate espresso beans, leave Silverton 4:30 with a frozen water bottle for T2, sunglasses and my running shoes. Get to transition at 5:15, fill my aero waterbottle, wiggle into a wetsuit. I didn't pack Trislide because I thought aerosols weren't allowed on the plane. Untrue. Probably could have borrowed from a Fearless neighbor if things were really tight. I wore sacrificial socks for the walk to the swim start with a partial water bottle and a honeystinger. Worked great-- my toe was peeking out a new hole right around the last call trash cans and I didn't need to use/track down a morning clothes bag at the end. One thing I hadn't appreciated is that the seeded time sign people left transition at 5:45 and if you don't immediately attach yourself to "the fast group" per Ingrid instructions at departure, you are going to need to hot foot through the gravelly shoulder to get to the front. Not advisable in bare feet. Fortunately, Julia, Diane and Tony were in a similar predicament and we ended up in the 37-40? min group together. It did create some confusion for the rest of the race-- seeing Fearless and not knowing if they were 40 minutes deeper into their race or behind you based on where they had ended up in the swim line up. Swim itself was fast. We dropped in in groups of 4 and were spaced so far apart I only bumped into one person. There is kelpy stuff toward the finish and I climbed out feeling a little bit like swamp thing.
3:34:02 Bike My fueling plan was an aerobar bottle of water, and an entire 11-serving box of date coconut rolls (should hit 250 cals/hour target and I need to eat 1 roll every 20 mins or so). I don't have a power meter and Ingrid gave me basic instructions (stay over 13mph, HR in low 140s). Course was straightforward, not too hilly. Outside of a little stress about whether I was drafting and some TMI issues (wishing I had tied on the bandana for discrete snot management, Coeur shorts generous liner helping a lot with chafe but not completely eliminating it past mile 40 and should I have reapplied vaseline/buttr after the swim?) this was smooth sailing. I remembered the race reports from last year emphasizing wishing they had fueled more on the bike and was feeling pretty proud of myself having finished everything about 10 miles from the bike dismount. If I were doing this again, I would practice grabbing bottles out of the cages, refilling aerobottle on the wing, and passing/throwing out stuff at a simulated aid station. I had experimented once in training with tailwind in a bottle but the logistics of managing two hydration systems without being confident grabbing stuff out of cages was too much to bother with. I skipped the aid stations and biked self-supported.
2:23:56 Run We were lucky this year and it stayed relatively cool/overcast compared to the previous day and previous year's race stats. Overheating was still my main concern. I grabbed an oversized sport top bottle we had stashed in the freezer from my transition bag to start the run. I drank what I could of the melt and bowled the remainder to Jens and Fallon shortly out of transition. I like Ingrid's idea of chugging Pedialyte to start the run ("you are a raisin and you want to be a grape") but I hadn't trained with that and I wasn't sure what its freeze-thaw properties would be. I had a dry pack of LMNT I carried as emergency salt (and ended up licking some off my hand to break up a side stitch at mile 12). I tried to reach for the race day electrolytes (Mortal) at the first couple aid stations but went easy because I hadn't sampled these in training and even so, things got a bit sloshy/burpy. I was delighted to find the aid stations had ice and my routine settled into filling the shelf bra of my Fearless top with ice and then crunching a cube on the walk breaks. Generally, I had trained at 1:30 run, :30 walk but the course felt congested at the start and with athletes running two loops. I ended up running through "a handful" of 30 sec alerts (2:30) and walking :30 to just not feel like I was constantly passing people and then walking in front of them. This worked for the most part for 11 miles, but if running is not your happy place, I wouldn't recommend this experiment. I was delighted to stumble across Stephanie as we entered the finisher chute. I had no idea she was so close (the confusion of the staggered swim start) or I would've pushed myself a little harder to catch up with her earlier on the run. The run was largely in Minto Park so it was a quiet-run-through-a-cathedral-of-trees sort of vibe, not the sort of run where there is music blasting at you for the duration to keep your spirits up and your mind distracted. Company for some of it would have been good.
6:37:11 Total This surprised me as it was 58 minutes faster than the Santa Rosa time I posted at my last half 8 years ago (pre-kid) and which I had been carefully avoiding looking up lest I feel disappointed that I finished but not as fast. It wasn't all the swimming with the current. I took 16 mins off the bike and ran pretty much the same pace (54 seconds slower). I am super happy with this and the great coaching guidance I got following Ingrid's plan. Now to find fun ways to maintain the gains for the rest of the season without another race on the horizon... Although Elsinore '26 on summer solstice is a stone's throw from Sweden and sherpa Jens has fond childhood memories of celebrating Midsommar he might want to recreate with Fallon...
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