socorro

I grew up thinking Socorro means something cool like frisky wind...Wikipedia says no, it just means "aid".

Anyway.

There was a race in Socorro this weekend, and I was there. The picture you see is the VLA. I didn't go there, though I would really like to some day.

Socorro about an hour away from where I live, so we drove up the night before and stayed in El Cheapo Motel-o. I'll just say that you get what you pay for at La Super 8.

The race consisted of a seeded 400m swim, a 20K bike, and a 5K run. And an enormous transition area. I can guess how a race is going to shape up by the Bling in the transition area. Socorro had a moderately high Bling factor, which I take to mean a lot of fast people. I know the Bling factor can sometimes mean there's just a lot of people with disposable income, but in this case, I was right.

I submitted a vastly over-ambitious swim time with my race entry. I don't know what possessed me. I said I'd do 400m in 7 minutes. I think I once did 400m in training for 7.5 minutes, but I may not have even counted my laps right. I was absolutely shitting myself when they lined us up for the swim by race number -- e.g., by the swim time. This means I got to go pretty early. I'm lined up on the side of the pool watching those who turned in their correct (very fast) swim times do their flip turns up and down the pool, and I nearly vomited.

For the record, this turned out to be a good strategy. I talked to everyone around me and explained that they were likely to be faster than me, and to please swim over me, I would be OK with that. I should explain that I've been using a similar training strategy - I make it a point to share lanes with pretty much anyone (small children, dogs, old ladies) and beg them to batter me as much as possible. I call it trauma training. It's all part of my master plan to get better at my open water swimming.

It didn't hurt that I shared a lane on Friday with a guy who is a triathlete training for the Olympics. Talk about a sweetheart, he gave me the best stroke tips ever! I feel like I should bake him some cookies or something. Wow!

Trauma training, Olympic stroke tips - it all came together! Plus, it turns out that fast swimmers are very courteous, they were very gentle as they passed me (hey, when you're good, you're good!). I think I only got passed by about 4 people. But! The time is not as important as the fact that I NAILED the swim, people! I felt GOOD! I got out of the pool feeling GOOD, not thankful to feel ground under my feet. I didn't stop. I didn't choke. I didn't panic. I pushed off under the lane lines just like I learned in training. I didn't grip the sides of the pool for dear life. I enjoyed myself. I even felt like I had more to give. Swim time: 9:42.

I exited the pool shouting "yess!" and trotted through the 2 mile long transition area. Put on shoes, socks, hopped on the bike and away I went. Long T1 (2:15). Ugh.

There's not much to say about the bike course, except it was pretty hilly (gentle hills) and a nice course. I like the course, it was challenging. Oh, and I did almost get run over by a truck. Nobody told him there was a race in his neighborhood, and I ran a stopsign thinking he'd wait for me -- d'oh! I ate an entire packet of Clif Bloks in an effort to stay on top. I feel I need more work on my bike, this was not my best bike time: 42:19 for 20K (about 17 mph average).

Short transition 1:20, away I went.

I got to watch my shadow on my way out. I look pretty good in profile, but I was feeling. like. shit. All those clif bloks were stuck somewhere in my GI tract and making me pay. PAY I tell you. My beloved husband (until death do us part - don't forget that part honey) passed me in the run and said something snotty along the way like "you look older than 37 to me", as if this would light my fire. Too bad my belly was fighting me, or I'd have kicked. his. ass. By mile 3, the problems were all gone - but so was my momentum: 28:22 for 5K. I can run a lot faster than that.

Total time: 1:23:55.7 . 8th of 18 in my age group, 46th of 131 in the Women. Beloved also had a really outstanding race - 1:09:36.1. He mostly kicked my butt in the swim. And the bike. And the run. Boys...what are you gonna do...

On the plus side, really good schwag: a cool hat, a reasonable t-shirt, and really good company (a lot of my training buddies were there, plus the Outlaws). They call me GI Jane. GI can mean so many things...

And since I entered as an Outlaw, I can say that my team won the club championship! Way to go, team!