Shimoda Triathlon

It continues to be challenging to actually do a triathlon.  

I miss the registration deadlines in several spring/summer triathlons I had hoped to enter. Carrying a bike and wetsuit around is such a hassle, and so unlike with running events, I am unable to casually jump in to races during journeys to San Francisco, Cambodia, Singapore, Seattle etc.  

Last week’s Oshima Triathlon is completely washed out by bad weather.    

My fellow triathlon teammates have come to scoff at me, saying I am merely a “runner with a cross-training problem”. 

Fortunately David organizes the Shimoda Triathlon last weekend – an informal, Olympic-distance team event in idyllic Shimoda. 

It is a wonderfully scenic course – as spectacular as any triathlon you will find anywhere in the world – we swim through crystal clear ocean water to a beach turnaround in an amazing cove.  The bike route is along breath-taking cliffs, and the run takes us along a quiet trail/road through dense forest and picturesque farms. 

It is not necessarily a fast course – my time is like 2 hours and 40-something minutes. I manage a pretty strong bike ride and finish 2^nd among the 8 of us doing the event. 

Munatsuki 10k

It was unseasonably hot on Sunday.  But I had signed up for a local 10k.  And the party afterward featured an intense cake baked by one of our teammates, Harrisson, who is a renowned pastry chef.    
 

I would have found the concept of racing 10k to be overwhelming in Sunday's weather conditions.  Except for the knowledge that the majority of my teammates were running the half-marathon distance, or even more appallingly, were attempting to run a full marathon in the searing mid-day heat.  Running a mere 10k in comparison seemed conceivable – in contrast to a marathon it felt relatively sensible even.  

So when we started our 10k race at 10am I went out reasonably fast – probably too fast in retrospect.  At the 2k mark I was distressed at the thought that I was going to slow - I calculated that I was running just under 3:50 per kilometer pace, slower than my pace for 21.1 kilometers at the Cinco de Mayo Half-Marathon four weeks earlier.  I was in 7^th place at this point and tucked in behind a fast slender looking guy in red singlet and we proceeded to overtake 3 other runners and move into 4^th and 5^th position.  At around the half-way mark the course climbed a short hill up to a sluice gate crossing the river, and my new friend in the red singlet raced away from me (ultimately finishing a strong 2^nd -- over 2 minutes ahead of me).   

I struggled at this point, running with no one remotely close to me but managed to hang on for 5^th place position in a time of 38:16.  I felt pleased with my race, though it was a lot more effort than I had wanted to expend. 

But that effort was ultimately worth it –  17 of us descended on Sizzler (a surprisingly upscale restaurant in Tokyo), and were awarded for our efforts with the amazing hazel-nut, passionfruit, cake with hand-made macaroons.