Women

Why I Raced an Impromptu Half Marathon

March 25th, 2018 by Kaitlyn Patterson

I love empowered, passionate people. And when such people have a mission that especially resonates with me, I will likely be a long-time admirer (albeit possibly a quiet admirer).

Emily Schaller is one of the people who has won me over. Emily came to our first year medical school class last year as one of our “patient presentations.” One of the more impactful parts of the first year of medical school, patient presentations involve volunteers dealing with chronic diseases come talk to us about the textbooks don’t tell us, namely what life is really like. I was highly impressed with all the people who volunteer to be honest and vulnerable with 170 future-physicians, often year after year.

Emily has cystic fibrosis, a condition that causes mucus to be thick and sticky, causing chronic lung problems as well as difficulty absorbing nutrients. It can be devastating and even with current treatments, the median life span is 41. Emily is an exceptionally charismatic person and captivated all of us as she told her story of essentially taking back her lung function and life through running and improved nutrition. Her story is also captured in a series of short videos by BreadTruck films.

She started the Rock CF Foundation in 2007, an organization devoted to CF awareness, fundraising and advocacy in the greater Detroit area. This involves raising money to donate running shoes and race entries to people with CF through “Kicks Back” and advocating CF research, including integrating exercise as as a treatment tool. One of the big Rock CF events is the Rock CF Rivers Half Marathon held around Grosse Ile in March.

She gave a quick plug for the race during her talk last year and it has stuck on my radar since then. I have been fortunate enough to remain injury free while running this winter and when my clinical schedule was free this weekend, I decided to go for it. I hadn’t been specifically preparing for it but felt that my running was consistent enough that it wasn’t a stupid idea either.

Yes, it was cold enough to justify the ski suit!

This was the eighth year of the race and it has grown to thousands-strong, a testament to Emily’s efforts and the strong sense of community and purpose surrounding the foundation and the race. The event was extremely well run and it was awesome to see so many people out and excited to race on a windy, chilly day in March.

Although I’ve identified as a cyclist for years, it is always fun and a bit nostalgic for me to jump back into an open running race. With minimal fitness tests and irregular training over the winter, I had no idea what to expect. I managed to pace it pretty well and ended up 3rd in 1:25 in a strong women’s field.

Kudos to the Rock CF Foundation and Emily for an impressive mission and great day!

Full results

Confidence and Humility- An Elusive Pairing

December 21st, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

-By Kaitlyn Patterson

The sport of cycling has enough quirks and intricacies to occupy athletes, coaches and fans for a lifetime. It is an easy sport to obsess about numbers, both physiologic: power, weight, heart rate; and mechanical: rolling resistance, tire pressure, gear ratios, wheel size, and so on. However, I find it interesting that all of this can be totally overshadowed by what is between a rider’s ears. A VO2 of 70 and a decked-out bike doesn’t guarantee podiums, and instead can easily overshadowed by a sub-par mentality.

Confidence is a huge part of riding and racing that can present a challenge to everyone across the experience curve. Coming from a running background with an aerobic engine but no bike handling skills, developing and maintaining confidence has been work in progress for years. It quickly became apparent that being confident on the bike is the product of both experience and mindset. Even after logging hours on the trails, some days I can regress to a newbie rider if my mind isn’t in the right place. More experience on the bike has made these fluctuations somewhat less dramatic but it has become obvious that confidence is something that needs to be deliberately prepared, just like bodies or bikes. This can be an exceptionally difficult thing to do, especially in a sport in which brakes and doubt have the potential to relegate you over the handlebars. However, training myself to recognize and tame thoughts that interfere with the task at hand has been an exceptionally useful and transferable skill.

As importance as confidence is, the confidence trap can also be dangerous on the other end of the spectrum. Confidence to the extreme can take the form of arrogance or recklessness. Even with optimal preparation, anything can happen in bike racing. Reminders of the fickle nature of the sport often surface during moments of over-confidence- pulling up before the finish line, riding outside your abilities and making mistakes, or underestimating others’ abilities before races. It never hurts to bring a dose of humility with every race and ride regardless of race resume.

Even in the absence of frank arrogance, there are a couple lessons in humility that we can all take from cycling. First is the acceptance that there are only a limited number of variables we can control. Optimal preparation and race execution can still be derailed by mechanicals and other racer’s mistakes. Second, even though the regulars on the podium may get a disproportional amount of attention, there are countless “races within the race” and untold stories that are even more impressive than clocking the fastest time. It can be easy to attribute podiums talent and hard work but it also takes an undeniable contribution of luck and privilege.

This delicate balance of confidence and humility is played out nearly exactly in medical training. Especially early in training, confidence is a difficult thing to cultivate with an experience base much smaller than the other members of the team. But we soon realize that the learning curve never actually ends and the best physicians continue to balance leadership with awareness of the limitations of their abilities and knowledge. Professional confidence will come with growing experience and knowledge base, but also needs to be deliberately developed, just like on the bike. Similarly, humility should be a constant companion with every encounter with patients and other members of the healthcare team. The consequences of neglecting this might not be as dramatic as an endo, but the impact can be much more significant.

Extrapolating life lessons from a sport seems a bit trivial but I’ve been reminded of these themes often in both cycling and medicine. Navigating the balance of humility and confidence in either sphere is exceptionally difficult and probably can never really be mastered. But I think this elusive task that is part of the intrigue of both cycling and medicine.

From One Fall Season to Another- Reflections on a Rollercoaster Year

October 17th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

–By Kaitlyn Patterson

The fall is hands down my favorite season. The air and leaves make me nostalgic about high school cross country, collegiate cross country and now mountain bike racing. Recently I have been reminded of last fall, which seems way longer than 12 months ago.

Last fall was a culmination of many surreal life changes- starting medical school, competing in a virtual cycling competition through Zwift Academy, and continuing my usual fall calendar of mountain bike racing. I was on a mission (or several), I had momentum and life was good. Iceman was the climax of the fall, an awesome day that will likely stand as one of my favorite cycling memories forever.

I absolutely knew that my pursuits through the fall were unsustainable but I felt it was worth it. After Iceman, I continued to fulfill the workouts for the Zwift Academy competition but I knew I had been digging myself a deep fatigue hole that was starting to engulf me. By the end, I was going through the motions and very much looking forward to the off-season. However, the fact that there was a real contract on the line started to become a more concrete reality. I had brought up the potential of winning to the medical school administration but was told to come back when I had more information. Conveniently over Thanksgiving break, I got more information. I was selected as one of the three finalists and had 48 hours to decide if I would accept the offer. The finalists would travel to training camp with the Canyon/SRAM pro road team and anyone that went to camp had to be prepared to accept the one-year contract if offered. The only way any of it was going to be possible was if I took an immediate leave of absence from school or left altogether. And to make it worse, I had no way to talk to the medical school administration about it before having to give an answer.

In the end, it was too big a sacrifice to throw everything else under the bus to pursue the virtual cycling experiment. And the thought of continuing to train at a high level and immediately launching into another race season in January was essentially inconceivable for me at that point. I also wasn’t ready to hang up my mountain bike in exchange for a road pro peloton. I ultimately made the difficult decision to turn down the offer, as did another of the finalists.

I didn’t publicize the conclusion of my Zwift Academy because I didn’t want to try and justify my decision to others. Despite occasional twangs of regret, I overall feel that it was the right call. However, my desperately needed off-season was beset with some poor decision-making. Based on just how fatigued I was after the fall and multiple years of bike racing immediately transitioning to ski racing, I probably needed many weeks of no training to truly recover. At the time, this was incomprehensible and I rested some but not nearly enough. I was excited to get back to running and skiing and I still considered myself invincible. As expected the winter was challenging in multiple ways- school was demanding, the snow was crappy for skiing, and Alex would depart for our usual ski racing adventures alone.

Fast forward several months to the summer when I was supposed to be taking advantage of my last chances to race bikes, I found myself in the deepest depths of overtraining syndrome that I had ever visited. In retrospect, I made several mistakes that should have been obvious but I missed. First, I needed a hard reset of recovery after the fall. A season absolutely should not start with residual fatigue from the previous. Second, I integrated running into my training more than I have in years and underestimated the training stress. Since I started cycling, I quantify training in hours instead of miles and translating this to running can be a slippery slope. Third, I lost weight that I didn’t have to lose. In contrast to most of the population, I tend to lose weight when I’m not careful and especially when stressed. This makes it exceptionally difficult to make progress in training and instead can directly undermine it. Fourth, I was utilizing exercise as a drug. Usually this is a healthy outlet but it started to become my only coping mechanism.

The signs were subtle at first, I wasn’t responding to training and had to take many more recovery days. However, my spring racing went well and I figured there couldn’t be anything wrong if I could still race fast. I apparently had to prove to myself that this was false. It eventually hit the fan and I felt like I broke my sympathetic nervous system. I was incapable of getting my heart rate up and sometimes would just stop and rest. This progression was absolutely consistent with the mysterious “overtraining syndrome.” It is often debated if overtraining syndrome is a real thing because we have no good way to measure it or “gold-standard” test. Criteria and descriptions vary somewhat but it is essentially the result of a dysfunctional response to stressors, both training and non-training related. As good as we are trained as medical students to identify patterns of pathology in others, we tend to be terrible in ourselves.

I again found myself at the bottom of a large fatigue hole realizing there was no quick or easy way out. So I took my summer races off the calendar, slept more and ate more. However, my recovering was punctuated by weekends of long rides up north or adventure rides in Marquette when I would feel better for a few days but then have to start over. It was hard to imagine being legitimately fast again.

Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah. One stop on our tour out west

I eventually realized I was just going to have to put away the bike for a while. In August, I went on a non-cycling vacation with my mother and then to a medical conference for a total of 3+ weeks off the bike. When I came back was the first time I felt a spark in a long time. As the fall air rolled in, I got the itch to race. I counted up the weeks and Alex and I devised a conservative training plan to put myself back together for my favorite fall races.

So while I may not have the same fitness heading into this fall campaign, I have a much different perspective and sense of gratitude. Days I get to ride and feel good on the bike are now gifts and not expectations. I have a greater respect for managing fatigue and the importance of recovery as well as accounting for non-training stressors. I have no doubt that cycling has taught me many things that will make me a better physician, many of them learned this year.

Just after Iceman this year I start my clinical rotations and cycling will take a backseat for a while. This summer has admittedly made this transition a bit easier as this season now feels like a bonus. So here’s to another few weeks of fall racing, riding and memories for future nostalgia before the next chapter begins.

Detroit Cycling Championship Team Recap

September 16th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

–By Terry Ritter

September 9^th saw big time bicycle racing return to the Detroit area. The Detroit Athletic Club put on the inaugural Detroit Cycling Championship. This event had a large purse ($45K!), and drew both amateur and pro teams from around the Midwest region and our friends to the east, Canada.

The course was interesting as well, though rather challenging. Three of the main roads used ran the perimeter of Comerica Park, where the Tigers play Major League baseball. Between corners #2 and #3 was a pretty good downhill that generated speeds in excess of 30 mph. From here there was a short section between turns #4 and #5, then #5 and #6, and back onto the long, slight uphill straight. And, being inner streets of a major city, the patched pavement and utility covers were plentiful, with the worst examples of the former on the course’s fast decent. Add a quality prize list and the accomplished riders that show for such a draw, and you’ve got a technical race that was fast and strung out from the gun. Having frequent primes only ramped things up more. Moving up and maintaining position was a challenge, especially since the opportunity to transit through the field of riders was muted by the speed, and dive-bombing corners was a common occurrence.

The ample purse meant a lot of new riders, and opportunities to have different race classes combined compared to the normal Michigan scene. This meant not only grouped category 3s and 4s races, but category 2s and 3s as well. There was also a full masters class. Ultimately, this left the racers on Team Athletic Mentors the opportunity to not only get a couple of events in, but to race with each other when we normally don’t get that chance.

Toeing the line in the combined Cat. 2/3 race was Terry Ritter, Rich Landgraff, Luke Cavender, Collin Snyder, Ross Williams, and Bobby Munro. Like all the races, this one was fast. Collin won a prime early on, then took a flyer to try to get away with three laps to go. However, there was too much horsepower for anything but a sprint finish.

Ross and Bobby were active in their Cat. 3 only race, with Ross attacking for a prime and then Bobby countering the next lap to try to get away. Great to see some tactical racing from our up-and-coming racers.

The Masters race was all three categories (35+, 45+, 55+), and it made for a large field but interesting dynamic. It wasn’t slow by any means (the 35+ group assured that), and there was a national champion kit in the mix as well. Richard, Peter O’Brien, and Terry doubled up (Peter was in the Cat. 3 Masters race earlier), with Jonathan Morgan joining the crew.

Elaine was our sole female Team Athletic Mentor rider and competed in the Cat. 3/4 race, as well as the Cat. P/1/2/3 race. Like the other races, the group was rarely grouped together, and the later race was especially fast. There were a few teams that were recognizable from the National Criterium Championship race earlier in the summer. With this being Elaine’s first year of serious road racing (not to mention criteriums), she did very well and represented the team impressively.

The final event of the day was the Pro/1/2, slated for 80 mins. A lot of big regional teams were there and it was super fast. Dan Yankus, Collin, Peter Ehmann and Jonathan started. Many riders didn’t finish due to the pace. Eventually, a group of 5 got away, including two Bissell Pro riders, that lapped the field. Then, with about 10 laps to go, there was a crash that left a few riders in need of medical attention and the race was halted, only to restart after the break with a fast conclusion. With a $200 prime on the second to last lap, the pace was high…until the group passed the first corner as the last lap bell was ringing. Bissell slowed a bit around corner #2, with Daniel taking advantage and shooting up near the front on the outside. Unfortunately, a number of riders dive bombed the inside corner, pushing Daniel and the Bissell train towards the outside and into the barriers, causing a crash. Fortunately, no one was hurt too badly and the race finished on that lap. Collin came home with 30^th on the evening.

Not getting enough racing for the weekend, Bobby, Daniel, Collin, Terry and Ross headed to Uncle John’s 56 mile gravel race north of Lansing on Sunday. Glen Dik joined the mix. The team was active early, with Daniel finishing fourth out of the small break that got away from the rest of the field. Collin got 6^th overall and Terry came in 13^th, and 3^rd in the 47-51 age group. Elaine and JoAnn Cranson competed in the women’s 24 mile race as well.

There are rumors that next season the Detroit Criterium Championship will be earlier in the season and hopefully on the national cycling calendar. With the positive support and great organization of this year’s inaugural event, there’s little doubt this can grow bigger and better, showcasing the renewal of our great city.

Is Anyone Obligated to Be A Role Model?

June 30th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

-By Kaitlyn Patterson

My first year of medical school has come to a close and it has left me a lot of things to think about. Besides doing a lot of necessary thinking about anatomy, physiology and disease processes, medical school has made me think critically about priorities- my own as well as those of healthcare and the medical education system.

One reason that I’ve continued to race and train over this year is because it has become one of my default priorities. At this point, I’ve been training consistently for so long that it is a routine part of the day. However, I am well aware that this time is a luxury that will become much harder as my clinical responsibilities continue to increase. I see this reflected in many of the students, residents and physicians around me- personal health suffers as time spent in the hospital increases and sleep, exercise and sunlight decline to minimal to none. Honestly, it scares me and I frequently wonder why it has to be like this. Why are the people who are supposedly healing others, so blatantly defying the most basic aspects of health?

This paradox was illustrated in a small group session we had about physical activity and lifestyle counseling. A discussion prompt was, “Should physicians be physically active and practice good lifestyle choices to be a role model for patients?” The reactions from others to this prompt ranged from an obvious yes to significant reservation. The time crunch argument was a big one- how can taking care of yourself be a priority when there are always more patients to see? The Hippocratic Oath does say that the patient comes before yourself but at what point should the line be drawn? Another interesting point was the liberty to separate personal life from professional life- that our own choices should be separate from what we do as a physician. However, this seems like a very grey area because they are difficult philosophies to separate.

Ultimately, nobody is obligated to be a role model but I think that it should be a considered a privilege and something to strive for. Role models can be powerful influences on other people and communities, sometimes without even realizing it. My Athletic Mentors teammates represent a range of occupations but have all earned a great deal of respect as professionals, people, and role models. I think a big contributing factor in this is prioritizing health and devotion to participating in and sharing their sport.

There are no absolute answers to any of these questions. However, to me it is obvious that the culture needs to change somehow. Because as much as physicians and other healthcare professionals are working and sacrificing, it is not currently reflected in better health outcomes- for patients or health professionals. I’m not exactly sure where the changes in healthcare and medicine need to originate, but a workforce full of true role models working to shift the paradigm towards prevention would be a great start.

Training While Pregnant

June 14th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

–By Lindsey Lilley

My husband and I are expecting our first child in November and we couldn’t be more excited. This change has also brought a new aspect into training, training while pregnant. This is my first pregnancy so I had NO IDEA what to expect or how my body would react. I spent a lot of time reading blogs by women who have led an active lifestyle before/during/after pregnancy and learned A LOT and it was nice to get a lot of different perspectives. This is a brief summary of my first trimester training.

Have you ever been hung-over, taken a sleeping pill and had to go potty 24/7 all at the same time? That is exactly what I felt like forweeks straight. I wasn’t going to let this be an excuse to not train because 1) Staying active is important for the health of our growing human and myself. 2) I want my body as strong as possible for labor and delivery (OUCH!) 3) There are still events I want to participate in this year. It wasn’t easy to get the workouts going. Not easy at all. It took a LOT of arguing and negotiations with myself to get started every day. Once I finally started, my swimming, biking, running and lifting sessions were when I felt best. Even though my workout time is when I felt my “best” it didn’t mean it got easier to convince myself to get going, I just did it. As an athlete I think it’s fair to say we are all used to doing things we don’t always want to do but know we should do.

10 weeks came and it was like a switch was flipped. The nauseous and exhaustion phase had passed, I was finally starting to feel like myself again. I was able to put more energy and effort into my training sessions. I’ve completed two races so far (Kent City Ridge Run 15K and 5/3rd Riverbank Run 25K) and look forward to “racing” throughout the summer and early fall. My times will be slower, I’ll be rounder but having my little workout partner with me this racing season is beyond spectacular.

Disclaimer: I did get the OK from my physician to continue training as long as my heart rate didn’t get too elevated for an extended amount of time, I wasn’t having any health issues/complications and I didn’t deprive my body of oxygen for too long.

A Key to the Marathon- Always have a Plan B

June 12th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

–By Danielle Nye

After wrapping up the tri season last fall I decided I would try a marathon this year. Many of my experienced running friends and teammates recommended the Bayshore Marathon. I signed up as soon as the registration opened and set out to start building my running endurance for the long race ahead. This would be my longest run to date and I wouldn’t be able to control all the factors on race day. In order to help keep my mental game strong during the race I decided to try something different. Instead of just setting one goal, I would set three goals for my race. My A goal would be 3:30-3:35, my B goal would 3:35-3:40, and the C goal was to finish no matter what and be proud of my accomplishment.

I lined up at Bayshore feeling prepared and ready to conquer the marathon. I took off following closely to my pacing plan. Everything was going really well and at the halfway mark I was convinced I was going to have a great race. At the 21.2 checkpoint my husband shouted that I had only five miles left and if I kept the pace I would have my Boston Qualifier! And then it hit. My quads buckled and I struggled to start running again. I walked through the next aid station and felt like five miles might as well have been a hundred. After a minute or two, I decided to keep going no matter what it took. If I could keep going I would still be able to make my B goal. As the sun beat down and other runners started to walk around me, I kept running. It was a slow run and my mind was screaming to stop. But I kept it going until I saw the track and made it to the finish line with my B goal still intact.

When things get hard during a race it seems your mind starts to think about quitting. I found that by setting three attainable goals during longer races it helps to keep your mental strength going even when the race starts to hurt you physically. It is important to set these goals with your current fitness in my mind and to be realistic about your ability. Having a range of goals kept me going during the hardest race I have tackled so far. Even though I did not get the BQ I was after I was able to finish my race and feel the satisfaction of completing my first marathon.

Tips for Early Morning Workouts

April 18th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

–By Elaine Sheikh, Triathlete

Most of us endurance athletes are beyond time-crunched – balancing work, family, social obligations and often training 10+ hours a week. Most of us don’t look forward to the alarm clock going off at 4:00am for that morning workout. Here’s some of my tips for making those workouts as pleasant as possible:

1) Prep your breakfast in advance! I avoid doing more than a few fasted workouts every week. Usually a banana or toast with nut butter or a larabar are enough to get me going for the workout. I’m a dedicated user of one of our team sponsors, Infinit. Often I can go fasted into a workout and still have plenty of energy with a bottle or two of one of my customized blends during the workout. However, when the workout is done and you have to fly through the shower and get to work, it’s important to have breakfast pre-made so you have time to eat something wholesome and don’t find yourself craving a donut on the way to work.

– I will often scramble a couple of eggs with nutritional yeast (those of you who tolerate dairy could use cheese instead) and sautéed veggies. That plus a cup of cooked rice and some coconut oil will still be surprisingly palatable after being refrigerated overnight.

– Another go-to is overnight oats. Use quick cooking oats and a milk or milk substitute of your choice in a 1-1 ratio. I add a scoop of green powder, nuts, fruits, cinnamon, and honey in whatever proportions I’m feeling. Put in the refrigerator overnight and it’ll be perfect to eat cold the next morning.

– One of my morning-of breakfasts is a simple protein shake. Milk or milk substitute, frozen fruit, nut butter, greens, and protein powder will keep you full until lunch and takes 2 minutes to throw together in the morning.

– A leftover baked sweet potato with a generous serving of nut butter or coconut oil, is another great breakfast. Depending on your caloric needs you may want to supplement with a shake or an egg or two.

2) Prep your workout gear the night before
-If I’m going to bike, the trainer is already set up with my kit and heart rate monitor next to it and my laptop and speakers set up the night before. If I’m running or swimming my gear is gathered and sitting next to the door. Nothing is more frustrating than getting to the pool at 5 am and realizing you don’t have your goggles!

3) Prioritize your sleep
– Nothing sets you up for failure like staying up until midnight and still expecting to wake up at 4 am refreshed and ready to train. As simple as it sounds, make sure you are streamlining your evenings so that you are able to sleep and be fresh in the morning. The night before is just as important as the morning of in determining your training success.

I hope this was helpful. Happy training!

Pressing the Reset Button

March 3rd, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

By Kaitlyn Patterson, Team Athletic Mentors Cyclist

An off-season has been a foreign concept for me for the past several years. The rollerskis (or real skis) would come out just after Iceman and ski race season would be in full force as soon after. And by the time the last xc ski race was over in March, it was already cycling season. I’m still not sure how I managed to avoid getting totally burnt out pulling this off several consecutive years, but I am very thankful for my string of healthy seasons. But with the move to Ann Arbor and school demands, I can manage being a cyclist but not a skier. And after a fall of balancing the first semester of medical school with mountain bike racing and then the Zwift Academy competition, I was pretty toasted and ready for a break.

I took some time totally off the bike and got in some skiing in December before the big January thaw. I didn’t do anything structured or hard, nor did I want to. I did have a few things I wanted to accomplish off the bike. My first goal was to put myself back together so I could do real runs. I injured my IT band at the GR Tri in 2015 and haven’t been able to tolerate much running since. It didn’t bother me on the bike so I admittedly put it on the backburner and just didn’t run. It didn’t get worse but also didn’t get better. Some concentrated rehab on my hip flexor flexibility and abductor strength the past few months has been very successful and I’ve been able to build up to 6-8 miles every other day.

It feels great to be running again and pretty nostalgic since I’m back in Ann Arbor. I’ve been running variations on the same well-traveled routes from my collegiate running career, albeit not quite as

Flashbacks of my previous life

fast or not quite as long. It has definitely helped to fill the void of not being able to ski or ride outside much.

I’ve also spent more committed time in the weight room since strength is definitely my weakness. I am slow twitch through and through. I’ve historically not been a fan of lifting because I haven’t seen it translate to improvements but I also haven’t previously committed enough to see results. This time is more enjoyable and it helps that I have a readily accessible gym and it has helped me get back running already. I think strength training can be a hard thing for a lot of cyclists and multisport athletes to commit to, but it really does translate to being more injury resistant and keeping control and form on the bike.

The remainder of my training time is spent on Zwift. I actually don’t mind the trainer and my cold tolerance for riding outside is pretty wimpy. The trainer also has the added benefit of allowing me to listen to lectures and material while I ride.

I definitely miss cross country ski racing and the ski community but it has been nice to have some time to not have to be on top of my game all the time. Sometimes a reset button is necessary and even enjoyable. And by the time spring rolls around, I’m going to be itching to race!

Dubai IRONMAN 70.3 2017

February 12th, 2017 by Kaitlyn Patterson

–By Raquel Torres, Triathlete

Making the decision to race

Since I did not participate in many events in 2016, I was hungry to keep finding race to challenge me. After my last event in Africa in December, I spent some time thinking about my 2017 goals. There is the commitment to make decisions about what races to sign up for, to work for me and for my sponsors. But this is difficult living in Michigan, where the winter is very cold and long and there are not many events. I did a few half marathons with very good results achieving my goals. This and the other reasons motivated me to look for a new objective early in 2017.

PRO or Age Group category?

I decided to try this whole year as a Pro in the Ironman races, to challenge and to try the Professional category. My coach Mark Olson always says to me “In the Age Group category you would be first.” Although I was scared, the opportunity to register as age group had passed so I signed up as a Pro for the 70.3 in Dubai as it was economically feasible. Even considering the obstacles of the distance, the long trip and going alone, but I felt that it would be worth it as I felt the need to compete.

Training Now for 70.3

In terms of the training, comparing the sprint distance (750 meters swim, 20k draft legal bike and 5k run to a 70.3 Half Ironman (1900 meters swim, 90k bike and 21k run) it’s a big step. I did not have a lot of time, but the desire was larger than that. The first step was to connect with my coach Mark, about the goal and to start to work. We started to work, designed the plan, with the objective to race on 27 January so we had 4 weeks. I was very motivated and focused to work harder than ever with lots of emphasis in the details. My attitude was more positive than ever every day. The hard winter in Michigan was spent with days like Christmas and New Year’s Day training like any other day…

I was running outside most of the time with very low temperatures and during a strong snowstorm I made the mistake to run a very long session on the treadmill. The change of surface brought on a minor injury. I was careful and stopped running until I was able to get an appointment with the doctor about 10 days later, after 10 therapy sessions and about 22 days without running, the doctors ordered x-rays and other tests and told me that with rehab and all things normal I could complete the event. I already had the plane ticket and the hotel was reserved, the event registration was done and the hard work and emotion for the long training was done.

One of the advantages of triathlon is that you have options; there are no excuses not to work. I decided to be more positive than ever even with many obstacles. I was psyched up, focused and at the same time a bit scared for the long flights and to try this new distance with these obstacles, I have to admit that some days I thought I was nuts.

The event was getting closer and I was training harder on the bike, swimming and rehab, weight training and nutrition, the things I could control. Aside from the more than 1001 things as a mother and coach. The day was approaching, my foot still hurt, but with my faith first I concentrated on the details and put aside what was not in my control.

Pack, prepare the trip logistics, leave everything in order at home for my daughter, everything methodically and with great attitude enjoying the process and the adventure. Giving 100% with a good attitude.

Race Lead-Up

I have learned that its good during trips to take with me as much food as possible for at least two days. For this trip, I brought my protein, spinach, basic supplements for my shakes, my bread. Some snacks, dehydrated fruits etc. I found a very good deal on a apartment style hotel where I could cook, as it was more affordable, comfortable and I could maintain my nutrition as close to the same as at home.

Arrival day: Set up the bike; go to the supermarket, attention to nutrition. Some mechanical problems, I was able to find a bike shop, where could I ride, where to swim, where to run? Details…

I had to figure out where to ride legally (its not permitted to ride in certain roads), sometimes I felt bad as I was not resting enough and I started to have invasive thoughts but I kept positive and able to focus on what was under my control.

3 Days before race: I was to run 15 at race pace and my foot was really hurting so I thought My God would I be able to complete the race? I felt horrible, tired, lethargic and with lots of pain. But I focused in God and to keep a positive attitude and my nutrition.

Race day!

Swim: I started slow, a small group formed, I had an easy pace and it was a really easy swim, some waves. I was able to keep the same pace throughout the swim race.

Bike: On the bike was my plan to keep up with hydration and nutrition, which I was able to do well. I had worked on the watts with coach mark to keep them at ab average of 210 watts and I was able to hold that pace without problems. I was breaking the race in micro-moments, thinking about the now and here.

Run: The initial plan was to keep a pace of 4:20 min/km keeping up with hydration I was concerned to have pain in my foot and it bothered me for the first 5 km only, someone ran in front of me and I fell down but quickly got up and kept running. I cut myself a bit and the first aid people came right away to assist me and I told them I was ok. I had my pace and at 10 km I remembered that I had forgotten to wear my socks! Right then, I had some blisters but I just said “Raquel, excuses are thousands do the best you can!”

I admit that I cried with happiness when I crossed that finish line. Just because I was able to complete it, as only God and I know how many obstacles we had to endure. The satisfaction to know that I did my best is priceless. I was able to complete in 4:32 finishing 16^th overall in the Pro category. It is an honor for me to represent my flag at the highest level of international triathlons in the long distance. I believe that we all should challenge ourselves in any area we want to grow, and if we have the passion it’s a lot more fun to challenge ourselves, always having fun and with a positive mind.