I woke up somewhere in the middle of the night gasping for air and seriously reconsidering doing this race. But I was also terrified of attempting an Olympic, in hilly Muskoka no less, without any training for nearly a month. I spent several hours tossing and turning and going back and forth with pros and cons. Suddenly, in a feverish dream, in the mists of dawn, a light bulb went off in my head. I always use NeoCitran (or a similar dissolving acetaminophen-based hot drink) to nurse myself back to life when I have a cold. I always complain about how sweet these drinks are - half the powder is pure sugar granules. But I would need a sugary drink on the bike anyway! Why not just cook up some of this mix, cool it down, and throw it in my bike bottle? I'd have cold medicine and sugar at the same time!
It was done; I mixed the mix and got on the road to Midland. There was a Kids of Steel series and a Give-It-a-Tri happening before our race, so I slowly and sleepily set up my gear as a bunch of speedy kids rushed by on their run course. I was so overheated and woozy. Everyone was pulling on their wetsuits, but I figured if I did wrap myself in neoprene on top of my fever, I might burst into flames. I waded into Penetang Bay, and I swear steam came off me. Right before the race, I downed a Tylenol pill along with my start gel and took off.
The waters of Penetang Bay deserve honourable mention. It's so weedy there, that you actually can't see the bottom at all. It's its own special biosphere down there, and really cool to see once you get over the constant gentle caresses of the weeds. If you try to stand in it, you will sink another few feet down through the vegetation and never hit bottom anyways. I just remembered my roomie's old mantra of getting through weedy waters, "They love you! They're caressing you with LOVE!"
I had tried to practice my mounting/dismounting tricks ahead of this race, but it turned into a bit of a disaster at the mount line. I jumped on but could not get my feet onto/into the shoes and totally stalled out! Had to get off, get out of the way, and try again. How embarrassing. Thankfully the photographer was further down!
The swim probably did a lot more for cooling me off than the pills did. I still wasn't able to breathe through my nose at all. I found myself wheezing heavily through my mouth. But I had nothing to lose here in my condition, so I hammered hard through the 20km course. It started up a hill to get to the plateau above the bay, but I gritted my teeth and got to the top. I don't remember much of the flat ride, just that I pushed hard without a care in the world, other than constant sips of my life-juice full of NeoCitran. When I got back to the final downhill, I was way too scared to go into aero to take advantage of it. I saw one 55+ lady whoosh past me in full aero - she was at the bottom in mere seconds. Must be nice. But somehow I passed a few people on this section anyway, so without knowing it, I was now in 3rd place.
The run course was essentially flat except for a short light uphill at the start. I was really focused here. Still sounded like I would need to be resuscitated in short order, but I can pull off a decent run no matter the circumstances. I did not see a single other 30-34 runner along the course, which made the race seem really lonely. Where was everyone? I knew that I was either doing really well or really really badly. Because I had no idea where I was, I just managed my pace like any other 5km race. I took Heed at every one of the very well-spaced aid stations. I had transitioned to a kind of mouth-nose wheeze at this point. In the final straight-away and downhill, I picked out some targets for kicks, caught them, and passed them. This included a male IM Florida finisher, whom I handily out-sprinted to the finish.
I somehow had a good feeling about this race. I collected my stuff, but came back from the car just in time for the awards. I made sure to be out of the free burger line when our age group came up. They called my name! I was 3rd! Wow. In my condition. I was so thrilled, but actually I think because I was so messed up, I wasn't nervous about my performance and just went all-out to the best of my ability.
So. Many hours later. At home with my medal. I suddenly had a thought. That NeoCitran doesn't just have acetaminophen in it, does it? There's some other junk in the formulation. I pulled out a packet: 60mg pseudoephedrine. That doesn't sound good! A quick perusal of the WADA Prohibited Substances list, and lo! pseudoephedrine is quite obviously on the list under stimulants. It is "prohibited when its concentration in urine is greater than 150 micrograms per milliliter." Admittedly I have no idea what kind of concentration I could clock by drinking maybe half of my mix over the course of 40 minutes, but let's face it: I had this stuff right on the bike during the race.
In the frenzy around Lance Armstrong's doping allegations, I read one article about how out-of-competition doping has become so sophisticated, there is no longer a need to use during competition - so if you fail an in-competition drug test, you're basically failing an IQ test! That actually made me laugh at myself.
Obviously there are no drug tests in this small local race series, and I obviously didn't mean to do this on purpose (although that's not exactly a sound argument!) The only thing I can say is that the person in 4th place was a full 8:31 behind me on this short sprint course. Her bike time was 48:46 and her run was 26:53, which I cannot imagine clocking under the worst possible circumstances, especially not on my racing bike. The medicine didn't clear up my fever, and I couldn't breathe properly the entire time. So I'm quite confident that I wasn't appreciably helped by the 30-60mg pseudoephedrine I might have ingested.
But I still feel really bad about it on principle. I will obviously never do this again. Or I will try never to implement any brilliant ideas I might have in the early hours of the morning while my head is on fire and I'm drowning in snot.
Swim - 17:39 / 2:22
T1 - 1:38
Bike - 43:00 / 27.9
T2 - 1:24
Run - 24:27 / 4:54
| S | T1 | B | T2 | R | F | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Place in Discipline | 5 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 3 |
| Place in Real Time | 5 | 6 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 |
--Distance: 25.75km
--Duration: 1:28:05
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