Kelowna Ski to Sea

Well, the start of my racing for the year has just begun. Yesterday, I competed in the Kelowna Ski to Sea race as a solo competitor. It involves downhill skiing, nordic skiing, mountain biking, road biking, running and canoeing/kayaking. I thought it would be a good, long, fun training day in my Ironman preparation. It was also a great excuse to visit with friends up there also. Much thanks to Kari for being the most excellent crew person!!

The day was beautiful, sunny and warm. The ski conditions were definitely spring like and this was the last weekend that Big White was open. First we took a chair up and then ski part way down to get to the start. This involved hiking up this steep mountain in ski boots and with your skis. What a way to lactic right away!!! We had to ski around gates which I had never done and I'm a bit of a downhill chicken so a bunch of people just flew by me. That was fine with me since I had a long day ahead of me and most people were in relays and of course I didn't want to get injured. The XC ski was soft snow again and I didn't tie up my left boot tight enough in my haste to get out of the transition area quickly and wiped out 4 times downhill before I figured out what the problem was. Duhhh. Nice area to XC ski on though.

The next section was mountain biking, but they changed the course since there was so much snow on the trail. It was literally a road ride down the mountain, but you had to use your road bike. Part of it was just to see how much speed you could tolerate on some of the long downhills. Being a bit of a downhill chicken, it certainly wasn't my forte, but still did OK. Luckily I got some slicker tires put on my bike once we found out in was on the road so I could go faster. I, then, hopped on my road bike to continue riding down the mountain to get into the city. I had ridden this part the day before easy and got 2 flats and sliced open my tire. At least it happened the day before, but I had to hitch a ride back to town to make sure I got to the bike shop before it closed.

The run part was flat and beautiful along the Greenbelt and, then, along the lake. It seemed like it was never going to end, but of course it did finally and I could give my legs a rest. They had to alter this transition since there was construction around this area. For those on a relay team, once the runner reached the check point, they would radio to the kayak/canoe area and do a virtual hand-off that way. Because I was racing solo, they gave us up to 12 minutes to walk to the kayak. You could use less, but any more they would add on to your time. It was good to get the heart rate down before I started to kayak. The water was calm and flat which was good as the winds have been known to pick up on the lake.

There were only 3 of us solo gals. The winner led the whole way, but wasn't that far in front of us. The other gal and I leapfrogged a little bit during the day. With the run/kayak transition, she must have used less time than I as she was a ahead of me finishing the race so I thought I was a very close 3rd, but with the adjusted transition times, I actually got 2nd by 8 seconds!!! I'm thanking Steve(Kari's husband who was on the winning team overall - congrats!) for lending me his faster mountain bike tires. A bonus for me was knowing that she competed in the Hawaii Ironman last year in my age group, so I'm feeling like I'm not doing too badly in my training now. It's given me a confidence boost that way.

I was impressed with the great organization of the race and the volunteers were friendly. Not many would do it solo, but it's fun either way. Look for downhill bikers if you are going to do the relay is all I can suggest.