I’m sitting here in the hotel lobby with Matt Chrabot watching the women race on the internet. They’re physically about a mile away from us, but since it’s 90 degrees outside, neither of us wish to venture out before tomorrow’s race. So far I’ve seen that the swim was a sluggish 19 minutes with some of the typically slow swimmers exiting the water within 30 seconds of the leaders. Then the internet froze.
This morning I slept in as long as I could. Which is to say, I forced myself out of bed when it was clear I would miss breakfast if I slept any longer. 12 hours of sleep is pretty much the best feeling in the world, though later on when I was running in the heat I was envious that Matt and Jarrod were done early.
We’ve been eating at a Kabob shop that serves massive plates of chicken ad rise with some kind of greek-like sauce. It’s delicious, and at 6 euros for a meal it’s also much less expensive than the typical.
The video feed just started working again. Jill made i into the front group after 3 laps of 8. OH NO, she caught on right before the hill, and then they focused the camera on her while she slowly suffered and was dropped off the back. Barry, the announcer was focused on Jill talking about how she was overextended and just suffering. That’s terrible, she basically dragged Daniela Ryf into the front group then blew up and droped back into the chase pack. Ryf couldn’t have asked for a better domestique! I’m sorry jill, I was yelling for you (literally, the people in the hotel were loking around the corner to find out what I was yelling about).
OOOH!! Jenna Shoemaker is bridging up by herself from the chase group! Â Oh no, but Amanda Felder had to pull our – and now Barry is calling her a novice. I can’t wait to hear what Barry says about me tomorrow. “Collins, one of the young american talents.” or he’ll make the country mistake like he did in Ishigaki, “That looks like a Russian athlete. Likely a swim biker. . .”
Wow. Haskins put forth a great race. 5th place, taking down some big names. Awesome. Best US finish at a WCS race this year. Cool!
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Continuing the running commentary. I’ve been taking pictures all day, and I’ll post them when I have a) a camera cable and b) a strong enough internet connection to upload photos. It’s getting close to bed time here in Madrid. I’m a little nervous. Tomorrow is definitely the biggest race I’ve done in my career. At the same time, that sort of takes the pressure off. Whatever happens, I’m going to learn something, do a few things right and a few things wrong. I love racing, so for better or worse, it’ll love it.
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My mom and sister both called me in Madrid. Skype doesn’t work here, so I sent out an email to my family, girlfriend and coach with the hotel info so they could call and give some words of encouragement. Obviously I’m right in always putting family first. 🙂
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Alright, check out triathlon.org tomorrow to watch my race live. It’ll be 4am on the west coast, 7am in New York, and 1am in Hawaii. (C’mon Team Jet, just stay up and watch when you get back from the bars!) You have to create a username to watch, but you only have to pay if you want to watch the race later on as a recording. Finally, I’m in a race with live video and audio feed! Plus it’ll be on Universal Sports as a 1 hour recap in the coming weeks (check you listing).
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That’s all for now. I’m off to bed!
But you are a swim-biker.