Wow, what a race!!! My legs are screaming at me big time!!
Today I raced the Revolution 3 half here in Quassy, Connecticut. The scenery is so beautiful here with stunning lakes and rolling green hills, reminds me a lot of home.
The pro field here was unbelievable with the best of the best on the start line, including Craig Alexander, Matt Reed, Ritchie Cunningham and Joe Gambles to name a few.
The gun went off at 6.50am………tick tick boom, we were now off on the 1.2 mile swim around Lake Quassapaug. Got into a great rhythm early on in the swim and managed to get onto the feet of Matty Reed. He is an amazing swimmer and I knew if I stayed close to him I would come out of the swim in a great position.
Came out of the water with Matt and most of the other main competitors and out on to the incredibly challenging and tough 56 mile/90 km 1 loop bike course. This was the hilliest bike course I have ever raced on and it was a matter of pacing myself and not losing the front bunch so that I still had a little left in the tank for the run. For most of the bike 6 athletes stayed together while Bjorn Andersson flew right past us early on in the bike like we were standing still. Joe Gambles then came through the pack and managed to get a 1 minute gap on us.
Arrived in transition with Craig and Matt, 2.30 minutes down on Bjorn and 1 minute down on Joe Gambles. Matt set the pace early on in the run and he was flying, if I wanted to have a chance at taking the title I had to stay with him. By mile 4 on the run we had dropped Craig Alexander and had about a 1 min gap back to him. Matt and I now thought it was game on between just the 2 of us so we slowed down slightly and found a more comfortable pace. Feeling really comfortable now and running side by side with Matt half way through the run, I now had to make sure I paced myself well so that I still had something left in the tank to get to the finish line first. Looking back over my shoulder at around mile 9 Craig was in my sight again and catching really fast…..bugger, I thought he was down and out. I now had to put the hammer down as Craig was flying toward us. With only 4 miles to go I managed to drop Matt Reed and have a slight gap on Craig Alexander. By mile 10, Craig had caught me and we were running side by side. I managed to stay with him for another mile but he eventually dropped me and unfortunately I had nothing left in the tank to go with him. With Craig now running away from me I knew I had to keep pushing to get to the finish line if I wanted to finish on the podium. Finally made it to the finish line in 2nd, 1 minute behind Craig Alexander and with Matty Reed 2 minutes back from me in 3rd to round out the podium.
All in all this race was unbelievable and really happy with the 2nd place result. With the stellar line up of Pros, grueling race course, incredible venue and professionally run event by Todd and Heather Gollnick and her Revolution 3 team, I will definitely be back here again next year.
Next stop is Cambridge, Maryland for the Eagleman 70.3 on the 13 June.
Regards
Terenzo
