East of the Cascade mountains, the land meanders downhill in fits and starts to the Columbia River. Ellensburg, home to Central Washington University, centers a valley full of alfalfa farms and burgeoning fruit orchards. Separated on the east from the river by the 2500’ Whiskey Dick Mountain, from Yakima to the south by the 2600’ Umptanum Ridge, and from Seattle to the west by 3000’ Snoqualmie Pass, Ellensburg is an isolated town of about 15,000, blessed by sun and breezes.
Both of which drew me to the Whiskey Dick Triathlon. One of a quintet of old line triathlons in Eastern Washington still put on by local Chamber of Commerce types, the Whiskey Dick joins Walla Walla’s Onion Man, Tri-Cities’ Titanium Man, Spokane’s Troika, and Yakima’s Valley of the Sun in producing races “the way triathlon used to be”.
Whiskey Dick starts at the Vantage State Park boat launch on the Columbia, elevation 633’. This mighty river has been tamed by a series of dams, and this particular wide spot, protected up and down stream by cliff outcrops, boasts a basically current free swim. As Cheryl and I arrived, volunteers from town (28 miles away) were still setting up the bike corral, cordoned of by yellow “caution” tape. I easily got the number one spot, first rack to the left out of the water, right on the aisle. I took no warm up, nor did I stretch. Just start swimming, and hope for the best.
At 8:15 (8:30 start), Vince Nethery called us (107 swimmers, about 15 of which were relays) for a course review. Little of it made sense to me, as I had never been to downtown Ellensburg, where the run would take place, and I’d never been on the Old Vantage Highway, by which we would cover the 28 miles back to town. He did point out the climb – 1900’ in 12 miles – and acknowledge the sun (bright, about 70F at race start) and wind (prevailing northwesterly, right in our face the whole time, with no trees to block its path.) Well, that was why I was there – I needed some racing time in heat and wind, to mentally toughen me for Hawaii in two months.
Then we all tromped up river about 400 yards to the swim start – across gravel, blacktop and weeds! Luckily,Cheryl was with me, so I trotted to the car to grab some sandals, which I would leave with her. Once there, I popped on my DeSoto wetsuit top, donned goggles and hat, at dropped down a rocky incline to the water. Once calf deep, I heard Rory Muellar shout “3 minutes”, and realised not only wouldn’t I get a warm up, I wouldn’t even get to pee before I took off. Hope that’s not a problem in this 3 hour race!
I heard Cheryl call my name, and looked in vain for her in the crowds behind me. Finally, I saw her, perched up in the boughs of a cottonwood tree, waving my sandals, grinning. What’s a sixty year old woman doing climbing trees, anyway? But it seemed right in the spirit of the race, so I shook my head, waved, and smiled back.
The water felt perfect, and I found some good feet for most of the race. However, the feet kept clomping up and down – my designated drafter had the biggest kick I’ve ever seen in a tri, just monstrous. And despite the power kick, he still couldn’t swim a straight line, so I would follow the bubbles whenever they happened to cross in front of me, but kept to my steady forward, sight-off-the-sun direct route to the big orange pyramids. Proclaimed a “1 mile” swim, I got out of the water in 25:45, which seemed a touch fast, but the water was flat, no wind, cool temp, so maybe it was right. I saw Cheryl running along the rock jetty as I exited. Pulling off my hat and goggles, I waved at her, and tossed my earplug her way, just for fun. She caught it!
Cheryl stopped right by my rack, on the other side of the yellow tape. Since we had to bag our swim gear for transport back to town, I was stuffing my wet suit into a giant baggie when she shouted, “Do you want to give me your stuff?” Sounds simple, so I just handed over to her. One less thing to worry about at the end.
There was no question about the hill. It started right out of T1, and didn’t let up for nearly an hour, 12 miles and 2000′ vertical feet later. Two guys passed me right out of transition, the steepest section, but I dropped on my aerobars, and kept a steady 230-240 watts, reeling them in within the first mile. Never saw them again. Two ladies went by half way up, and I couldn’t stay with either. I did pass about 5-6 more guys on the climb. Once over the top, I got passed by two more men, heavier then me, on the initial 6% grade.
The rest of the way into town was just a grind it out classic time trial, slightly downhill, but into a steady 10-15 mph wind. 200 watts got me about 21 mph. Tiring, legs getting heavy, but still strong, I rolled into a confusing T2. It was basically rack your own bike, anywhere, and move to your pre-packed bag. But no one told me this, so I spun around confused shouting my number out, until someone pointed out the carpet under the trees where a women waited with my stuff. Fun. I hate point-to-point triathlons, or more specifically, I hate having two transition sites, with no chance to see T2 or set up my stuff.
As I said, this was an old school tri, and the way out of T2 was not real clear. I did see an aid station off to the left as I stepped over the timing mat, so I headed there. A guy my age, sitting on a beach chair in the shade, tried to explain, “straight out to the turn, then on to the trail.” The route was marked with red arrows, I discovered, but they weren’t so easy to see in the shade with the bright summer sun blinding me. Since there was no runner I could see in front of me, I had to swivel my head around a bit for the next minute before I found both the left turn arrow, and the start of the gravel rail-trail we took for the first three miles.
Once in the sun, on the bermed rail bed, navigation was no longer an issue, so I could start to pay attention to my pace. Around mile run, a lean guy in black calf compression sleeves, with a VERY low arm carriage – he seemed to be scratching his thighs as he ran – slowly pulled up and eased by me. He was going just a wee bit faster than me, so I wondered during the whole time on the gravel if I would reel him back in second half. After the turn around, and then another 1/2 mile to the aid station, he missed the left turn, and had to circle back. I picked up about 5 seconds on him there. Over the next mile, I kept moving closer.
As I eased up towards him, I announced my presence, “Pick up the pace; you’re slowing down.”
“No, I think you’re going faster!”
Well, I wasn’t, I hold the same pace the whole run, but try telling him that.
The last two miles were in and out of shade through town. Mile 5, we hit a big hill, up to the town’s water storage tank at the top of the park, then back down the other side. The distance from mile 6 marker to the finish thankfully seemed less than 0.2 miles, so I was able to finish with a flourish, and still talk to Cheryl sensibly. Run was 46:15, for total time of 2:57:50. Finishing under 3 hours, 22nd (including 4 relays in front of me) out of 107 was OK for the second oldest person in the race, I guess.
I looked behind me for the guy I’d passed, but two more 30 somethings had been gaining on me the whole time. I congratulated them, and said, “I guess you just ran out of room – another mile and you’d have me.”
One answered back, “Thanks for pulling me home – like your pace!”
Well, so do I.