Spooky Du-Belle Isle

What a beautiful day to race on Belle Isle in downtown Detroit. The race was on October 11th. Arriving on the island for a Sunday 10am race is great. The morning was still chilly and there was a slight breeze. I’ve done this race once before and love it as an end of the year flat and fast event. It draws about 100 athletes, along with a lot of beginners by notice of all the MTB’s. Distances were 5k run/40k bike/10k run for the long course.
For those who have never raced on BI, it tends to get very windy for more than half of the race, which is why riding with a power meter helps tremendously. It doesn’t make you faster, just more consistant and it meters your efforts (or at least guides you!)
My race was uneventful. First 5k was good, in that I wanted to run around 7:15’s, but the coach averaged 6:50’s. (That speedwork paid off!) The bike I rode alone the entire race and passed a few short course people, but it was pretty much a solo 40k effort. It was windy coming around the west side of the island, but the motor was warmed up and feeling relatively well. I was passed by some young hot shot at the beginning and never saw him again. Final 10k was tough. It was 2 loops out and back, so you got to see where you stood. I gained one net spot on the second run to come home 5th overall. There was some out of towner who placed a head of me in my AG, but he moved up to 2nd or 3rd overall, so the ole’ coach by virtue of his upgrade, garnered a so called AG win. Not a bad way to end the multisport season!   I was talking with a guy who drove up from Columbus, Ohio and he commented on what an awesome venue we had and that it was his first time on BI.   He loved it.  As do I.  (Too bad the city hasn’t done more with such a beautiful piece of property. )

My running was feeling good in preparation for the Disney Marathon in January. Monday, I was moving a little slow, but those ZOOT compression recovery tights are magic. Very little post muscle soreness for the previous day’s 15k.

Data for the day:  Bike split 1:04, 755 kj, Max power 441, normalized power 201, max speed 25.1, average 20.5