Just my luck!

Since Galveston I have not been feeling 100%. At first jokingly I blamed it on the pizza I ate the night before the race, thinking I had some sort of food poisoning or something.  The morning of the race and for a few days post bike/run race I had the runs (or as I like to call it “The RRHEA”). It seemed to clear up, I kept training....Fast forward seven days.

This past Sunday, I woke up ran 10 miles went back to bed by 9am (not normal). The rest of the day I couldn’t seem to keep my body temp regulated. I was wearing a touque one minute in 100 degree heat, the next minute turning down the AC in the house to 64 degrees. I blamed it on my ice bath and smoothie and carried on.Monday at work I was texting Carley saying I don’t really feel well I and told her I was just going to sleep on the couch at work so she wouldn’t make me do chores when I got home (damn chores). By the time I got home my face was beat red, Carley immediately took my temp and it was 104.8. Wow, popped some Ibuprofen’s went to bed. Middle of the night put on a light grey jogging suit, woke up it was dark grey and could be wrung out with sweat in the morning. Trained Monday temp spikes twice, it was rough but carried on. Tuesday woke up rode two hours, ran at the track that afternoon and later temp spikes again to 104. Consult Dr. brother in law  who tells me to start alternating Ibuprofen and Tylenols every 2-3 hours like the summer/winter Olympics. Tuesday night sweat the bed so bad soak the down comforter, and it is currently still at the dry cleaners. Wednesday am swim, then temp spikes again Carley forces me to go to CareNow. At CareNow I have no temp, Dr. runs some blood, urine and swabs for strep which all comes back negative. She tells me if I didn’t sound so intelligent she would tell me I don’t know how to use a thermometer. Wednesday pm I was told rest as per coach and Dr rules.

Thursday am soak the bed, and am lethargic. Carley takes my temp its 103.7 and I can’t get out of bed. Carley gets me dressed cause I can’t and takes me directly to the ER. We are there for 7 hours, they run more tests take X-rays nothing, and again I have no fever during most of it. They do however take blood cultures, the results take at least 24 hours for preliminary reports and send me home. Thursday no training.

Friday morning temp is only 102.1, yes! So what do I do? I swim and run and head to work. By 9am ER calls me to tell me my blood cultures are positive and to report back to the ER immediately to be admitted to the hospital. I ask if I can come in about two hours so I can ride first, they advise me not to. I call Carley at work, she freaks out and I drive myself to the ER and meet her there.

I get to the ER, wait about 10 minutes until all the Docs get wind of my situation and i’m immediately admitted and seen by ER Dr, Infectious disease Dr, Hospitalist Dr, and another ER Dr. Three nurses also swarm me and start an IV and take about another pint of blood. I think they thought I may have had some sort of contagious deadly disease. They all asked me at least three times “have you been outside of the country in the last three months?”. They aren’t sure what’s poisoning my blood but they order a CT scan of my abdomen to make sure my organs aren’t infected as well. CT is clear....except for my colon which is really full actually.

The next three days I live in the hospital waiting for my blood cultures to grow the bacteria in order for the Doc to treat it correctly.   More blood tests reveal my liver enzymes are off and my WBC count is non existent.

Living in a hospital is rough, if Carley hadn’t have brought me every meal I would have starved to death. And sleeping, well I don’t think I slept more than 4 hours a night being checked for a fever every hour, and blood draws at 430am.
Sunday afternoon the infectious disease Dr informed me I have a strain of salmonella bacteria in my blood. Weird thing is that salmonella is usually just a GI tract disease that doesn’t normally infect your blood. The Dr’s are still trying to convince me that I travelled outside the country in the last three months, however I blame an unpasteurized yogurt I bought at Central Market three weeks ago that was in a really cool jar. I guess we will never know!

I don’t quite have a clean bill of health yet. I have to follow the infectious disease Dr on an outpatient basis for the next month and take some oral antibiotics for 12 days. Definitely not my way of spending a weekend!

BP

The Good, the Bad and the Nyquil!

The past two weekends I have raced Olympic Distance races. One was good and one was as Carley would say a race that you need to bike home along the freeway. I guess she’s right, if you were my wife watching it was embarrassing. 

The first race was a small pro race in Possum Kingdom, Texas called Trifecta. It was an incredible venue with a small prize purse but it showcased just how big the triathlon community was in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. I couldn’t believe how much fun everyone was having and how big some of the area tri clubs around here are. 

Off the start I took an early lead and never looked back. Don’t let this little race confuse you with easy. The swim was nice and easy but the ride felt like it was up hill the entire way out. It didn’t help that i lost my aero bottle within the YMCA so I rode the course without much liquid. I had to really watch the effort to make sure I didn’t get too dehydrated. 

Getting off the bike it was a very first challenging 3miles of off road trails. It looked more like hiking trails and the volunteers were not ready for me. Apparently I went off course in the first mile but I did follow the directions of the volunteers, and even ran back to T2 to ask the volunteer which way to go next. Next year i will make sure to put out a much stronger effort as I know the fast guys from San Antonio will be hunting for me. 

After returning to DFW after Trifecta it took two nights of not sleeping and suddenly I was sick. Great, with Gavleston 5150 the following Sunday I knew I had to recover quickly. Carley ended up sick and I feel like we just spread it back and forth and i was actually taking cold medicine leading up till the race. Not ideal but when you haven’t raced in 2 years you take any race you can get. 

After driving through a near tsunami to get to Galveston on Friday it continued to rain all Saturday. I ended up doing some training on the course in pouring rain and probably not the brightest.

The race turned into a bike/run with a TT format. When your feeling sick and almost up to 80% the last thing you want to hear is that the swim is cancelled. The race plays out much differently when you take the swim out. I was very looking forward to trying to swim with a couple of fast swimmers that were there. The water was choppy but it was a  professional “Tri”athlon.  When it rains and is storming in the PGA tour they don’t say okay guys were going to the putting green to putt for the win. 

Regardless I was still fired up to race. I gave it a good strong effort and without my back cramping about 40mins into the ride i probably would have had a great split. I was still pretty angry about the swim being cancelled as i felt the swim conditions were no different then an ocean swim.  The last 15mins I lost some time and a guy that started a couple of spots back caught me. I had to stretch out the back a few times and get ready to roll for a run. I claim I was running but i was having a difficult time getting my race suit zipper down and i was cramping.  In all honesty i was finishing it up for some points for Hyvee next year. The worst part was you had to run by the water each loop and see that the swim could have easily happened. I think that for all professional races they need to delay every hour till the race can happen. Most of the time it seems like 2hours later it would be easily been able to happen. However i understand all of the crazy logistics that race directors need to go through to make the race happen. The quickest transition of the day was my bike out of T2 and on the way home with a Dairy Queen stop. Carley had already climbed through the bars of the gate in T1 and had my bike out when she saw me running more like jogging around Moody Gardens. 

I am feeling much better than i was over last week but i have decided to spend some time and get ready for Austin 70.3 later in August instead of trying to get another race in next weekend at the US OPEN.  I have included my power file here and i am hoping we can make some big aero changes before next year to make sure my power is moving me forward. 

Thanks for reading, 

BP

Galveston Power File 

http://www.trainingpeaks.com/av/OGHUPGL2QFWK3AHSPI5OLWJ7NU

Rev3 Wisconsin Dells

Well better late then never. Last weekend I raced a rainy cold Rev3 Triathlon in Wisconsin Dells. It was my first time racing at a Rev3 event and I can’t wait to race another event again. I can’t believe how organized and professional it was.  Race morning came and it was another cold day that lead to pouring rain. My swim was good exiting with a group that had Kaleb VanOrt, Drew Scott, Chris Foster and a few others. The first few miles of the bike i was riding very well and then I nearly crashed going out on the first turn. It was raining and it made me very nervous and once i almost hit the deck I ended up taking it too easy on most sections of the race. My wattage was a lot lower than I wanted and I often was soft pedaling down descends and slowing way down for cornering.   My run was good even with a few insole issues that had me stopping trying to get the bunched up insole to flatten out in my shoe. All in all the swim and run was probably a pretty good estimation of where I am at right now. I look forward to the next 4 weeks of training to get ready for a couple more Olympic races. 

Athlete Country Finish
Pro Men:
Dye, Cameron US 1:50:55
Collins, Ben UM 1:51:48
VanOrt, Kaleb US 1:52:34
Cowan, Brooks US 1:53:08
Limkemann, Eric US 1:53:23
Leto, Kyle US 1:53:28
Thompson, David US 1:53:35
Scott, Drew US 1:54:29
Leiferman, Chris US 1:55:34
Starykowicz, Andrew US 1:56:00
Poulsen, Brent  US 1:59:20

Giant Eagle 5150

Giant Eagle 5150

This past Sunday I raced Giant Eagle 5150 in Colombus, OH. I ended up 9th in the Pro race.  I knew I would be rusty but I didn’t know to what extent. My Homestays Kelly and Dave made my trip very enjoyable and it was very exciting as we all raced. My coach and I are very confident that in the next few races we will iron out all of the little things and be closer to the front soon. 

After analyzing the race and reviewing results i realize i made a few key mistakes that cost me a lot of time. No matter how pro you think you are there are many details that can’t be forgotten. 

Don’t settle in the Swim. I had a great start and was right with the leaders the first loop of 2. It was a typical beach start and I hate beach starts. Mostly because I suffer from "Short Man, Tripping Over Water" syndrome. Nothing too crazy but i did feel like a pregnant elephant mid-way through the swim. I am not sure if it was the lack of racing or the shivering in 50degree weather we had prior to the start. Being a non-wetsuit swim i was sort of excited but standing waiting for the start I could have used that rubber layer keeping me warm. WIthout turning this into a novel I settled behind a slower swimmer and we lost 20seconds from the lead pack. The second place finisher came blowing by us on the final stretches of the swim and I couldn't get around to exit with him and we came out just behind. Glad that was over. 

   

Eat more calories when racing in the cold. I ate no gels and had 6ounces of Power Bar Perform. I had my Power Bar gels with me I just didn’t take one on the bike and i missed my Gel in my T2 bag. I definitely used up that 90mins of glycogen fairly fast shivering. There was no excuses on this one. I just kept telling myself that it was all good and you can have that other gel you have in T2. Then i started entering bonk city population 1 and lost some power the last 5 miles.

Transition time matters. I lost close to 10seconds on the first transition and  30-40seconds on T2. Yes i couldn’t get out of my speed suit or find my T2bag. This obviously can’t happen in an Olympic distance race.

I need to practice my cornering and have confidence riding around traffic circles. I lost time riding slow through intersections and around circles. I know this and I will work on my technical skills a bit more. I also nearly stopped at two intersections because there were police on both corners and cones on both corners and I couldn't figure out where to turn. In the end the course kept going straight. I did drive the course but i started second guessing my course knowledge when looking at pylons and motor cycles. My watts per KG where closer to a half Ironman ride but with an elevation drop on the last miles and some fading energy it wasn't that far off. Maybe 10-15watts. 

The funny thing about racing is it is in fact “racing”. There is no second chances and it doesn’t matter what you should of or could have done. It is just on to the next one. 

http://premierraces.com/content/files/Giant%20Eagle/Olympic%20Tri%20Overall.txt

It’s great to be back. I am still smiling even with the mediocre result and I cant’ wait for the next one. I have had a great year and a half with my new coach Tim Crowley and everything is in place. The great thing about the high paced Olympic distance racing is I am sure it will give me some great form for some 70.3 races later in the season. I figure if you can adapt and race with the fastest short course athletes then stepping back to the 70.3 distance should be much easier after 2 years off from racing. That is why I am headed to Wisconsin Dells this week for the REV 3 Olympic Triathlon. Lots of amazing talent will be racing and I am excited to throw myself in and get some quality race miles. Temperatures should be similar so I will plan on some cold racing and proper fueling as well as quick transitions. 

Thanks for reading,

Brent 
@brentapoulsen