River Cities 2006
By: Trevor Casper

Established precedent on LafayetteFitness.org suggests that one may not file a race report unless one or more of the following conditions are met:

 
        1.  The subject race must be at least half-ironman distance.

        2.  The subject race must be the first race ever attempted by the filer.

        3.  The subject race must have certain characteristics so as to make it ridiculously difficult to finish (these characteristics may either be a permanent feature like the big, nasty hills at Holy Toledo, or a one-time thing like the mysteriously migrating swim course buoys at this year's Indian Creek race).

        4.  The filer of the race report must have conducted a portion or all of the subject race in such ridiculous or amazing fashion so as to arouse strong emotions among racing peers.  Such emotions (and their causes) can include:  amazement (outstanding performance, tremendous perseverance or suffering), pity (bonking, multiple flats, crashing), mirth (leaving your front wheel at the house, getting lost on the race course), and envy (winning the big draw prize at the awards ceremony).

In keeping with this protocol, I probably shouldn't file this report on the recent River Cities race, since nothing really funny/extraordinary/scary/cool happened.  It was a pretty routine race weekend.  I arrived on time, I had all my stuff, none of my stuff was broken, I followed my race plan, stayed on course (a challenge for me based on recent history), and went faster (marginally) than I did last year at this same race.  So what's the deal?  Well, I told Ben that I'd file a Holy Toledo race report back in April, and I never did.  So I owe him some correspondence.

First, for anyone contemplating racing in the River Cities race next year.  Get everywhere EARLY!  There are 1300 people in this race and if you arrive at the packet pick-up after 3 p.m. you will be standing outside in 100 degree heat for an hour.  Not good.  Wherever you plan to eat the night before the race--get there early.  Shreveport has twice as many people as Lafayette and apparently half as many restaurants judging by the number of people waiting to get in to the Macaroni Grille that we patronized Saturday evening.  If you arrive at the race site one hour before the gun goes off you will sit in your car in a traffic jam for at least 30 minutes of the hour that you planned to devote to setting up your transition area and warming up.  River Cities is like an international flight--plan to arrive at least two hours before your departure time.

So at 5:55 a.m., just before dawn, I coasted to a stop behind a row of winking brake lights to wait for the gate to the Cypress Lake recreation area to open.  Five minutes later, it did, and as I slow-rolled past the park gate with my windows open to a perfect morning a pretty teen-age girl handed me a fresh daisy and told me "good luck and have a good race."  A boom-box by her feet played "These Eyes" by The Guess Who.  I'm not overly sentimental, but that scene made me feel like everything was right in the world.  A smile, a small act of kindness, and a band from back home--it's the little things.

Let me now offer props to the race organizers.  A thunderstorm passed through the race site Saturday night, thoroughly trashed all the tents that were set up, and blew the swim buoys to the far end of the lake.  Now at Indian Creek they might have said "yeah, the swim buoys are supposed to be all in one big cluster down there by that bridge.  Just go around 'em and come back."  (just kidding)  But not at River Cities.  They worked all night to put tents back up, collect swim buoys, and reset the swim course.  And they only started fifteen minutes late.  Well done.

My race plan was simple.  Swim middle of the pack and come out of the water fresh, bike HARD, run a 22 minute 5K on tired legs.  If I followed through on the plan I thought I could go two minutes faster than my time last year.  Long story short--I was exactly on track when I left T2, but leg cramps (a nagging problem for me this year) slowed me down on the run.  I had to stop and stretch once, and then run pretty gingerly for a good ways.  So 23 something instead of 22 flat--marginally faster overall.  And more props to the race organizers.  A race in Shreveport, in August, that starts at 8:15 a.m., should be ridiculously, insanely hot.  But this one isn't.  The lake is warmish, but not bath water, the bike is over before the sun gets too high, the run course is well shaded, and they have a sprinkler arch.  In addition, there are two aid stations on the run course and you pass each of these stations twice.  They hand out ice-water, gator-ade, and towels soaked in barrels full of water and ice.  The River Cities organizers do a superb job of mitigating the heat factor.

The heat factor was low, but the Lafayette factor was high, as there must have been close to 20 triathletes from the Lafayette area competing.  Maybe more.  They brought good comradery, good smack talk, and more fun.  Finally, Irene and I stopped at Lea's Lunch Room in Lecompte on the way home.  Mmmmm--fried chicken, cornbread dressing, apple pie.  Highly recommended.