Half Full Bike Course

Half Full Triathlon Bike Course Map

My next triathlon is on October 3. The Half Full Triathlon is a 70 mile race out in Howard County, MD. The bike ride will be 56 miles. It is a very hilly ride and parts of it include the Columbia Triathlon bike course. I think there are only two little sections of the Columbia Tri course that did not make the cut for Half Full.

Anyway, fresh on the heels of completing my first tri yesterday, I rode the Half Full course today for the 4th time. I had set a goal of doing it in under three hours. I rode today with Paul Kwiatkowski and he had two buddies from the Montgomery County Triathlon Club join us. One of those guys is doing Kona. He won the lottery. His first Ironman... at Kona. One day, I'll do Kona.

Funny... in the parking lot... about to clip-in were Marcia, Wendy, her husband Mike and Chris Stokes future son-in-law. Because Paul's Kona buddy was running late, we couldn't get going with Marcia and her group. Rob Vigorito, race director for Eagleman and the Columbia Triathlon, was also in the parking lot getting ready to clip in.

We got started late and it was immediately evident that Paul's buddies would not be able to keep up. So, we just kept the hammer down and dropped them. Paul stayed on my wheel almost the whole time. I dropped the chain on a hill about 15 miles into the ride, and we stopped to top off water bottles at mile 46. Paul was falling off the back by then and we had those last two hills to go, so I thought it be best that we fill up. It was a short stop.

Statistics...

7:37 am clip-in
56 Miles
Avg. HR 137
Max HR 163
2:16:22 in 126 - 150 HR zone
Average cadence 88
3:04:12 ride time

So, I didn't make sub-3 hour... but I did go faster than last week... at a lower heart rate. It was a sunny day... but not very humid and temp probably only got up to low 80s.

Next weekend... Deep Creek Lake.