Jebel Hafeet Duathlon

Two days ago was the Mercure Challenge.  Jason Metters, an expro triathlete, from Australia puts this race on for the last several years.  In May, I mentioned that Faris Al Sultan holds the record for this race.  Rumors have him coming here in a few weeks.  At Hawaii, Faris was listed as being from Al Ain, UAE.  Al Ain is the city Jebel Hafeet is in, which is in Abu Dhabi, the Emirate.  Got that?

Anyway, as I sit here listening to the mid morning tunes on KNRK 94.7...I'm following IMAZ where Aleck, Christian and another friend from college Patrick are racing.  It's exciting following friends online during races.  Patrick had a stellar swim at 56:31.  

Back to my race.  Jen, Rebecca and I all raced.  The course is 10km uphill at an average of 8% followed by a 4km run averaging 4%.  I only recorded 9km bike segment climbing 2200' and 3.8km on the run climbing 380'.  Regardless, shorter didn't exactly mean easier.

Again, I have no idea who the players are in these events, except for Kevin, whom I figured to win.  He did.  I stayed with the lead group for all about 5mins and then settled into my on pace, per my usual.  There were about 5 people ahead of me at that point.  In the next couple of turns I passed most of them.  Again, I got the jump on the flat where they were recovering, I kept the watts up and blew by them.  Good times.  I had a couple people on my wheel at that point.  Next thing  I knew, I was by myself and looking to overtake a rider for third place on the climb.  I saw Kevin ahead and another rider in front of him.  They were too far and I still needed to run.  Again, didn’t know what kind of runners were behind me.  I rolled into transition, in third, about 1:45 back of Kevin.  I saw the 4^th place guy roll in as I ran out.  Leaving transition was a 400m climb at about 10%, brutal.  Think running up Lynch Hill at Wildflower, but only 400m.  Once to the top is was a false flat and two smaller climbs to the turn around, then all downhill quad busters.  Just as I hit the turn around, I passed second place.  By this time Kevin had passed the first guy, apparently he did so in transition.  I gained on 15 seconds on Kevin, but I came in a solid 2^nd place, winning the Senior division.  Kevin is over 40, winning the Veteran division. 

Jen got passed by a 17yearold on the hill, never to regain her lead.  To her credit, this girl trains for tris and is very strong while Jen is training for a marathon, only riding 2 hours a week (one of those rides is Jebel Hafeet though). 

Both Jen and I brought home 2^nd overall placings, a trophy for her and hotel voucher (one night stay) for me.  It was a good day.  Very proud of Jen.  She won’t lose come April when she is actually training for tri again.  We will be doing Hafeet so often, she will kill most guys that day!