Hey there. I didn’t want to do a write up of the CEEPO Venom until I’ve had the chance to put the bike through some training and racing. Many of you already know, from pictures and such, that I’ve been riding this frame for a few months now. The CEEPO Venom just got back from the Big Island of Hawaii, got a proper cleaning (salt water is super corrosive), and is now ready to tackle the off season.
Thank you CEEPO Triathlon Bikes for providing me with the Venom. The model I received is the 2014 edition, blanketed with a nice coat of white and red glossy paint. The CEEPO Venom was designed for long course riding, especially for triathletes tackling the half ironman (70.3) and Ironman (140.6) distances.
There are some features of this bike that I like, including the ability to choose my own front brake, cockpit, and the ability to fit both electronic and mechanic drivetrain systems. For my Venom, I chose to to run Shimano Dura-Ace 9000 Di2. All the e-tube wires are run through the frame. And for simplicity of the initial fit process, I carried over the cockpit from my previous triathlon bike, the Slice.
I built this bike from the ground up, so making a few personal modifications were inevitable.
Reverse Brake Routing
To provide a cleaner front end, I swapped the left and right brake cabling. The front brake was routed so that the right lever controls the braking – simple, efficient, and works perfectly with the Dura-Ace 9000 front brake.
The rear is a bit more complicated, since it uses the Tektro R725, “u-brake” style system mounting under the bottom bracket. The brake cabling for the rear starts on the left side of the down tube, runs through the frame, and comes out near the bottom bracket. The entire brake cable goes through the frame – it was designed that way. Routing the brake cable through the left lever resulted in a much cleaner front end cable routing and less inner cable bend.
Tip: Install an in-line barrel adjuster to make adjusting brake cable tension on the fly a breeze!
Hindsight Tip: Since the rear brake is located at the dirtiest possible area of the bike, make sure you keep the brake as clean as possible, or else the brake will not work properly, (I learned this the hard way when my brake arms seized up and stopped working.)
Rear Dérailleur e-tube wire routing
The CEEPO Venom has two holes on the seatstay, one near the middle and one a bit further closer to the rear hanger. I choose to run the electronic cable from the hole that was closer because that hole faces downward, exposing less cable.
All I all, I’m super happy with the CEEPO Venom. It’s first race was at Toughman New York, where it helped me come from behind after a slow swim to capture my 3rd age group win in a row. Since then, it has raced both Ironman Maryland and Ironman Kona; and now it is ready for another round of training!
The long awaited IRONMAN Kona blog post…Sorry for the delay. Business school midterms and projects, along with work took priority immediately after Kona, leaving me virtually no time to write up my experiences in Hawaii. I promise that will be my only excuse in this recap of IRONMAN Kona.
Our journey to Kona began on October 6th. JFK>PHX>KOA. The 13 hour travel time didn’t even phase me, knowing that the Big Island would be filled with the best triathletes from all over the world.
Race week was super busy!
Not soon after landing, I found myself going to the CEEPO Launch party. Going to Kona with a bike sponsor was an honor, and I am proud to ride CEEPO Venom, developed by Tanaka Nobuyuki. Tim Russell, of Thoroughbred Triathlon Coach, joined in on the action.
The rest of the week, included: (excluding all other touristy events)
Slowtwitch Forum gathering party presented by Cannondale
Kona Underpants Run
Practice riding on the Queen K highway
Swimming out to the ,Coffees of Hawaii, coffee boat
Meeting 8 time olympian medalist, and Team Chocolate Milk teammate, Apolo Ohno
Some more pics!
Obligatory Energy Lab photo
Finishing is a memory that will never be forgotten
CEEPO well represented at the Slowtwitch party
riding the Queen K
post swim Team Chocolate Milk meetup!
2014 Kona Underpants Run
The week flew by. Splitting time between Family and pre race activities left me no time to rest, which would have been a priority if Kona was going to my IRONMAN race. This week was focused on the experiences, the sights, the atmosphere – just everything that makes IRONMAN and Kona ever so magical leading up to the big day. Like pineapples…I did not miss any opportunity to consume an immense amount of pineapples. No matter where I ate them, they were succulent and super tasty. And while I’m on the topic of food – I’ve learned to appreciate the deliciousness of adding Macadamian nuts to my food, especially on top of my pancakes! Island Lava Java on Alii Drive served the best pancakes with chopped up macadamian nuts on top.
Friday before the race was the mandatory bike and gear bag check in. I checked in around 2:30pm. The IRONMAN Kona bike check in process is like no other IRONMAN check in. Why? Because you get to have a volunteer escort you through the entire process, from bike check in, to run bag check in and then to bike bag check in. It was really cool to have a volunteer walk me through the Kona Pier and show me the direction of where I would be running during T1 and T2 on race day.
My CEEPO Venom was parked early.
Alright, let’s get onto RACE DAY!
Pre-Race – woke up at 4am, checked in to transition by 5am, body marked (temporary tattoos). I ditched my parents to get body marked and weighed in. My race morning weight was unusually high at 142lbs; it must have been all the pineapples and macadamian nuts 😉
I met up with my parents in from the King Kam hotel. They watched me body glide myself and put on the swim skin (no wetsuits for Kona!) By 6:30am, the Pro’s have already started and it was time for all the Age Groupers to enter the water. I got into the water 15 minutes before the start and found myself treading water for a while. That must have sucked a good amount of energy from me, which I will get into later.
Swim – 1:22:30 – for me, that was a bit faster than what I expected. Not having done an IRONMAN distance swim (2.4 miles) without a wetsuit, I was expecting a 1:25 swim split, which would be about 10 minutes slower than my Lake Placid split. The coolest part of the swim was that the water was always clear, so drafting was relatively easier than say…a lake swim. Conditions were choppy but nothing crazy enough to break my stroke.
T1 was super fast. A little too fast – I forgot to apply sunscreen. Bad decision. Always reapply sunscreen in transition.
Bike – 5:42:27 – This is where things got ugly. And after giving it some thought, I finally realized why I felt so sluggish on the bike; I had not eaten a big enough breakfast! So I ended up riding the first 40-50 miles feeling like I had bonked. And trust me when I say this, it feels like a death march. What was supposed to be a 5:10-5:15 bike split turned into a dismal 5:42, which put me in a bad position for the start of the marathon. Without really getting into much detail, I wasn’t able to generate my target wattage until I reached the 7-mile climb up to Hawi. After the turn-around, I tried my best to stay tucked in during the descent. Focusing on not getting blown off the bike was also a challenge…but it was also exhilarating! I found a good rhythm coming back into town but the deficit I suffered on the first half of the bike would inevitably catch up with me on the run.
Run – 3:53:23 – Leaving T2 has always felt as if I were shot out of a cannon, but in this case, I felt more sluggish than ever when starting the marathon. I knew that pushing hard on the second half of the bike would hurt, and it did. It hurt a lot. The first 10 miles, out and back on Alii was a constant effort. By the time I reached the climb up Palani Road where I saw Mom and Dad, I had started to lose it. That is where I decided to walk; running or shuffling up Palani wouldn’t have been any quicker. I knew that the longer I stayed out on the course, the more I’d hurt. So after a few walk/run efforts, I mentally topped off and ran the last 13 miles without stopping. My legs ran on cruise control at around 8:45 to 9:00 mile pace. What surprised me the most was that I was able to run in and out of the Natural Energy Lab without stopping. The stretch in the lab is nearly 3 miles long, where no spectators are allowed, only volunteers and racers. The last 10 kilometers hurt, but I knew that if I stopped and walked, it would hurt even more…so I kept on running. At mile 25, I saw my parents one more time coming down Palani Road. Mom was so excited that she ran down Palani next to me!
The moment I turned onto Alii Drive, I knew that I had made it. And in a blink of an eye, I found myself finally crossing the finish line, at 11 hours 4 minutes and 13 seconds.
Finishing IRONMAN Kona. Another stepping stone fulfilled.
I forgot to publish this post before Ironman Kona. Here’s what I had to say (written on the flight on October 6):
A long flight from NYC to Kona means I can finally recap how my 2014 triathlon season unfolded.
Most people dream of going to the big island of Kailua-Kona…but my mission to qualify for the Ironman World Championship was secured at this year’s Ironman Lake Placid on July 27th. A month prior, I had set a personal best half ironman performance at Toughman Tupper Lake Tinman.
After Lake Placid, I took time off, which lasted a few days. Qualifying for Kona was a relief, but at the same time, I knew that my training schedule would have to be readjusted with additional training load.
On August 9th, I completed the Leadville Trail 100 Mountain Bike Race. It took me over 10 hours to complete, and was possibly the toughest day I’ve experienced in the saddle. I earned the famous LT100 finisher’s belt buckle (which now sits on top of the fireplace mantle, placed next to my IMLP award)
On August 23rd, I raced the Tobay Sprint Triathlon in Oyster Bay, NY. You can read more about it here.
The month of August flew by. Training was on schedule and everything was falling into place – life couldn’t be any better.
September marked the start of grad school, which I won’t get into much, but if anyone is considering grad school + Ironman training + working full time, you’re going to need to dial back on something. I learned that the hard way…hey, you live and learn, right?
An event I could not miss was the TOUGHMAN Half Ironman up in Westchester, NY. This marked my 3rd consecutive year racing, having won my age group in the previous years. And the result of this year’s race was no different. After a dismal swim, I made up a ton of ground on the bike course and left T2 in the Top 15. The TOUGHMAN run is my favorite, partly because of its scenic course, but also because it’s hilly! Last year, I ran 1:30 off the bike and took a top 20 overall finish. This year, I ran a 1:26 half marathon to chase down 5th place overall!
A week after Toughman, I got careless and crashed. Tons of road rash, and as I’m writing this…the wounds are still in the healing process.
But the crash didn’t stop me from completing the inaugural IRONMAN Maryland on September 20th. The swim was beautiful, the bike course was flat, windy and boring, and the run course was a 3 loop tease-fest; you run by the finish line 5 times before you can actually make the right turn onto the finishers’ chute. I owe it to my teammate Jill, who was very adamant in convincing me to do a 140.6 mile training race, 3 weeks out from Kona. That weekend was so much fun!
And so you have it, between Ironman Lake Placid and Kona, I’ve done: Leadville 100 + Tobay Sprint triathlon + Toughman Half + IRONMAN Maryland.
And all of this wouldn’t be possible without the continued support of my family, friends and sponsors.
Brickwell Cycling & Multisports
CEEPO Triathlon Specific Bikes
ISM Saddles
Headsweats
Team Chocolate Milk
