After finishing 70.3 Oceanside in a commanding 8th place, HPT Athlete Justin Riele secured himself a spot in the 70.3 World Championships in New Zealand. Riele wrote this piece detailing his day and the fueling plan that pushed him to the line for our Feed | Insider.
Justin: I had a solid off-season of consistent training and couldn't wait to see how I would stack up against the best in the world at Oceanside. After racing with a hip stress fracture last year and ending most of my season after this race a year ago, I was hungry for redemption. With several of The Feed’s High-Performance Team athletes on the start list, including Lionel Sanders, Jackson Laundry, Marc Dubrick, and Matt Sharpe, I was definitely a bit nervous and had some imposter syndrome, but I knew this could be an opportunity to make a statement that I belonged here.
After waking up at 4:15 am on race morning, I ate a big bowl of grape nuts cereal with 2 bananas, a double espresso shot, and then sipped on a water bottle with carb drink mix in it while traveling to the race. This helps me avoid a small glucose crash after breakfast, and using the Supersapiens CGM, I’ve found it helps keep glucose levels consistent from breakfast until the race start. Thirty minutes before the race, I gulped down a TDeltaS Ketone Ester Delta G shot and chased it with a caffeinated (75mg) Amacx Gel. With some ketones and carbs to top off the gas tank, I was ready to rip!
The swim was full blast from the gun, and I came out of the water in the main front pack just 30 seconds behind the leaders. I settled into a strong bike group with Braden Currie, Patrick Lange, and Florian Angert for the first 10 miles as we started chasing down the three guys that had swam just 30 seconds up ahead, and I was right where I wanted to be. I had another caffeinated gel and started sipping the first of my two water bottles on board, each mixed with 90g of carbs. I knew the legs were firing well, and I was in a comfortable position settling into race power.
At about mile 20, the race really started heating up when Sam Long, Lionel Sanders, and Jackson Laundry bridged up to the front. I knew this was go-time - I could take a risk and try to ride with the big boys going full gas and risk blowing up my run, or I could play it a bit safer and settle in with Marc, Braden, and Jelle for the rest of the ride. I gulped down my second gel and decided to go for it, and spent 6 minutes averaging 392 watts solo to bridge back up to Sam Long, Lionel Sanders, Jackson Laundry, and Max Sperl, and nobody else was able to match the effort. I settled into the last position of the front group of 5, and thanks to Sam's heroic effort on the front of the train, we proceeded to put 4-5 minutes into most of our chasers over the last 20 miles. I came off the bike in 5th place in a solid position to hang on for life on the run, with a 2:06 bike split averaging 323w - by far my hardest and best ride to date.
As I started the half marathon in 5th place, I felt a bit dizzy and could tell a migraine was coming on, presumably from the hard bike effort. I started losing my vision which was a bit scary, and ran with my eyes closed for a bit. I honestly wasn’t sure I’d finish the race despite being right where I wanted to be. I reached for a caffeinated Amacx Gel, which seemed to help my migraine subside for the back half of the run. I had two more gels throughout the run for 90g carbs total, and I hung on for 8th place with a 1:19 run split after Jelle Geens, Braden Currie, and Marc Dubrick ran me down in the closing miles.
Finishing “in the money” at a stacked race like Oceanside is certainly my proudest and best result in the sport so far amongst the competitive field, taking down some of the greats for the first time like Joe Skipper, Chris Leiferman, Patrick Lange, Florian Angert, and Matt Sharpe in an honest race. I may have crossed in 8th place, but you would have thought I won the race by the finish line photos and post-race celebration. You can check out my YouTube video race recap here.
After the race, I had some tasty tacos with The Feed team, a couple of Athletic Brewing Free Wave Hazy IPAs, and a few NOT-Athletic Brewing beers later that night to celebrate… a rarity for me these days. I punched my ticket to the 70.3 World Championships in New Zealand and expect to move into a Top 100 PTO World Ranking and Top 10 American ranking.
