Ironman Canada
Penticton, British Columbia
August 29, 2010
2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, 26.2 mile run
Going into this race, I was feeling sluggish, not super confident, injured, and did I say sluggish?
The swim started off with roughly 2800 people spread out across a quarter of a mile with plans to meet at the first buoy. I thought that since we would all be meeting there, I would at least get to the front of the line and have people pass me instead of the other way around. This idea popped into my head after speaking with a bunch of other better swimmers and it turned out only 1161 people beat me out of the water. This could have been due partially to my strategy of swimming in a zig zag pattern. Straight lines are over rated and I was very happy with my 1:11 swim which was a 7 minute PR from IM New Zealand and a 5 minute PR from Aquabike in July.
The bike is something that I have gotten progressively stronger on but multitasking is tough which has resulted in nutrition issues, cramping, throwing up… in previous races. I decided this time around to stay in Zone 2/3 (aerobic) so that I would have good legs to run the marathon. Riding conservatively was a very hard thing to do but I stuck to my plan even when people were passing me. That is until the rain started. I was really trying to keep taking in nutrition but when the rain/hail started with about 25 miles to go, I got so cold that I couldn’t stop shivering and was therefore unable to grab my water bottles to drink. Plus all my focus was on staying alive as I went down the backside of Yellow Lake at 30 mph in the wind and rain with both brakes fully engaged. Seeing 3 ambulances at the bottom of the hill wasn’t very comforting. I was hoping to ride at least a 5:30 but was happy to be off the bike in 5:39 and made up a lot of positions, 1162 to 407 and 131 to 54 in my age group.
When I ran into the transition tent, I wasn’t able to put my socks and shoes on by myself because my hands were frozen. Thank goodness for the volunteers! I was nervous starting the run since my legs started to tighten during the end of the bike but decided to just stick with the plan of running a sub 8 pace and walking each aid station. For the most part it worked on the first half with me crossing the ½ way point in 1:46. I quickly realized that the return trip started out with a hill and what felt like a nonstop headwind. My pace slowed a bit but I tried to just focus on drafting anybody who passed me. This worked perfectly as everybody I drafted, I ended up passing J I didn’t manage to keep up a 8 minute pace for the return portion but was happy with a 3:44 time which shot me up 140 spots to finish in 267th place out of 3029. I passed 14 guys in my age group to sit finish in 40th out of 247.
Overall, it was a great day with many friends finishing their first Ironman and others pulling of awesome finishes on a difficult day.
Bike Breakdown.
Run Breakdown. You can see how often I had to go to the bathroom… lots of stops
Here’s the video of the day before the race.
California 70.3
Indoor skydiving on Friday night. Saturday bike and run. Sunday swim and run.
Had a PacBikes training camp this past weekend. Some good tough workouts from Friday -- Monday. I didn’t make it on Friday due to work and on Sunday, I decided to do the workouts later in the day so I could make it to Church and have lunch with the Siacor family. Andreas made a video of the last day’s ride which was a long and tough ride that included some drama as Nate took a spill but managed to come out of it without injury.
Andreas’ recap of the day, “Today the conditions could have hardly been better for february. The ride on the Peninsula was hilly, hard and scenic and sunny. Some strong girls consisting of Erin, Kelly, Rosi and Vicki climbed Old La Honda with the boys then took a different route and it sounded like they rode a good 4 hours. The boys (John D and B, Alan, Nate and myself) headed up on Skyline, down West Alpine, up/down Pescadero, up/down, up/down, up/down on Stage road and up/up/up on Tunitas Creek Rd, down/down/down on the 92.”
Beautiful day. We are in such better spirits compared to days 1 & 2.
Carmel to San Luis Obispo. Long day in which we got through 135 miles. Started and ended in the rain. Pretty cold day.
After getting lost in the Marina trying to find Vic’s place, then getting lost in Daly City, and jumping on the freeway to get to Pacifica (SCARY!), we finally got into sort of a rhythm albeit against headwinds. Included getting lost, I ended up cycling ~110 miles, Rahim powered thru ~15 miles, and Mike did ~125. Very hard cycling day. Day 2 and 3 recaps will come soon.
Video of my experience during the NFEC 50 miler
NFEC Data from my Garmin 305
