At 4am, Tracy and I get up.  I went over everything on my lists/in my head – making sure everything was in the right bag.  For those of you that haven’t done an Ironman, you get a bunch of bags to put stuff you need for the race – one for swim-to-bike, one for bike-to-run.  These you dump off when you hand in your bike.  There are two bags called “special needs” for food/pickmeups/a pistol to end it all – that you can get halfway through the bike/run.  I had it all laid out the night before so it was a matter of grabbing them and going.  I made a pretty big mistake though – I put my run nutrition in my run special needs bag and was going to put it in the transtion bag when I got up to the convention center.  I managed to move my gummy bags over to the right bag, but forgot the waterbottle full of Infinit.  That’s really not a big deal for me since I have an iron stomach, but all my salt pills were in the pouch attached to the bottle.  That ended up causing some hurt later in the day.

Otherwise, pretty uneventful.  I was really anixous to get in the water in float, but the people looking to “race” that day wanted to save energy.  So we hung around near the entrance to the water.  Here’s a cool picture with some of the EN guys:

Do I look fat in this wetsuit?      From Ironman

The Swim (1:13): About 15 minutes before showtime, we get in and float around.  Frankly, that was the most peaceful time of the day. I was a bit nervous about the star but found a nice space of empty water, and let’s be honest – I am bigger than the average Ironman.  It’s more likely that I’d be bringing the pain, rather than getting it during the swim.   Luckily, that’s how it turned out.

There were a few people that freaked out as we hit the first turn.  A lot of people converge on that spot, so everyone goes upright in the water for 15-20 seconds – like being in rush hour traffic.  Remember, we’re all in wetsuits so you float a bit.  I could hear some guy screaming though – dude, just chill.

Anyway, I ended up going waaay to fast (at least that’s my story for now).  I swam a 1:13:08 – 10 minutes faster than the 2.4mi swim I did in mid August on the same course.  I didn’t feel like I was going fast, but I definately felt hot.  The water temp was about 76 degrees, so wearing the wetsuit and going out fast for me probably wasn’t smart.  I was shooting for around 1:20 -a nice leisuely pace.   Tracy took this video as I came out of the water – about 10 secs in I lumber on by.

I hadn’t planned on running up the helix – I knew it was going to be a long day and my goal was to get my heart rate under control.  I ignored my plans though and got caught up in the moment – frankly it was a ton of fun running and getting cheered on.  People are 2-3 deep the entire way up and they all were great.

The Bike (7:23):  I decided not to throw my powerfile stuff in here. If you care, you can view the bike power graph here.  The short of it was I did a poor job of keeping my power down during the second half of the first hour all the way until God took care of it for me after hour 3.  I had no idea I was burning that far above plan – I thought I was doing a good job the first hour, especially since I had to have been passed by over 500 people (no exageration) during this time.   I took comfort that all those people were going out too hard – but should have been better on my end of racing smart.

The consequence of blowing my power up? Heart rate out of control, and a big bad blowup coming down the road.  My Deep Dark Place came as we turned to begin lap two of the course – around 3:30 into the bike.  I seriously thought about packing it in there.  Everything hurt, I was going about MACH 0.002, and all around it was no fun.  I was able to get to the special needs stop, and I began pounding water and gummy bears while pouring water over my head.  I then realized it was waaay hotter than I was used to, and I hadnt drank as much Infinit as I had planned – primarily because it tasted like frog feces. Blech. 

Long story short – I did a mental reboot.  I decided my goal was now to get to the run in a position to shuffle run the whole thing so I wouldn’t join the ranks of the walkers.  I needed something to hang my pride on, and that seemed to work.  As part of my strategy I decided I’d stop for water every aid station, and keep my temp down.  This worked well.

The rest of the ride was uneventful for the most part.  a well meaning volunteer dropped my nutrition bottle with 30 miles to go – no biggy just switch to Gateraide.  This worked well until the Gatoraide I took at the very last aid station was launched as I hit a hard bump coming back into Madison.  Unfortunately, I was on the razor’s edge nutrition-wise because I bonked HARD the last 4 miles in.  If you check out the power graph, you’ll see how the blue line plummets the last 15 minutes of the ride.  There’s no real hill there – that’s just me gasping for life. 

The “Run” – 5:26:  I was in a bad place at transition.  I ended up losing my sunglasses, I didn’t have my nutrition, and I’ve never run more than 18 miles before.    Considering this, I think I did ok.  My strategy was to run between every aid station, walk the station as I eat/drink, and walk the hills.  I was planning on running the first 6 miles at 10ish min/mile, and pick it up after that.  That didn’t happen.  I averages 11:30’s the first 6, falling back to 12’s for 7-13.    I was just cooked by this point.  I had a good time, and I was amazed by how many people were outright walking it.  As proof that the Ironman is a walking event for a vast majority – my shufflerun 12:26/mile pace let me gain 230 spots in the final ranking.    I hit dark spots at mile 12-14 and mile 20.  Mile 12 is where you really hear the crowd cheering for the finishers, and you run up alongside those lucky souls who have finished for the day. However, I had to turn off to begin the next 13miles while they get to hit the showers. I wanted to punch their smiling, fit faces in. 

Mile 20 is like a blurry nightmare to me.  It’s nearly completely dark out by Picnic Point except for the aide stations and a goofy Ford booth.  All I could think of was this is what the night scenes from Gear of War wear built off of – beacons of light with bad,bad,bad man dark inbetween.  Even though I knew mentally I only had another 1-1:15 to go, it felt like I had years ahead of me.  The light never seemed to get closer – until it did.  Once I hit the turnaround I stopped to work out a cramp, and then it was onward to home.  That made it much easier mentally.

Finish: 14:24 – And then, after 9pm, it was all over.  I’d finished.

From Ironman

Two photos capture the moment.  First was this one with Tracy: she’d been there the whole day cheering me on, and I really appreciate it.  She also let me train the 3-5hours needed on Sat/Sun without complaining.  It takes a special woman to do that when you have three kids.

From Ironman

Then, there was the pizza….I swear to you that that generic soda and pizza were the best my lips have touched.  And let me assure you that I have purveyed many pies and drinks in my day!

From Ironman

Post race: I have had the post-Ironman blues.  Hard!  It’s weird to have no real goal to hit.  I also know I won’t have a chance to redeem my performance until 2011 at the earliest, so I’ve been babying up and stewing about that for a bit.  It’s time to man up and just enjoy the fact I did it, I am an Ironman, and look forward to the future.  Thanks again for everyone that supported me along the way – I hope to be able to return the favor again in the near future.

Last pic – REMEMBER TO GET SUNSCREEN EVERY CHANCE YOU CAN! I had it put on at swim-bike and bike-run transitions, but it wsn’t enough.  This still hurt 2 weeks later.

From Ironman

On the other hand, while I think I can race an Ironman, I’m still not sure I will execute as well as I should.  I tell myself that the race rehearsals I have coming up will give me experience, but you never know until the day comes.  I think the great training program and helpful support from Endurance Nation have really set me up well, but as my track coach used to say “the proof is in the pudding”.

Today I was supposed to bike 4:30.  I ended up doing only 3:00 as I blew a tire on the way back through Belgium, WI.  My car was in Shorewood, so I was happy to have a spare tube.  I was unhappy to find out:

1. I suck at fast tire changes
2. Still haven’t mastered getting the wheel out of the chain (horizontal cutouts)
3. My combo pump/CO2 thing was cheap – it physically blew apart into 2 pieces when I cracked the cartridge.  I have pictures of the mess I’ll post sometime.
4. My spare tube had a slow leak, or my pump couldn’t get enough pressure into the tire.  Either way I was screwed.

Luck for me I have a loving wife who loaded the family into the van to pick me up.  I had a nice burger and beers from Curly’s; if you are ever riding the bike trail and need to stop for something to eat I highly recommend it.  Nice people, good food and cheap.