OK Here’s a quick
down and dirty that got out of hand and sloppy. I know it's been a while since I've posted anything. I've had pretty limited racing this year with my primary focus getting ready for this...
Jen, my Wife and I, went to Madison Wisconsin so I could compete in Ironman Wisconsin September 8th. This has been a year in the making because of course as soon as registration opens the year before after the race completion, you must enter because it fills up quickly.
The race administration requires you check in
by Friday two days before the race by 5:00pm.
So we left on Thursday after stopping to watch our kids, Noah and
Abigail run a cross country race in Papillion. They did great, Abs got 5th and
Noah 14th. It was a very hot
meet…Noah’s body does not like heat.
Anyway, we drove to Iowa City that night and got there around 11:00pm –
pretty uneventful. It took us a while to
get going in the morning, but we finished off the drive the next day and got to
Madison in time for the 2:00pm Race briefing.
The Briefing was pretty informative and helped put some of the pieces
together for me regarding the transitions and special needs bags. Each Transition – T1 Swim to Bike (Cycling
Gear) and T2 Bike to Run (Run Gear) had
bags for each. The Bike and Run had
special needs bags that would be taken out to the course on race day and you
could pick up out on course. I ended up
only using one special needs bag and that was for the Bike course – Coke and PB
and J. The rest of Friday got sucked up
looking for our hotel, checking in, Dinner and a few drinks to un-wind. BTW, the check in took an hour to go through
the line. Kind of ridiculous. Lots of
standing. Not sure what the hold up was, cuz I didn't see it when I finally worked my way up to the front.
Saturday Jen and I slept in
ate a late breakfast and rode from the Hotel down to the race course and back –
we were staying out in Middleton a ways from the downtown area. This ended up being a nice ride, except we
ran into some WI Badger fan congestion heading to the Saturday afternoon
football game. Campus is situated right
near the Race course and on Lake Mendota. The Lake is one of the two lakes that are separated
by a land mass that houses downtown, WI Campus, and State government including
the Capitol which was the site for the Race Finish. Doing the ride allowed us to plot our drive
course to the race in the morning and also loosen up the legs. The ride ended up being 18 miles. When we got back to the hotel I had a couple
hours to pack the T1 and T2 bags and get down to the Monona Terrace and drop
them off along with checking in my bike – This had to be done by 3:00pm when they
close the transitions. Packing the
Transition bags was stressful to me because I wanted to make sure I had
everything I could possibly need for the bike and run – I ended up over
packing, but then I always do. Once you
drop them off, it’s done deal. You are
able to get to your bike in the morning to check tire pressure and make sure
everything is ready to roll.
I had Qdoba for dinner the
night before the race – a veggie burrito…messed my stomach up that night and
then things were not moving like I would have liked on race morning…if you know
what I mean! This kind of bothered me all day – maybe leading to problems
later as you’ll see.
Race morning came early –
4:15am wake up and breakfast and 7:00am start– of course I really woke up at 3:30 with a “a
shit” moment of adrenaline…I’m racing today!
The weather totally turned out to be nice after it was hot and humid on
Saturday, a cold front went through and it was 75 and cloudy, but windy
Northeast Wind 15mph.
The swim is a mass deep
water off shore start with a one lap 2.4mile loop. When they fired the start cannon it was like
being in a Koi pond at feeding time. The
first section of the swim course was 1500meters to the first turn with a tail
wind, we did the mandatory Moo (that’s right cow Moo, an Ironman WI tradition)
at the first buoy turn and were pretty tightly packed in there – I hear there
were possibly 2500 starters. The course was a big rectangle and we turned
back into the wind on the back side of the course so it was a little choppy
from the wind. The water was fairly clear, you could see past your arm –
and hand outstretched in front of you a ways. With the chop though, it
was hard to look over the waves and see the buoys…that bummed me out a bit, and
I ended up taking a few waves in the face and taking in a little a lot
of Lake Monona. I mostly just followed
the herd around the course. 1:17
T1 involves stripping off
the wet suit after exiting the lake and then running the circular car ramp up
to Monona Terrace building and into the bag room and then into the changing
room. I changed and made my way to the
bike, but made a quick stop to the use the Porta John. 10:58 – slow.
The bike course was tough –
112 miles. The course was an out and back balloon with two loops on the
balloon. It featured lots of hills hilly
and lots of turns meandering through Wisconsin pastoral scenes that included
plenty of Corn and Trees too. It even
included some old farm houses and Holsteins.
I opted to ride my Road
bike- I probably would have been fine on the TT bike, but I had struggled on
long rides with it getting a sore neck and shoulders. Oh yes, I’ve moved
the bars up and messed with position from here till Tuesday. Just couldn’t get it quite right…I think my
elbow pads need to come back a bit further to make it right. Anyway, On course I would catch the guys and
gals on the climbs and put time on them, and then some would go blowing by me
on the bottom of the down hills tucked in their Time Trial position and with
their nice aero wheels and Carbon Fiber frames whoooooshing along…I played leap
frog with many of the same people all day. At mile 57 I stopped at the
special needs stop and picked up my coke and PB& J, I also made use of the
Porta John to try and get my gut to feel better - They had Porta Johns all over
the course for such emergencies. That stop helped a little.
Amongst all the hills, the
bike course had 3 climbs that were basically smallest/easiest gear – 39x23 for
those in the know. They were steepish
and well placed that you were tired when you got to them and they became a quad
burning effort. We finished the 2 loops and went back into the wind to
finish and head back to Madison…There was a stretch into the wind after 90
miles that was a false flat with a climb at the end that was really tough and
slow balls of the feet burner. One major bummer I suffered from was the
balls of me feet were on fire for some reason the last 30-40 miles. Not
sure why, I did get new shoes a month ago, and did a couple of longish rides of
70+ miles with no issues. I thought they
were tested out, but obviously not well enough. Oh wait 112 – 70 = 40
miles…huh! They are basically the
same fit and model as my previous shoes and I even had my insoles that I had in
my previous shoes in there. So the sore feet and the fact that my quads
were a little crampy at the end of the bike should have been considered a bit
of foreshadowing of things to come… 6:06
T2 – We Returned to the
Monona Terrace Convention center for the Bike to Run Transition. The Volunteers grabbed you bike and racked
it. The volunteers were exceptional…all
Day! Including in the transitions where they would help you empty out
your bag, allow you to get changed and then take and stuff your old clothes
away and haul off the bag. Upon leaving the building, there were rows of
Porta Potties and both times leaving transition, I was able to get right in and
use them. 6:08
The run was well set up…Two
loops. The only bummer was seeing the mileage for the first loop and the
second loop…and only being on the first loop. Uggghhh, I’m only one loop
in???? Oh no. Actually the run went great…at first, I stuck with my
plan and stayed in zone two all day, so on the run, I was keeping my heart rate
at that 148-150 mark. This worked great, wasn’t breathing at all, was
taking in fluids at each feed station…which there are plenty of them along the
course. However at mile 15 – 16 – 17 I got the bonk bad. I
walked a bunch of 16 to 17 and stopped and did a big feed at that feed
station. That helped and was able to get running again by mile 18.
I held on, but could only run about 9:00 pace and then I made sure I went
through the feeds slow and I took on lots of fluids (cola being my favorite and
water) and ate some banana, oranges. Felt pretty good until the last
mile, but was able to keep running until the finish. Super sweet running
down State street around the Capitol to the finish line – the crowds were
pretty amazing here. Actually, the
spectators were amazing all day watching this parade…including out on the bike
course. Total Time 12hr:11min:51sec
After the finish I was
pretty dizzy and needed a couple volunteers to help walk me out. Jen
found me at the finish and helped me find a place to sit down on a bench…and
there I ralphed, and ralphed. All water. So my stomach must have
basically shut down and I got dehydrated. Totally a mess. I could
barely walk. Must not have looked good because after Jen and I finally
made our way down to Monona terrace building to pick up my bike and transition
bags, the security guy there came over and asked if I was OK – stating that we
have medical here for you…hint hint, you should use it. The first time I
said I’d be ok, but as I sat there and tried to stay awake and started to
shiver, my legs started to lock up, I knew there was no way I could walk to the
Van. Finally I gave in and “take me to
the medical tent.” They wheeled me out to the transport in a wheel chair.
The folks at the medical
tent were great. They took my weight…152, basically down 8ish pounds from
the weigh in the day before. They gave me two saline bags via IV and a
blanket and that was huge on making me feel half way decent. I actually
warmed up and the legs felt way better. I was actually able to eat and drink
fluids that night.
Reading through this, there
are obvious issues.
1)
Intestinal
issues – How to solve those?
2)
TT
bike vs. Road bike – Toss up? Need to
get the TT bike more comfortable.
3)
Bike
shoes. Probably shouldn’t have changed shoes so close to the race…needed
to do it way earlier if I was going to do it. The old shoes were pretty
mushy, but so be it.
4)
Run –
Maybe I should have gone even slower at the start? Kept my HR way
down? Not sure. Would that have
allowed me to saunter along at 9 minute pace instead of finishing pace of
10:20per mile.
5)
Had a
goal of 11:30 – finished at 12:11
Swim - 17:38
T1 – 10:58 with PP stop and
long run
Bike-6:06
T2-6:08
= 7:40
Which if my calculations
are correct would have left me a 3:50 marathon to make the goal. 8:46
pace? Do-able? Should be!
Hmmm - do over?
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