IM Hawaii: Day 8 - Race Report

Updated Race Report

3:30am wake up call. Made a pot of coffee, and had a bowl of oatmeal with bananas, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, granola bar, some gatorade, and a bottle of Zym. In transition I would top it off with a powergel and some Zym catapult. I mixed two bottles of carbo pro and zym, and one of just zym for the bike.

My mom and grandma were demoted to the sofa bed last last night

Roche and I went out into the darkness of the Kona morning along with hundreds of others who were waiting for shuttles to take them down to transition. At first we attempted to board the Austrialian's bus thinking it was a shuttle, but we quickly kicked off. Upon arriving at transition everyone is directed to the back of the host hotel to get body markings. Here they were collecting special foods run and bike bags. Then we proceed around to transition. Roche was no longer allowed to accompany any further. In transition I put my bottles on my bike and found one of the volunteers walking around with pumps. I couldnt top off my front tire because the valve was stuck inside the zipp valve extension. After some searching I had a mechanic work some magic and everthing was good to go.

While walking around transition, it was virtually impossible to spot a bike worth less than $5,000. If I had to take an educated guess, I would say the average bike was about $6000.

As many of you well know, trying to find a bathroom/porta pot is always a challenge in the morning. I usually take a jog and try to find a remote location to do business. I ended up finding some portapots on Palani and stood in line behind the Norman Stadler. Then I headed back to transition to get ready for the swim. I hung out with Brian a bit along the rails of the special needs bags area and watched some of the commotion and goings on. The NBC camera crews were all over the place. There was some of the usual joking around among athletes. But the overall atmosphere seemed a bit more serious than other transitions.

Pre race - view of transition

Two of the three parashooters were SEALS, also racing today, jumping into the swim start.

Swim Start

At 6:45 the cannon blasted, starting the pro race. I was in transition taping up my skinsuit, the crowed erupted and most of the age groupers had gathered by the pier’s edge or had already entered the water by way of the beach. I made my way over to the side of the pier between the special foods bag areas. Christian Waterstrat was headed to the same spot. We chatted briefly, and wished each other good luck. As we talked one of the Vaseline volunteers came around. As inappropriately as it may sound, we generously lubed one another up with heaping handfuls of lubricant. Skinsuits and salt water don’t exactly create the most comfortable contact points on any part of the body that will be moving for the next 2.4 miles. My combination of Bodyglide, Vaseline, and electrical tape was a smashing success in the water. However, no matter how comfortable I managed to keep my skin, the actual swim was another story. At 6:50am, opting not to jump off the pier, I made my way through the mass of athletes in transition making their last minute adjustments and preparations and headed down to the beach. If the sight standing on the beach at the Ironman World Championships doesn’t get you ready to race you need to get your head checked. 1800 of the world’s best athletes were in front of me making their way out to wade in the salty pier water with between the massive Gatorade blow up bottle on the pier and giant floating Ford logo, which create an imaginary line between them (the starting line). A dozen or so surfers are constantly paddling back and forth along the line keeping everybody honest. The spectators lined the pier 5 deep on Ali’i Drive as far as I could see. Helicopters, the announcer, the spectators, music, chatter between the athletes and the sound of 1800 people treading water fill you ears.

Coast along Ali'i drive - before swim - NBC helicopters, and coast guard helicopters and a Navy B-12 added to the excitement race morning. I first settled in about 15 people deep from the line along close to the middle of the masses. Then second guessed myself and moved over to the left of the pack, but up closer to the line, about only 10-20 meters behind the Ford float. With no announcement the cannon crashes. Amazingly enough the start was hardly congested. I was expecting a start similar to Wisconsin, where I was unable to get into a rhythm until about the 150m mark. Everyone got off to a quick start and jockeyed for position, gradually veering to the right towards the buoys. Try as I might, sighting is always an issue. The reference point is a sailboat, which serves as the turnaround. I was able to find some bubbles and stay on some feet for a good portion of the swim. The closer to the buoy the more frequent contact becomes. At the turn it’s a free for all. I would keep getting someone on my feet, it felt like they would hit me every stroke. It didn’t make sense… trying to get a draft off my slow moving waiflike figure is simply a poor choice. Making the turn at the second orange buoy and heading back you can look up and see the giant Gatorade bottle as your sight. At this point I was still feeling relatively fresh. I hoped in a nice train of about 5 or 6 single file swimmers. They pulled me along for a good portion of the return trip. I was finally dropped with somewhere around 400m left to the swim exit. If you can hit the wall in the water, I did. All I could think was “why didn’t you swim more?”. I probably had one of my biggest swim weeks (volume wise) of the year the previous 6 days in Hawaii. My arms were completely spent. People were passing me left and right. I finally reached the beach and ran up the stairs to T1 with a time of 1:12 (8 minutes slower than Wisconsin). Everyone pretty much makes a lap around transition until you get to the bike gear bag area. People are yelling numbers like crazy, and someone grabs your bag for you and directs you into the change tent. It’s a complete disaster in there. People are everywhere, most all of the chairs are occupied, there is gear, sunscreen towels, bottles, gels, bags etc. all over the place. I ran to the end and dumped out all my stuff. I found a bottle of sunscreen and frantically and poorly lathered my body. Threw on my shoes and a very generous application of DZnuts. After the tent we’re all directed through the enormous transition to our bike, put on my helmet and glasses and ran out, T1 was 5:28.

Bike out of T1 Bike out is insane. It seemed like we had 2 kilometers to the top of Alpe d huez in the tour. The crown was absolutely amazing, crowding the railings, hanging over with noise makers and such. The bike heads straight up Palani Drive and then heads south 5 or so miles on Kaukini Hwy. This part of the course is blazing fast. People line the streets the entire first down and back. I hit the turnaround, then came back up Kaukini, up Palini again then left onto the Queen K. At this point there was about a block of construction, the road wasn’t the greatest. The street was littered with tons of yellow aero sponges and water bottles, I remember thinking, “That sucks” and remembered David and Byers telling me, so politely, "Don't suck!". Little did I know, this is probably where one of my Carbopro bottles popped out of my flatwing. Heading north on the Queen K felt great. I was just happy to get out of the water and try to make up for some lost time. The wind wasn’t too bad at this point, only a slight headwind/crosswind, mostly coming from off the ocean from the left. I got into a rhythm and was able to start making a couple passes. However, it seemed that for every pass I completed some old guy or super strong lady would come blasting by. These people are ridiculous cyclists. If there were no wind, the course would be very forgiving. I wouldn’t call it a rolling first half, but pretty close. There are gradual, steady inclines from 400m to 1 mile. The plus side is you do you work getting up, but are rewarded with a screaming fast descent/(almost recovery) down the back side. I started dripping sweat in the 2 or 3 miles on the bike. I had been going through my liquids like crazy the entire way so far, and already down one carbopro bottle I was hitting up the aid stations for electrolytes every chance I got. Once my heart rate settled a bit I downed two Roctanes during the first 40-50 minutes. I don’t usually do well with all the sugar syrup and fructose in Gatorade, so I would usually alternate Gatorade and water at the aide stations. Usually grabbing a Gatorade bottle at the front of the aid station, slamming it for about 10 seconds, then tossing it by the end of the station. Making the turn toward Hawi, I was sure to avoid the shoulder where I flatted 6 days earlier. Heading toward Hawi is a complete and total nuisance. Uphill, into a very stiff head/crosswind. About 75% of my ride up to the turnaround was spent on the base bars. Trying to stay aero didn’t seem to be too advantageous with the crosswinds. Tipping the scales at a buck 45, running 606s with a 70mm stem was not a greatest setup for such a situation. Several times I as blown clear across the road, onto the shoulder, hanging on for dear life. I kept waiting for the pros to pass by on the opposite side of the road. Finally the time car came by, then a minute later the leaders. I didn’t recognize any of the top 3 guys. Stadler was sitting back in about 6th, followed closely by a couple of his teammates. After the excitement of the leaders passing, the punishing winds prevailed. My focus was back on trying to keep the rubber down. Hitting the turnaround was such a gift. I didn’t feel I needed anything from my special foods bag so continued back down to the Queen K. Times like these make me wish I raced with a computer just to check max speed. Everyone was smoking down the road with a nice tail wind. Again though, there were some sections where a crosswind would come out of nowhere and scare the crap out of me. I was able to make up a lot of ground this portion of the ride, beginning to make passes again. Back on the queen k the times were not as fun. High hopes of a tail wind were crushed. Winds were back, at times I was out of my saddle… going down hill. My glutes were starting to tighten up with about 30mi to go. More frequent climbs out of the saddle helped mix up my position and grab a couple extra riders on the up hills. I was feeling pretty good at this point except for my feet. I rode the last 20mi with my shoes unstraped. Coming back into town was another gift. I couldn’t wait to get out on the run.

Run - about 5mi marker on Ali'i Drive - eating oranges

Coming into T2 I slipped my feet out of my shoes the last 400m or so. Rolled up to the dismount line and handed my bike and helmet to one of the waiting volunteers. Again you run through the bag area, grab your "run bag" and head to the change tent. As I ran in I saw a familiar face, Dr. Svilick (who does some ART out of Endure It once in a while). He joined me in the change tent and helped me sort out my shoes and such in the midst of more chaos. I ran out and up Palani again, the course makes a little loop around the finish festivities before returning to Ali'i Drive. Then its about 4 or 5 miles south, turn around, retrace your steps then up to the Queen K to the Energy Lab. I ran a good portion of the back half of the run with a South Dakotan 28yr old Jason Crisp. Having a partner up to and through the energy lab helped the time pass a bit quicker. A couple miles out of the energy lab his IT band started giving him issues and he had to slow up some. Coming back seemed to be a bit downhill. I shortened up my stride and increased my cadence allowing for about a 25second/mile pick up over the last 9 miles. Below are some race stats. TOTAL SWIM 2.4 mi. (1:12:03) 1:53/100m 973 80 FIRST BIKE SEGMENT 5.5 mi. (1:32:34) 21.93 mph SECOND BIKE SEGMENT 28 mi. (2:36:29) 21.12 mph THIRD BIKE SEGMENT 59 mi. (4:20:16) 17.92 mph FOURTH BIKE SEGMENT 88 mi. (5:47:49) 19.87 mph FINAL BIKE SEGMENT 112 mi. (7:01:31) 19.54 mph TOTAL BIKE 112 mi. (5:44:00) 19.53 mph 831 76 FIRST RUN SEGMENT 5.2 mi. (7:45:22) 7:38/mile SECOND RUN SEGMENT 10.3 mi. (8:25:55) 7:57/mile THIRD RUN SEGMENT 17.6 mi. (9:26:36) 8:18/mile FINAL RUN SEGMENT 26.2 mi. (10:34:53) 7:56/mile TOTAL RUN 26.2 mi. (3:29:17) 7:59/mile 594 67

When it was all said and done (mostly done, I didn't and don't usually say too much) I finished in 10:34:53. Splits as follows:

Swim: 1:12:03

Bike: 5:44:00

Run: 3:29:17

T1: 5:28

T2: 4:05

The most spectacular post race ever. Most notibly the massage tent had over 100 massage therapists working on athletes. The line was about 30 seconds long, the quickest I've ever experienced. It was certainly a sight to be seen, the walking wounded were everwhere. I didnt see the medical tent, but would imagine it was pretty full. They provided bamboo mats, people were laying all over the place or hobbling to get their medal, finisher shirt/hat, and more importantly CAKE. Just as it is anywhere you went all week there were tons of different languages being spoken among the athletes, volunteers, family, friends, and staff. Post race with everybody Toby and I post race - The guy is everywhere, a networking genious. Art of Tri will soon shock the world.