Ironman: Its Always Epic.

I woke up on Sunday morning feeling excited. Always a good sign; “today I get to do Ironman!” Everything went smoothly on race morning and I jumped in the water 20mins early for a warm up. I couldn’t wait for the race to start so my nervousness would stop.

I had an awesome swim. I had a feeling I would. My swimming has improved tonnes, largely thanks to Clint’s training smarts and the new long course elite group he is coaching in Victoria. It’s been very good for me. In my journal I wrote 53.30 as a best case scenario for the swim. I swam 53.27. That was inconceivable last year.

On the bike I knew right away that my legs were feeling heavy, but you cant dwell on crap like that in a race. If you feel bad, its too bad, but today is Ironman day and you have to keep moving. I was riding a disk wheel that Lori Bowden gave me (of all people!). I have never even met her, but she is a good friend of Clint’s and so I inherited a very nice 650 Zipp disk to go on my baby Cervelo.

The conditions were windy and everyone suffered as a result, seemingly with the exception of Tereza Macel who was absolutely flying. She biked faster than my little brain can conceive. My stomach also felt off on the bike, but again, you cant dwell on these things, just make good decisions and try to get the calories in the best you can.

Starting the run I knew I might be in trouble and really felt like shit. But this is Ironman day and I cant change it, so its either run or quit. The latter was very tempting. At mile 4, I was running in about 8^th or 9^th and Clint said, “You can catch at least 5 girls.” This was the perfect thing to say and so I kept running. And one by one, I picked them off, never feeling good, but still moving forward faster than those around me. At mile 20, I overtook Janelle Morrison (who, kudos to her, had her own problems out there and still finished 3^rd!). Its tough overtaking another “runner” at mile 20 of an Ironman, because, unlike some of the other girls, she was actually moving forward at a fair clip and I was scared she might latch on and we might have a battle on our hands. I was in no mood for battling. As it turned out, I just went past and very slowly pulled away.

It happened at mile 23, just after the mile marker. In the space of a minute I went from running reasonably well to walking and staggering all over the road. I bonked hard and it wasn’t pretty. The medics were there immediately trying to coerce me into the ambulance with promises of a nice bed and some morphine. It was very tempting. But in the end, the nice ambulance man (from Victoria!) walked an entire mile with me to get me safely to the next aid station. It was touch and go whether I was going to finish.

I gobbled down loads at the aid station, then walked the final 2 miles to the finish. Ironman #15 done and dusted.

There’s one thing I can say about Ironman: its always epic.