Friday 15 February 2008

Geelong 70.3 Ironman 2008




Race overview: It was a beautiful day for racing.. not to hot, not too cold. Was a storm on the horizon that never actually hit us.. Was better prepared following on from the shep experience however still learnt a lot from this race as well.

Swim: Got off to a good start in the swim and got into a nice rhythm. Not much biffo which was surprising. Sat on some punters feet who was going a nice pace and he pulled me out to the first buoy. The biffo started as we rounded the first buoy and then bamn!! Blinded! The sun was rising and was right in the line of sight… for some stupid reason I chose my clear goggles so had no protection.. unfortunately this caused a bit of chaos and resulted in me coping a wack to the eye from a wayward leg which ripped my goggles off. Didn’t worry just refitted and was back in the game.. The sun had lead most of us off course though and we ended up taking a very wide birth around the buoy before heading back to the start line… although I got off to a good start, time slipped by a little and I finished the swim in 35:42 – better than shep but not as good as had hoped / or should have done.. only a minute quicker than shep.

T1: grabbed a water from the table only to find it tasted like pool water with chlorine.. no good for the guts… get to the bike and go to put nutrition in my back pockets only to find the new Team Crank It! Suit I purchased didn’t have back pockets!!! Aghh!!! Ok, just tuck them up the legs and go go go… Lesson learnt..

Bike: Oh no… stomach cramps… bike was a disaster.. after all the training you do, its so hard when it all comes undone because of stomach cramps.. it was a long and lonely bike course with ZERO shelter from the coastally winds that buffeted the course… the road surface was not smooth and all in all lead to a disappointing time of 3:02:00. Lap 1 was ok, but stomach was hurting.. when I started to try and have some food it just came back up.. I couldn’t stomach anything!! This was not looking like it was going to be a good race If I couldn’t eat or drinking any nutrition.. I kept forcing myself to eat and try to keep something down. As hard as it was, I had to sit up and slow down and hope the pains would go away.. if I continued to push I wouldn’t finish the race at all.. listen to your body.. Lap 2 was not much better but around the same time and then by lap three I was just begging to get off the bike in the hope that it would sort out my guts… Lap 3 slower by far and all ending in the disappointing time… appears to be around 16min slower than shep. Disappointing.

T2: Despite the stomach pains, felt good through T2 and now knowing I had no pockets was quick with the nutrition and out to start the half marathon.

Run: Started the run feeling relatively fresh.. the stomach pains were still there but the legs weren’t too tired… got into a good motion – it was a nice run course, a few hills but that took allowed you to think about other things rather than simply just the long flat grind. Found a toilet on the first last and went in for a stop then had a banana… bingo bango it seemed to sort out the stomach issues as I could keep down the banana. Back in the game. The support on the road was amazing and certainly helped to push through the 21km. I found out / learnt the hard way that I simply didn’t have the km’s in my legs that I needed and on the last lap I had to slow to a walk for a couple of minutes…. This lead to a slower time than I hoped and not being able to break the 2hr mark for the run, however I think it gave me a good lesson and better understanding of the sacrifice and dedication needed to complete these gruelling events.. Run time – 2:09:50

Crossed the line, happy with the day out but not satisfied… the overall time of 5:47:33 was not as good as I wanted or had hoped for especially given the better conditions than shep…

Post event – recovery was great.. no soreness, no dehydration… maybe I didn’t push hard enough!?!?! I learnt a lot from Geelong and now the goal is to look forward to a full distance of which more dedication and drive will be required to succeed. Completing it will not be enough for me.. I have to give it everything I have got and that includes training hard - something i dont think was completely up to scratch for the two half ironmans.

Until next time....