RACEDAY!
Wow, a year since I registered, over seven months of training, months of planning and here it is.
I woke up in the best mood. I didn’t get the best night sleep, but I wasn’t expecting it. I was just so happy that it was time. I felt prepared and I wasn’t nervous at all. It was such a great feeling. Alison on the other hand was a bit nervous.
Woke up at 4:00Am to eat, then I took a hot shower and did some light stretching. Got my gear on, and prepared my dry clothes bag and then we walked to the transition area.
Yeah, my tires weren’t flat. Apparently others were not so lucky. Some found their tires flat in the morning, others discovered them flat after the swim, some popped as they were mounting them for the start of their ride. Like I said, I was happy I got my flat Saturday and not Sunday.
I inflated my tires to the suggested pressure by last year’s top female Heather Gollnick, made sure everything was ready for me to start my bike portion and walked down to the swim start.
There we got marked, 970 on my arms, and 38 on the back of my leg. After that I got in a good stretch and then had to wait in line. First the bathroom line, then the swim start line. 6:50 the pros started, 7:00 everyone else, 7:30 after one more wave to Alison, I was in the water. Water temperature was great. I got into a groove early on. My breathing was very controlled and I just felt very comfortable and relaxed from the first stroke to the last. The current wasn’t too bad, which meant up stream wasn’t too hard, but you also didn’t get a boost down stream either. I thought I was having a great swim, so I was kind of surprised by my 1:18. Was expecting more like 1:10. The only problem I had was a cramp in my right calf with about 200 meters to go.
Looking back now I probably could have shaved several minutes off of both of my transition times, but I told myself to relax and not rush through them. So that’s what I did. I wanted to make sure I did all I needed to and was fully prepared to start the next part of the race.
I’m going to give the Reader’s Digest version for the bike portion. A lot can happen in 112 miles but basically everything went well. I was able to maintain my 17mph goal. I tried to take advantage of all of the down hills. No flat tires, no accidents. I did pop my chain once, but it was a quick fix and I was back to work. I stuck to my hydration and nutrition plan and tried to stay as cool as possible. By my standards it was a great ride. I expected to ride for 7 or more hours, so to see my time was 6:37 I couldn’t have been happier. By the way, I didn’t look at my time until I was dismounting my bike.
So now I was in an even better mood than before. All I wanted to do was to get off of that bike, and I did. So it was time to just settle into a run and finish it up.
I wanted to start out at a 10 min/mi pace for the first 13 and decide then if I could pick it up from there. I pretty much averaged 10-11 min/mi for the first 16 miles, and then I started to have some problems. Physically I was fine. I wasn’t tired or winded, my body felt great, my breathing was controlled. I wasn’t hot, dehydrated or have any stomach issues. I simply lost mental focus and had a tough time getting it back. So I started to think about my family, friends, all of the support I was getting, the Hoyts and how lucky I was. At about mile 20 or 21 I was able to get back my focus and I was able to finish strong. I would have liked a better run time, but considering, I was very happy with 4:52.
Before I left for Louisville, I was telling a group of friends who were going to track me online that if they saw me finish in 13 hours that meant I had a good day. I finished in 13:05. I HAD A GREAT DAY!
Monday, September 8, 2008
Saturday – 8/30/08
OK, I have to be honest with you. It is now Monday the 8th and I am trying to update and wrap up my blog almost a week after it ended, so hopefully my memory is still clear.
Saturday morning Alison and I went for a short run. We ran around the wharf and spent some time looking around the transition area and the swim start, which is about a mile from the swim finish. After the run, we ate breakfast and went to the room to rest.
At noon we went to a downtown restaurant to meet her family (Tricia, Randy, Andrea and Mark) for lunch and as we are standing outside of the restaurant out walks my parents! I couldn’t believe it. They had driven all through the night to get there and surprised me. Of course everyone, except me was in on it. Apparently they worked it out weeks ago and were going to surprise me that night at dinner, but got into town early so there they were. I was shocked and extremely happy! What an energy boost to have them there. It was amazing.
So obviously we had a great lunch and afterwards I needed to turn in my gear. We walked down to the transition area to drop everything off and as I was racking my bike, my back tire popped and went flat. I couldn’t believe it, but I actually handled it really well and as I kept telling myself, better now than tomorrow. I had to take my bike to the bike tech area and I had them put on a new tube. I didn’t want to use the 2 I had so I just bought a new one. As I’m standing there Heather Gollnick comes up next to me. Heather was the top female finisher last year and she wanted the bike tech to look over her bike one last time. She told me to enjoy the race and that I would always remember my first.
After a quick ride to test out the bike, I finally racked it and headed back to the room. Unfortunately I did not have any time to rest before we had to get ready for dinner. That made me a bit uneasy, but overall I was very relaxed all day.
Alison found this great Italian restaurant online and we all met up for dinner. It was great, the food, the service and more importantly, the company. We didn’t even talk about the race, so I was even more relaxed. After dinner it was time to go back to the hotel to rest, but Alison had more surprises for me.
Weeks before the race she had been asking friends and family to send her well-wishes to pass along to me, and Saturday night she gave them to me. There were cards, pictures, e-mails, letters and a whole bunch of things from people who wanted to wish me well. It put me in such a good mood and helped me realize how much this all meant to me. I told Alison that I was going to enjoy this and not worry about anything because I had already won with all of this support.
And that’s exactly how I woke up…
Saturday morning Alison and I went for a short run. We ran around the wharf and spent some time looking around the transition area and the swim start, which is about a mile from the swim finish. After the run, we ate breakfast and went to the room to rest.
At noon we went to a downtown restaurant to meet her family (Tricia, Randy, Andrea and Mark) for lunch and as we are standing outside of the restaurant out walks my parents! I couldn’t believe it. They had driven all through the night to get there and surprised me. Of course everyone, except me was in on it. Apparently they worked it out weeks ago and were going to surprise me that night at dinner, but got into town early so there they were. I was shocked and extremely happy! What an energy boost to have them there. It was amazing.
So obviously we had a great lunch and afterwards I needed to turn in my gear. We walked down to the transition area to drop everything off and as I was racking my bike, my back tire popped and went flat. I couldn’t believe it, but I actually handled it really well and as I kept telling myself, better now than tomorrow. I had to take my bike to the bike tech area and I had them put on a new tube. I didn’t want to use the 2 I had so I just bought a new one. As I’m standing there Heather Gollnick comes up next to me. Heather was the top female finisher last year and she wanted the bike tech to look over her bike one last time. She told me to enjoy the race and that I would always remember my first.
After a quick ride to test out the bike, I finally racked it and headed back to the room. Unfortunately I did not have any time to rest before we had to get ready for dinner. That made me a bit uneasy, but overall I was very relaxed all day.
Alison found this great Italian restaurant online and we all met up for dinner. It was great, the food, the service and more importantly, the company. We didn’t even talk about the race, so I was even more relaxed. After dinner it was time to go back to the hotel to rest, but Alison had more surprises for me.
Weeks before the race she had been asking friends and family to send her well-wishes to pass along to me, and Saturday night she gave them to me. There were cards, pictures, e-mails, letters and a whole bunch of things from people who wanted to wish me well. It put me in such a good mood and helped me realize how much this all meant to me. I told Alison that I was going to enjoy this and not worry about anything because I had already won with all of this support.
And that’s exactly how I woke up…
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