Ironman Louisville - TriathlonFull Ironman

The idiot behind me jumped into the same spot as me and landed on my legs. Dude! Took off and did quite a bit of weaving trying to find a clear path of water. Swimming into the sun in water with 6 inches of visibility made it tough to see people. Swim, swim, swim... oh goody, the end of the island... we must be making the turn soon. Hmmmm... I don’t see people turning... ok... swim a bit more... still not turning?? Sheesh. I think we swam at least 400 yards beyond the island before making the turn to head down river to the swim exit. I really couldn’t feel much of a current at all. Just a heck of a lot of chop from all the people thrashing about and wake from the police/coast guard boats moving around. I had some a-hole swim over my left side. Sure, given the lack of visibility I can understand not seeing someone, but the guy took like 5 strokes swimming over me. I was very tempted to grab his ankle and give it a good yank, but decided to play nice. Pretty much the entire way I was dodging slow people, getting bumped around, etc. Finally I could see the exit, but was blocked in by idiots who were practically stopping. Uhhh... dude... MOVE!!... you may want to dilly-dally out here, but not me!! Up the stairs and running into transition.

Shout "CANNONBALL!"

Grabbed my bike gear and headed for the changing tent. Took a seat and struggled with my too-tight socks (silly me), shoes, sunglasses, helmet. Ok... um... now what do I do with my bag?? Help!! They didn’t seem to have a marked spot to drop the bags or anyone taking them! Wasting time here people.... help!! Got out and headed to the sunblock station and got white goop slapped on both shoulders. I tried spreading it around with my wet hands and wound up with white hands with brown beads of river water.... ewwww!! Grabbed my bike and headed for the exit.

Bigger socks; bike jersey to cover shoulders.

Hopped on the bike and took off, trying to avoid the idiots swerving all over. Turning onto the road I heard my name called out and saw my Dad. Once things thinned out I dropped into the aerobars and kept telling myself “don’t eat the paste!!”. I hadn’t gotten the chance to ride or even drive the course, but I had studied the elevation profile. I knew we had ~8 miles of so a basically flat, one hill from the detour, and then flat to rolling for another 10 miles or so to the out and back segment. So I knew it would be easy to go fast during the early miles, but it would be a bad idea to push hard. There were tons and tons of people, but it wasn’t as bad as I had envisioned. I actually found myself passing a lot of people, but then I had started near the back of the line, so I figured there couldn’t be more than 500 people behind me. Hit the first hill and though “hey, that wasn’t so bad”. Several more gently rolling miles (during which my rear bottle ejected right before I went to dump it into my aerodrink... d’oh!) and we were on the out and back section. From all I read it had seemed like this section was particularly dangerous with rough roads, 2-way bike traffic and 2 of the bigger hills on the course. Started on a nice descent, passing people despite braking a bit. Whhheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!! Flew down going close to 40mph and cruised up the other side and out to the turn.... then did the same thing on the way back. That had to be the best part of the course!!

Continued on the bike out to the loop and on to the LaGrange festival. It was fairly uneventful out there. Lots of passing going on, only a couple good climbs – only one that forced me out of the saddle. Played leap frog with a couple people. I was amazed at how many guys I was passing that were all decked out with deep-dish front wheels, disc rear wheels and aero helmets. It’s not that I was going that fast... but they were going that slow. On a one-lane road I did see someone had spray painted in orange “Ironman” with a slash through it. :-( Geee, I know that a lot of roads get shut down for one day and you probably had a run-in with some idiot cyclist being an a-hole, but this event does bring in a LOT of money to the area. Around 40 miles I finally started taking in calories (had been feeling a bit off after drinking a lot of nasty river water). I also was ready to get off the bike, seeing as how the only tube of aquaphor I had was in my special needs bag at 65 miles. Ouch. Big mistake. The last 10 miles of the first loop (50-60) were pretty sucky. The terrain seemed pretty flat to me, especially considering all I had heard about “relentless hills”, which didn’t help. Hit the turn for loop 2 and knew I had 5 miles to go until special needs... oh thank god!!

Quick stop at special needs to apply aquaphor and back on the course. Felt pretty good again and seemed to be maintaining the same pace (though I was paying absolutely no attention to current or average pace – on purpose). At this point it seemed a lot of other people were taking the downhills easy, but I was flying down them and using the momentum to get up the next “hill”. Hit the end of the loop and knew there was ~20 miles to go.... woohoo!! With about 15 miles left I started cranking up the pace. Terrain was flat or downhill, lots of people sitting up on the pursuit bars taking it easy... and me... flying down the road like a maniac, ready to get my run on. Got into the downtown area and knew I was close when I passed the spot I had been waiting in line at in the morning.

Train more.

Darn near fell off my bike after I hopped off!! Jogged into the tent on half-numb feet, shoe change, hat, gels and out to a port-o-john (thankfully no line!). Took off up the chute looking for my Dad, but figuring he wasn’t there yet as my bike was 35 minutes faster than expected. Oops, my bad!

Ugh. Legs felt fine... in fact, they felt better than I had expected. But every time I tried to ramp up the pace I felt tired and would get a stitch. I had run out of G’ade late on the bike and knew I probably had not taken in enough calories. I had been hoping to run a 4 hour marathon, but gave up on that as a possibility around 10 miles. From there until the end it was more about survival. Around 14 miles we finished the first loop, passed less than a block away from the finish at 4th Street Live and headed south again. Talk about cruel and unusual punishment!! I was trying to run as hard as I could between aid stations, then walk through getting water or coke. Also, I realized how much I dislike a pancake flat, paved course. At least a hill gives me an excuse to walk and not feel like a wimp! 3 miles to go I went around a corner and there was an enthusiastic spectator with a megaphone telling runners they were awesome and called me “the Queen of Awesome”. Yeah!!! That totally made my day. Eventually I made my way back north to 4th Street Live and the finish. Tons and tons of cheering spectators!!

Not hammer the end of the bike. More bricks. Eat/drink more on bike.