Beach2Battleship Half Iron Distance Triathlon - Triathlon1/2 Ironman

Swim was not bad. I never really had a good rythym. I was sort of forcing it. Had moments were I seemed to get in a groove, but they never lasted. I told myself to stay way left after the turn and I think that really helped.

Obv swim a whole lot more. As for on the day, I would try and relax and swim more smoothly

Solid T1. I never really tried to hurry, I just did it. Strippers were pretty good (I would slip em a dollar for thier work)

nuttin

So this is where things get funky. Can anyone say Deja Vu? 2yrs ago when I DNF'ed it all started with a flat in T1. Well guess how this one started?? Ran my bike over the timing mats and went to jump on and my front wheel sort of squirms beneath me. Are you serious. Reach down and my front is as soft as a babies bottom. This really sucked because I had taken extra care compared to 2yrs ago. I installed my latex tubes and vittoria's over a week prior to the race so I could be sure they were good. I rode 4x on the latex prior to the race and all was good. On the morning of the race they were inflated, but I went to top them with air because latex always loses some. Get the nice folks to top me back up to 105PSI and I am off. Not sure what happened, but I had a flat. Get myself in a huff but eventually get a butyl tube in the wheel and get going. I actually stopped my watch and then restarted once I got back on. So officially I rode 2:38, but on my watch I rode 2:31:23.
The actual ride was not a good one. At 1st I thought just calm down and get going and it will be good. My legs just never came around. I rode smooth and had a VI of 1.02, but could never get the power I wanted. Planned on riding around 215NP and actually ended up with 205NP, so quite a bit lower than planned. Frustrating because despite the lack of training I did a 40 and a 50mi ride in the last 2 weeks and had no real problem riding at 215. Race day it just was not there.

I actually think swim training might help. i think I kick alot while swimming and my hammies are dead tired when I get on the bike. Maybe swimming kills my bike legs.

So I will have to check my records, but I think this might be one of my slower T2's.
If you remember way way way back at the beginning of this report I said that if I could catch Louis I would run with him. So with the flat on the bike I never did catch him,so I was not sure wether to stop or what to do. Race # wise we were pretty close 1202 and 1222 so our T2 bags were not far apart. As I was getting mine I saw Louis' bag still hanging there. I was like what the hell, I didn't pass him on the bike what is up. Well I get my shoes on and then decide to wait b/c I figure he will be along shortly. As it turns out Louis is directionaly cahllenged and was sorta eager to do the full IM so he missed the turn for the HIM. After I while I was not sure what to do, but in came Louis. I was secretly cussing him b/c now i was going to have to run 13mi and after a bike that was way harder than it should have been I was ok with finding a shady spot to sit.

I would say screw Louis I am outa here. he has already given me my biltong no point in waiting now (Yep of the 1 or maybe 2 peeps reading this at this point, you are saying what in earth is he rambling on about now) Louis was kind enough to bring me a South SAfrican delicacy (Biltong or dried meat in simple english)and gave it to me in T1.

Unfortunately Louis had a knee issue and we were not able to run quite what I had hoped to help him run. It was still a good time out there in my mind and hopefully I made it a touch easier for Louis to get to the end during a pretty crappy day at the running office for him.

nada

Put flip flops on because I wore shoes that I had never worn without socks before and had a bloody mess on both of my heels


Set up does a good job and this i sa must do race.