Ironman World Championship 70.3 - Triathlon

I swam hard off the start and made a group with two other guys. As I came out of the water, I thought I was in fourth for my wave. Really I was in seventh. It was a good, clean, low-contact and fast swim. I remember seeing slices of color -- grays, blues, purples etc. -- as I breathed and looked at the horizon. This is wacky because it was heavy clouds with strong rain. One more episode of my mind going a bit psychedelic on a hard charging swim.

I had one goggle fill halfway in the first 300 meters. It didn't really upset me, but it did make it so I would breathe and sight more than otherwise necessary once we started catching and passing the women in front of my wave.

Due to the strong field and the 8 minutes between my wave and the women in front of me, I didn't sprint off the line so much as power up to full speed. I could have worked about 5 percent harder on the first half.

It was a long run on super soggy grass. I don't have any complaints with my transition although I did get snagged on my Roka -- probably because I never practiced taking it off at speed. OOPS

Practice with Roka swimskin. I don't run at a sprint through transitions because I'm trying to manage my breath and heartrate. maybe I should...or at least kick up my jog to a run.

I rode hard -- harder than I usually do in a race. I think I started to crap out in the middle third of the ride and it definitely had a negative effect on my run. I rolled the dice and lost.

Despite the perceived effort being consistently up at the redline, my time was way off. On the course, this didn't bother me. I adjusted and just tried to manage my way up each hill as strongly as possible. The sun came out and really heated things up when I had about 5 miles left.

Nutrition was spot on. Frozen Ensure plus 4 scoops instead of 3 in a Perform bottle. 1 bonk breaker and everything else Gu gel (one of which was Roctane.)

Better even pacing; better hill climbing. I wonder if I need more long rides for this distance. It seems that I had more gas when I was doing Lake Placid training than when I was doing Las Vegas training...even though the former had less intensity. This is definitely a puzzle to solve.

Everything went pretty smoothly though I did monkey around with my sleeves a bit and I should have just left them.

Execute each step just slightly faster. It was very helpful to walk through the T2 and the tent and see the exit on Saturday before the race.

Like the bike, I went for it. I thought that maybe I was just having a bad bike day and I could have a run PR since I hadn't used up all my juju on a bad bike split.

The first time I turned around and started back uphill, I imploded. It was spectacular. I went from humming along around an 8 minute mile pace to suddenly being around 9. It got uglier from there. At a couple aid stations I got dizzy. I couldn't get turnover in my legs. Going downhill I felt like crying it hammered my quads so much. Going uphill felt like I was crawling. I stuck it out and refused to throw in the towel, but the time was horrendous. A week later on a run course that was equally or more difficult, I ran nearly a minute faster at Savageman.

Lesson -- Kent does not do a good run on current fitness if he hammers the bike as hard as possible. I trained on the hills, but I didn't train for this course + my race strategy.

I got the food -- which I needed ASAP -- I actually felt really hungry. Then I went for the massage, watch people finish for a while and then rode back to the hotel.


My race strategy was too aggressive for the fitness that I brought. In addition, I think I may have -- for whatever reason -- also had something of an off day. The combination was to be some 30 minutes slow and to really pay for it on the run.

Regardless of the nasty time, it was an amazing experience.


I still cannot believe that I qualified and was there. Now, I'm having a hard time getting my mind off of the planning of what it will take to requalify.