Ironman Arizona - Triathlon

A little upset at how slow this was as this was the first time in a long time I felt GOOD in open water. Wetsuit chafed; I felt it happening, tried to fix it; just decided to deal with it. Water was a bit chilly, but it felt fine; never felt cold. Navigation was HORRIBLE. I swear the buoys moved on me.

Figure out sighting. Buy a different wetsuit. Work on technique. Figure out why I suck in open water.

Ironman transitions are a bit different than normal, but it felt okay. Actually ran from strippers to med tent and then med tent almost all the way to my gear bag. Never had that much energy before.

Not slice my foot open the day before so as to not have to stop at the med tent.

This bike sucked. Every damn pedal stroke hurt. Pre-ride a few days prior felt great; race day, awful. Stopped fairly often to pee/reapply butt butter - BEST MOVE EVER. Also sunscreened a lot which was smart on my part. Dropped nutrition at one point. Wanted to stop eating at mile 90, but didn't. Kept cadence around 90 or above - really happy with that. Average cadence is probably actually higher - cadence meter on bike hated the downhill on the Beeline for whatever reason.

Train more. Train more outside. Maybe not stop as much? Figure out lots of different food options.

Totally worth the extra time to put on the compression socks. Also I should probably feel bad for eating some of the volunteer pizza, but eh.

Not much. Maybe just do the socks myself instead of having the volunteer help - I was much more efficient.

Could NOT run off the bike - kind of disappointing, given training, but with how my legs felt getting off the bike, I was not surprised. Was able to pick it up nicely and drop below 12:00/mi for a few of the middle miles of loop one which made me very happy. IT band neglected to act up, but gastro did. Was able to stop walking and get going again no problem. Able to keep up a nice walk clip, too.

... not swim in Tempe Town Lake so as to not get gastro issues? Honestly, I'm not sure why my butt got unhappy in the late miles. I think I probably should try to eat more real food during the day ... or put a probiotic in special needs.

FLY through the finisher's chute ... walk around to get fries and find husband. Then walk to pick up bike and gear bags ... finally die about an hour after crossing. Struggle back to the hotel.


Experience? The sheer fact that I'm slow? Also my butt.


Volunteers and crowd support were fantastic. Run course made me want to kill myself at times ... as did the bike. If I had ridden outside more, maybe I wouldn't have had as many issues. I dunno. Overall, I'd do it again. When I can afford it.