Ironman 70.3 Muncie - Triathlon

I had a nice swim. Lined up somewhat to the outside, but on the front row. After the start there weren't any feet to follow so I veered right and found a smaller pack. This quickly turned into 1 guy in front and I was able to catch a draft until about the first turn buoy. At that point we had started moving through the previous wave and traffic was fairly thick. I made the decision that I was working a little harder than I wanted trying to follow the draft and avoid other swimmers so broke off and swam my own race the rest of the way.

Traffic was pretty thick but I felt like my navigation was good. The fact that it was overcast really helped as we didn't have the sun in our faces on the way back to the beach. Overall the swim was uneventful and I felt good heading into T1.

Easy run up to T1, but it's quite a distance from the water. Got to my rack and stripped my wetsuit off with only minor difficulty. My feet didn't want to come out so I had to sit down for a moment. All else went nice and smooth.

So the bike was a little ugly for me. I started out feeling fine, but around the time I took my first gu (about 10 minutes in) I started to feel a little queasy. I tried to drink but neither water nor sports drink went down that well.

I had a bottle of heed loaded onto the bike to start the race and sipped on that every once in a while. I also picked up a bottle of perform at the first aid station. After that I picked up water. When I look back on my hydration for the entire ride, I think I drank most of the heed (around 22 oz), 1 bottle of perform, and 1/2 bottle of water. Total roughly 50 ounces.

I was only able to take in 3 gu's on the ride, including the one that I had 10 minutes in. They were Clif Citrus flavor with caffeine, which I have used in training quite a few times. They're not my favorite, but I have never been sick using them. For some reason they just tasted awful and did not settle in my stomach on this day. When eating one of the packets some got under my tongue and I almost gagged.

About 1/3 of the way into the course, I started seeing other M35-39 motoring past me. This was super frustrating and after a while I lost count how many had gone by. However, I knew that if I tried to pick up the pace I would definitely pay for it later. Instead, I kind of went into a preservation mode as I thought about the 13.1 mile run ahead. Due to this dialing-back of effort, I had an average bike HR of 150, which was significantly lower than my target of 158bpm.

Towards the end of the bike, I knew that I was way outside the top 5 podium spots. Looking at the results after the race, there were 22 guys faster than me on the bike and I had dropped from 3rd place to 11th coming into T2.

Based on my hr data I don't think my issue had anything to do with going too hard on the bike. I'm not blaming nutrition, but just to be on the safe side I don't plan to race with Clif Citrus flavored gels anymore. I'm wondering if it was just a bit of a bug or maybe swallowed too much water on the swim.

T2 went well. I sat down to put on my socks and shoes as I wanted to make sure I didn't have any wrinkles to cause blisters. I was out on the run course fairly quickly.

As I started the run I made the decision that since I finished the bike on reduced effort I would shoot for a PR run at the HIM distance. Last year I ran a 1:30 off the bike but that was in cooler weather and on a flatter course.

Almost immediately out of T2 I felt a little wave of dizzyness and slight nausea but that passed after a couple minutes and I felt OK.

Within the first mile, I caught and passed 3 guys in my age group (I always look at peoples' calves to find out) and started to wonder if it would be possible to run myself up to 5th place and onto the podium. The only problem was that I had no idea how many places back I was.

From that point on, I started playing a mental game... every runner or group of runners up the road were in my age group. All I had to do was hunt them down and I would be that much closer to the podium. This went on all the way to around mile 6, but unfortunately everyone I caught ended up being from previous waves. However, there was a steady stream of runners that looked like they could be 35-39 coming the opposite direction and I knew that they were a mile or less ahead of me.

I kept the game going and started picking off runners in my age group, but very slowly. 90% of the people I caught ended up being from another group. I was getting pretty tired also, and noticed that even though I was dumping water all over myself at the aid stations, and dumping ice down my tri suit, there was dry crusty salt building up on my face.

I caught two more around the 11 mile mark, and after that there was empty road with the exception of two runners very far ahead. I told myself that those two runners were #5 and #6 in AG and I had to catch them. It took about 1.5 miles to catch the first, and unfortunately he was 25-29. I dug deep and focused on the 2nd runner and finally caught him less than a half mile from the finish. I was ecstatic to see a black "37" on his left calf! After hanging about 10 feet back to catch my breath for a bit, I passed with a surge to (hopefully) discourage him from hanging on.

That left me with around 1/4 mile to the finish, and one awful hill full of spectators. They all started shouting "he's right behind you!" Of course I had no idea if that was because I had just passed him, or if he was making a move. I couldn't risk turning for a look so just dug deeper knowing I was almost done. At the top of the hill you turn left almost 90 degrees into the finishing chute, and I took a quick glance behind. I saw that he wasn't close enough as long as I kept my kick going down the hill.

I finished the race less than 10 seconds in front of him, with a 1:29 run split. At that point I thought to myself whatever place I end up, I gave it everything I had.

I staggered a bit as the volunteers went to grab my timing chip. There were medical volunteers right there watching the finishers and one of them asked if I was OK. I said I thought I would be fine but was having a hard time walking and breathing.

He walked with me out of the chute and at that point I really started to feel bad. Couldn't catch my breath and the world was spinning. I sat down but the feeling didn't pass. They brought me into the medical tent, and to make a long story short they determined that I was just extremely dehydrated and gave me a couple bags of IV fluids. I recovered fairly well after about 30 minutes and was able to enjoy spending time with my wife and kids down at the beach.

A while later, I decided to check the race results to see if I had managed to just barely squeak my way onto the podium. I couldn't believe it when I saw 2nd in AG! I actually wondered if there was a typo or timing error and decided I had to look it up on the live tracker as well.

Although 1st place basically crushed the rest of us, 2nd through 5th was separated by just 2 minutes. Also, 6th was less than 2 minutes away from 5th. So basically if I wouldn't have kept pushing on the last half of the run I would have finished off the podium.


Dehydration... I should have known I was setting myself up for failure by drinking too little on the bike. I also should have seen some of the early signs and made changes as necessary... nausea, dizziness, dry salty skin.


The volunteers were great! I love small local races too, but you just get so much energy and excitement at these larger races. The volunteers make an event within an event with music at aid stations, games, water hoses, etc and just keep you so motivated. I have not done a lot of Ironman branded races but the ones I have were all very good. Muncie puts on a great race.