Ironman USA Lake Placid - TriathlonFull Ironman

Being there in '06 to watch the swim start and the race, as well as reading tons of blogs, I was fully prepared mentally to get the snot kicked out of me with this massive shotgun swim start with 2,000 plus people. Since the start was basically on a very long straight away with the first turn buoy 1,000 yards away, swimming counterclockwise, my game plan was to find a spot somewhere in the middle of the field and off to the right. I figured many were going to start middle in to stay as close to the buoys as possible, but I wanted none of it, no thanks! If I could hang a bit wide of the buoys on loop 1 I thought I could avoid huge pile-ups and huge beatings.

After a littel waiting around, it was go time! The TV helicopter was flying over head, the countdown was on, and before I knew it I heard that cannon fire and the field was off! I actually felt so thankful and fortunate to be where I was, and excited to finally get going and be involved in such a huge-scale event!!!

What amazed me most about the first 10 minutes of the swim, was I didn't get hit or pounded once. It was the strangest thing. But just when I started thinking that, it seemed like the field bottle-knecked, and bodies started piling up. That was when I got my first heel to the chin! Ouch, that one hurt! I actually chuckled to myself surprised that it took so long, and thought "that dude has one hard foot!"

The field thinned out again, found myself at the first turn buoy, rounded it wide with no problem, and started the long straight away back to the crowd and beach. Again, no problems there. Hit the beach, turned to the guy beside me and said "what a great first loop, nice swimming budy!" Not sure why I said that to a total stranger but I was just so excited to be swimming, it felt effortless.

In all the excitement, I forgot to catch my split for loop 1. Oh well I thought, doesn't matter. Loop 2 was exactly like loop 1 but the field had thinned out even more it seemed. I took one really good shot to the head on loop 2 that felt like a sucker-punch. I just came up to breathe to the right and POW! How my goggles stayed is beyond me. Siting was never an issue as I always could see during breathing that I had a group of swimmers to my left, and same to the right, so I maybe only looked up to site 3 or 4 times the entire swim. How great is that? Made the turn on loop 2 and started thinking "man, I'm almost done with a 2.4 mile swim, this is f... awesome!"

I could hear the announcer as I finished up the swim, hit the beach and noticed the clock...1:10 and change, NICE!!! My personal best in the pool was around 1:15, without a wetsuite, and without 2,000 swimmers and a file pile-ups. I couldn't have been more excited and happy with the swim, best swim of my life!!!

Right after the swim exit, I found a stripper who instructed me to sit on my ass and she pulled that wetsuit off in the blink of an eye. Nice work, you go baby!! Grabbed my wetsuit and started to run to T1. It's a run of a few hundred yards I'd say, and the crowd support was just unimaginable! I never saw the family, but I had goose bumps the whole way. This time last year I was the one yelling and cheering, so wanting to be on the other side of that fence line. And now I was there, what a charge and rush that was!

Absolutely nothing. It was a great swim time for me, and even when I hit some pile-ups, I always seemed to quickly find some open water to navigate to. I took a few good shots along the way but that's just part of the experience, it wouldn't be so much fun if things like that didn't happen! I wouldn't change a thing!

Ok, if you look at my T1 time and compare it to many others, you'd see it was quite slow, but there's a good reason! I found my T1 bag with no problem and headed to the men's changing area. My game plan was not to wear any biking clothes under my wetsuit, I didn't want to start my long bike in any wet gear. As I hit the tent, I was shocked how many men were in there. "Holy shit" I said out loud, where the hell do I go? Didn't see an open chair anywhere, so I just made my way down an aisle and started changing. If I never see so many naked men that smelled like one giant ass ever again, that'll be ok with me! Waaaaay too information in there for me, thank you very much!

Got the bike outfit on, helmet, etc... Stuffed my jersey pockets with all my nutritional needs, strapped on my fuel belt, had the volunteer shower me with suntan lotion, and off I went. And yes, I biked with my fuel belt. I know I'm likely the only person in the field with a fuel belt while biking, but the three bottles it carries had my electrolyte supplements and that's how I trained. So I stuck with what worked in the past even though I looked a little goofy. But here's where I had my first blip...

As I ran out of the tent and down the grass to the entrance to the bike area, some guy next to me says "buddy, you just lost some of your nutrition back there". I said thanks, and reached back to feel what I could have lost. Um, why is there absolutely nothing in any of my jersey pockets???? Oh shit!!!!!! Apparently when I strapped on the fuel belt, it pushed the pocket contents up and when I jogged to get the bike, it all bounced out. I never had this problem before, but then again, I never jogged with all that stuff bouncing around like that. I panicked for just a second... do I go on?? do I go back? mind you I have all those people behind me. I'd have to run back against traffic.

Sattler, I thought to myself, don't be an idiot. Go back and get your nutrition or you're a dead man out there. So I did. I retraced my steps and over about 30 yards were scattered cliff bars, energy beans, and even my PBJ which had clearly beens stepped on. Oh well, no big deal I thought. I grabbed everything, restuffed my pockets, grabbed my bike and off I went!

I likely lost a few minutes with this screw up, but in the grand scheme of things it didn't upset me at all. It was just the first of several times I'd remind myself to stay positive and be patient.

Loop 1 split 3:03:49 - 18.28 mph avge:

Loop 1 seemed somewhat effortless. I set a new PR with a 48.14 mph descent on the big downhill! To make my point on the winds picking up though, I only hit 41 on the same downhill on loop 2. I tried to focus on nutrition, riding comfortably, and just tried to drift off mentally to la-la land and think about anything other than all the miles I had left to bike.

Loop 2 split 3:34:22 - 15.67 mph avge:

Loop 2 felt pretty good overall. The conditions definitely seemed to be more challenging, and some fatigue started to set in. But mostly I started thinking about how I had to run a marathon!!! So I promised myself I wouldn't let all those bikers flying by me distract me at all, and I tried to just ride steady and easy on the flats, and get into a comfortable climbing rythm on the many hills.

As I've figured during my training rides and other races, I just don't quite have the power that most riders have. I was constantly passed on the flatter areas. At the same time though, I seem to be a much more comfortable climber, always catching up to those who passed me earlier. Even without my climbing gears, I just seem to make up tons of ground on the hills while still riding comfortably.

Overall, I thought the bike was a good strong ride while leaving something in the tank for the run. I definitely lost track of my nutrition in terms of the order of things, but thought I did a good job of constantly consuming liquids and nutrients every 15-20 minutes.

One quick inspirational story I want to remember. About 10 miles into the bike, we hit an aid station. I looked up ahead and some poor guy totally wiped out, bad bad fall. We were likely doing around 20 mph at the time. His bike was over there, he was dead in the middle of the road on his back, rolling in pain, holding his arm and I heard him moaning in pain as I went by motioning others to watch out for him. To my amazement, while on loop 2 of the marathon, so many hours later, I passed him as he was somewhere on loop 1 running. I have never seen such a bad case of road rash in my life. He had a sleeveless shirt on and his right arm was nothing but scrapes, cuts and blood. His elbow looked heavily bandaged, and with all that, he was still going. What guts and determination...good for him... I hope he finished.




Nothing really. I finished the ride tired, but not nearly as tired as I was when I did the full ride during training. I thought I handled the nutrition pretty well, and smartly slowed down to save energy on loop 2. So far, I had just had a fantastic swim, and a pretty strong bike. With the run my most comfortable leg, I was really feeling good about the day and excited to get those running shoes and head out!

I loved how the volunteers took your bike and racked it for you, I felt like a pro! No real T2 problems, but not the fastest in history. Again, my game plan was to start the next leg feeling as fresh as I could, so I did another complete wardrobe change, including jersey, tri shorts, socks, etc... This was also strategic from a nutrition standpoint. If at any time I started feeling lowsy, being able to look at my jersey to see if I had heavy salt stains would be a clue. So if I wore the same outfit biking and running, I wouldn't have that clue to go by during the marathon. So I took the time to change the wardrobe, again just trying to be smart and patient.

I also had my second transition blip of the day. I saw portoilets as I headed into the T2 tent to change, thinking there would also be portoilets on the other side of the tent where you exit. So I passed them up, changed, and headed out the other side but saw nothing. I asked a volunteer and she said I had to go back thru the tent to the ones I saw earlier. That's the second time I had to retrace my steps in transition!!! I just chuckled at myself for being an idiot, again...

Pee when you see a portoilet, don't assume there will be more when you don't know for sure!!! A few more minutes lost, but no big deal...

The triathlon leg I felt most confident in, most comfortable about, turned out to be the greatest physical and run test in my 20 years of running. My game plan was to shoot for a 3:45-4:00 marathon running 8:00-8:30/miles. When I left T2, I noticed the clock was around 8:08 or so, and for the first time I thought it was possible I could finish around 12:00 hours, which I thought was doable on a great great day.

I set out on the run course and ran the first 4 miles or so around 7:40 pace, feeling pretty good. I then started thinking... it felt hot as hell, and I had 22 or so miles to go, and running 7:40's not knowing how my calf would hold up might not be too smart, so I slowed down to 8:00's and felt much better.

Since I normally run my long runs around 7:30ish pace, running 8:00's really felt nice and relaxed, very efficient, and I felt as mentally strong as could be. I also noticed that at that slower pace, I was running more flat-footed, which meant less strain on my calf. My legs felt great, the calf hadn't bothered me once the entire day, and to my surprise it never did, not once over 140.6 miles!

With the heat still present, and several long stretches with no shade, I decided to start walking through the aid stations at each mile, beginning around mile 5 or 6. I would take a minute or so at each one to grab some cold sponges, some fluids, take an electrolyte tablet, etc... I clocked a few miles and realized my average per mile pace was dropping to 9:00-9:30 by running an 8:00/mile and spending a minute or so walking through an aid station, but that worked for me.

After a few miles of this, I felt my game plan was working quite well. A 4:00 hour marathon was definitely doable, and the legs felt pretty good. But all hell was about to break loose and I never saw it coming...

Around mile 9 I hit that first hill and decided to save my energy for later in the marathon by walking the hill. Once I hit the top, I started running my same pace again, but I slowly began to feel nauseous. So I slowed and walked again. I reminded myself that I knew I would be tested during the day, and maybe this was it, so I blocked it out of my mind and started running again. Ha, I just faced my test, stared it back, and kept going. I won, I passed my test, that was it, or so I thought...

A few minutes later I started feeling dizzy, and the nauseousness was getting worse. Oh shit I started thinking, this is not good. I started rethinking my nutrition and what I had been taking. Yep, everything seemed to be in check with my gameplan. What could be wrong??? Around mile 10 hitting 11, I was slowed to a walk, and not a fast walk either. I was totally crashing, and scared to death.

I hit the major steep hill and walked the entire thing. I tried running a bit afterwords but thought I was going to hurl big time. I was in total desparation and the demons were beating on me with an ugly stick. At mile 12 I went by the family and I saw the look on Peg's face, I knew I looked like death, and I felt like it. I couldn't run a step. I spent a few minutes thinking I might have to drop out, and actually started looking for a medical tent. I couldn't run, was suffering to walk, the site of fluids, nutrients, food, everything was totally disgusting. I felt full, couldn't eat, couldn't drink, couldn't run, and had a good 14 miles to go, not good....

After walking a bit, I hit a shaded section, and said ok sattler, get your shit together. And I started reflecting. I remembered reading articles about when you start crashing. I clearly remembered that if you get rediculously dehydrated, your screwed. If you bonk nutrition wise, you can bounce back. I knew I had been drinking so I told myselt it had to be nutrition, it just had to be. I also noticed that while starting the run with a new outfit, I had big salt stains. So I forced down another salt tablet, and at the next aid station I forced myself to drink some coke.

I told myself it was definitely possible to walk the last 13 or so miles if needed and I could still finish, and if that's what was needed I would do it. So I walked and walked and walked. I walked practically the majority of miles 11 through 15 I'd say, losing lord knows how much time. But I didn't care at that point. I promised myself not to think about the finish, not the look at my watch, just to walk, and very slowly take in whatever nutrients I could. I grabbed some salted pretzels, more coke, and managed to keep it all down. I figured I was either going to get worse, or get better, just ride it out and see.

Around mile 14 or so, I very slowly started to feel better. I jogged a little which felt ok, then walked again. By mile 15, I actually started to feel like my body was coming back to life. And man what a feeling that was. I remember seeing the mile 15 sign and thought I had 11 miles to go, I could feel life again, and this was definitely doable. At the mile marker sign, I hit my watch and started to run. I got mile 16, looked down, and ran another 8:00 mile. "YES!" I thought, I'm finally feeling better.

At the same time, I was scared to death of going back to that horrible feeling of bonking, so I told myself to run if it felt good, and walk through every single aid station to take whatever had salt and sugar, and I alternated between coke, gatorade, and water. From that point forward, I ran nearly every mile around 8:00/pace, with a minute or so of walking.

I finished the long out and back and hit that first hill heading back to town. Be careful Jay, just walk it. Ok, so I walked it. Got to the top, started running into town and saw that monster of a hill up ahead. Nearly everyone I saw was walking it. I'll never forget looking at the bitch of a hill and thinking "I walked it the firt time, and even though I'm on mile 22 or 23 or whatever, I'm running that fucking hill!"

And so I did. The hill turns to the left most of the way up, and there was an announcer there, and a monster crowd beyond belief. I was so determined to run that hill, the announcer read my bib and yelled out my name, "Com'on Sattler, RUN THAT HILL!!!" I got most of the way up on sheer determination. Took the turn, walked for like 10 seconds, and said run you piece of shit, and started running again. And I ran that fucking hill!!!

I realized all that was left was the short out and back by the lake, I saw the family and gave them the thumbs up that I was back and doing well. I remember thinking I'd see a friendly face or two at the last aid station up ahead, and I was nearly home free. I walked once or twice for a minute or two each time, and got back into my run pace after each one. I saw Polly at the aid station, said hi, made the turn back and only had a mile to go!

I had a good run pace going and knew I was golden to finish. I looked at my watch for the first time in a while and was shocked to see that without all the time I spent walking, I had a shot at breaking 13 hours. With a 1/2 mile to go, I saw the kids and got all teary. I yelled out at the kids to come with me, and said "com'on guys, you guys are finishing this with me!" So Austin ran on one side of me, and I held Alexis' hand as she ran on the other side of me. It was a great moment. I couldn't have been more proud of them for being out there so long cheering. I felt very blessed. I got a huge wave and great job from Peg and she headed over to catch the finish.

The kids and I ran down the last hill and entered the Olympic Oval, the environment just isn't describable. We crossed that finish line together and I couldn't have been happier. It all worked out ok in the end, I had a time I was quite happy with, I went through a nutritional nightmare and somehow rebounded, crossed the finish line with my kids, had great support from Peg, and became an official IRONMAN!!! How great is that?

Not a damn thing. I would have loved to have avoided the nutritional disaster, I think a 12:00 hour Ironman is in fact doable, but dealing with this stuff is all part of the package, whether it's this, a flat tire, etc... All together, I think I ran about a 3:45 marathon with an hour or so of walking, I'll take it!

The next two hours were a bit rough though. A few minutes after finishing, everything I had been pushing aside mentally came back in full force and I was a vegetable. A couple grabbed me and one ran off to get medical. They came over and carried me to the medical tent. It wasn't pretty. Fortunately I didn't get sick, but the doctor told me my temp had fallen to 92.7 and I had lost 12 lbs.

I spent 2 hours in the medical tent with an IV getting fluid, but felt much much better afterwords. I couldn't be more thankful to the volunteers and the medical staff. They all did a fantastic job!

What a great overall experience and physical and mental test.

Um, laying down in the medical tent for 2 hours!


140.6 miles!!


A spectacular event in every way. Anyone considering giving it a go, you definitely should. Anyone wondering if you can do a full IM, you can. It's an experience you'll never forget!