Ironman 70.3 Florida - Triathlon1/2 Ironman

An OK swim for me. I was pretty conservative with my exertion and found a good rythem fairly quickly. I was in wave 13 and spent a good amount of time weeving between people in earlier waves. My drafting and navigation sucked, though. I had a very hard time finding and staying in a draft. I did not factor in with the weeving the need to do more sighting.

Sight better and more often. Draft better.

My transition was pretty good, for the most part. A lot of the time was spent running from the lake to transition. I lost a few seconds after mistaking the tree over my bike for another and going down the wrong line. The whole area was pretty crowded, so after getting my bike I joined a line of people trying to get through a narrow path to the bike start.

Evaluate and sight the area the morning of with bikes and people from the entrance to transtion from the lake.

This was a great bike leg for me. I have worked a good bit with my cycling endurance and it paid off here. Aside from one area where roadwork forced us on to the sidewalk, the course itself was pretty good. There are a couple of 1-2 mile out and back loops that I did not like. The course is not pancake flat and contains some rollers, though they are small enough to stay in the saddle or stand up to stretch out. The sky opened up on me around mile 35 and 50 and I spent half of the ride with my sunglasses on the tip of my nose in order to see.

Nothing.

Good transition, although slowed by the rain and slippery carpet. I moved through very well and did not waste any time.

Cover my running shoes. The rain came through the transition about 10 minutes before I got there. Luckily, I was under a tree, but my shoes did get a little wet.

I paced the bike very well and came off feeling pretty good on the run. After adjusting in, I held a good, comfortable pace of around 8:15-8:30 for the first lap. My plan was to hold this through lap 2 and open it up on lap 3, but this all changed when the clouds broke and the sun brought hell to the run course. At that point, it got Africa hot out there. The humidity from the earlier rain made it very uncomfortable. I soldiered on through lap 2, but started to get some GI aches due too much Gatorade and not taking in enough water. At the start of lap 3, the heat started to break me mentally. I started walking through aid stations, grabbing ice for my hat and to stuff down my suit. After the turn around, I sucked it up and puched on to the end. Lap 3 looked like a war zone. The paths were worn, wet and muddy. People were really hurting.

HTFU more. I did not get enough heat training in before this race, so that probably contributed to the discomfort of the run. Physically, I was OK, but the heat really started to take a toll on me mentally on lap 3, even though it was my last lap. I feel like I paced everything well up through the first half of the run, particularly the bike and swim. A guy that finished a couple of minutes ahead of me collapsed at the line and had to be taken off in a wheel chair, so I am not beating myself up to bad about this.

Walked to the food area, had a couple of pieces of pizza and the best Coke I have ever tasted.


Heat.


Great race, good venue in theory. Unfortunately, bringing in 2000 athletes and their families is not an incentive enough for Disney to inconvenience themselves by allowing the run to go anywhere but the dullest areas of the property. Aside from the run course, this is a well organized and executed race and venue.