Ironman Coeur d'Alene - TriathlonFull Ironman

Pre-Race Plan: I’ll be wearing my race top, tri-shorts, and HRM strap under my wetsuit. I plan to use wax ear plugs to help with the dizzy spells after leaving the cold water. Zero swim warm up, first time in the water will be when the gun goes off. I plan on lining up towards the back-right, finding some feet to draft and staying wide until the first turn. Stay relaxed and get through the swim without too much contact. Due to my shoulder injury I do not plan to swim hard. The swim is just a necessary evil so I can get to the bike and run.

Actual Race Day: I lined up with captantony on the beach to the far outside of the course. Gun went off and slowly walked into the water. Put my goggles on and started swimming. For the most part this was an uneventful swim. I got kicked and grabbed a few times but nothing that I would call intentional. I did not hook the Velcro flap over the back of my neck correctly, I now have a large wetsuit hickey on the back of my neck. There were some large waves and chop on the water. I drank a ton of lake water. Overall nothing too bad, very happy to be done.


Assuming I had not crashed, I think I could have swam a little faster. Maybe a 1:20:00. To get under an 80 minutes next time I need to work on pushing my swimming in training. Most of my training swims were just swimming laps with no real structure or intensity.

Pre-Race Plan: Hit the wetsuit strippers and grabbed my bag. Into the tent to put on bike socks, shoes, helmet, sunglasses, race belt, HRM watch. See the suntan gals, hit the port-o-potty (if needed), on the bike and out.

Actual Race Day: Went smooth and per plan. Stopped to say hi to my wife and son, lost a little time but no big deal.

Due to the weather I lost some time trying to figure out what I was going to wear. I had a jacket, jersey, and arm warmers in my bag. Finally desided to just go with the arm warmers. Next time have a better cold weather plan.

Pre-Race Plan: “Ride the ride I should not the ride I could”. Easy pace (130 BPM or lower) until the start of the north hill loop. The first time around the north hill loop and until I’m back to start the second hill loop I want to keep my heart rate below 135 BPM, it will jump on some of the hills but even then I want it under 150 BPM. For the second time around the north hill loop I want to keep my heart rate below 140 BPM, again it will jump on some of the hills but not above 155 BPM. My heart rate monitor is set to beep at 160 BPM, if it beeps I will soft peddle until it drops to 130 BPM and then start riding again. No peddling above 25mph, coast the down hills, save my legs.

Pre-Race Bike Nutrition Plan: My watch will be set to beep every 20 minute to remind me to eat. I’m planning on eating around 250 to 300 calories per hour on the bike. I will start the bike out with a bottle of Spiz mixed to 1000 cal. I will mark to third points on the bottle and drink a third of it every 2 hours. My bottle of Spiz will also have 4 Succeed tablets mixed into it. I also plan on eating a Cliff Bar at mile 20, and a Cliff Shot Block package at miles 45, 70, and 95. For water I plan on grabbing a bottle at every aid station and draining it before the next station. If I don’t feel like I need to pee during the first loop then I will increase my water intake to 2 bottles per station. I’ve been dehydrated before, it’s not fun, not going to happen this year. I also plan on popping 2 more Succeed pills as I’m finishing up the bike and heading towards T2.

Actual Race Day Ride: When I got on the bike my stomach was feeling a little upset from all the lake water I drank. I rode easy for the Higgins point out and back thinking that my stomach would feel better by the time I headed north out of town. It didn’t. [TMI Warning, you may want to skip to the next paragraph] I reached the start of the hill loop and was still feeling sick. While climbing the first hills my stomach was doing flip flop. All I could think about was the “going to the bathroom on the bike” thread that was on BT a few months ago. I needed to find somewhere private to pull over but there were people everywhere. While laughing about the thread and worrying that it was going to crap myself I rode real easy until I finally reached the aid station on Dodd Road. Pulled in, hit the bathroom, nothing but major gas, false alarm. Left the aid station and started riding again. I was a behind on my nutrition plan at this point but knowing that it was just a gas issue I concentrated on getting back on track. By the time I reached the Ohio Match Road turn around my stomach was settled down and I was caught up on my fuel plan.

Heading back into town the first time I could tell it was windy out but I stayed down on the aero bars and concentrated on keeping my heart rate around my planned 135bpm. There were times it would jump on the hills or I would catch myself riding too hard. At these times I would soft peddle and let it come back down. At mile 56 I checked my time and was at 2:50ish. I was a little worried that I may have gone out too fast.

The second lap was uneventful. Heading north out of town I could tell I had a tailwind, at times I was holding 25+ mph and still keeping my HR under 135. I skipped special needs as planned, maintained my heart rate, and hit all my nutrition goals.

At the Ohio Match Road turn around I knew I was on a bike PR pace. I was worried that my run was going to suffer and thought about holding back on the return trip to town. After much internal debate I decided to push the last 20 miles a little harder than planned and hope for the best on the run.

Overall, I stuck to my pre-race plan fairly close. At the end of the bike my average heart rate was 136.

Actual Race Day Nutrition: Followed my plan as written except for the amount of water between stations. Since is was cool out I only drank around 3/4 of the water.

I don't think I would change much for next time. I am blown away with how well the ride went for me.

This past winter I was very consistent in training. As a personal challenge I tried to ride 100 times in the first 100 days of 2009. I crashed on day 95 during my 94th ride for the year. I think that this consistancy paid off big time on race day. I plan to repeat this challenge in 2010.

Off bike, grab bag, bike shoes off, helmet off, glasses off, run shoes on, grab run hat and go.

I love T2, I just don’t like staying there very long. My pre-race goal was to race thru T2, I really wanted to be in the top 10 for T2 times. I did not reach this goal but I did set a T2 PR. I went thru in 1:13, to get top 10 I needed a 1:10. Overall I was tied for 16th and beat 31 of the 39 pros in the race including Bryan Rhodes. Bryan dropped out of the race after I posted a faster T2 time than him. I do not know if this lead to his decision to drop out but this is the second time we have raced together and the second time I’ve beat him in T2. Bryan, if you read this, I’m available for T2 coaching.


Run the marathon in my bike shoes?

Pre-Race Plan: Run, walk, or survival mode. It’s hard to say. I have not been running with my heart rate monitor this year, I may just turn it off for the run and go by feel. Plan is to run from aid station to aid station. Walk the aid stations, put a cup of ice in my hat, drink a cup of Gatorade and grab a cup of water for the road. I’m also planning on taking a gel every hour. Start in on the coke and chicken soup on lap 2.

Actual Race Day: After racing thru T2 I tried to hold back for the first part of the marathon (looking at the splits, I did not do a very good job at it). During the first lap I did not walk at all. I drank a cup of Gatorade and water at each aid station. For the second lap I switched to coke and water at each station and walked the stations until mile 23. I also was taking salt tabs at miles 8, 15, 20, and 23. For the first 23 miles I did not check any splits and ran completely by feel. At mile 23 I looked at my watch for the first time. I saw that I had a shot at breaking four hours for the marathon if I could cover the last 3.2 miles in 27 minutes. I stopped walking the aid stations and started pushing the pace. When I turned onto Sherman Ave I know I was going to be cutting it close to the 4 hour mark and started a slow speed sprint. Crossed the line with 39 seconds to spare.

I'm happy with how I trained and raced this year. Next year I'm going to run a little more over the winter, similar to what I did on the bike.

Pre-Race Plan: Eat some real food and keep drinking H2O and Gatorade until CPS kicks in. Then beer, pizza, and bed.

Actual Race Day: I lasted about 15 minutes in the food area before I got very cold and started to shake. I saw flyboy working at the med tent and asked to borrow his phone. Called my wife and told her I need to get home and warm up. Picked up my bags and bike. Home, showered, beer in hand by 8:30pm.


I was 210 pounds on race day. I would like to race next year between 185 and 190. (I've said this for the past 5 races, it still has yet to happen).


IMCDA is a great race. Clean water to swim in, scenic bike ride, a lakeside run, and a great race day crowd.