Lone Star Triathlon Festival - Half Iron - Triathlon1/2 Ironman

First open water swim of that length. I wanted to come in under 40 minutes and I did so I was happy with the swim

This is where it all went down hill

sickness/pain


So, maybe someone can help me out with what happened to my race as I cannot figure out the exact cause. About mile 5 of the bike I got razor sharp stomach/intestinal pains. I figured they would be gone in a few minutes, but they never left. They proceeded to get much worse. By the second half of the bike I could not even get down into the aero position anymore as they hurt so bad. I got into the run and started it off walking and taking in all the water I could hoping to kick the pain so I could finish. The pain was much worse during my walk than it even was on the bike and running was completely out of the question. I ended up walking one loop of the course in just over an hour and I had to call it quits. 4 hours of razor sharp pain was my limit. I'm sure many of you probably saw me on the run course as I was walking and kind of doubled over while doing so. It was extremely dissapointing as this was my first half and I was very excited to make a good showing which obviously did not happen. After talking to some people about the cause of the pain, everyone has a different opinion on what it was. Some say it could have been from ingesting salty and (possibly contaminated water) on the swim. Others say it was dehydration from the start, someone else said it was because I took in a gel right after the swim and did not wait until I was 20+ minutes into the bike to start nutrition. Any ideas, comments, or similar experiences would be appreciated. I really want to pinpoint the exact problem so I do not make the same mistake. There is also the possibility of a crappy time of coming down with a stomach flu or food poisoning. Any thoughts??