I think I did pretty good on the swim. I had a good clean start and no contact. Seemed like a lot of the faster swimmers were to my left on the outbound leg. Found some feet for a little while, but lost that after we got mixed into some of the previous waves. Spent a lot of the swim navigating around previous waves. I swam pretty hard, but stayed in control. I felt good out there.

Try to find some good feet.

This was very clean. No wetsuit, so just put on sunglasses, race number, and helmet and I was out of there.
130/1554 OA.
21/138 AG.

Nothing on this one.

My plan was to take the first half of the course at a pretty moderate effort level and then see how I felt. My stomach took a little while to settle down and I was a bit burpy for the first hour or so but managed to keep everything down. A guy in front of me wiped out really bad on a turn in the first 5 miles. He looked like he'd be ok, but I don't think he was able to continue. The cop at that turn was there so I continued on. It was a bit nerve rattling just cause I saw his wheel fall out from him as he hit some gravel and took the turn to fast. I was passing people most of the time, and had some guys come by me, too. After Smithville Rd, I started upping my effort level some. Once I got up to Egypt Rd I started getting pretty warm and was sweating a lot so my focus turned to keeping cool and getting as much fluids in me as my stomach was willing to handle. I topped off my aerobottle with water at each aid station.

Winds on Dailsville and Jenkins Creek Rd was pretty strong. Had to really measure the effort out there.

Nutrition was 1x600 calorie bottle of Infinit, 2 GUs (1 Roctane) and 2 endurolytes. Seemed to work well and thats usually how I train when I do a long ride.

I'd consider not wearing the aerohelmet. Not sure of the tradeoff between having a hot head and aerodynamics. If I had a regular helmet, could I have pushed a bit harder on the 2nd half? Beats me.

Everything here was pretty good. I didn't wear a watch for the rest of the race but had my Garmin turned on and ready to go for the run, so I put that on as I was running out of transition. I wanted something for the run to keep my pace in check.

Socks on and shoes on pretty smoothly and I had to stuff a ziploc baggie full of salt pills and GUs into my back pocket. Grabbed a couple cups of water on the way out.

Wear a watch the whole time.

233/1554 OA
36/138 AG

Wow. Well, I started off pretty fast. About mile 3 I started feeling pretty doubtful that I was gonna be able to run the whole thing. The first few aid station I had blown right through, grabbing water/gatorade but not doing a good job of getting it down the hatch and I could tell I was gonna pay for that strategy if I didn't change it up. So before the next aid station I took out my baggie and popped a couple salt pills and swallowed them down with some water. Took my time to grab ice to put in my hat. Then had some gatorade. I pretty much lived from aid station to aid station from then on, taking (what I'd guess to be) 15-30 second walk breaks to get whatever I needed. This worked well. It slowed me down but the alternative was gonna be a helluva lot slower or a DNF. Around mile 4 I had to pee, I jut pee'd on myself as I ran. That was new. The last few miles were a real struggle to keep running. Legs were getting crampy and I really just tried to focus on keeping some semblance of running form together. I also focused my attention on thanking volunteers and encouraging other runners. If it was good karma, so be it, or if it just took my mind off of the agony in my legs, so be it.

At about mile 9 a red corvette drove past and the license plate said "HOTRUNN". I had to do a double take to make sure I wasn't delirious. I said something to a couple of the people around me and they either didn't see it in time or I really was delirious because they had no reaction to it.

I had 2 GUs (mile 5 and 10) and whatever calories I was getting from Gatorade. Felt good in terms of energy.

Splits: 7:19, 7:32, 7:55, 8:28, 8:09, 8:29, 8:40, 8:38, 8:49, 8:57, 8:52, 8:42, 8:28.

Not much. Maybe just bite the bullet a bit sooner with the aid stations but I think I reacted to the heat fairly well and adjusted as necessary. There were times were doubt crept into my head that I wouldn't be able to run the whole thing but then I just thought about the idea of walking all that way and that did not seem appealing at all.

When I got into the aid station walking routine at first I was a bit disappointed thats what I was resigned to, but eventually I realized that it was necessary in order to have a successful run and that the conditions dictated a change in race strategy.

Sat in the finish chute, drank water and Gatorade. Little bit of walking. Doused myself under the firetruck shower. Eventually gathered up my stuff, went back to the house and took a cold shower. Went and had a Wawa hoagie on the way home after my stomach settled down. That was awesome.


Heat.


Very well run. Great volunteers. Great race organization. Pretty kick ass venue.