I was really happy with how the swim went. I probably held back a bit because this was my first HIM and I was wary of wearing out on the swim. Not too congested getting started and out ahead of most of my wave and was able to settle in to a nice pace after the first turn. Had to do a fair amount of weaving through groups of people as we caught up to prior waves. I have to admit it was fun to start seeing new colors on the swim caps as I made my way through the swim.

Probably swim a little harder; otherwise this was the swim that I wanted to have.

I had the absolute longest run of any competitor with my bike from the rack the to bike out. Literally the far back corner from the bike out. It was fine though. I knew I wasn't going to break any records out there, so I made sure I had everything I need for the ride and snarfed down a hammer bar as I made my way out of transition.

Become a pro. They had sweeeet spots in the transition area. Also make sure not to have a hammer bar hanging out of my mouth as I run my bike past the photog on the way out of T1.

Hard to describe conditions. Headwind, crosswind, tailwind. Cloudy and cool, sunny and hot. Dry, wet. Thunderstorm. We had it all. I was feeling great for the first 25 miles. Hung in but probably worked too hard for the next 15. By mile 40 my back was sore. By mile 45 my quads would cramp if I tried to stand in the pedals and stretch my back. By mile 50 my quads would cramp even if I didn't try to stand. By mile 53 both my quads and hamstrings were cramping. I couldn't find any position on the crank to rest them up without cramping . . . had to hop off and work my legs out with only 2-3 miles left. Saw my bike pace plummet from near 20 mph to just under 19.5. Very frustrating.

Not ride so hard. I made the mistake of looking at past years' paces and also the paces that I held on my various traning rides. I failed to listen to my body when it was telling me to take it easier. I think a mph or two slower on the bike would have made all the difference - probably would have netted the same time (by avoiding the complete stop for a few minutes and very slow spin into T2 after the cramping) and left me with a lot more left to get through the run.

I knew my legs weren't going to handle anything extravagent coming into T2, so I just coasted to a stop, dismounted and walked it in to my space on the rack. Stopped in the port-a-john (conveniently right my my crappy -pun intended - rack spot) and saw some evidence that I had to really make sure to hydrate a lot on the run.

Here, not a ton. If I hadn't killed my legs on the bike, I would have jogged through T2.

It was awful to get a quarter mile into the run and have my legs lock up with massive cramps. I had to come to a complete stop and massage them out. I got my first inkling of iron distance comraderie as a few people stopped to make sure I was OK. The awfulness went away a little bit as I started moving again and saw that I was a part of a steady stream of people who were also walking it out. As it turned out, except for the last half mile (which I ran) the most I was able to run at one time was about .25 or .3 of a mile, and then I'd have to walk to a minute or two. It was (and still is) frustrating to have need to walk so much after all of the training, but I quickly realized on the course, that you simply have to be adaptable and figure out what's going to work to get you through the race. The slight silver lining is that my limiting factor here wasn't my cardio vascular fitness. My HR stayed really low and, except for my legs, I actually felt pretty good. What limited me was the leg cramps and my musculature. I think my traning was actually on target; I just need to race smarter next time. After the second aid station, drinking up more and cooling off with some cups of water dumped on my head, I realized that even if it was going to be SSSLOOOOWWW, I knew was going to make it. I was able to relax and enjoy the challenge of seeing how far I could run at one time, leapfrogging back and forth past and chatting with other run/walkers. The esprit d corps among the athletes on the run course was unique and special.

Bike smarter next time. Give up 10-15 minutes of time on the bike to have enough in my legs to go a few minutes/mile faster than the 13:30's I had from walking so much. Not worry quite so much about running in the heat. With aid stations every mile or so and lots of opportunities to dump water, it just wasn't as big of a deal as it might have been. I trained assuming that I would cruise through the aid stations; I've now realized that running a mile at a time and taking 30 seconds to walk through the aid station to drink, dump water and cool off is a worthy goal.

Walk around. Get some attention from my family. Talk to friends. Pass my water bottle from my dehydrated hands to those of my kids, who promptly started fighting over it.


Too hard on the bike.


My personal race performance left much to be desired. The race experience was awesome. The organization was great. The volunteers and the community were outstanding. My support crew (Jen and the kids) were phenominal. Jen really came through by rallying the troops and having them out on the sidelines to cheer me on on an unpleasantly hot day. However bad my race performance was, nothing could top the feeling of approaching the finisher's chute and seeing my family there to cheer me on . . . best feeling in the world, and even had I raced faster, that feeling couldn't have been any better (although I might have gotten to experience it a little sooner).

Overall, I have to look at this as a good experience and a definitely a learning experience. If I knew then what I know now, I think I could have done this race 20-30 minutes faster, just by making better decisions.