there were a few parts of the swim that were pretty choppy and i ran in to a few sticks along the way that were floating down the river. i had read a race report from last year about people walking in the swim in the middle of a sand barge - YEP saw that again.... weirdest thing.

It felt nice to get in to a rhythm and do a few hard intervals in between the long swim time. made it break up a little more... once i could See transition i started pulling harder and when i got to the 3rd bouie away from the exit I started kicking

i could have sited a little better and would probably been out of the water sub 1:10:00 but I did the method people on my right and people on my left way of sighting...

took my time nice and easy made sure i had everything. I thought that there was no nudity in Transition but defiantly saw 2 people drop naked.

I got to my bike and saw sondra, sarah, chris, and my parents. Sondra and Sarah both had signs and were screaming - my dad was trying to get me to stop and pose for a picture - chris was ringing a cow bell and im not really sure what my mom was doing... but I know I saw here there Cheering me on.

Transition was kind of a blur and was pretty long run from exit to t1 to my bike...

have bigger pockets to put my stuff in

as the bike started out, it felt nice to be rolling - was going what i thought was easy but the first 20 miles were my fastest, 19.75 i think for the average. The next segment was around 19, after this i decided that I should go down a little bit so that i could have a decent run. so I slowed down on the second loop to around 18.5, I think a little of this may have been to stopping 2 times on this segment to pee also. Pushed it back up to 19.25 for the last 20 or so.

On the first big hill at mile 10 I put it down in the the small rings in from and once i got to the top I could not get out of it so i had to stop to manually put it back in to the top ring. never went back down to the little one. on the out and back section I was shooting by people on the way down and using my momentum to get me up as fast as i possibly could. pushed it up until i was at 90 rpm in each of the gears then down shift until i was in the top ring in the back.

going up the hill on the way back to the main part of the course i started laughing as I was passing people because there was a funny song stuck in my head just as i got up out of my seat, the dude next to me looked at me funny and asked if i was OK, i said yeah i just though of something funny and kept pushing it up the hill.

Once i got to the main section to the laps through lagrange I saw Jim and the KCM group (ken and Glen) that was nice... they were a bunch of excitement all day and just good overall motivation. and some good pictures also.

in the laGrange loop the section from the turn to the sharp turns out back went real fast. you basically have a cheer section at the turn, an aid station with a tun of people in the area. then 2-3 mile in to lagrange with pretty flat area with a few rollers . then in LaGrange It was a mad house, almost like the finish line but not quite. There was a few thousand people from aid satiation to lagrange and barricades set up with narrow shoots and fast flat section. Before the race i told sara that they should be in the back left hand side and forgot about this and didnt know they were there until they yelled drew and i was just past them.

went through the country and saw the horses and Kentucky country. nice and fun. There is a sharp turn at the end of a longer decent section and a hard 100* turn, i almost went off the road with a few other people.

there was an aid station #4 that was good on the 1st loop and terrible on the 2nd they ran out of water.... REALLY? thats terrible. i almost used powerbar preform to dump on my head to cool me off. but decided not to.

There is a road that goes from the loop road to lagrange, both times i came up on to this section I thought i was back to the turn spot but it was about 2 more miles ahead.

The second time through lagrange was nice because I knew where the crew was and was able to wave and smile at them.

on the end of the second loop it was a little congested with riders that were on their first loop and others that were starting to slow down and not get out of the way. it was starting to get hot and people were fading fast... I still was goign to the rest room so i was rockin an rolling.

on the way back in to louisville it was nice and fast and almost all down hill - there were 2 -3 crazy drivers out there with cars trying to navigate through the bikers... what a cluster. hit it hard on the way back in and talked with a kid that graduated from KU last year and talked about the club for a bit then started to rock and roll on the flats. got back to T2 and handed off the bike and jogged - walked some of the way in to t2

not too much... maybe ride the computrainer a few more times to know the course.

have a small gear to peddle up the hills

took my time and didnt know what to do with all my nutrition and anti chafe stuff so held nutrition and ran a ways with it in my hands. sarah was yelling and screeming with me for about 200 meeters and cheering me on. everyone was right by the chute that goes out to the first turn on to the street.


have a plan for my nutrition and a place to put it

long lonely and boring... i knew there was a reason why i have never wanted to run a marathon before. my longest run prior to this was 20 miles and was a heat index of 101* when i finished. so this felt nice because of all of the sponges and water - preform every mile at the aid stations.

volunteers were great and there were a bunch of them. plan was to run nice and easy the first 7 to the 1st turn around then pick it up a bit for the next 12. till mile 18 - this is when it was getting HOT and just kind of kept the same pace. a little slower but it wasnt bad i felt good and just kept moving my feet. mind over mater... (a guy that was cheering people on said that about 45 times in the short 4 times that i passed him on the out and back section. It was great to have that many people out there.

I started having stomach issues some where along the first 3 miles that eventually just turned out to be gas the whole time. but stopped 3 times because i thought that i needed to stop.

miles 7-17 were kind of a blur. except for the part of the run were we go almost right by the finish line and can see it. There was sooooo much excitement here and people all over the place really cool. Sondra was the only one here at the time that i passed through. and said HI and i would see here in about 2 hours at the finish line. and waved bye. after getting out of the down town section it was magountious. and boring.

I got to mile 17 and was itching for the 18 mile marker to show its face so that i could kick it down.. not really but just wanted to metaphorically. after that i just wanted to get to mile 20 - at mile 20 i had 1 hour to run 6.2 miles... that just under a 10:00 pace. i thought that i could do that no problem. then 5.2 miles 50 min, 4.2 with 40, 3.2 with 30 and etc. at the 25 mile marker i had to pee bad and wanted to enjoy the finish with out having to worry about peeing so i stopped.

the finishing chute was a Blur. all i remember is looking back down the home stretch and there was no one behind me any close so just floated down the chute and remember Mike saying something about KU, me giving some fist pumps and the bright lights - then the volunteer helping me to the photo shoot and on down the line...

I think that I walked only about 4 times... once up a little hill in the U of Louvlle and then again in 3 of the aid stations. other then that just keep moving.

there was one point where I thought of dave chapelle's charctor Tyrone Biggiams where he is walking across hot coles and says "my feet are skrong"... I thought to my self I have strong feet no matter how bad there starting to hurt. (today is tuesday that im writing this and there is no swelling in my feet"

Every aid station i took water, ice for inside my tri top, sponges for head, preform and more water for head.

eat more... i ended up having 3 extra GU and 2 Chomps packets with me... all planed out i had enough fuel for a 5:30 run so I should have only had 2 extras not 5. but i did eat a cliff bar and took my time with it.. so that was 250 calories that equals the 3 gu that i didnt have. but my timing of the nutrition was not so good ... its a long day and hard to remember what all you plan on doing for nutrition.

after the finish line i talked with group ... took some pictures, drank a celebratory beer, and decided to walk to hotel to shower and go out to eat. went to room used the RR, showered, put my finisher shirt on and hat. and went to the 4th street live area to eat, it was cool, went and got a massage then went to hotel room with about 20 min till 12:00. with only 20 minutes till the end of the race i wanted to stay to watch but i was so wore out and tired and wanted to just lay down in my KING BED....


running speed - nutrition on the run?


overall this was an amazing experience! i am lucky to have such a great support staff and girlfriend that put up with me through out the summer and my training schedule.

as i was leaving Louvlle the KCM group asked me what race i was doing next... I said ... Im going to Oklahoma Joes....