Prior to the start people were saying that one could look out at the kayaks and see that they were actually having to paddle ever so slightly -- backwards! -- to stay in place. I chose not to look. Even if they were right, however, pretty quickly I think it became a completely slack tide; no current in either direction. I have to confess that the lack of any current was a little disappointing as we were all expecting the 'tailwinds' of previous years. But hey, this is ironman (er... 'iron distance') and you deal with it.

This race was my first mass-start of any size in the swim, and I was a little nervous about it, but I've never been afraid of contact in the swim (more subtle foreshadowing), so I went for it, running from the beach and diving out there right in the thick of everything. For about 1K things were going pretty well. Because we were in a huge pack, very little sighting of buoys was required -- just make sure you're still in the pack and keep swimming. I was actually swimming strongly. My shoulder did not hurt, and I was breathing every cycle, which meant I was working hard (and, it was to be hoped, going 'fast', for me), and still I felt great.

The wind started to make things choppy, which meant that every so often, you'd turn to breathe and have to abort the mission, but as I was breathing every stroke cycle, these occasional missed breaths were not a problem. Until...

I turned to breathe and at that very moment the person swimming next to me apparently (at least, I think this is what happened) switched to a breast stroke kick and WHAM! I caught a heel squarely in my gut, at the very same moment that I was going to breathe. I took on a lot of saltwater into my sinuses, lungs, and gut. And then in some odd reflex action, I attempted to breathe again. It was very strange, because I was thinking "don't do that!" but at the same time, my body just did it. It all happened in slow motion, about 1 second in real time. With my face in the water, of course I sucked in another load of saltwater. My day was about to turn 'epic' after all.

I had to stop and move off to the side. I was disoriented. At one point I was literally seeing stars. A kayaker asked whether I was alright, and I knew that 'no' meant my day was over, so of course I said 'yes'. I then proceeded to throw up twice. Thank God for wetsuits. At least I could just float there instead of treading water while this was going on. I think I must have floated there for 5 minutes, but I really don't know. Eventually, spurred by I don't know what -- animal instinct? -- I rejoined the fray.

The rest of the swim felt awful but was otherwise uneventful. There was contact here and there all the way to the end. Apparently waiting 5 minutes (or whatever) meant that I just exchanged one pack for another. I got off course a little bit a few times -- I was still a bit disoriented and having trouble sighting -- but honestly I don't think it cost me much time. In fact, at one point I think I might have actually taken a better line than the pack that I was with.

Wear body armor.

Needless to say, T1 was regrouping time. I didn't bother to have the wetsuit stripped. I knew I wasn't going to be worrying about the 10 seconds saved from that. I peeled the top off and jogged to the tent. I felt pretty nauseous, and could barely remember my number when the volunteer asked. I needed to sit down, and that's what I did.

After a couple of minutes, I resolved to get moving again. I put on the leg warmers and the arm warmers and the gloves and a cycling jersey, and shoved a trash bag up my shirt. The hardest part was getting socks on -- my hands were pretty numb. Anyway, I got it all on in reasonable time and hopped on the bike.

Under the circumstances, taking it easy was the right choice. It's easy to second-guess in hindsight, knowing that a few minutes saved would have had me on the AG podium, but really, I had no choice in the moment.

Once out of the transition area and onto the roads, I began to assess. I knew that I needed to take in some nutrition -- I had absolutely nothing in my gut. I tried a sip of sports drink and thought I was going to gag. I think the problem was that Heed was a bit too much like saltwater, and I guess it goes without saying that saltwater was not high on my list of desirable refreshments at that moment. I was still quite nauseous. So 10 minutes later, I tried a little gel (from the flask -- probably less than 1/2 a serving) with water. That seemed to be better. I waited 20 minutes and tried a little more gel with water. So far so good. Then I started to feel my stomach gurgling. It got worse and worse until I knew I was going to puke. I pulled over and threw up in a ditch on the side of the road.

OK, friends, today is going to be a lesson in nutrition-management under tough circumstances....

Puking made me feel a little better. Hop back on the bike. But what to do about eating? If I can't get anything down, I'm hosed. Still, no sense in trying to eat if it's going to just come back up. So I just rode for a while. Needless to say, I was not riding at my originally hoped-for 5:15 pace.

At around hour 2 of the bike I gathered up the courage to eat again. Gel with water. 20 minutes later, OK, it stayed down. Repeat the process. 20 more minutes...still OK. By around hour 4 I was feeling pretty good. My change in mood no doubt had a lot to do with the fact that the wind had become a tailwind. I found my legs and some motivation and turned it on.

The motivation came in the form of a train that had apparently formed behind me. I came up behind it at one point (between hours 3 and 4) and got tired of watching the drafting (not all of them were, but some were -- I should add that apart from this train, I did not see any drafting; not that I was looking). I passed them all and continued what, at the time, I thought was enough of an effort to drop them, and indeed thought I had dropped them. A little while later, a guy came up behind me -- I recognized him from earlier and recalled that it seemed that he too had been unwillingly caught up in the train. As he passed me he said "are you Michael?" Yes. He told me his name as he passed, but it took me a while to figure out that he was someone from SC whom I had never met, but had watched closely in the past because he is a strong AG competitor in my AG. He said "You've got quite a train behind you. Let's break this thing up." Shit. So I hadn't dropped them after all. I let him complete his pass and followed (legally!), though he was, for a while, riding a good 100 feet in front of me. A little while later I started really feeling good and turned it on. We turned on to an out-and-back section and there I turned it up another notch. I passed him and on the return I could see that I had put quite a bit of time into the train. Then we hit the tail wind and I felt great. I averaged about 24mph, maybe more, for the last part of the ride. In the end, I finished the bike about 10 minutes ahead of the train.

Nothing, really. I think. I guess taking in calories early might have been a mistake . I don't know. I do feel that if I had felt good all the way, I would have easily hit my 'A' goal time of 5:15, and quite possibly better than that.

I felt good coming off the bike, and T2 reflected slightly more attention to speed than T1 did. I could have focused and gone a little faster, but this T2 was OK, especially considering that I entirely changed my top. (I could feel that the chafing had already been bad, so took off both the bike jersey and the tri top.)

I was feeling good coming off the bike, but I still had a big problem. I had taken in only around 1000 calories. This was a huge problem for me, because I am not great at taking in calories on the run -- I rely on getting 300 per hour or more on the bike, then minimal intake on the run to get through. That plan was obviously not on for today. I felt sure that if I didn't get a lot more calories in I would bonk by mile 15 and end up walking the rest, or worse. I would not resign myself to that fate.

So, I immediately began taking in calories, at first in the form of gels. I was going to aim for around 200-250 per hour, which is a good bit more than I would have done had the bike nutrition gone to plan. For about 6 miles that plan seemed to be working well. I was running in the 7:30s and feeling pretty good. Right around the turnaround for the first loop, I could feel myself getting a little queasy. The legs were fine, but the stomach was not. I slowed down a little, both on the calories and on the pace. Then I slowed down a lot. Over the remainder of the first loop, it got worse and worse. At the end of the first loop, I seriously considered bagging it, but quickly set that thought aside.

OK, how do I get through this? Think! I knew that the second loop would be slow and it was getting chilly. In what I can only describe as a shockingly good decision, I grabbed my special needs bag and threw on the long sleeve shirt in there. The nice woman who handed it to me was obviously concerned about how I looked. "Are you OK? Do you want to sit down? I have a chair." Stand back you evil temptress!! If I sat down my day would be over.

Miles 13 to 17 were pure hell. My stomach was in full revolt. Every time I tried to run or even walk fast I felt that I was going to throw up. Those 4 miles took me well over an hour. Around mile 17 I said "Screw it. I'm not walking any more. I'd rather puke." So I ran, and shortly after stepped into the nearest porta-potty. I thought I would puke, but no.

If I were a 19th century novelist I'd probably describe what happened next by saying something very clear but nonetheless vaguely polite and oblique, like "and then I was purged". But the 19th century did not, to my knowledge, have porta-potties. In the rather less delicate 21st century, in the nick of time, I turned around and dropped my drawers and for the next 5 minutes had what can only be described as a gut-emptying bout of "summer complaint" (look it up).

I emerged from the porta-potty into the fresh air and I swear I could hear birds chirping and colorful butterflies were singing zippity-doo-dah. I felt 1000% better. OK, 9 miles to go. I'm not going to worry about nutrition. Just run. And run I did. Slowly at first -- and I did pause at the aid stations to take in a little Heed and OH THOSE SUGAR WAFERS TASTED SO GOOD. But mostly I just ran. By the end, I was running sub-8s again, and I finished very strong.

I don't know. Maybe go old-school and eschew all food and drink as 'unmanly'? Honestly, though, the first six miles and the last nine miles were quite good -- around 3:20 pace all told. The middle was the ugly part. I have little doubt that a different approach would have been better; I just don't know what it would be.

I collected my things and we took a water taxi to the car. Back to the hotel and wash up. We walked to a nearby restaurant but I couldn't really eat much. I ate a few bites of dinner and went to bed.


The kick. I'm going to claim that I made good decisions in this race, but honestly I don't necessarily know. They felt right at the time, under the circumstances, and I see no reason to second-guess myself now.


Setup Events is awesome. This race is logistically about as complicated as can be, and yet they pulled it off beautifully. I heard a few people whining about 'lack of support' on the bike. Huh? Grow up! It's ironman (er...'iron distance'). I think there were 5 aid stations on the bike for crying out aloud. So stop crying. If I do another 140.6, this race will be high on my list. The quality to price ratio is very very high.