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It’s done! I completed my first Ironman 70.3 triathlon and I am proud of that accomplishment. A year ago, just toying with the idea to sign up for my first short triathlon, I never even thought of doing something like this and here I am. Here are some details of the race weekend.

FRIDAY: We arrived in Orlando Friday afternoon, got our rental car (the new chevy malibu) and headed directly to the Ironman Race Expo on Disney’s property. It was sunny and REALLY hot. A bit scary since weather was still lcool in south Ontario and I did not get a chance to train in hot and humid conditions. The trip to the race compound was good to get our bearings for the weekend and proceed with the athlete check in. that was a good move because the lines were long  on Saturday! Also visited the Ironman store, where I got a bike jersey and a couple of t-shirts and caps with the Ironman70.3 Florida logos. Then, we headed to our hotel, the Hilton Parc-Soleil Resort. That place was simply awesome. We had a suite on the penthouse level, with kitchen and all. We really liked the place. For the evening, we went to ‘Downtown Disney’ to eat at the ‘House of blues’ where some live band was playing. It was nice.

SATURDAY: On Saturday morning, we went to Lucky’s Lake Swim for my first open water swimming practice of the year. That is quite an experience. You have to visit the website, read a bit, and watch the video to see what I am talking about. The guy is real: same as in the videos. He actually welcomed us in Speedo with a cowboy hat, and guided us to a parking spot on his own lawn. It’s an awesome concept when you think about it. Lucky has a huge mansion on a lake. He basically invites everybody to swim with him 6 mornings per week from his property. And it is quite popular right now. We ended up being 240 that Saturday morning. As promised, I got my “I survived Lucky’s lake swim” bumper sticker, “enter the food chain swim” patch and I got to sign the ‘wall of fame’. Actually, the wall was full, so I ended up signing on the cieling of that portion of Lucky’s house. I really enjoyed that outing. And it was perfect practice for the following day. I did one crossing (1 km) and it went well, boosting my confidence for the ironman Swim. Pancakes were served afterwards.

See more pictures of Lucky’s Lake Swim

Then, we went to the Ironman Race site to take delivery of my bike. I did a test ride to make sure everything was OK and then checked it in transition (Ironman 70.3 races requires you to check in your bike the day before the race - it would be too hectic otherwise with 2000+ athletes showing up with bikes at 5h30 am on race morning). We then attended the athlete mandatory briefing and headed back to the hotel. We also had the good idea to scout a meeting point for Race Day.

My aunt and uncle, currently in vacation in Miami, joined us in Orlando in the afternoon to witness and cheer for the race. My mom arrived at the airport a bit later to complete my “support team” It’s nice to have people cheering for you. We all went together to eat Italian in the evening (pasta is always a good pre-race-day meal).

The plan was to go to bed early around 9pm, but it was more like 11pm when I got to it. At least I was not too nervous and got asleep easily.

SUNDAY - RACE DAY: I woke up at 4 am after a short but decent night of sleep. Quick breakfast (2 toasts with jam, 1 banana and half a bottle of ensure). Then, I got a real BAD idea while I was dressing… I have a toe nail threatening to fall for the last few weeks and decided to put a band aid on that toe to keep it from falling. I would pay BIG TIME for that mistake later in the day. By 4:20 am, I was on my way to the race site. I did not have to wait long for a shuttle from the parking lot to the start line, so I had plenty of time to setup my transition area. Preparing the transition area included:

- Install the bike computer on the bike
- Fill all the water bottles with water and Infinit Nutrition
- Set helmet, sun glasses, bike shoes, running shoes, etc ready for quick transitions
- Apply sunscreen
- Prepare swim gear (cap, goggles, skin suit)
- Identify the flow in and out of transition, and find visual cues to quickly find your bike. It sucks big time when you do not find your bike during the race (happened to me once). I was on the 3rd row from a big tree out of the swim, and 4th row after a fence when coming back from the bike split.

After that, I had a lot of time left to hit the restroom 3-4 times (stress does that to me), and meet with my wife and family a bit later. I was really pleasantly surprised when they arrived because the crew was all dressed the same with custom t-shirts that Corinne designed without telling me. The t-shirts were just awesome. I think some of my competitors were jealous of my support team The front of the t-shirt said “Go Thierry Go” with stylish cheering characters and the back said “Ironmate Support Crew”. Isn’t it awesome!

I then patiently waited for my wave, starting at 6:12 am, almost an hour after the pros went out. I thought I would be more stressed than that, but I felt pretty good. The last months of training really got me confident.

Race Swim - 1.2 miles - 0:38:37 - about top ~23% overall

My objectives here were modest:
1- Hoped for ~ 40′ or better
2- Avoid any panic for this ‘long swim’ without the security of a wetsuit(longest race swim so far was 1000m, only 2nd race without wetsuit)

I succeeded for both goals. My swim is still tentative with a lot of stops after contacts/collisions (and there was a lot of contact in the water), but I kept my cool. Also did a few breast strokes somewhere in there. I did not navigate as close as the buoys as I wanted, increasing the distance to cover. Swim form was not as good as it could be.

Still far from my training times, but I see that as an opportunity: I have potential for *relatively easy* improvements this season here which should be good for a few minutes if I can improve on all these aspects.

Really, I have to be happy with finishing in the first quarter of the people of a half ironman swim, barely 1 year after swimming my first laps. That is usually my weakest sport and it was not my worst split that day. I did much worse in the run… Overall, the swim was a success.

TRANSITION 1 - 0:4:36

Just average performance here, but I took extra time to try to clean my feet before putting bike shoes because my transition area was in gritty sand. Still, I could not remove it all. There was a lot of distance to cover between the beach and the transition area, and then a long distance to run with the bike to the mount line. That is why my time is so long. I was barely faster than the average of the people which was 5:08.

RACE BIKE - 56 miles - 2:28:28 - top ~12%
 PWR_AVG_no_0s: ~230watts
 >Graph and maps: GARMIN CONNECT | TRAINING PEAKS

Awesome bike split.  I am sure that run results may have implied that I over-shot my targets for the bike, but I did not. By feeling, I really did not push too much either. Race plan called for ~240w average. I was at 238w for about the first half, but it dropped a bit later due to several factors including some legal drafting, a bit of backwind and intentional adjustments late in the ride (see below).

I felt really good for the whole thing except for a few incidents - race almost ended early when someone threw a bottle under my front wheel at km18. I almost lost control as my wheel deflected while rolling over the bottle. It must have moved a lot cause I noticed quite a bit later that it moved my brake pads, letting them rub a bit.

However, at about km 80, I noticed quadriceps giving up when doing certain motions. Not sure why: I do not recall having this during long training rides even with higher wattage than this. Perhaps I walked and stand too much in the previous days. Also, I did not do SWIM>BIKE bricks in training. I suspected that I could be real trouble for the run and reduced my power output for the last 10k’s of the ride. Below you can find the graph of my average power output by laps of 5km and the cumulative progression compared to speed. The drop in power at 80 km is obvious.

I was hoping for a 33 to 34 km/h avg speed before the race, but got ~36.4: I am more than happy with that I was around 37 km/h average before starting to hold back my power. Course was crazy fast. I should not expect this kind of speed every time.

I followed my nutrition plan: 1 bottle of Inifnit + 1 gel per hour on the bike, with a couple of additional gels in the last 20 minutes.

Overall, I think I did what I was planning for here, listened to my body, and pulled back slightly when I needed to.

TRANSITION 2 - 0:2:08

Just above average performance here since average people took 3:26 here. Again, I tried to clean my feet a bit without success. I should have had an extra towel to wipe the sand off my feet.

RUN RACE - 2:04:58, about top~27%
 ~barely sub 6:00/km
 >Graph and maps: GARMIN CONNECT | TRAINING PEAKS

I ran into BIG problems early. The start of the run felt relatively good. I stopped early to tighten my shoe laces (lack of  preparation - laces were set for thick training socks). I ran the first 5 km without too many issues, moving at good pace. I thought at that time that I may be able to finish with a sub 5h time. Oh boy was I wrong.

After only 2 km, I had pain issues relating to big right toe… Huge mistake in the morning to put a fabric band aid on 2nd toe. The fabric from the band aid made friction and peeled a huge patch of skin on adjacent big toe. Combined with sand still left from my T2 transition area, pain was awful due to that patch of raw flesh. I somehow managed to tune out and ignore the pain and keep running (did stop a few times to remove my sock and try things without success though).

The sun was hitting hard, heat was really bad, and there was almost no shade on the course. Most of it was in some kind of uneven grassy trail, in crazy heat. Then I needed to stop to pee for the first and only time and went in one of the portable toilet along the run course in a sunny area. It was an oven in there and thought I would melt in there.

Then HEAT got the best of me and my hear rate started to act crazy - it was going really high even for moderate pace. Things got pretty bad here and I started to walk here and there to let things settle down. I was still moving good at that time when I was running, but the frequency of walking intervals kept increasing. Heat was crazy at noon. No shade on a huge portion of the course: it was brutal. They had sponges and kiddie pools filled with ice - they saved me.

Things got worse after half mark of the run. Legs were locking, not always responding. Started running with modified stride to avoid/reduce muscle locking. I walked through each aid station every mile to ice my head and drink. Shoes became wet (squishy) and heavy from the ice showers, not helping the cause.

The course was a 3 loop affair. Corinne and my family had found a good spot: in the shade, at a crossroad where I was passing twice per loop. It was really comforting to see them so often, cheering for me.

At the end, I could not run more than a few hundred meters before walking again. Each step was a challenge. I had only one km to go, and I could not even manage to run it despite all my intentions to do so. Can’t tell how happy I was to finish. If the course would have been just a few km’s longer, it would have taken me forever to cover those.

According to Mr Garmin, I stopped or walked ~27 times. That’s INSANE! I really did not want  to walk I am disappointed with my run - I can do so much better than that. In running races, I usually finish in the top 5-10% of the runners. If I can nail the run next time, I can do a much better finish. See my Heart Rate graph below.. Every drop in the curve means I either stopped -messing with my blister or trying to stretch - or walked.

POST RACE

After the race, my heart rate took forever to go down below 135, which is scary. I had to keep moving (limping around) for like 20 min after: every time I stopped, my head would start spinning and felt like passing out.

I went to the massage tent, where they could not do anything with me. As soon as they would raise my legs, quads would contract and cramp like crazy. They sent me to the medic tent where I got ice for my quads.

After a piece of pizza, I went back in the medic area later after I removed my shoes and saw the state of my big right toe with a huge patch on raw flesh. They tried to clean it with alcool or something like it and I screamed from the sharp pain. They finally used something else (IV fluid) that worked without the sting.

Finally, checked my bike in with Tri Bike Transport and headed back to the parking lot (a good 25 minutes walking) since the line for the bus shuttle was REALLY long. On our way to the parking lot, my heart went to the people still on the run course that we saw, well passed 3 pm.

RESULTS - 5:18:46 - Overall 340/2025 - Age Group 48/349

I really thought I could do a better run than that. I really did not want to walk. Hope it goes better next time.

Overall, I need to look at the big picture: I did awesome for 75% of the race, and I completed in a better time than the limit of 5h30 I set for myself in the beginning.

All pictures are in the album below: 

Half-Ironman Florida 2010

The next Ironman 70.3  I was planning to do is Muskoka, where I can’t beat this time since the bike course is longer and much tougher with a lot of hills. Therefore, I am now considering registering for Ironman70.3 Steelhead in Michigan July 31 to try to beat my time.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 24th, 2010 at 5:15 pm and is filed under Sport and Races, Travel, Our news. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.