Lessons Learned at IMCDA

I've had nearly two weeks to mentally review my Ironman training, and the event itself, and here are a few random yet consistent thoughts I keep coming up with.....

1. First and foremost....I'm "in", meaning, I'm addicted. Some people ask me "so, what will you do now that you've checked this off your list?" I tell them I don't have a "list". This wasn't a stand-alone goal. It's more like a lifestyle now. Sure, I've got my real job, family, and everything that is associated with job and family will of course be first and foremost. But I'm fortunate that my wife and boys are enthusiastic and supportive of my "hobby". My experience at Coeur d'Alene only served to reinforce my........dare I say............passion........for the sport.

2. So, if I'm going to keep doing this, I want to get better, right? To do that, we need more focused and structured training. I am very happy with the level of endurance I was able to accomplish over the past year. I finished an Ironman on my feet, with a smile on my face and a little bit of a bounce in my step. The past two weeks I've felt great, have taken a couple of light to moderate rides and some short runs of varying intervals. Now I've adopted an Olympic distance training schedule from Triathlon Magazine's "Essential Week-by-Week Guide". This time around, I plan on following the variable intensities of the workouts, as opposed to my recent experience of focusing primarily on long sessions at a moderate intensity.

3. Swim. Yes, swim. Swim more. Swim better. Swim in different water. OK, so I didn't really "learn" this, as I knew it all along, but IMCDA certainly served to reinforce the need to continue to build on swimming. No, I'll never be one of those dudes in the lead pack flailing away like there's no tomorrow. But I certainly don't need to be in the back 1/4 of the pack either, lumbering along for half an hour before I decide to actually swim. So, I'll continue to seek advice, help, coaching, etc., and will remind myself that swimming is just like cycling and running.....your performance is based on your level of training.

4. STICK TO YOUR NUTRITION PLAN!!!! Lord have mercy. I'm smart enough to know this. After all of the work I put into developing a plan, experimenting, and becoming totally satisfied with my Hammer Nutrition-based plan, I ditched it at the start of the marathon! I guess I was suffering from some sort of stealth exhaustion-induced brain failure. Sort of like what mountain climbers experience at extreme altitudes. In any event, don't let Raceday me out-think training period me.

5. I've got a great group of friends and family. Outside of my wedding and the birth of my children, I don't think I've ever received so many well-wishes for anything I've ever done in my life. And not just the disinterested "hope you do well" type stuff. Honest to goodness interest and intrigue from friends, family and even casual acquaitences. And even from highly-accomplished triathletes.....the kind of folks who would have been showered, changed, munching on pizza and drinking a beer by the time I crossed the finish line.

That's all for now. Thanks for checking in.

Ironman CDA - Done!!!!

As I was enjoying my first "non-workout" Saturday morning in what seems like, well, forever, it occurred to me that somewhere, someone who maybe accidentally read this Blog on occasion would wonder......"gee, did that dude ever even make it to Coeur d'Alene?"

The answer is yes, I did make, and I did finish. No, it wasn't anything spectacular from a performance standpoint (13:49:59 -- broken down in the report below). But make no mistake, the entire event, from the moment we arrived in CDA until the time we left was absolutely one of the top 1% of experiences in my life.

Accommodations:



I traveled with my wife and 2 boys (10 and 11) so we made a family vacation out of it, and rented a cabin on Lake Hayden, fewer than 10 miles north of the town of Coeur d'Alene. It was perfect. We had easy access to everything we needed and everywhere we needed to go, and we were able to cook and enjoy most meals at the cabin.

Pre-Race Thurs & Fri

We more or less committed ourselves to enjoying the town and the festival atmosphere that Ironman. We did some light hiking on the trails, milled around Ironman Village, and generally had fun. I did take a dip in the 55 degree water Thursday morning, in some vain attempt to "get used to it". After 45 minutes of practice swimming, I couldn't feel my hands or face, so thought it may be a good idea to get out of the water.

On Friday, we let the boys go para-sailing, which was an incredible experience for them, and we later rented a ski boat, although due to the water temp, it turned into a "tour boat", as nobody wanted to ski.

Saturday

By now, the nerves had returned, and pretty much the entire day was dedicated to getting ready for the race. I put in a 20 minute light run, then hopped on my bike and rode about 15 miles, winding my way to Ironman Village. NAS does the most outstanding job of setting up for these events. I was absolutely blown away by the organization, and the helpfulness and availability of the team of volunteers. So, with Swim-to-Bike and Bike-to-Run bags packed, we headed to the Village.

I spent about an hour getting my bags and bike placed, and familiarizing myself with the Transition area. I walked through it a couple of times, on the outside chance that I'd recognize some of it the next morning .

Once everything was in place, we pretty much browsed around some of the vendor tents, did some shopping at the NAS Ironman store, and then went back to the cabin for an early meal and some downtime. I spent most of that downtime packing my "Special Needs" bags, and checking (and re-checking) my swim gear.

Raceday!

After tossing and turning all night, I actually logged about 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep Saturday night. Woke up about 4:30 with a huge knot in my stomach, and tried to relieve it with a Cliff Bar and a cup of coffee. It sort of helped.

My cousin, Kathleen (two-time IMAZ veteran, and up in CDA to volunteer and sign up for '09) graciously drove me the short 10 minutes into town, gave me a quick hug, and sent me on my way. I got into the Transition area about 5:45, and spent the next hour moving around, adding a couple of things to my transition bags, dropping off my Special Needs Bags, and putting on my wetsuit. The next thing I know, I've wandered to the beach with the masses, and we are about 10 minutes away from 7AM. They announce that the water temp is 59 degrees, and somehow this makes me happy? Gee, only about 10 degrees COLDER than Barton Springs! A virtual hot tub!

SWIM:

I'm standing there minding my own business, when BOOM, the cannon goes off. No countdown (some kid did sing the National Anthem), just the cannon. You ever see one of those Nature Channel videos where hundreds of penguins dive in the water at the same time? That's the last thought I had before running into the water.

30 minutes of pure, unmitigated stark raving terror. Hell is not a network of fiery caves, it is cold water with 2,000 people churning, kicking, paddling, swatting, gasping, floating, sinking, gargling, spitting.......well, you get the picture. This is a two-loop course, each loop 1.2 miles. 8 buoys out, one buoy across, 10 buoys back (I know, didn't make sense to me either).

I was hoping to get to the first turnaround buoy in about 20 minutes. It took me 40! Holy crap! I'm done. Not even gonna make it out of the water. I panicked. Poor Joe (the trainer who tried his best to teach me how to swim). After giving me all that advice, I'm out here dog-paddling!

Wait a second.......Joe taught me how to swim. That's right! I know how to swim! Well start doing it dumbass! OK. So I did. Made the trip back to the beach in about 20 minutes, and knocked out the second loop in less than an hour, for a total swim time of about 1:30.

I get out of the water, relieved, and looking forward to the Bike.

Transition 1

Most people spend about 6-8 minutes between the swim and bike (the elites spend about 3-4), but I must have taken a nap or something. 11+ minutes. Anyway, off I was on my favorite leg...the bike ride!

Bike:

The bike course is a 2 loop course, and while challenging, it was actually the highlight of my day. It was really fun. The first 20 miles or so are sort of a warm-up ride along Lake CDA, back into town, then north out of town. Once you wind your way through Hayden Lake Country Club, and make a couple of turns, and BOOM, you're staring at the hills.

But, what goes up must come down, and there were some generous descents. However, some of the descents involved winding roads and blind turns, so some technical skill was needed. In any event, the first loop flew by, as I averaged something like 17.8 before stopping to take my first bathroom break at around mile 60, thinking I may have to wait in line if I held out until the Special Needs stop at Mile 64. So I stopped there just long enough to grab a PB&J out of my Bike SN bag, and was off to complete Loop 2.

Well, as fun as Loop 1 was, Loop 2 was almost, but not quite as enjoyable. I'm pretty sure one or two of those hills grew a little. There is a point where you go from unstriped road to newly painted, striped road, and that is the introduction to a three-tiered stair-step hill that never seems to end. It was big time tough the second time around.

After exiting the hills, it is a mostly down-slope ride back into town, but there was a pretty stiff south wind by that time of the afternoon that required a little more work to move through that I would have preferred. In any event, my total average for the 112 miles was 16.6. Again, I was hoping to come in around 17.0, but I was generally happy with where I was in the race and how I felt at the time.

Transition 2

Once again, a certain amount of lolly-gagging must have occurred, because I spent just over 6 minutes in T2. A portion of that, however, was spent going to the bathroom.

First true mistake of the day: So at this point, I've been at it for over 8 hours. Funny thing, the brain apparently doesn't function at full capacity after that period of time. Case in point: despite becoming a borderline junkie when it comes to Hammer Nutrition's endurance product "Perpetuem", and despite properly consuming 2 separate "3 hour bottle" of the stuff on the bike course, and despite having a "2 hour bottle" in my T2 bag, ready to go, just add water, I, in my infinite wisdom, convinced myself, "aw hell, I've only got the run left, I don't need this stuff! Too heavy to lug around!"

Second mistake of the day: Not only that, but I had also stuffed a small flask filled with Hammer Gel - Espresso in my back pocket. Plenty of gel for most of the run. Well, the first mile is a short out-and-back on a sidewalk along the lake. During the "back" portion, I didn't like the way it was bouncing around, so I threw it away!!!!!

So there I am, running a freaking MARATHON without either of my tried-and-true nutritional aids! At the time, I thought "Boy, I'm a genius! Look how I'm cruising". In fact, I was running pretty good to the next turnaround (right at 6.5 miles or so) that I decided to dial it back on the next leg, so I'd have something left for the last half.

I hit the 13 mile turnaround feeling pretty good, grabbed a light pullover out of my Special Needs Bag, stopped for a brief second to chat with the family, and headed out, by this time about 12 miles from the finish. I trot through the remainder of downtown, I guess still spurred by the crowd, then..........BAM! Nothing in the tank. Complete and utter shut-down. WTF??? I've got over 10 miles to go! I decide that I'll run 5 min and walk 2. Couldn't keep it going for 5 minutes.

After much debate with myself, the best I could come up with was walk the uphills and run the downhills. Actually, I didn't come up with that......I overheard someone else say it. Regardless. This is what I did. Well, I was also not too picky on what I considered an "uphill".....basically, if it wasn't down, it was up!

It was somewhere around here that I also "did the math", and realized that a sub 13:30 finish was impossible, but that sub 14:00 was pretty much "in the bag". So I decided not to "kill myself" and cruised on in, soaking up and enjoying the incredible course and atmosphere (besides, its not like I had some "kick" deep down in there anyway!)

My family was right near the finish corral, spurring me on, and I did, in fact, have a quarter-mile kick in me, and I finished with a bounce in my step and a smile on my face! My cousin, (remember her? The two-time IMAZ vet Kathleen, who was in town to watch me and several of her friends and who signed up to be a race volunteer) "caught" me at the finish line. My wife and boys promptly found me and the post-race celebration began.

Well, "celebration" is a bit of a stretch. A couple of pieces of pizza; got my bike over to the TriBike Transport check-in; picked up my transition and special needs bags, and we were headed back to the cabin. I ate some left-over pasta from the night before (extra salt!) which hit the spot, a warm bath then shower, and just as I was about to grab a beer, I hit the bed and fell fast asleep.

We spent the next day milling around CDA as the Village was being broken down, then drove to the small town of Harrison on the other side of the lake, for a light and easy mountain bike ride on a flat paved trail --- therapy for the legs. Then cleaned up, had a nice dinner on Sherman Ave. in CDA, (multiple beers!), and settled in for one of the best night's sleep I'd had in weeks.

A final word about the towns of Coeur d'Alene and Hayden, and the volunteers who worked the event......If you want an analogy, think of most triathlons, marathons or half-marathons as 3-Star hotels.....you know, nice, comfortable, clean, but you've got to carry your own bags, no room service, etc., etc. Then think of Ironman CDA as a 5-Star + world-class hotel. From the moment we hit town, through and including Raceday, until the time that we left, we were treated as VIP's by just about every single person we came in contact with.

My first Ironman will always be my most memorable, and the location, people and support of my family and friends made it a truly special event.

Houston Marathon - Race Report

Hello again. Yes, I'm still out here, but figured that endless "training reports" would be just a little on the boring side. So, here is an actual "race report". Woohoo!

The Chevron Houston Marathon starting gun sounded at 7:00 AM yesterday (Sunday, January 13) to clear skies, 44 degree temp, and a 10-15mph north wind, and a record 17,000 runners (apprx. 7,000 full, 10,000 half).

I won't bore everyone with the details, but this was my second marathon, and my finish time was a mere 1 min. 26 sec. better than my first go around. Yesterday, I got a 3:56:47, and in Austin last year, I got a 3:58:22. So, different cities, extremely different courses (Houston mostly flat, Austin pretty darn hilly), and very similar weather, but the same result. I guess for all practical purposes, I'm a 4 hour marathoner.

Looking at my unofficial splits, I do seem to have run Houston much more consistently...starting out at about 8:50/mile, with only a slight fade that kicked in around mile 19 or so. In Austin, I logged several early miles at 8:35, only to be faced with about 4 10:00 miles later in the course, before having to really give it a kick to finish under 4 hours.

I ran Houston with a friend, and that made the race much more enjoyable. In a way, I'm glad I ran my first marathon "solo", because I felt like I was able to absorb the event and personalize it a little. Conversely, having a running partner run stride for stride was very beneficial. I began cramping up at about mile 22, and the obligation to finish with him, without holding him back, is what kept me going.

DEHYDRATION PROBLEM:

I didn't realize it at the time, but the right hamstring cramp I was able to ward off in mile 22 was actually the first sign that I was on my way to becoming severely dehydrated. Almost immediately after finishing, I began experiencing a massive headache, and I had absolutely no appetite whatsoever. This is alarming for me, because the post-race cheeseburger is always my salvation!

My ever-supportive wife drove me home, and I slept the entire hour in the car. When we got home, I went straight to the couch, where she basically force-fed me some chicken broth and and water. I went straight to bed, and it wasn't until about 6:00 AM this morning that I actually felt better. Since then, I have rebounded, regained the appetite, and feel pretty much 100%.....except for the typically sore quads.

This is where I need some help from you guys. My IMCDA discussion group has already given me some advice on hydration/electrolyte strategy, but I can use all the help I can get. At the time, I felt like I followed a pretty good plan....no alcohol the week before the event; increased water/fluid intake the days before; good amount of water/Gatorade immediately before race; water and/or Gatorade at every stop, plus a pack of Sport Beans every 45 minutes or so.

So far, it appears as though I should look into into electrolyte supplement in addition to water/sports drink. I need to work out a formula, based on my 6' 3" 190 lb. frame, and heavy (though not profusely) sweating.

I guess part of the problem is that I (stupidly) tend to worry about this more in the summer, when I'm sweating buckets, but not on days like yesterday, where the sweat dries so fast, the only think left on your face is a layer of salt.

Now it is time to recover, and get ready for Austin in February 17. My plan there is to run it as sort of an "Ironman Simulation", which means I won't be trying to set a PR, and won't even care about 4 hours. Try to get myself familiar with a even, steady pace that I'll be able to handle at Coeur d'Alene.

Then, blissfully, I'll be back into full-time cross-training.