Spirit of Racine

I did my first half Ironman on Sunday. It was a little more grueling than I anticipated....

On Saturday I looked up directions on how to get to the race site and saw that the water temp was 56 degrees. That made me a little nervous along with the fact that it was supposed to rain all day. I took my bike to the race site on Saturday afternoon. There was fog in the air and it was drizzling. Luckily I got there early enough to get a good transition spot.

I woke up Sunday at 4:30am since I was leaving from my parents house which is an hour away from where the race was held. My dad drove me down so I could rest a little on the way. When we got there, there was a lot of fog. In fact there was so much fog that the race was pushed back 15 minutes. This was actually a good thing for me. It allowed me to get in a short bike warm-up. After the warm-up, I found out the race was pushed back another 15 minutes. I walked the mile up to the swim start.

The swim was a point to point. I decided to go into the water for another short warm-up. It was COLD. It took me 15 minutes to get comfortable up to my neck (by this time the race was pushed another 15 minutes). I took a few strokes and immediately got a headache. Every time I put my face in the water, my head started to pound. After another 15 minutes push back, the race started an hour late. I found someone I knew and she had Vaseline and told me to put it on my face. Shortly after I lined up at the start in the front because of being a strong swimmer. Right when I entered the water my goggles broke. I freaked out a little then just went. Since there was no chlorine, the swim without the goggles was bearable. The transition from the water was really long, longer than a football field. I was out of the water in just over 27 minutes.

My T1 went well and I was off on my bike. It was really crowded, way too many people. I thought for sure that I got a penalty going up a hill. The USAT officials were all over the bike course. The bike course was not as bad as I thought it was going to be. The hills were doable, nothing like the website made it to be. It was a fast course and by the end all the fog had lifted. I had a cliff bar right at the beginning and my Accelerade was gone within 30 minutes. I took the bottles of HEED at all 5 stations. I am lucky it did not make me sick since I have never had it before. I drank each bottle in about 20 minutes. I was super thirsty. Looking back it was watered down and probably not enough calories (read how things went on the run below). Since I kept drinking it so fast my coach said that could cause bloat. I felt super bloated coming into T2. I did the bike in 2 hr 38 min or 21.3 mph. The girl that I swim with caught me right at the end. I was happy I held her off until then! I knew I could not hold her off for the run since she ran in college.

T2 went well also. I was in and out. Besides feeling really bloated, I thought everything was fine. There were 2 big hills in the beginning, but the rest of the course was relatively flat. At mile 2 I started feeling really bad - really dizzy. I had to walk almost a mile. I got some nutrition at the aid station and felt a little better. Up until mile 9 or 10 I stopped at every aid station to drink, eat, and walk. I probably walked 2 miles or more of the course. The course was a double loop so at mile 6 I knew I soon had 2 big hills to look forward to. I started to feel fine at mile 11. So, I ran the last 2 miles in. Mike and the girls were there to see me finish, which was really nice. My run took 2 hr 27 min or 11:17 min per mile. It was really slow.

My total time was 5 hr 37 min. I was faster on the bike than I thought I would be and a lot slower on the run. Coach told me I probably did not get my nutrition right and will help me with it this coming weekend at the IM WI training camp. I know I should be happy with my results since this was my first half IM, but I am still disappointed. I am getting nervous for WI.

IM WI is in 7 weeks. These next few weeks I will be concentrating on nutrition and endurance. I only have 5 weeks until the taper begins.

I got a much needed massage today. I don't recover like I used to!