My turn! Chinook 1/2 Ironman Race Report

While I sit here and wait patiently for Susi's full race report (hint hint) I guess I should write mine.

Woke up to a beautiful day on Saturday. They were calling for it to be 27ish and it was coming true! I got down to the race site with plenty of time to spare, got set up and chatted with my Tri-Cops friends who were volunteering. I finally got into my wetsuit at 7:30 and went down for a swim. The water was surprisingly pretty warm all things considered. I got my face wet and went out for a few laps and the good old panicky feeling started to come back. WAIT NO I'm not suppose to feel this way anymore! I'm over this stupid fear of lakes thing! I pushed through it and swam a bit longer and was feeling a bit more comfortable. I got out chatted with some more people and tried again. Not great but I could get my face in the water and actually swim. Everyone lined up and off went the horn. I thought I was sorta in the back half of the pack but wasn't and on came the full scale freak out. I couldn't breath and there was people everywhere. It was bad. Rose from Tri-It stopped to ask me if I was ok and I could barely squeak out a 'I think so' so onto the back I went to try to calm down. I check my HR and it was somewhere in the 190 bpm, which is somewhere in the zone 4 for me. WAY too fast for a swim. Ended up doing the entire first lap on my back and so my course looked something like this.



At one point the kayaker came up beside me and said I'll lead you in, rather humiliating. Got out of the lake and check my watch it was 37min! 3 min shy of my total goal time! I realized that I had to hustle to get out of the water before I was DNF'd All I thought was 'just get me on the damn bike' as much as I hated that swim I knew I wouldn't quit I was looking forward to the rest of the day too much to stop. With nothing but open water I tried again and was much calmer and swam the entire second lap, Finally getting out of the freakin' lake at 51.02 in 154 place. Not last but not far. Lesson #1 learned: stay WAY, WAY, WAY in the back instead of attempting to get on someones feet.

Onto the bike. I was worried that I had expended so much energy swimming that I wasn't sure how the bike would go. About 5km in Lola bucked off my Profile bottle and I had no water. Two bottles of energy drink on the bike and that was all, my tummy was not very happy and clearly wanted water not this crazy mixture. But I started picking people off and having a lot of fun. The course took us past my Junior High School. Good old Red Deer Lake! I laughed and thought of my old gym teacher who frequently made comments that my brother and sister clearly got all the sport genes in the family. Look at me now Mr. Martin! I digress. The bike was awesome, I love that route through Bragg Creek and was reminded of the CTAPP night ride when we did that route at 4am to test out our lights. I FINALLY caught up with Keith and Estela around the 30km mark. We chatted briefly about my awful swim and then Keith used his advantage to sip past me on the down hill before I climbed up the valley. I had a hard time convincing my stomach to eat the Cliff bars I packed instead it seemed happiest with gels and the banana from the half way point. Clearly some more experimenting needs to happen in the next few weeks. Some serious cross winds coming back which was seriously disappointing. I knew I didn't have as many calories in me as I would have liked going into the run but it's all a learning process right? Got off the bike in 3.24 and my bike place was 87th overall. Lesson #2 Learned: Don't put all your water in one place. Lesson #3: get into my areo bars and stay there. You will learn to like it one day.

Onto the run. I got off the bike and headed out chatting with an athlete who had been hit by a truck! I passed her on the bike course and she complimented me on my biking and said she was surprised that I was back so far in the pack. I explained my crummy swim and she said it freaks her out too and it's just about getting in as much lake time as possible. Away we went on the the baking hot run course. One of the volunteers said the standard 'you look great' I told him he was lying and he said no really you look better then a lot of people I've seen! I saw him a few more times and he started calling me 'Smiley Girl' Stopping to use the facilities on the course my friend Graham had caught up with me, I was surprised because I didn't remember passing him on the bike and assumed that he was WAY ahead of me. Graham is a chatter box so we ran together for most of the two laps. I was happy for the distraction of his conversation. He's training for Louisville and invited me to train with him in Sylvan which I will take him up on for sure. We grabbed a coke at the final rest station and WOW does that stuff work wonders. We jogged up the hill and picked up our speed coming into the last km. 2.17 on the run. I was happy that we managed to run 99% of the course. Walking the aid stations and the hill on the first loop. Lesson #4: Coke is your friend, for someone who has very little caffine in her day-to-day diet if used properly could have really helped me earlier in the run.

All totaled 6:37.46 my friend Wes and his darling kids surprised me showing up at the finish. A touch slower then I had hoped for but considering how the day started I was just happy to be able to see that finish line. On a whole I'm happy about the race considering how bleak things were looking earlier in the month and I had serious doubt about even making it to the finish line combine that with how I felt in the lake and I'm pretty damn happy about crossing the line. Sure it would have been nice to be faster, stronger but the lessons I learned and the confidence the race gave me are priceless.

Hopefully I can still get Sylvan in and attempted to get into a lake at least once a week between now and IMC. Lake access anyone?