Saturday, October 21, 2017

Ironman Louisville Race Report

IMLou... this was my A race. I was really hoping to go sub 10:25 and set myself up for some confidence going into the winter. Alas, that didn't happen. Getting to the race was easy, I flew down thursday morning and met up with amber at the louisville airport. mike flew in later that night, john and danh drove from wed evening until thursday. by the time they got there, we were ready for dinner, we had el taco lucadore. it was uber tasty, i ate all the tacos.

friday we checked in and lounged. we ended up meeting up with mike and steve for vietnamese food, which ended up being pretty authentic! saturday was a bit more eventful than we wanted. we dropped off our bikes to find danh's rear wheel seized. he called every shop in the louisville area, no one had a 650 hub, we thought he was going to have to do the ride in a fixed gear. i got home and decided to make a post on slowtwitch. luckily, someone was kind enough to reach out and lend danh a rear 650 zipp wheel. his name was mark weghorst, total trooper.

the cool thing about sat was sitting in at the pro meeting. it was interesting, and really cool to see the race from a pros point of view. to be honest, most of us who know how to ride a bike, or finish in the sub 12 region really feel the same way. the refs need to do a much better job enforcing the rules.

we also watched kona.. all of it. no one could sleep, we all wanted to see sanders finish, lange ran an incredible race to catch him. though we all felt he should have been dq'd for the jersey being zipped too low, rules are rules, right?

race morning: 
i get up at 5am, have some covfefe, an rx bar, bannana, some juice and water. i pack an extra banana and a gu for pre swim. when i get to the transition, i realized that i left my garmin at home... fuck, i can't believe i did this again. i asked danh's fiance ("twin") to grab it at the house when she had the chance so i can possibly snag it during the run. how could i be so stupid to forget it, two races in a row... ugh. 

swim: most of my friends are stronger swimmers than i. i ended up in the 1:10-1:20 line. probably halfway through the pack because i realized my morning bag didn't have my number on it, i rushed to find a volunteer with a marker and we slapped 319 onto it. hopping in the water, i felt fine. i had no idea what i was going to do for time, i knew i would swim faster than my imkph time of 1:17 but i also didn't want to get tired like i did at kph. the water was dark, so it was really hard to follow any feet, more than 1.5 feet and you can't see anything. the swim out to the turn was fine, i got a bit off course a few times (all the way to the right, then left of the course). by the first turn the water got really cold, then warm, then cold. it was really weird. by the 2nd turn i knew i had gone almost half way... i just went into cruise control mode. i realized the current was stronger to the left of me. a few times i was swimming in really calm water, that was a mistake. the last 500 yards of the swim were probably my best 500 yards ever. i started kicking and for the first time ever, i didn't feel awkward, or expend more energy. i should try that more often. 

swim was 1:12, my new swim pr (choo was 1:12, without a wetsuit, but probably stronger current?)

t1: i got out of the water and ramped my heart rate up towards the bike. it was colder than i wanted it to be, so i was careful to dry off as much as i could. as i ran out, my helmet fell off, DOPE. i got my bike and as always, had to be careful of people stopping to hug family and friends. gotta remind myself that not everyone does these events as a race, some people are happy to dilly dally. in the end, it's my fault for being a shitty swimmer. 6:XX (i think)

bike: i generally am slow to get my HR up on the bike. but i think running hard through transition (despite the shitty time) helped me get amped up. i took in my water and calories and was feeling good. i was pushing good speed for the power as well. it was probably the best i have ever felt coming out of the swim. about 30 miles into the bike, before the sharp left turn, i was coming down a fairly straight hill. i was going about 40mph and screaming for people to move over yelling "on your left" 5-6 times. these 3 guys up front were riding 3 wide, and just not moving. i hit my brakes, crossed the double yellow and swerved back. in doing so, i hit a crack in the road pretty hard. i knew i flatted. about 1k yards later my tire went flat, i pulled over immediately as the 3 dotards rode by a min later.

i ripped off my pitstop, only to realize the plastic nozzle had fallen off. whelp. there goes my race. i just sit on the side of the road and asked folks to let neutral support know. about 7 minutes or so goes by and john yen rides by. he blows by me, but comes back to offer me his pit stop. great, this will work. i put his cover on my pit stop. i had never used one in the past, but it seemed pretty self explanatory.. nope. the foam blew out the sides, nothing went into the tube. i then use his.. same thing. now we're down 2 pit stops. i told him i would need his tube co2, lever and co2 inflator. but told him i didn't want to take his only one. he was under the impression i had one, but didn't want to use mine. so he agreed and went on. a few other friends rode by, i just sat and waited. then one guy stopped. #380. jim deruby of maverick multisport. he asked me what i needed, i said everything, just go. he offered me a tube, levers, and co2. i quickly did the repair and he was off. i got off not long after and to lack of better judgement, decided to push the watts to catch up.... unfortunately that's where the course tilted up, it was brief, but it was enough to really drain me. i didn't realize it, but i was sitting for so long that my bike computer turned off. i'm guessing it had to be at least 20 minutes of sitting around getting cold.

at mile 50 i felt pretty crappy, the same feeling i normally get when i am at mile 95 or 100 of the bike portion. i wasn't sure why, but i was really uncomfortable and i couldn't push any watts. i realized my bike saddle was off, i must have landed on it, causing it to tilt up. i couldn't ride aero for more than 1-2 minutes d/t the discomfort, and i couldn't pull on the pedals d/t the saddle position. i think i got things fixed at around mile 84 or 87 which allowed me to put out decent power again. it was good timing though, the winds had picked up and i needed the watts to be able to keep going straight.

bike: 6:13 or 6:17. my 2nd worst im bike ever.

t2: i got off the bike and did the long run on cement (god, i have the softest damn feet in the world). as i grabbed my bag, i reached into my bike bag to grab my arm warmers and gloves as well. by the time i get into the tent, i realized my watch was in my run bag the whole time.. oops sorry "twin"! i scurried out to the run, making a pit stop to clear my insides. because i was on the bike for much longer than expected, i had to take on gatorade, which just doesn't sit well.... time: 7:xx

run: whelps, i probably had a decent run in me since i didn't put out too much power on the bike, at least that's what i had expected. about a mile in i felt my legs cramping (i didn't get enough salt in on the bike). i stopped to stretch for 2-3 mins and got going again. i felt pretty good, i saw a bunch of friends on the course, but as the sun was setting i could feel it getting colder. not good. i just don't run well in the cold. i caught up to joe and we ran together from mile 3 or 4 all the way to 11 where we caught kimball, we ran together for a bit and i con't onwards with joe until mile 15 or 16. at that point i was too cold to run well and told him to carry on. when i'm not having a great race, i take care to take on lots of nutrition and pee about every 3 miles. perhaps those mini intervals to pee and catch him were taking a toll on it. i ended up linking up with jim deruby again, we ran 5-6 miles together and chatted until it suddenly warmed up at mile 24. my stride was widening and i saw della at mile 25. i ran up to her to say hi and told her we were at 25.37, possibly further d/t me delaying my watch start. when jim caught up i took off with him, and pushed a bit faster towards the finish, not because i cared about my time, but because i just wanted to run hard since it was warm. i crossed the finish line. 12:13:XX my 2nd worst ironman time. marthon was 4:45 or something horrible like that. 

i saw john, mike, and amber at the finish, it was nice of them to wait for me, they must have been cold. i then saw kimball, joe, kate, and jeff at bag pickup. we went home to shower and come back to cheer danh but he finished before we could get back out.

this was a tough race for me. the bike was really mentally taxing. my mind went from such a happy place, to such an unhappy place. i knew i put in the time and effort to have a good bike, to have a few mechanics (also dropped my chain 4 times, long story, but i've never done it on a race), really throw a monkey wrench into things.  2017 was a rough year for racing, that's for sure. this is now 4im's where i have done much more poorly than expected. yeah, there are excuses for each one, but in the end, this is a long race, i have to do a better job reducing the chances of these mistakes.

back to the drawing board. i'm hungrier than ever for a strong race in 2018. 

No comments:

Post a Comment