Sorry for the late post today, but Ironman is a long day and this is the first chance I have had to sit down in front of a keyboard. I almost wasn't going to put a post up, but sitting here with an Ironman worth of sugar and caffeine tearing through my veins, sleep doesn't seem particularly close, so I thought I would put up a quick summary of my day.
In short, it was pretty darn fantastic. I ended up finishing Ironman WA with a healthy PB and getting comfortably under 9 hours (which was my main goal). My time was 8:42, which was enough to snag me 16th in one of the hottest fields that Ironman WA has had in years. The conditions today were absolutely perfect, making for a very quick day, with lots of PBs and the course record being broken. Fast day or not, I will happily claim that 8:42. Pretty stoked would be an understatement.
How was my day? In brief, it was to plan. As in exactly to plan. A wise person told me yesterday if at any point I am faced with a choice between working above my limit to stay with somebody or letting them go, to take the conservative option (at least early in the race), which is exactly what I did. As a result I raced to my limits the entire day, which meant that I didn't fade or explode, but rather got across the line sore and tired but still moving.
My day panned out a bit like this.
Off the line, the swim was instantly one of those ones were you know you can comfortably sit in the bunch, the pace was just right for me. I had no problem finding some toes and comfortably sitting on them on our trip to the end of the jetty. More than once I was thankful that I grew up in Australia regularly swimming in the ocean as we do, because as the chop got worse the pace of the group dropped as some seemed to struggle with it. As we turned around the end of the jetty we hit the chop proper and the group slowed right down. At that point I decided I would take a bit of a turn so I led the second group most of the way towards shore. A few hundred metres from shore somebody else took over and I was happy to let them. All up it was a really comfortable leg, so I was very stoked to see it come in under 50 minutes.
Once I was on the bike I was faced with the 'go or stick to the plan' choice almost right away since I started in a group of three. I decided to try and go with the group for the first 20km and see what it got me. By 15km it was obvious that the guys in front were working above what I wanted to do so I let the rubber band snap and they rode away. From that point on my day was a pretty solo affair.
During 180km on the bike you are going to have lots of ups and downs and so it was for me. By about 70km my back was really stiffening up requiring regular stretching from that point on. I almost considered stopping to stretch it, but in the end that wasn't necessary. I have been working on back flexibility in the last few weeks, but it obviously wasn't enough.
Sticking to my own race plan I got through the first lap of the bike in pretty good shape (besides a stiff back), but I wasn't sure how the second lap was going to go. I had a bit of a flat spot at 100km and I thought that the fade was coming, but to my surprise the power came back around the 110km mark and from there the numbers were maintained for the rest of the lap. In fact I saw almost no fade, it was almost a negative split, which I guess is an indication that you have got the pacing right. It definitely showed me the benefit of having a pacing plan properly set out and sticking to it. Being able to maintain my numbers meant that I was able to regain a few spots that I had lost on the first lap, which was a nice way to finish off the leg.
My only hiccup for the day came on the run, and it wasn't a big one.
I got off the bike and onto the run feeling pretty comfortable. I settled quickly into a tapping along rhythm about bang on my planned pace. After the first km my heart rate settled to where it was supposed to be and all was right with the world. However, about that point I also realised that my Garmin was nearly flat. I had made the silly mistake of leaving the backlight on and after 6 hours or so of racing it the battery was nearly drained. I knew I could cope without it, but I really didn't want to run without either pace or heart rate info. After some frantic button pushing I managed to turn down the backlight, but somewhere in the process I also turned off the GPS. That wasn't ideal, but it did mean the watch was going to last a lot longer and so I didn't try to fix it. I wanted to run mostly to heart rate anyway and I had that, plus I could figure out my pace from the mile marker signs. Also I suspected that I might actually run a bit better if I wasn't constantly chasing a certain pace. In the end running like that got me through the entire marathon. Not perfect but it worked.
As it was I don't think the lack of GPS made much difference. I tapped away a really comfy cadence for the first 20km and got to that point feeling pretty strong. On the third lap (Busso has 4 x 10.5km laps) it started to pinch, but I was able to keep the rhythm. Up to that point the heart rate had been building as per my plan (up 3bpm every 10km) but at 20km I just wasn't able to raise it anymore. The heart rate was still quite low, but I couldn't gather any more intensity, the body had run out of steam to push harder, all I really had was the strength to hold on. I got through to 30km okay, but it was getting to the point where I was ready to be done. By then though I knew I was through the 20km to 30km danger zone and that the last 10km sort of takes care of itself, although it wasn't going to be pretty. By the time I was on my last lap the wind had really picked up, making the run a real head wind/tail wind affair. Five of the final seven kilometers were into the wind, making for the slowest splits of my entire run leg, a sort of parting gift from the race. The head wind did make turning and heading for home with tailwind was particularly sweet though. The really sweet moment, however, came when I was able to turn and finally run down that finishing chute. So happy to finally finish, even happier with the result.
So that was my day in a nutshell. Probably the best way to summarize my day is this: These days when I prepare my race plan I have a Bad, Good and Brilliant version. The idea behind this is that you have contingencies, no matter what you day throws at you, it can't throw a surprise your way since you have already thought through the scenarios. Today my race pretty firmly followed the brilliant path of that race plan. At every time check I was ahead of where I was expecting to be and was still feeling good, like the effort was sustainable. It was the sort of day where everything seems to align and everything seems to goes right. That is pretty rare in Ironman. It was a day that I am very happy with.
So I think that gives an idea of my day. As usual I will do a full blown race report during the week and get it up ASAP.
Now if you don't mind, I am finally feeling like sleep might be an option. In fact I think I just briefly fell asleep. Time for a bit of rest.
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