St. George Ironman Training Camp

A few months ago I signed up for an Ironman training camp in St. George, Utah with Endurance Corner. The purpose of this camp is to preview the Ironman St. George course. So here are my thoughts, comments, etc. on this course along with the comments and thoughts from one pro champion triathlete Chris McDonald and Gordon Byrn.


Day One --

I arrived pretty late at 10:30pm. We had breakfast the next day at 6:30 followed by a lecture then a swim. The lecture was about overall Ironman training etc.

Off to the swim, the swim workout was a simple set that included a 1300M warm up can you say crazy. I only did 400M of the warm plus the main set. I got in 3200M including rest sets in 60 minutes. The main set was pretty solid it went:

400M / 30" RI
4x100 / 30" RI
400M / 1' RI

300M / 30" RI
3x100 / 30" RI
300M / 1' RI

200M / 30" RI
2x100 / 30" RI
200M / 1' RI

100M / 30" RI
2x50 / 30" RI
100M / 1' RI

After that we went back to the hotel grabbed some food then Chris McDonald helped me put my bike together or I should say he did it and I watched. I guess one of the benefits of racing all the time is you learn to disassemble and reassemble your bike quickly. He did it in less than 15 minutes. The whole entire camp I was just in awe that I had the opportunity to workout with some of the best athletes in the world. Even some of the campers were Kona AG qualifiers too.

After lunch we had a short ride thru snow canyon, were we also did a lesson on descending down hills. This was my first taste of some of the scenic views St. George, Utah has to offer. It also included a nice 5 mile climb too. I was well into zone 3 during most of this climb. I was hoping I could do most of the climbing in zone 2 but I could tell this wasn't the case. I am pretty sure though my fitness will allow me to run in zone 3 on t he bike or the run for well over 2+ hours. I was running a compact crank up front - 50/34 and a 12/27 in the rear. My front derailleur's set screws were off and i couldn't use my 27 gear without scraping the chain. So I toughed it out. All the pics are at the end and on my Facebook page so those of you that on Facebook can view if you are my friend.

The descending lesson put on by Chris and Marylin McDonald was excellent. I can now say that I am fearless when I descend. I no longer use my brakes when riding down hill. A couple of key pointers that I got in my own words are as below, one is very visual so maybe I take a picture and include it so you can see it.

1. The tires want to stick to the road. This is the visual one.




2. You don't turn when descending you move your weight and body.




3. You should put your outside foot at the bottom of the pedal stroke and put weight into, this helps to keep you from skidding away. It really works.




4. Let your inside knee kick out when moving thru a curve just like the high speed motor bike guys do.




5. Lastly if you have down both of those things and you are still feel like your slipping turn your head into the curve




6. Also I already knew this one, but it really helps with speed wobble, use you knees to squeeze the top bar.

Read this link for the full article by Marylin McDonald

I was a little nervous about the ride on Saturday considering the hills were longer and the ride itself was longer. My roommate and I were both in the same boat. He had only done 1 Ironman as well and we were both worried everyone would drop us on Saturday's ride.

Friday concluded with a 5 mile transition run. I opted out of this because I really wanted to have a solid Saturday ride and not hinder that by running. We finished the night out with dinner at a great place. Everything but lunch on Friday was included in the cost of the camp. We had all our training nutrition covered, plus dinner both nights. Since we rode all day on Saturday we didn't really have lunch.

Day Two

On day two we would have 3 ride groups, a friendly group, peppy group, and a MAS peppy group. Since I had never ridden hills like this I decided to opt with the friendly group. We rode out at 7:15AM. Gordo took us to the start of the loop and we were off. I took the first loop very easy. I took some pictures and just got into a rhythm. Having never even drove the course I didn't know what was where. My first impressions were that it wasn't too bad. I rode the first loop so slow. It took me 3:09 minutes for the first loop. I missed the second aid station on the course and had to ride the second half of the course without water. Luckily it was mostly down hill and rolling hills. I got refueled shortly after the start of the second loop. We took some pictures here with a small group I was riding in. I was going really slow and I knew it too. The point of this ride was purely to scope out the course. However, I felt really strong on the second loop, so I decided I would push it up a notch and really start to ride. I had come to the conclusion on Friday that when riding these hills there would be no way for me to stay aerobic. So my plan would be to just keep my heart rate as low as possible and stay as fluid and relaxed while climbing. With that being said I will describe the loops the best I can.

Once the loop starts at Hwy 18 and Snow Canyon Rd, it is a steep 8% down hill, you can really move on this. No need to break the road is smooth no curves. Get some free speed here if you can. I got up to around 35mph on this road. Then its a few short rollers before you get thru town. Nothing hard. After you get thru town you start on HWY 91. This where the course goes out into the sticks. 2 lane roads, chip seal, but smooth chip seal if you are used to riding in Texas. It didn't bother me at all. However many of the other folks (most people except like 3 were from Southern and Northern California, the others were from Boulder, CO) complained about the chip seal. As you venture further into the loop, there is a great deal of false flats. These are deceiving. You don't feel like you're climbing, but you really are. They keep coming at you too. Basically when you look at the course map on the website or seen below. The real climbing doesn't start until you get to about mid way up the the left hand side of the loop is where the big climbs are. There are really only 2 big climbs on the course. But don't let that fool you. The course is still really hard from the rollers and the false flats. The hardest part of the course takes about little under an hour to ride. I clocked this on my second loop when I was riding significantly faster. Remember I rode the first loop in 3:09 and the second in 2:26. Huge negative split. I anticipate a bike split well over 6 hours for this course. Gordo's comments were that only the really good pro's would break 5 hours on the bike. Chris McDonald also said that this is one of the hardest courses he has ever done, including France, New Zealand, Louisville, Wisconsin, and Placid. Chris McDonald said he would be around 4:50++ on the bike course here in St. George. Its tough. The hardest climb was a total of 8 minutes long. I rode a 34 - 27 gearing on this hill and my HR still jumped up to 160 on the bike. A big topic of the weekend was discussing power / HR / Pace / and RPE. I plan on buying a power meter for this course and using it to train. I don't think I will be running my aero wheels either on this course. No reason to.

Day Three

Day three was run focused. All I have to say is that it is the hilliest run course I have ever done. I have ran the Austin marathon and that is a joke compared to this course. It seems like you are running up hill the entire time. Both ways, out and back. There are down hills, but in reality they killed me as much as the up hills.

My plan for this course is simple, this is what I got from my weekend, and working with the other coaches. Since I am doing Lake Placid approx 11 weeks after my schedule will be simple. This is a race of endurance, strength, and durability as Gordo says.

After my Ultra 50k race on 12/5/09 I will spend the rest of December doing weight training, hiking with a weighted back pack, and riding big every weekend with hill repeats at the end of each ride, plus Yoga and Swimming. Then January will then be the same thing but I will start to do my runs strictly on hills. I will continue to do big rides as often as possible, and maintain strength training at least 2 - 3 times per week. I am also going to alter my strength training plan to really try to build muscle in these first 2.5 months. I want a good strength to weight ratio for this course, I also want to be durable and injury free. I will be doing as much riding as possible for this course. Swimming will be a once a week or twice a week. Maybe I will pick a few weeks to back off on the biking and do a swim focus week. Not really sure yet, but all I can say is I have a challenge ahead of me training for this course in Dallas. We have no HILLS.... Hope you enjoyed this report.

I'll try this link see if it works for photos of Utah : http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2392572&id=9414770&l=5b443a0bfd

Video BLOG!!!!!

So not sure how this will work when you get an email but it may not embed correctly, so please click on this website to view the video blog.

http://becomingaironman.blogspot.com/

Enjoy!!!

Chicago Marathon

This race would be my 4th marathon (if you count the Ironman) and 3rd official marathon. I decided to this race after my 2nd marathon in Austin this past February. I figured that a month after my Ironman I wouldn't have to train for the race and would be able to just run it and have fun. I also have a close friend from high school who just so happened to live like 6 blocks from the starting line. So after my Ironman I struggled with recovery. I really wanted to workout, but every time I would try to do a workout I just felt flat or when I would go for a bike ride it would take me like 45 - 60 minutes to start feeling good. I took this as a sign I wasn't recovered and backed off. I finished my Ironman on 9/13/09 and the Chicago Marathon was on 10/11/09. During that period of time my workouts consisted of these:



4 - runs for a totaling of 21 miles
1 - 750M open water swim
2 - bike rides totaling 40 miles


Well I have to say that I was kind of excited to go and do the marathon. I left for Chicago on Friday on what was supposed to be a 4:30pm flight. Needless to say we didn't leave until about 5:15. I got to chicago at a terrible time for traffic. 7:45pm on a Friday. I sat in the cab for almost an hour. Cabbies are horrible drivers too. They just slam the gas press the break. I much prefer the train. If I would have known it would take me an hour in a cab I would have taken the train since it only takes about 45 minutes guaranteed. Plus I took the train back to the airport and actually enjoyed it more than the cab. Plus its only 3 dollars plus a 7 dollar cab ride to the station, as opposed to 40 bucks in a cab the whole way.


Friday night was good. I spent time with my close friend Matt. We shared many memories and caught up on life. Needless to say we drank about 2 bottles of wine, plus all the beers we had at the pub. I think we went to bed around 3-4am. I was drunk.


Saturday I awoke at about 10:30am. So not much sleep. I can't really sleep in anymore like I used to. I started the hydration process. I left for the expo while my friend Matt who I was staying with stayed and watched college football. While at the expo I got a free stride analysis and video taping session from Brooks. I had never seen my own foot strike pattern on tape. I have a pretty neutral gait. They also were selling huge tubs of gatorade endurance formula for only 20 bucks. They tubs are big, they weigh 3lbs. That is a lot of gatorade. So after that I left the expo and went back. I hated having to take cabs everywhere, when I was only going like 2 or 3 miles. If that. If I lived in that city or new york I would so ride a bike everywhere. That is a no brainier. The expo was really close and cost me like 20 bucks round trip including tip. WTF... I could have walked the 3 or so miles but I figured I'd be better off staying off my feet.


So fast forward. I ate dinner pizza and a salad and was asleep by 9:30am. I woke up at 5:30am. Race start was 7:30. Normal routine, shower, eat oatmeal, drink Gatorade, get dressed. Here come the complaints. Well Chicago decided to have unseasonably cold weather this weekend. WTF.... The past 2 years have been hot for Chicagoans, in the 70 - 80's... I'll take that over the 30's anyday. Now in the 90-100's that is a different story and probably will opt for the cold. Well I awake race morning and it is 26 with a wind chill. I didn't have pants or tights. Rookie mistake. I bet on it being in the high 30's to start and high 40's to finish. It was the opposite. I was freezing the entire time. I left the apt and walked to the start. It was only like a 4 - 6 block walk. Super close. I timed it perfect. I think I waited in my start corral for like 10 minutes. The race gun was off. My race plan was simple, stick close to the 3:40 pace group, chat to as many people as possible since I didn't bring my headphones and kick it up a notch at mile 20 if I felt good. Well needless to say I didn't find too many chatters. I talked with one guy for like 5 miles. Really nice guy. At like mile 7 I started to get really dizzy, but not the kind of dizzy from dehydration but more the dizzy you would get from standing up too fast or if you have ever felt dizziness from vertigo? I started to suspect that it was because I felt really cramped and was really close to so many people. I saw tons of people fall and get trampled by the runners behind them. Even when you start in a specific corral it didn't make much difference. Especially when the streets get narrow. Some turns we I was almost forced to a walk. I quickly pushed my way to the sidewalk and immediately felt better when I wasn't surrounded by people. I drank a bit too much water before the race and had to pee about 3 times during the race.

Basically the miles clicked by. I got to about mile 17 or 18 and was feeling a bit bored. At this point is when it finally thinned out and there were not that many people around me any more. The cold weather really had a huge impact on me. I felt pretty miserable for the last 8 miles or so. I kept shaking and shivering. I was cold no doubt about it. At this point my clothes were wet too, this didn't help especially when the wind blew. I stuck to my normal nutrition plan and had 4 gels the entire race. Plus Gatorade and or water at just about every aid station. At mile 19 I started to get a second wind. The sun was out and I thought that I would pick up the pace and see what happens. Well I did well. The miles kept clicking off. My left hip was tight as always. The cold however didn't help with keeping it stretched out. I stopped a few times from miles 17 - 25 to stretch it. Since I didn't have any real goal on time I didn't really care. It wasn't till mile 20 that I started doing the math on if I could PR the race. Well this is why I picked up the pace. I had a lot more ups and downs in this race than normal. I think that is because I didn't train for it and didn't have it as a goal race.

Well here are my mile splits:

Total Time -- 3:40:56

Average pace per mile -- 8:25/mile total average HR 156

Mile -- AVG HR -- Pace

1 -- 150 -- 8:12
2 -- 151 -- 8:26
3 -- 151 -- 8:13
4 -- 149 -- 9:00 --- bathroom break
5 -- 155 -- 7:51
6 -- 152 -- 8:05
7 -- 149 -- 8:22
8 -- 150 -- 8:36
9 -- 152 -- 8:17
10 -- 150 -- 8:13
11 -- 152 -- 8:15
12 -- 155 -- 8:30
13 -- 157 -- 8:29
14 -- 156 -- 8:19
15 -- 156 -- 8:18
16 -- 157 -- 8:47
17 -- 155 -- 9:00 -- this is when I was feeling really cold, bored, and stretched my hip
18 -- 155 -- 8:54
19 -- 154 -- 8:46 -- then I realized I could possibly PR if I would just suck it up and fight the cold
20 -- 161 -- 8:24
21 -- 163 -- 8:12
22 -- 164 -- 8:09
23 -- 160 -- 8:30 -- walked thru an aid station
24 -- 161 -- 8:21
25 -- 157 -- 9:00 -- this is funny, I was not motivated and just wanted to quit, not from being tired or cramping but because I didn't care.
26 -- 168 -- 7:44 -- this is what I call a kick. I should have done that at mile 25, I had too much energy
.2 -- 174 -- 1:38

So all in all this was great finish to my racing season of 2009

I did 2 half Ironmans, 1 sprint tri, 1 Ironman, 2 marathons.

What is next for me????

Well next is my Ironman St. George Utah training camp shown here. This is 11/12 -- 11/15
http://www.endurancecorner.com/services/st_george_ironman_camp

maybe the Austin marathon on 2/14/09 ?????? I don't have a real reason to do it.

Then after that is Ironman 70.3 New Orleans on 4/18/10

Then Ironman St. George, Utah on 5/1/10

Then Buffalo springs Ironman 70.3 on 6/27/10

Then Ironman Lake Placid on 7/25/10

Probably Longhorn Ironman 70.3 sometime in October of 2010 or just take the rest of the year off and run some winter marathons. Maybe I'll do the Texas Quadruple that year of San Antonio Marathon in November, then Dallas White Rock Marathon in December of 2010, then Houston Marathon in January, then Austin marathon in February.

I plan on signing up for Ironman Louisville this year. My team has a few folks heading there so I will go and be a helper and also ride and swim the course. There is also possiblity for Ironman Cour D'Alene in Idaho too. We'll see how the 2 Ironmans in one year go this summer.

Until, then the blog will be pretty slim unless I just feel like writing. However in case you don't know I won't be going home to Cincinnati this year for Christmas. I will be going to Australia to visit a friend from high school, Reynold. Its a once in a lifetime opportunity. He has been living there for like 2 years and he lives on the beach.... So I am sure my 19hrs on the plane ride back will allow for some writing. Until then...

Cheers.

My Ironman Movie

So ever since I started training for the Ironman I thought that upon completing the race I would make a movie about my experience and how endurance sports have really changed me. I put together a movie and it is now on the internet. It can be found here on my coaching page from my team. Oh yeah by the way I am now a coach with Texas Triple Threat and look forward to helping tons of people out in the future. I only hope I can also help people achieve the goals and dreams the same way my coaches have.

So the link that contains the video is on my coaching page, simply scroll down and click on the "Becoming an Ironman" link. I would grab a drink and some popcorn cause it is about 30 minutes long. But enjoy it. This is my way of telling everyone out there anything is possible...

http://www.texastriplethreat.com/coachingservices/coachbrettbio.php

The big show!!!!!

So as I said in my last post the next time I would write in my BLOG would be for my race report. Well here it comes.

On Friday I went to packet pick up and also got my bike from the Tri Bike Transport. I met a super nice lady named Leslie from Dallas when I commented on her tri top and the Enduroshark Salt Pill logo. These are the salt pills I have been taking and love them. They have tons of salt in them, 255mg to be exact. She ended up giving me a ride to the places I needed to go when I told her I had been sick the previous days. So kind of her. I am sure I will run across her again sometime since she lives in Dallas. Friday was a bit more hectic than I needed with all of my family arriving and spent a little more time on my feet than I should have. I also went to the Athlete dinner and meeting on Friday night. Food wasn't bad and it was a cool part of the experience. One guy lost 212 lbs while training for the Ironman. This is why triathlons are cool.

So on Saturday all I had to do was drop off my T1, T2 bags, and my bike. This was all that I wanted to do too. I was successful at this as well. The entire afternoon I spent with my feet up relaxing and napping. We finished dinner by 6:45 which was perfect since that would give me 12 hours till race start. However this wouldn't really matter cause some how I knew I would be in the porta-john at some point on Sunday.

The race day had arrived. I had a wake up call for 3:45am. I showered, ate my oatmeal and banana and packed up the last of my things. I picked up my 2 bottles of red bull mixed with water that would be in my special needs bag on the bike. The hotel was supposed to freeze them, but they only put them in the fridge o-well.

We parked and got to the race start early. I bumped into Casey Z. and Sam M. as well as Richard B. This was nice to see them. Something that was really weird about this race that is different than all other ones I have ever done was how I felt on race morning. Normally on race morning I am nervous and worried about what is going to happen. However for some reason this race I was missing this feeling. I was not at all nervous about the race. I was so confident that I would finish the race. There was never any doubt in my mind about finishing the race. In the days leading up to the race I was more nervous about getting to the start. Usually before a race I kind of dislike the swim and don’t look forward to it. However this feeling was gone. I feel that much of my missing feelings were due to the large amount of mental preparation I did for this race. I had spent the last 9 months mentally imagining what the race would be like, how I would feel and what would go thru my mind on race morning. I was very confident in my training and knew it would take me to the finish line. I approached the event as 3 separate events, an early morning 2.4 mile swim, a late morning summer bike ride of 112 miles, and an afternoon jog of 26.2 miles.

I walked to the swim start and got in line. I got in the water at about 6:45, I was tired of waiting around on dry land and wanted to get this thing started. I wish it would have started at 6:30 as opposed to 7am. I floated in the water till the cannon went off at 6:50 for the pro athletes. That was cool. They took off. The next 10 minutes went by very fast. The swim start was actually a bit anticlimactic for having some 2,406 athletes all start at the same time. I started right at the front of the pack. I didn’t care about hitting people or what not. I knew I would swim 1:45 – 1:50 per 100M so I knew I would be near the front. One thing that was very interesting about this swim was that how little energy and effort I exerted to maintain that pace. In training I was supposed to do a few 5km swims but never did. My longest swim was only 3200M. The Ironman swim is 3860M give or take. I didn’t even have to work hard to keep my pace at all on the swim. I think this had something to do with the amount of other people in the water all swimming the same pace. I didn’t mind bumping into people too much. Pretty typical for any race, in the that at the first turn we all pretty much stopped swimming and were doing a doggie paddle. One thing I did notice was that other people’s swim stroke really has a great deal of force when they go thru the water. I found that I swim just as fast as everyone else but when my hand enters the water and pulls thru I do it very gently, others not so much. When a few people would stroke it felt like they were punching the water, I don’t get it. Swimming is all about technique and the force of your hand into the water and thru the water isn’t as important as its positioning. So for instance when I would stroke and hit someone else’s back or leg it would simply be a gentle tap as opposed to a forceful blow. So the swim ended as quickly as it began. I was out of the water and felt great. I had the wet suit strippers pull my suit and I began the run up the helix.

Swim Time: 2.4 miles – 1:07:02 – 1:46/100M

40th place in my Age Group, 216th overall

On to T1, this was weird, I had never done a transition where everything I need was in a bag. My brother in-law was working T1 as a volunteer and he helped me do everything. However I didn’t really know what to do first when I dumped everything out of my bag. I stopped for a second and gained my thoughts and did this:

Dry off,
Put on socks
Put on chip
Put on shoes
Eat twix bar
Eat potato chips
Drink 5 hr energy
Put on HR monitor
Put on helmet
Put on sunglasses
Put on race belt

I did all of these things and took way longer than I needed to. I also kind of walked part of the way from swim finish to T1. I was just stopping and looking around and experiencing the atmosphere. I am disappointed with my times in this respect but really glad I did it. I enjoyed the moment. All I could keep thinking was that it was really happening, I was on my way to becoming an ironman. It was so surreal. The next one, I won’t be wasting time. Next time in and out, and also practice my transition with everything in a bag. Luckily Jeff my brother in-law was there to help. I really appreciated everything he did for me this weekend.

I ran outside and once again stifled by the transition set up. I literally had to run from one end of transition all the way to the other end. So I mapped it on Google earth and it was about a .15mile run from the door of T1 to my bike.

T1—14:24 – next time 5 minutes or less…

So I was off on the bike. As soon as I started pedaling on the bike I had my left calf/hamstring get a bit tight on me. This was the same pain I had about 3 or 4 weeks before the race. It went away and I was fine the weekend before the race but for whatever reason it came back. It wasn’t a show stopper but also something I didn’t want to get worse as the day went on. For this reason I was a bit more conservative than I would have been if I hadn’t had this tightness. It was more important to finish than finish fast. I had spent 9 months training and wasn’t going to waste this opportunity.

The bike was easy as I remember it. No real hills at all. Simply rollers, up and downs. There were 2 actual climbs and they are short. My hill repeats made these seem super easy, even at mile 90 or so on the second pass. I smiled all the way up the hills and got out of the saddle and just danced on the pedals all the way to the top. My nutrition plan was this for the race. I was taking EnduroShark Salt pills http://enduroshark.com/ These are great. They have almost 255mg of NaCl in them, plus tons of other sodium. I was taking about 1 – 2 of these per hour and a few extra in the last hour. I started out with powerbars every 20 minutes. I ate 3 powerbars over the first 3 hours or so, plus tons of Gatorade. This would put my calories around 300 – 400 per hour. I pissed twice on the bike while riding and once in the porta john. I picked up my special needs bag at mile 57 or so and grabbed a quick drink of coke, handful of chips, 2 waterbottles with red bull mixed with water and my 5hr energy. I also ditched my socks at this point to. I don’t know why but I didn’t want to wear them right then, even though I wore them 60 – 70% of the time on my long rides in training. I finished the second loop and started back for T2. There was a stretch of straight road that had a headwind on the way back for about 3 miles and this was around mile 105 – 108 or so, this was the worst part of the race. I wanted to drink and eat a bunch more but knew I couldn’t because I would be running in like 20 minutes and didn’t want a full belly. Then I lost my last water bottle with like 3 miles to go and was really thirsty and didn’t have any water. This was all happening but as soon as I realized it I was in T2 and done with the bike. Now on to the mentality of lets just go jog for a few hours and then you will be an Ironman.

Bike Split

112 miles – 6:12:46 – 18mph Average




Heart Rate Average for bike course 138


T2, I ran in grabbed my bag and sat down with Jeff. I immediately put him to task of fixing my race belt. It came apart on the bike. He fixed it while cleaned up with wet ones. I put my gels in my pockets, visor, shoes; race belt fixed by Jeff and was ready to run. I ran out and got tons of more sunscreen slathered on me. That is one thing I didn’t get was sunburned. I was coated the entire time I raced. I started off running very easy about 9:30 – 10 minute pace. I felt really smooth and strong. I knew the first order of business was finding a porta john to take a crap. I knew this was coming and figured I better get it out of the way early in the marathon so I could just run. This was accomplished. I continued chipping away at the miles, holding myself back a bunch. I felt a bit of tightness in my left calf, but all in all I was again being really conservative. I wanted to finish. I ended up in the porta john again at mile 5 or so. I expected this to happen, a normal day for me I am on the toilet a few times anyway.

T2 --- 10:57

The run was weird, since my goal was to finish under 13 hours at this point since I knew the 12 hours was out of the question. In hindsight I went way to slow and felt way to good at the finish. However, I did get to enjoy the entire run. When you see pictures of me on the run you can tell how good of a mood I was in. I mean honestly, I was so happy that the day had finally come and in a few short hours of jogging, I was going to be an Ironman. I absorbed all that was Ironman Wisconsin on that run. At about mile 20 Jeff started running with me. We kept a decent pace. I was bit tired at mile 20 but still kept my cool. I walked thru aid stations and up the 2 steep hills, but other than that I was pretty much doing a slow jog the entire time. As I write this I am a bit ashamed of my run time seeing as I held so much back, I could have done tons better. I can make up for it in my next one. I want my next Ironman marathon portion to be just under 4 hours or as close to 4 hours as possible. I think this is completely within my reach too. My only concern about my next 2 Ironman run portions is the hills. This could prove challenging. My nutrition on the run was gatorade, water, salt pills, coke, pretzels, chips, and bananas. I ate one gel on the run and didn't want to eat another one. To be honest, I was just flat out hungry, all I really wanted to do was just stop and eat a restaurant. I wasn't bonked, I still had plenty of energy and felt pretty damn good the entire time on the run. The bananas were the best. Once I ate a few of these I felt much better. One thing I hated about the run was the fact that they had orange gatorade on the run. They also had orange gatorade on the bike. That is a rookie mistake for such a high profile race. Orange gatorade was the last thing I wanted to drink was orange gatorade. I had probably drank like 2 or 3 liters of this on the bike. It didn't taste good to me at that point.





Run Split





26.2 miles -- 4:43:20 -- 10:49 / mile




Heart Rate Average -- 142 -- (I should of went a bit harder, I can run up to 170bpm and still be aerobic)





Total Time: 12:28:27





Swim Time: 2.4 miles – 1:07:02 – 1:46/100M


T1—14:24


112 miles – 6:12:46 – 18mph Average


T2 --- 10:57


26.2 miles -- 4:43:20 -- 10:49 / mile





After the race, I felt pretty damn good. I was so happy with myself. As you can see from my pictures I was really happy after I crossed the finish line. It was pretty emotional for me, I can safely say their were tears of joy as I crossed that finish line. I had imagined that moment of coming up the last hill on state street turning the final corner and seeing the finish line so many times over the past year. I had played that moment thru my head more times than I can count. After the race I went straight to the food tent. I was hungry. I had a coke, 3 slices of pizza, and some cookies. I was extremely hungry on the last part of the run. I met back up with the family took a picture or 2 and then had my Dad go get my stuff from transition. Then they informed me they moved the car we had parked that morning a few blocks away. This was horrible news to me. That morning we parked 1 block from the finish line. Perfect spot. Now we had to walk like 4 blocks to the car. This sucked, but moving the car did allow my brother in-law to see me on the bike, so I was okay with that. By the way, Thank you so much Jeff for everything. Taking me to the hospital and helping me out when I was sick. Being there in Transistion both times for me and running with me the last few miles. This was a huge help for me. Thanks a bunch.





All in all, this was a terrific experience. I can't wait to do another one. I really enjoyed training for it and racing it. I probably will still use my blog to post updates about different things from time to time. I will definitely use it for all my race reports too.




HERE IS MY VIDEO LINK --- VIDEO LINK, (The link isn't working yet because Youtube won't let me put up a video longer than 10 minutes) My ever so gracious brother in law Jeff will be hosting the video for me on his website. I will update the link when it it is up. There are way more pictures in the video, so I suggest you watch it.

The time has come and look what happened

Well, I decided I would give a quick update to everyone as I sit here in Wisconsin. I made thru almost 9 months of training without any serious injuries or set backs. My last 2 months of Training were very positive and strong months of training. Wouldn't ya know, the Tuesday before the race I have come down with some type of viral infection. Since Tuesday 9/8/09, I have been running a fever, sore throat, achy, and all the other great feelings of a viral infection. So I flew up to Madison yesterday evening and I was still running a fever of 102. I would sleep in about 1 - 2 hour increments, waking up every so often either in a cold sweat or because my throat would hurt so much from swallowing. I decided I should go to the ER today. I wanted to go to the ER because I knew they would give me an IV ( I got 2L worth of IV fluid), as well as a dose of steroids to take the swelling of my tonsils down. An urgent care type place wouldn't do this. Both of these things made me feel much much better. They ran tests for MONO and Strep, both came back negative. However they are running a 48 hour test for strep. In the mean time they decided to give me some penicillin just in case the 48 hour test came back positive. This way I would have 48 hours of antibiotics in my system. I am feeling better already this afternoon. I also got some pain medicine which will help me sleep better and help with the aches. I feel confident that I will be able to race. I may not be 100% on Sunday, but I am gonna get thru it one way or another.

What is interesting is that I haven't had a cold or anything in over 2 years. The last time I was sick was in late July of 2007. I came down with strep throat, and all the same symptoms I have now. Would you believe that this was 2 days before my first Olympic distance triathlon? Funny huh??? I did the same thing then, I went to the ER, they gave me an IV, Steroids and antibiotics. I did my race 2 days later and finished. It wasn't by any means a stellar performance, but I still finished, and was eager for more. Something tells me that this weekend will be much the same.

What is also weird is that I know 2 other triathletes who said they had the same thing happen to them right before their Ironman races. I think it has something to do with the tapering and not working out as much in the past few weeks, I don't know.

I have this funny feeling that the next time I write in this blog, it will be my Ironman Race Report.

Until then.

Cheers

Mentally Challenged

So the big day is some 44 days away. This week I took another big step. I signed up for Ironman Lake Placid. This race is held in Lake Placid, New York. It will be my 3rd Ironman race. It is 2 months and 25 days after my 2nd Ironman. This is really going to require a huge base to be built up prior to my 2nd Ironman. So much of a base that I can quickly recover from Ironman Utah, and get right back to training. It's a good thing that Todd will be able to help me with this. The course is pretty challenging with some good climbs on the bike and run. Check out the website Ironman Lake Placid. After signing up for this race, I began to think back to my first few triathlons, and I realized that my first season of triathlons was very similar to my first season of Ironman races. Back in the spring of 2007, I signed up for some 5 triathlon races in one night before ever having raced in one. I just gotten a new bike and I wanted to make a commitment to training and jump head first into the triathlon world. Well here I am doing the same exact thing with the Ironman distance race. Signing up for 3 Ironman races before ever completing a single one. I think this speaks a great deal about who I am and can in few words explain how I tick. When I put my mind towards a goal, I go all out to see it thru. Well I am here to say that this is the plan. I have a few other goals in my future, but haven't really committed to any of the fully yet except the Ironman. Those are in no order:

1. Cross Country bike ride
2. 50 mile Ultramarathon
3. 100 mile Ultramarathon
4. Racing in every Ironman in the USA and Canada....... (I'm closer to this one than any, and probably will achieve this in the next few years)

So back to the point and title of this article.

I haven't been posting much lately, but seeing as my race is so close, I really wanted to reflect back on what I have learned from my training and share this with others. Making the decision to train for an Ironman is a big commitment. Not only a commitment of time, but money, and even a psychological commitment. I have gotten to a point in my physical training where, I just expect to go out and train everyday, day after day. There are many days where the easy thing to do would be just sleep in or just take a day off. There are days when you wake up sore and don't wanna run. You have to push yourself out the door and work hard. Racing an Ironman is something you can't fake. You have to put in the time and effort, otherwise you will fail. Before my training really began, I didn't know what to expect, week after week, day after day. I just would get my schedule from Todd, and work the plan. As Todd says, plan the work, work the plan. Now, I kind of know what to expect from him. The biggest challenges so far in training for this distance race have not really been logging the miles, but something else. The two biggest challenges are as listed below. So anyone thinking about an Ironman, start planning on how to figure out these mysteries.

1. Ironman Race Nutrition
2. The psychological aspect of training

The hardest thing so far, that I haven't figured out 100% is my nutrition on the bike. Each weekend is another experience, and to be honest, the only thing that I can control is what I put into my body and how far I ride or run. Everything else is just sit back and see what happens. I would say that I have about 65 - 75% plan for nutrition on the bike. But I have 45 days, to keep experimenting. I don't suspect that I will have figured out my nutrition strategy 100% even on race day. If it is like my Half Iron distance races, I will have to do a few before I perfect it. No harm about this and I'm really not that worried about it either. What ever happens, happens.

The other very difficult thing is purely psychological in 2 different aspects. The first aspect is how you have to push yourself to new limits almost every day. For your first Ironman what do you expect? You are going to be training more than you ever have in your life. So you just have to accept this and know that you got to put in the time to achieve your goal. It can be challenging of course, but don't you think the race will be challenging too? Whenever I get down about my training, feel frustrated, or feel like quitting during a long day, I just suck it up and think to myself, that I KNOW I will feel the same way in Wisconsin too. By continuing to overcome, those days when you feel like quitting, I am building a library of memories that I can draw upon during that fateful day in Madison. While racing in Madison, I am going to want to stop, walk and probably quit, but every time that happens, I'll just stop and think about the long days I spent all summer training and remind myself that the pain will pass just keep moving, and the faster you move the sooner you'll be done. This is very important for me, and I feel I have truly grown in my ability to push thru pain and go to new levels.

The second psychological aspect is POSITIVE VISUALIZATION. I never really realized it until I read some articles in this months Triathlete magazine, but I have been relying on this for so long. Ever since my first race. Many people ask me what I think about when I got out and ride for 5 hours or run for 2+ hours. Well to be completely honest the below items are really what goes thru my head in no particular order:

1. overall body feel / pain. etc.
2. reminding myself to eat and drink
3. singing lyrics to songs I'm listening
4. thinking about the lyrics to songs and what they mean
5. visualizing myself at all the points during the Ironman and how I am going to feel.
6. The feeling I am going to be feeling at the finish line of IM Wisconsin

Items number 5 and 6 are what I mean by positive visualization. I visualize my self racing Ironman Wisconsin. I put myself in Madison mentally every day. I am thinking about the 2 laps on the swim in the lake, while I am in the pool. I concentrating on relaxing and finding a groove in the lake. While on the bike or doing hill repeats, I am thinking about climbing those rolling hills in the farm lands of Madison. Thinking about what I am going to feel like after loop #1 heading into loop #2. Trying to relax and be positive. Thinking about relaxing riding out in the first 20 - 30 minutes of IM Wisconsin bike leg. Thinking about mile 18 on the run in Wisconsin and knowing that the only thing that is going to be running thru my head is how bad I feel, how much I just wanna stop sit down and quit and how I am going to overcome this feeling and keep moving forward for those last 8.2 miles. I think about this all the time. I think about all the lows that I am going to feel on the run and how I can over come them. All of these thoughts are truly a huge part of my training. I really feel that by thinking these thoughts, I am preparing myself psychologically for everything that may happen during the race. Without this mental preparation, I feel I would not be ready for the race. This positive visualization is something I highly recommend to all athletes, because it will really pay dividends. I have done it for every race, I have ever competed in and sometimes during the actual race, I sometimes get a deja vu feeling wash across me. This can be a bit eery, but that disappears, and it soon it is an advantage that I have over other competitors, and my own self.

So think about it, and see if you can apply that your life.