The Racine weekend kicked off with a great dinner with the
large group of friends, old and new, at a fantastic Italian Restaurant downtown
called Salute. They accommodated our
large group, had wonderful staff and food portions and quality fit for a
pre-race meal. It was a great dinner
filled with laughing children, stories of how we all knew each other, 6 degrees
of separation and an all-around great time.
It was an opportunity for the race support crew of spouses, children and
person to all get acquainted with each other in preparation for their day of
cheering and fun in the sun.
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| Pre Race meal with some great people |
On race morning I was up at 4:30 in order to meet Nick by my
car. Nick’s wife Angie and son AJ would sleep in and meet up with my
team, Meghann and Mara, later in the morning and ride together to the
race. Our bikes were already checked in at transition from Saturday so we
really only needed to find a parking spot and get comfortable before our 8:03
start time. There’d be three of us starting together, along with Nick and
I there was also Jason. I met Jason and Nick last summer through Team RWB,
Jason and his wife Daphne run the Wisconsin Chapter and over the last year
we’ve kept in touch on training, life, new bikes and everything else
triathlon. Jason, Daphne and Nick are all veterans and proudly represent
our country still, beyond their time they were actively serving in the
military. Nick and I had the chance to get in a run and some outdoor
swimming leading up to race time and what I’ve learned is that no matter how
early I plan to be where ever we are meeting; he’s going to be earlier.
This was the same race morning as I exited the hotel room and Nick was already
at my car. The two others that were in for today’s race adventure were
Mike and Heather. The triathlon power couple; Mike had his first taste of
the half ironman distance last year and Heather was stepping up to the distance
for the first time. They were staying closer to Racine so we planned to
meet up before the race.
We found a parking spot just outside the park that was home
base for the race. I stepped out of my car and couldn’t believe my
eyes. The sun had just gotten fully above the Lake Michigan horizon and
was the pinkest orangish sun I’d ever seen. Neither Nick nor I had our
phones but it was beautiful. The whole
morning felt great weather wise. We
walked to transition and got settled. My
transition setup is pretty standard; towel folded a couple times and laid
under/next to my bike, running shoes and visor at the top of the towel and
cycling shoes and race belt below. My
nutrition plan was to have a GU after the swim and three on the bike. I set one GU on the towel and taped the other
three to my top tube of my bike. I also
put my pill bottle of salt tabs in one of my cycling shoes so I could put that
in my tri top pocket after the swim. The
remaining nutrition was my magic mix of strawberry perpetuem and powdered
chocolate milk. The warm strawberry mix
was beginning to make me gag so I tried adding a couple scoops of NesQuik
chocolate powder, it helped make the mix more palatable and my stomach was all
good with it so it’s been my mix for a while now. Last details were putting my aero water
bottle on my bars and setting my helmet and glasses on the handles as
well. I put my sweatpants and shirt in
my bag along with my flip flops and grabbed my wetsuit, goggles and swim
cap. I lubed up my neck with body glide
and figured there was no reason to come back to transition before the
race. It was a little after 6 and there
was no hurry as the only thing left on my list was hit the bathroom and walk a
mile down the beach to the start.
As I walked to the porta potty line I saw Heather and I
jumped in behind her. There was one person
in between us, a younger man who was wearing his Team L.I.F.E. gear. Team L.I.F.E. is a group of athletes that are
committed to raising awareness, fundraising, and racing to help children and families affected by cancer. The athlete is from Two Rivers and knew Eric
personally. Eric was diagnosed with
Leukemia and his brother Mike decided to sign up for Ironman Wisconsin and raise
funds. Their father came up with the
name “Leukemia Ironman Fundraiser for Eric (L.I.F.E). I encourage you to read up on Team L.I.F.E.,
the website has videos that Eric posted on YouTube to spread his story of his
fight and his many great words of encouragement. I’ve forgotten the athlete’s name but his
fundraising for Wisconsin Ironman opens up on the Team L.I.F.E. website this
week and I’ll post an update when I can get his information. A great team, a great cause and a great
conversation. I even had the opportunity
to shake his hand and congratulate him after we had both finished.
Heather was in line with a friend of hers whom I’d heard
about, Heidi. Heidi is new to triathlon
and was given the opportunity to dive in in a big way. A little over a month ago she won an entry in
to Wisconsin Ironman. At the time she
was signed up to compete in her first Olympic distance triathlon. The Racine Half was her next big step to
Ironman. She was all smiles and
excitement pre-race and when I saw her after she finished, she was even
happier.
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| Mike and Heather celebrating their finish |
After the bathroom line conversations had ended and I was
all ready to go to the swim start I waited for Nick outside of transition. While waiting I noticed a motherly older
woman who was flipping through the pictures she had taken already that
morning. I asked if she was able to get
a shot of the sun rise, she continued to flip through her pictures and showed
me the one she had taken. It must have
been just long enough after the sun rise Nick and I saw because her picture was
a very yellow sun and not the pink-orange sun from minutes before. I described the sunrise we saw and asked her
why she was attending the race. She
talked about her son and how proud she was of him and how this was his first
half Ironman. She was excited to talk
about him and how they love going to his races.
It reminded me of my mom and all the encouragement she gives me. We said our good-bye’s and good-lucks as Nick
approached and we began our walk down the beach.
One of the many things I’ve appreciated about endurance
sports is the modesty of so many of the competitors. Nick and I were walking down the shore line
and we began a conversation with a woman walking by herself. I think the three of us were all in amazement
at how calm the water was for being Lake Michigan. The woman described last year’s 4 foot
breakers that she had to contend with.
She went on to talk about how she was trying to qualify for the Ironman
70.3 Championships. She had qualified
last year at Steelhead and wanted to repeat the effort. She discussed how she’d need to finish either
1 or 2 in her age group. She was calm
and offered some advice on the course as she’d done this race numerous
times. I’m always impressed by these top
age-group athletes who are so happy to casually talk and discuss this sport and
their experiences. I was hoping to run
in to her after my finish but did not.
In my mind I pictured her taking first and booking her ticket to Canada
for more favorable race conditions for the 70.3 Championships as last year as she
said Vegas was a difficult race due to over 100 degree heat.
About the time Nick and I arrived near the swim practice
area the pros were getting ready to start.
We walked off the beach to put our wetsuits on while sitting on the
sidewalk. On the path to the sidewalk we
passed a fellow Team RWB’er. Nick
introduced himself and we continued walking.
As we were putting our wetsuits on another Team RWB’er and his son
showed up. They were in town from Ohio
and we chatted with them for a bit while we packed ourselves in to our
wetsuits. The PA announcer for the race
stated the pros were going to be starting and to stand for the National
Anthem. We stood and faced the
water. Nick stood tall and confident as
he saluted towards the swim start. I
noticed a number of people facing us, which I found odd, so I turned and
noticed a huge flag pole behind us up on a hill. I pointed at the flag that hung almost still
to Nick as he completed his salute, pivoted and began again. Normally National Anthems prior to my races
are a moment of silence in my head, I listen to the anthem and feel the energy
around me as fellow athletes are in their mental preparation for what’s ahead. I really hadn’t thought much about the race
itself up to that point. I’ve done my
training, had my nutrition and race plan so at this point there really wasn’t
much to think about. I stood in
appreciation of the friends and loved ones who were competing and there in
support and simply admired the flag and the beautiful morning.
Once the Anthem had ended we walked down by the water and stood
with our feet in. At dinner the night
before I was talking with Angie, Nick’s wife, about his estimated swim
exit. She said that Nick thought
somewhere between 40 minutes to an hour.
I gave Angie a funny look as I told her it would be more like 35
minutes. I’d swam with Nick on a number
of occasions and knew that he’d have a good swim. Nick had never swam in a wetsuit and the
times we swam I’d be wearing mine and he’d use his pull buoy. Nick never had a problem keeping up with me
under this arrangement so I knew if he’d be calm in his wetsuit he’d be
swimming right with me or even faster.
As Nick and I stood on the shore I brought up his swim estimate and how
I thought he wasn’t giving himself enough credit. He thought it was a conservative number and
explained his rationale behind it and why he shared that with Angie. That led to a conversation about his time in
the military when he was stationed overseas.
He talked about coming home midway during his tour and how he was
thinking about a friend of his who was moving out of his convoy and in in to a
group that was likely to see more direct engagement. After the visit home Nick returned and found
out that it was actually him who’d be leaving the convoy. It was an emotional moment for me to hear his
account of these events and the conversations that followed between him and Angie. I had stopped thinking about the race some
time ago when Nick started his story.
There are many things I appreciate and I feel I do a pretty good job of
putting myself in other people’s shoes, but that story really put things in
perspective as the race was nearing and it really didn’t matter much like I
thought it would. I thought having a
coach and spending all this time training would give this race some special
meaning that I hadn’t seen before. Truth
is, it didn’t, it simply clarified to me that for me these races are about the
people not my finishing place or time.
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| Nick and I post race smiles |
Shortly after Nick’s story we met up with Mike and
Heather. Heather was in the earliest
start wave of all of us, followed by Mike, than Jason Nick and I were the last
of our group. Mike Nick and I walked in
to the water together to warm up. The
day before the water temperature had gotten to 62 degrees. Mike and Heather had swam on Saturday and
described the water as being a pretty good temperature for racing. By the time I walked out and was waist high,
I was freezing. My wetsuit has small
holes in the crotch that I’ve glued with wetsuit glue, but it’s usually the
first place water enters. I thought I
was going to go in to shock. I stood
there as Nick jumped in face first and started to swim out and back. I was amazed at how clear the water was but
quickly dismissed it because of the chills.
I finally dove in face first and started to swim. I immediately had goose bumps followed by a
stinging in my hands as they felt frozen.
My face, head and hands were the coldest. At this time I did have a little concern over
the water temperature. I’d never been in
that cold of water and had no idea how I’d warm up during the race. I kept swimming and when the three of us
would meet and stand around I kept my arms in the water while flapping them
back and forth. I was anxious to get out
of the water and warm up but we all stayed in and kept moving. We said our good lucks to Mike as he hopped
out of the water to get to the start line on time. We stayed a few more minutes but all I wanted
to do was head to shore to warm up.
We began making our way to the start line as we had about 15
minutes. We still hadn’t found Jason and
even as we were corralled with our starting group we couldn’t pick him
out. With 4 minutes left before our
start we got shuffled down in to the water at the start line. Jason walked by with a few minutes to spare
as we got to wish him good luck for the race finally; he positioned himself on
the far left of the start line. With
about a minute to go I put my goggles on, shook Nick’s hand and waited for the horn.
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| Kids having a fun day together |
The horn blew and the group started a mild jog through the
water until we got deep enough to swim.
Either my warm up worked or I forgot about the water temperature because
it was a non-issue. The swim was
basically a three sided rectangle. The
straight out from the beach was fairly tight with our wave having about 40
people in it. It was a pack until the
first right hand turn. It was really
pretty gentle and no issues. After the
turn was a straight away of about a mile.
I worked on finding my rhythm and followed the advice of my coach to
keep finding bubbles to swim in (draft).
I managed to find one partner for a good stretch. I was comfortable at the pace and I didn’t
seem to close in too much and he wasn’t pulling away. I stayed on his feet for a while until we
caught some slower swimmers and he went one way and I another. After him I never found another swim partner
but kept moving along. A brief stretch I
decided to pull a little harder while focusing on really reaching out
front. It’s so hard to tell if any of
those changes really do anything because everything is relative; you can’t see
yourself moving or time yourself and even judge things when passing other
swimmers or buoys, so I just kept going.
I felt good, not too hard and not too easy. At some point I saw Nick pass me on my
left. I could see his RWB tri top
sticking up out of his sleeveless wetsuit.
It was a pleasant surprise that the water quality was as clear as it was. Visibility was the best I’ve ever swam
in. I could see swimmers all around me
and even had some depth in the water as I had my head down. The one thing I wasn’t seeing very well were
the buoys. I don’t remember how many
there were but they seemed just spaced out enough that it took that little
extra effort and energy to find the next one.
Around half way through the swim I started seeing more red swim
caps. Each swim wave had a designated
swim cap color. Mine was orange and the
group in front was red. That group had a
4 minute head start so I was happy to begin seeing more of them. I did get a glimpse of a couple blue caps I
think that were the group behind me. I
wasn’t worried, I wasn’t freezing my ass or hands off and the water was quite
comfortable with pockets of warmer water sprinkled in too. I hit the final red buoy to turn right to
shore, as I sighted after rounding the corner the swim exit was still far
enough away that I couldn’t quite pick it out.
This is a time that always feels like the longest stretch. I was told that this last straight away was
shorter than the start but it felt significantly longer. Maybe it was shorter but it felt like forever
to get to the beach. There were many
more bodies on that final stretch and I began to pass people walking. I kept swimming and had been kicking for some
time to try and warm my legs up for the bike.
Once I stood up I did my normal beach side routine of undoing the Velcro
on the back of my wetsuit, unzipping and peeling the suit down around my
waist. Lastly, I took off my swim cap
and goggles and began to make the long jog up the beach. Shortly after crossing through the blown up
Ironman swim exit I saw Meghann smiling while holding her phone up taking some
pictures. I was happy to see her and
smiled back. I continued the jog up the
beach knowing that eventually there’d be wetsuit strippers. I ran through a kiddie pool that was there to
get sand off our feet. Finally, right
before the transition was the strippers.
My only complaint is that they didn’t have artificial carpet or
something laid down on the sidewalk to sit on.
We all had to hop on the wet sandy sidewalk as our wetsuits were pulled
off. I continued to jog and made my way
to the bike. I tossed my wetsuit over
the bike rack bar, wiped some sand from my feet and tossed on my cycling
shoes. I did my GU, put on my race belt
and put my salt tabs in my tri top pocket.
I got a handful of chamois butter and liberally applied it to my nether
regions then lastly it was the helmet and sun glasses and off I went. I had to make my way to the other side of
transition to the bike exit. While
exiting I saw Meghann again and moved on to the bike mount line.
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| Happy to see my person after a 1.2 mile swim |
The bike ride can be summed up like this: the first 3 and
last 3 miles suck, the 50 in between are pretty nice. Once on the main drag on the way through town
the road was awful. The road itself was
in good shape but every 20 yards was a huge crack between slabs. There were many water bottles, nutrition bottles
and various other things that were being launched off people’s bikes. There was nowhere to go on the road to avoid
it. I was trying to get up to speed so I
was down in the aero position only to have the bumps jostle my hands so much
that I’d hit my gear shifter and change gears.
The worst part was my seat got a little loose. I hit enough bumps while sitting forward on
the seat that the nose of my seat kept creeping down. I had to jump my ass to the back of the seat
and pull up on my feet to get the leverage to push the back of my seat down in
order to get the nose of the seat level again.
This continued for…53 miles. When
the road was smooth is was less of anissue, but when I’d be in aero and hit a
bump…the nose would drop down. It was
annoying but there wasn’t much I could do.
As I was going through this bumpy hell I caught Nick and we had a back
and forth as we were settling in, then eventually I stayed in front of him and
didn’t see him again until the run. The
bike was pretty uneventful; I thought the roads were pretty good to great. There were more times I felt like it was easy
to stay up to speed then the times I felt I had to down shift. I got passed every once in a while by a biker
but for the most part it was a younger male with a “24” on their calf, meaning
they were 24 years old. Somewhere in the
first 10 miles I caught Mike and wished him well. Not too far out of town I caught Heather and
gave her some cheer. I felt really good
about my bike and was confident I was maintaining above 20 mph. I stuck to my nutrition plan and continued to
drink water regularly. I spaced out my 3
GU’s at about mile 15, 30 and 45. I
continued to sip my perpetuem chocolate milk mix regularly and trusted that I’d
have the energy to run once I got off the bike.
Another item I loved about the bike course was the spacing of the mile
markers. I have done races where they
put a mile marker literally at every mile.
Nothing makes a 56 mile bike ride seem like 500 miles than seeing a marker
every mile. They were normally over 10
miles apart which was the perfect distance.
It seemed about the time I’d wonder how far I was in I’d zip past
one. I was dreading coming back in to
town as I knew the bumps were waiting.
This time I more or less sat upright although I wanted to push hard in
to the finish. As I rounded the last
corner before heading back in to the park where transition was I heard my name
being yelled and raised my right hand in acknowledgement. It was Angie, Nick’s wife, and I assume she
was at the corner with Meghann and the kids.
I hopped off my bike at the dismount line and shuffled back in to
transition.
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| Can't say enough about these two people! |
The bike to run transition is always the fastest as I simply
have to rack my bike, take off my helmet and glasses, remove my cycling shoes
and put on my visor and running shoes. Less
than two minutes and I was running. The
two transitions (swim to bike and bike to run) have distinctly different odd
feelings to them; often when I come out of the water it takes me a bit to get
my equilibrium back as my body has become accustom to rocking back and forth in
the water and feeling weightlessness.
When coming off the bike and beginning the run it pretty much feels like
I’m running through waist deep mud. My
legs feel sluggish and heavy, my stride feels like crap and in general I feel
very slow. It’s hard for me to get a
true feel for my actual speed. My plan,
as discussed with my coach, was to run the first 5k at a good steady pace, then
the next 10k pick it up to more my goal speed and then the final 5k to give it
all I had left. When I ran out of
transition the race clock said 4:25, which was actually 3:25 for me as I
started an hour late. I wanted to be off
the bike at around 3 hours in to my race as I knew that would set me up
perfectly for a sub 5 hour race. I
wasn’t able to do the math to determine what pace I needed to maintain to hit
my goal so I just ran. As I began
running I did my best to judge my speed and felt pretty good as I settled
in. I was passing people pretty
consistently and again was only being passed by younger male athletes. Just to clarify, all the female racers
started in front of me and the male field was inverted oldest to youngest. It was a good feeling and I wanted to be
smart. I hadn’t noticed how hot it had
gotten while on the bike but as the run started I could really feel the
humidity. I was expecting perfect race
conditions sitting just under 80 degrees by my expected finish time but the
humidity pushed the heat up early. The
run quickly became my favorite part of the day, not because I felt great or
because it was the last part of the race but because it allowed me to see my
friends who were racing multiple times.
The run is basically a 5k out and back twice. On my way out I saw Heather coming in on the
bike and I got to yell out to her. She
was followed shortly thereafter by Mike.
On the way back I saw Nick making his way out for the first run loop and
we exchanged a high 5. Not too much
later I saw Jason and cheered him on. As
I approached the first loop turn turnaround I somehow managed to look behind me
and spot Angie. I have no idea why I
decided to turn around while running but I called out to Angie and her and Meghann
responded. I made the left turn at the
sign that said “2nd loop” instead of the right that said
“Finish”. Immediately in to the second
loop is the largest hill and at the top was Meghann waiting, smiling again with
her phone snapping more pictures.
Probably not my best pose as I finished a long drawn out hill. It was a good pick-me-up as I felt pretty
good and had one more 5k at my current pace.
On the way back out I passed Nick again and he looked strong. Again, not too much later was Jason. I was heating up and each water station was a
combination of sipping some water followed by dumping as much on my head as
possible. On the first lap I grabbed a
sponge and tucked it in on the back of my visor so each subsequent water dump
go that wet and helped cool my head. As
I made the turn I noticed a runner whom I’d gone back and forth with a number
of times. We were running about the same
pace and had been by each other for some time.
As I approached the turnaround I knew it was going to be a tough 5k to
make my sub 5 hour. I was hurting and
the 5k seemed like 10 more miles instead of 3.1. After making the turn the fellow competitor
I’d been running with turned to me and asked if I was on my second lap. I said I was and he confirmed he was
too. I told him if he didn’t stop
running neither would I. I don’t know
what would have happened if he and I hadn’t had that exchange. Maybe I used him as a crutch to try and not
go all out, maybe I would have walked some of the last 5k, I can’t guess but I
can say that he and I ran to the end.
Not long after we joined together I saw Mike as he continued his run-walk
as I now know he was fighting through some pain. I again passed Nick and again Jason. There was something about crossing their path
each down and back that kept me going both laps. It felt like an accountability to keep going,
to keep pushing to help give them the strength to move on as best they
could. As Bob, my running partner’s name
as I later found out, and I kept pushing ahead he was telling me how he’d had
to go to the bathroom for the last 6 miles, how his stomach was hurting and his
overall discomfort. He was asking when I
started and what my goal was, I told him 5 hours and that if he got me to the
finish under 5 hours I’d give him a hug.
I just wanted to be done and running with him was the fastest path to
getting there. He kept asking when the
hills were coming and how far we had to go.
We kept running and did our best keeping pace. There was a gradual downhill that went
through the zoo followed by the last uphill of the race, a flat section then a
nice decline towards the turnaround/finish chute. At the last downhill we both gave it all we
had left. He was in front of me and I
was trying to stay with him. After
keeping right to head to the finish I saw that there was one final
incline. As I started the incline I
looked up and got to see Meghann one last time cheering as I pushed on. I looked up and saw the clock at the finish,
6:06 (5:03 in my race time). As I neared
I did what seems to be what I always do now…dry heave. I kept heaving until I stepped on the finish
line and puked up some water. I hunched
over and continued to puke a couple more times.
Finally a volunteer said “are you done?”
I looked up and said I wasn’t sure.
Swim: 37:00 01:54/100 meter pace
T1: 04:52Bike: 02:41:08 20.85 mph average
T2: 01:26
Run: 01:38:50 07:32/mile pace
Total: 05:03:16
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| The Home Team relaxing after the finish |
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