There will be a long version of this! First of all, I did it. There were some incredible challenges this weekend out of my control and in the end I embraced what I was given. The race is supposed to be a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride and 26.2 mile run. The swim, due to conditions that prevented the navy dive team from getting into position, was cancelled. It was the first time in 16 years of this particular Ironman that that has happened. People walked away from this race. I have an acquaintance who did that. Packed up their bikes and left.
I am still very disappointed about the swim…but the remaining 138.2 miles of this course were anything but easy. We had winds of 25 mph that were gusting up to 35 mph. Most difficult bike ride of my life. Even more so knowing I had to save something for the run. So I stuck to my plan in case of wind. Take what it gives you. Don’t fight it. When it’s on your ass, open it up. My original goal was to finishing in about 6:15 on the bike and I finished 6:39. The weather was so cold that I was barely sweating and had to make several rest stops. With the wind and stops, the fact that I finished the way I did is something I’m very happy with.
When I started the run my plan was to walk 0.5 miles and then see how I feel. Just to get myself together. My hope was to do a sub-5 hour marathon. I ended up finishing in 5:17 which is an hour slower than my best but still my 2nd best marathon time ever (that is unlikely to stay true 😉 ) My total time was 12:05. My goal for the race had been 13:30 and my swim would have been about 1:20 – 1:30 so I am proud to say that my training plan and race day plan were dead on. I could not have run a better race.
Thanks for following me the past year on this journey (all none of my readers! 8) ) I still have unfinished business at this distance. I will always be proud of this race and the work I had to do to get myself to the point of completing it. But I want the full experience under my belt. It will be a few years before I make another go at it since the commitment is life altering for about a year and triathlon is only one of my many sports/hobbies (my g/f says my main hobby is to collect hobbies). But I will be back. 8)