Scott's 2010 IMC

Well, I have been avoiding doing this as I am trying to avoid accepting I am done.

Pre Race
Most memorable of the pre-race was the fact that I felt so tired & fatigued that the last 60k ride felt worse than the 160k’ers. Leading up to the race I may not have looked nervous, but I was, to a degree. Not overly bad, but I kept thinking all the races this season that led up to IMC helped me prepare. I look for at least one thing to go wrong each race & thought I might have gotten mine out of the way in the pre-race. Friday morning swim my Garmin worked fine, then I went to charge it that evening and it was dead. Tried every key combination known to reboot or reset it, nothing. So on to the back-up plan of stealing Cindy’s, forgot how long & many settings needed to be changed to get it setup, spent much of Saturday doing this, it helped distract me, so a good putter activity.

Morning of race, actually slept well, everything fell together as planned & scheduled. Kissed Cindy goodbye, entered the chute. Nerves good (2/10), drop special needs, head in to swap around a few things like shirt I had in bike to run bag to swim to bike (mostly because the temperature was seeming to be a bit colder than desired). See a few TTL’ers, glad to see familiar faces, but not really in the mood to chat much. Joined the line for the can, all systems go and then I put on the wet suit. Found my nervousness went up a bit as it was rubbing off from others in the change tent, learned for next time being outside to do this would have been better. Started down to the beach just before the Pro’s started, it was getting more & more real. Walked way to the left as planned, did a few strokes, calming down & feeling good. Chatted with Alfred a bit, then I think we both needed some space to mentally prepare for the race (or control nerves?). Thirty second before the gun, someone behind me called out ‘Who here has size 14 feet?” I actually do, so he said great & worked through the crowd to start right behind me, many chuckled, then bang, we’re off.

Swim
The few in front of me started swimming; I walked & walked until the water was deep enough to actually swim. Goal was to stay calm, long & smooth, it was actually working. Seemed to be with a well suited starting group, only a few contacts, but all was going great. Wanted to try and stay far left, even out of the crowd if I can, but this didn’t work as those to my left kept moving toward the buoys, so I went with the flow. Finally after rounding the second houseboat I could get to my preferred spot & by this time felt lonely, so back in to the pack. Found the swim nice, 90% bi-lateral breathing, may have been so calm because all that training was over & time to actually do what I’ve been preparing for. Hit the beach 1:07, cool, 3-8 minutes faster than expected all the better, grabbed my T1 bag & went to the tent, umm no too busy, changed on the grass outside. Socks inside out, oops, start for the bike, around the tent, relatively smooth T1 happy with 5 minutes spent here.

Bike
Grabbed my bike, recall I didn’t get smeared by the screeners as they were at the tent exit, oops. Back-up plan of spray sunscreen on the bike was there, all good. Hit the start line & notice watch was now saying start T2, hit the button one too many times, oops, fixed it on Main street, no big deal, what’s a few hundred meters over 180k ;-).

Glad to see the TTL’ers cheering, Thank-you. Bike started really nice, may have been going a bit too easy, but as our 2 year old says ‘That’s OK’. Let people pass, while I pass just a few, hit the first real hill and the group bunched, a bit too tight & slow, but no one fell over. Everything was feeling great. Hit 40k and notice back tire was going flat, seems I picked up a staple like piece of metal. Change went slow and calm, didn’t want to make any stupid mistakes. Got the valve extender on, tub in, tire back on, checked to avoid pinch flat, but did not want to pull the CO2 trigger prematurely and waste one. Forgot how fast this fills the tire, pulled it and had no chance to recheck before finishing the fill as it went so fast. Didn’t think to balloon blow it by mouth first (thanks Cindy for telling me this after, oops), got lucky, no pinch. Likely lost 5-10 minutes, but it was a clean change, so calm was better than making mistakes. Nearing the Husky & had to pee, hit the turn, saw the line 10-15 deep & decided to hold it, next station was only 2 deep of a wait, it was worth it. Finished climbing Richter’s, everything was going great, hit the downhill & found I had amazing speed here, happy to let’er run above 60k/h and pedal to that point, passing people galore, biggest issue was people pulling out to pass one or two riders & not going back in but riding the line, had to do lots of yelling to get them out of my way, loved getting over 70-75k/h.

Hit the rollers, first climb slow & with the others, then down fast & hard, up the next the same, slowly pulling ahead of those near me on each downhill, was actually enjoying these as they were so much easier than the last time. Glad to start seeing TTL’ers riding on the out & back. First corner Sarah rocked by, then one by one saw Mike, Jeff, Nate, & Kent, figured out they must have passed me during the tire changing activity. Hit special needs, actually wanted everything I packed, a bit surprising, but happy with choices. Glad to see the other familiar faces of the ladies that were chasing me.

Then the wind & rain started, it was cold and a slog. This actually made me happy, as I am accustomed to riding in this type of stuff and its better for me than being too hot. Didn’t make me much faster, but that wasn’t my goal ;-). Climbed Yellow Lake, happy to hit the crowd chute, Thanks again TTL’ers friends & family, it was greatly appreciated. Hit the top of the hill & while those that slowly passed me going up the hill were recuperating I started dropping gears & going like stink, glad to have gone easy earlier, but found many were not happy with the speed of going downhill and were really slow to move over. So I got blocked ~5-6 times to the point that I had to squeak by yelling my head off to get people to move over, unhappy to have to use my breaks & drop my well earned free speed. Had lots left in my legs at this point and pushed all the way back to town, enjoying the easier start and reward later (maybe a bit too easy, but hey you have to learn something). T2 was good, ~5 minutes again, but this included a porta-potty break, so all was good.

Run
Started first 2-4 k way too fast, but everything was feeling great, typical brick feeling was not there, kept trying to slow down, but was having a hard time doing this. The slowing of the pace came shortly after. Pace felt good, rain felt good, walking the aid stations felt good. Seeing TTL’ers it felt good to cheer them, as I realized this made the race good & happy for me, sorry to those real close to me on the run as I was chatty. Hit special needs only wanted the tic-tac’s, again sorry for those near me as I was noisy on the way carrying these. Knees stopped being happy running up the hills, but a fast walk was still good. Got to the marina, photo opportunity time, mental reminder to remove the sponge from the hat, had a crowd appear around me, saw Cindy, actually had enough in me to sprint past them to get clear for a photo, realized minutes later that the spurt was short lived as I settled back in to my previous pace. Last few k’s I felt faster thanks to the crowd, saw Kent as I turned to the last out & back as he was heading in, the finish was so close I could taste it, then the crowd thinned to nothing, but wait I saw the crew at the turnaround & sped up again. Tried timing the other runners to avoid a clump at the finish, hit the line & was happy to have finished, stalled slightly for the photo opportunity to be right. Well worth the few seconds and a better picture. Time actually was only 3 minutes slower coming back, than the first half, super happy here.

Finish/Post Race
I am an IRONMAN. Happy to be met by TTL’ers at the finish, catchers, medical, chip takers. Surprisingly not feeling as bad as I thought I would, but I did not push into the zones that would hurt as that was not my goal for this race. Not saying the race did not hurt, but I intentionally kept some energy in reserve as I had never put these activities together for this distance and finishing was the goal, not time. I had never done a 42.2k run, so I really didn’t know how I’d do.
Post race I’m not as bad as I thought I’d be, but first real activities still to come. Walking, sleeping, stairs, eating, digesting, all seem to getting back to normal.

By the numbers swim 1:07, bike 6:33 (including a flat), run 4:48, overall 12:38:21. Post race noticed 4 moderate blisters, one toenail definitely going to fall off, and one amazingly supportive family to now focus some of that training time toward.