I Am Ironman! B2B Very Long Race Report

Nearly 600 wetsuit-clad athletes are standing on a North Carolina beach, hopping around both from nervous energy and because of the cold sand beneath all the bare feet.  It is five minutes from the start of the Beach to Battleship full distance triathlon:  2.4 miles of swimming followed by 112 miles of cycling and then 26.2 miles of running.   Everyone is at their peak fitness, having trained for many months to be prepared for this.  The majority of the field is comprised of first-timers for Iron distance, and is 70% male, 30% female.  The swim is set to start at 7:30 am, a mass start, meaning all the athletes will charge into the water at the same time.  People are jockeying for position, the strongest swimmers up front, people who hope to just survive it in the back.  Conversations are happening about the water temp, perfect at 71 degrees, and equipment issues, often expressed as hopes for goggles that don’t fog and swim caps that don’t peel off.  The speakers are turned on and the anthem is played.  And then Eminem’s Lose Yourself is pumped out (nice choice, race directors!), and everyone breaks into smiles and head bobs.  It’s time to begin.

 

I’m among these people, and before I describe the day, I have to talk about what it took to get there.  Friends who have done Ironmen have told me that you are an Ironman by just arriving at the start, because getting through the training is far more challenging than the race.  When I decided to do this, I felt ready for the physical difficulties the training would pose, but looking back I was either blindly naïve or willfully ignorant about the emotional challenges.   For the past few months, my life has been work or train, and nothing else.  My house was a mess, my mail was out of control, I haven’t watched television, read a book, gone to a movie.  At times, I’ve squeezed in a visit with family or a dinner with friends, but each time I was secretly stressed about time, because there simply wasn’t enough of it.  Through September, when I was training for 15-17 hours a week and working more than 50, I felt like everything was slipping out of control, and I was failing at all of it.  Work was overwhelmingly busy with emergency after emergency.  Every bad workout was loaded – how can I run a marathon after 114.4 miles when I could barely get through 10 miles of jogging on a hot day?  I was completely physically exhausted from the never-ending string of super-early mornings that do not suit my natural sleep tendencies.  Each day that passed it became harder, but as each of those days progressed I felt I had invested too much to walk away. 

Jack Braconnier, my absolutely brilliant coach at Walton Endurance, talked me down from the ledge more than once.  His coaching gave me the confidence to look past the struggle and simply stick to the plan.  And while September and early October were crushingly brutal, it was also the time period in which I got to see the results for the first time.  One of the final weekends, my “epic weekend,” consisted of a 3800-meter swim on Friday night, followed by a 104-mile pre-dawn ride on Saturday and then an 18-mile run on Sunday.  To that point, those run and swim distances were to be the longest of my life.  In the pool on Friday night, I was struck in the last few laps by how good I felt, as if I could keep going.  And then the next day on the bike, part of the City to Shore ride into Ocean City that I’ve done in the past (albeit a shorter distance option), I charged the two bridges at the end that I had always suffered through like they were wind-free flat roads.  And during the 18-mile run I felt so strong I went out of my way to add a nasty hill at mile 13.  A week later I beat my marathon personal record by more than seven minutes at the Chicago Marathon, and I felt like most of the race was easy.  I couldn’t believe what I conditioned my body to do.

Race week itself was rough.  Some very significant issues with my family surfaced.  Work was crazy.  Also, health issues for my dog, Sadie, became very apparent, which terrified me.  I was not in a good frame of mind.  I decided that I was allowed to worry about all of that until Friday, the day before race day.  Starting Friday morning, I would push all of that out of my head and be completely selfish and race-focused.   As stressed as I was about everything else, I felt ready for the race.  Every once in a while I had what I called a “holy shit” wave when I realized what was ahead of me, but I was confident that all of my hard work meant I was prepared.

The good news was that the weather was expected to be perfect, sunny and in the low 70s, and both Wrightsville Beach and Wilmington were beautiful.  And so it was on race day.   When I charged into the water that morning, it felt fantastic.  It was warmer than the air, and between the buoyancy of the salt water and my wetsuit, I almost felt like I was hovering above it.  I typically panic quickly after I hit the water in a tri, but this time I just felt really good.  I started slow to get my bearings and kept building through the swim.   The 2.4 miles were easy, both because of my training and because of the strong current pushing me toward the finish.  When I got out of the water, I looked at my watch and realized the swim took me 1 hour and 12 minutes.  My best tri swim this year was 48 minutes for 1.2 miles, so this seemed amazing to me.

At B2B, one of the places in which you pay for the helpful swim current is in the 400-yard hike to T1.  I was not fast at all with the process of getting from swim to bike with the clothing change and porta-john stop.  When I exited the tent, I realized that while my swim was good for me, it wasn’t good.  My bike was very lonely, because almost all of the other bikes were gone.  At least it was easy to find. 

My strategy for the bike was simple:  1) take the first half easy and push it in the second half; and 2) eat and drink a lot. After a lot of trial and error in my training rides, I had settled on a combination of Smucker’s Uncrustables peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, honey stinger bars, honey stinger waffles, bananas and gu chomps for bike nutrition.  I decided that I would have to have some kind of nutrition at least every 10 miles to try to get the calories I would need to survive this. 

The ride was tough.  It was flat, but windy.  Flat sounds great, but it also means you are peddling for all 112 miles, since you don’t get the break that a good descent will provide.   The first 30 miles were a bit of a battle, because the athletes participating in the half-distance event started to catch us (they started later, but had even a stronger swim current).  The first group of these athletes passed well, but some of the next group seemed to go by a little more recklessly (e.g., while I was being passed properly by a few cyclists on the left, one zipped by on the right without calling out his passing, a big no no for this ride).  Indeed, I saw one wreck about 50 meters in front of me when a rider hit a traffic cone while trying to pass another rider.  Because I was passed so frequently and closely, I was nervous about grabbing my water bottle and my aero bars, because I can still get a little wobbly when I do either.  The half athletes split off at about mile 40, and I continued on to the rest stop at mile 55 that had our special needs bags, which contained the stuff we had stashed before the race that we might want to access at this point.  To the lady who gave me her extra packet of chamois butter – thank you.  I paid that forward by giving another woman some of my Tylenol.  I spent 10 minutes at special needs, stuffing all the food I could manage into my system, and off I went.  

At mile 56, I checked my watch:  3 hours, 30 minutes with the stop.  My goal for the bike was to break seven hours, so it was time to drop the hammer.  This is where it got fun.  As I picked it up, I started dropping riders all over the field.  I, on my little roadie with regular wheels, chicked lots of guys on top-of-the-line tri bikes with $3000+ wheel sets.  Yes, I hurt – I was achy in lots of places, but nothing that slowed me.  The worst pain was in my girl parts ( I need to change saddles, I think) and my feet.  The headwinds were tough, but I tucked into aero position and punched through them. 

This is when I realized that an Ironman is a lot like bipolar disorder.  One minute you are miserable and you hate the world, the next you are ecstatic because you see yourself getting through it, and that finish line fantasy becomes more tangible with each pedal stroke.

My final bike time was 6:48.  This means I did the ride in negative splits (the second half faster than the first) and easily cleared my goal time.  And I felt great!  Hardly spent at all.  After another eternity in T2 changing into my run gear and enjoying the perks of a real bathroom with sinks (T2 was inside the convention center), I took off on the run.  At this point, it was nearly 4:00 in the afternoon, and I had been racing for eight and a half hours.  My goal for the marathon was to complete it in less than six hours, but I was hoping to hold it to under five and a half. 

The run course was lovely.  Wilmington, NC, is a great town, and the volunteers along the course were some of the best I’ve ever encountered. The course was two loops, and it wrapped around the waterfront and through a park.  There was an aid station every mile, stocked with sports drink, water, pretzels, cookies, donuts, pizza, oranges, bananas, chicken broth, Pepsi, Vaseline, electrolyte pills, and lots of other helpful stuff.  I ran at an easy pace until each aid station came into view, and then walked through each, grabbed some stuff and walked a bit after.  This had me at about a 12-minute mile pace, which is what I was hoping to maintain at least to mile 20.  I felt really comfortable, which surprised me.  The course was confusing (again, this is where the volunteers were excellent, and essential), but it didn’t feel like a lot of distance. 

At 6:30 pm, I was nearly halfway through the run and still feeling good, though my stomach was starting to send some error messages.  I collected my glow necklace from a volunteer (they asked the runners still going after dark to wear these) and kept moving.  The halfway point was both fun and bad.  The bad was that at the turn you could see the finish line (so tempting to just turn there!), but the fun was that all of the spectators for the finish line were there cheering us on. 

As I was heading into the aid station at mile 18, my legs started to feel a little wobbly, so I grabbed a banana, some broth and some Pepsi at the stop.  I ran for a bit and realized my stomach really was not happy with that combination so I had to incorporate some more walking. While walking, my legs felt very unsteady.  This was the only point in the entire race in which I was concerned I might not finish.  I knew mentally I could get through the rest of it, but I worried that my legs would just give out.  Walking for a while helped, and at mile 19 I decided to try to run to 20, and then reassess. 

I hit the timing mat at mile 20 and looked at my watch.  I realized that if I could do the remaining 6.2 miles in under an hour and a half, I could break 14 hours for the race.  Of course, it took me quite some time to figure this out, because it is hard to do math in your head when you are so addled you can’t correctly spell “cat.” 

Breaking 14 hours in an Ironman for me was incomprehensible.  My evolution of thinking about this race went from “I could never do it at all even over the course of days” to “I just want to finish before the 17-hour cutoff” to “maybe I can break 16 hours” to “I think if I have a great day I can break 15 hours.”  Sometimes I fantasized about a sub-14:30 race, but I pushed that thought out of my head because I didn’t want to be disappointed at the finish if I couldn’t achieve that. 

I knew that if I ran, the inevitable and increasingly lengthy walking breaks would not be fast.  I also knew that I am capable of power walking at a very strong and consistent pace, even when really tired.  I decided to switch to power walking, and I maintained a bit over a 13-minute pace all the way to the end.  In those last 6.2 miles, I passed a lot of people who were doing the run/walk effort I had considered, which seemed to validate my decision.

The last miles clicked by quickly. I was focused and determined.  I wanted that finish and I could smell that sub-14. 

I headed into the stretch along the waterfront that I knew would take me into the finish.  A volunteer yelled out “a quarter mile left”!  I turned the corner and there it was – the giant “FINISH” banner.  A huge wave of emotion hit me and I almost started crying.  But then I checked myself, because I didn’t want to cry.  I wanted to roar, and I wanted to run to the finish.  And as I started to do both, all of the spectators along the way broke into huge cheers.  I came up to the line and saw the race clock:  13:53:05.  The clock, for months my worst enemy was now a source of elation.  I flung my arms up and screamed some more.  It was a rush of the most intense feelings: amazement, disbelief, jubilation.  I was an Ironman, I did it well, and I felt tremendous.  If this was not the biggest moment of my life, it was certainly in the top five. 

 

In the days since, I’m still riding the buzz, and I’ve had some time to reflect.  This was a life-changing experience.  I wrote a post recently for the ACS Determinators’ blog about achieving things that I previously thought were impossible.  There has always been a voice in my head saying “you can’t do this.”  During the 13 hours and 53 minutes of this race, however, my inner voice had a different message:  “you’ve got this.”  I wanted it, I worked like hell for it, and I took it.  I am an Ironman, and nothing or no one can ever take that away from me.

 

The P.S. to this is now that I’m a few days out from the race and have studied my splits (1:12 swim, 6:48 bike, 5:27 marathon and 25 minutes of total transition time), I’m starting to see the places in which I can shave time. The obvious place is transition, since during B2B I had enough time there to watch Ghandi, the director’s cut.  But I also think there’s room to grow on both the bike and the run.  I hope to do another one, if I can find a way to train for it without risking my livelihood.  If so, Jack - you better be ready, because there’s no way I’m doing this without your masterful guidance. 

Shoreman 70.3 Race Report

The good:

Right from the start of this race, there were dark, ominous clouds overhead.   Because of my phobia, I know cloud types and formation. The ones overhead were not sweet little stratus clouds.  They looked as much like cumulonimbus as anything I’ve ever seen.  In my world, cumulonimbus clouds mean I stay inside, away from windows, poised to put a blanket over my head.   Those of you who know me well will understand the magnitude of what I’m about to say next:  I raced anyway.  I got in the water and did my two laps (1.2 miles).  I got on the bike and continued riding through the intense downpours that kept popping up.  I continued with the run even though I knew there was no place to take cover along the run course.  I did the whole race under a very real threat of thunderstorms.  This is probably the most significant advance I’ve ever made against this phobia. 

The ok:

My swim skills have definitely improved.  In fact, they have improved to the point in which I am now getting kicked and jostled in the water just like the other triathletes.  This is new for me, since until now I was always the lone swim cap in the back.   The problem is that I now need to learn how to pass people.  I kept getting caught up behind people whom I wanted to pass, but couldn’t get through.  I also need to work a little more on sighting so my 1.2 miles is not 1.3 because I find myself off course (happened at least twice today).   Swim time: 48 minutes.

The bike would have been good, but the ugly:

So I’m riding along, feeling good even though it is pouring (taking it easy in the wet), and I hit mile 12 and hear POP!  Yes, my tire.  My back tire.  My back friggin tire.  I do not have good tire changing skills, but I do know how to do it, and I did have the proper tools. Part of the reason my skills are poor is that when I’ve flatted on the road in the past, I tend to accept the offers of help from guys who are riding past.  I was surprised by how many of those offers I got today, but I didn’t want to interrupt someone else’s race, so I waived them off and went to work.  The repair took me at least 17 minutes (my bike computer clocked my bike time at 3:16, and the race results page has my bike time at 3:33 and some change).   I may not win any awards for my flat-changing skills, but if anyone was giving out prizes for quantity and variety of use of the “f” word, I certainly would be able to claim one.   When I got back on the bike, the first thing I learned was that the wind had picked up dramatically.  A headwind, which continued to strengthen through the remainder of the ride.

The run was awful.   The sun came out, and it was a combination of humid and windy.  I started to panic in the first two miles because I was already taking walk breaks.  This made me wonder how the hell I am ever going to get through a full iron-distance tri in just six weeks.  I had hoped for 2:15-2:20 for the run.  I finished in 2:39, which was very discouraging.  I was relieved afterward, however, when the other athletes were talking about how difficult the run was. 

My overall time was 7:09:10.  I really expected to come in under seven hours, and had hoped for a time closer to 6:30.  I do feel like I got the sub-7, because of the time lost dealing with the flat, but I was still not close to my goal. 

Things I learned today:

When I have to arrive at my tri as sunrise is occurring, and it’s damp and has been raining frequently and the tri is near the shore, bring mosquito repellant.  Lots of mosquito repellant. 

I don’t need to start in the very back any more in the swim.

I was an insanely stupid idiot moron for waiting so long to install my aero bars.   I can’t quantify how much extra speed I got from them, but boy did they make the ride more comfortable. 

CO2 inflators are awesome.

When my plan is to pop a Tylenol during the bike ride, it would help to actually bring the Tylenol with me on the bike ride. 

Take the extra 10 damn seconds in bike-to-run transition to reapply my sunscreen.

Put the little sample of body glide that I obtained for just this purpose in my pocket for the run.  My post-run shower should not sound like an out-of-tune mezzo soprano audition. 

Jack and Jill

In the movie Hitch, Will Smith plays the titular character, a matchmaker whose specialty is helping men find a way into the hearts of the women of their dreams.  He meets Kevin James’ character, an overweight, short, frumpy accountant who has fallen in love with a beautiful, famous and wealthy socialite who doesn’t know he exists.  Hitch decides to take on this client, considering it his greatest challenge, a masterpiece akin to the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. 

This plotline resonates with me.  In Ironman training terms, I am Kevin James, and I now have my very own Hitch.  Jack Braconnier at Walton Endurance, an outstanding coach and amazing triathlete himself, has agreed to oversee my training.  Jack typically trains pros and athletes in contention for age group awards, people who can do things like swimming and cycling and running.  I’ve seen him help beginners too, such as the lady at swim class last month who told me she had only swum for the very first time ever just two months previously, and then proceeded to drop me in her wake. 

Jack’s generally awesome.  He is incredibly positive and super nice.  And while he’s smiling at you and chanting supportive things, he is employing every nasty tool in his sadistic little arsenal.  My friend Ashley, a very strong swimmer and accomplished triathlete, attends his weekly swim class.  Each week, “how was class, Ashley?”  “Oh my god, I can’t believe I didn’t throw up in the pool.”  Or, “afterwards we were just lying on the deck because we couldn’t move.”  This week, she went to cycling class.  “That was the hardest cycling workout of my life.”  Jack is smart and knows his audience.   We are overly eager weekend warriors who are willing to suffer endlessly for the sole purpose of crossing a finish line either at all or faster than we did it last time.  We don’t need yelling and cajoling, only suggestions.  We volunteered for this crap, just for the “fun” of it.  So when he tells us to swim a bunch of 100-meter drills as hard as we can, we nod and go.  This allows Jack to get away with all sorts of vicious tactics. 

Jack is convinced he can get me across that Ironman finish line.  He’s so optimistic he’s even saying things like he thinks he can get me out of the slow lane at swim class.  I don’t think he’s come to terms with what he’s up against.  This I can help him with.  In fact, I’ve already started this process. 

Last week he sent me my training plan for this past weekend and this coming week.  After five separate e-mails asking how to log in to Training Peaks (yes, I know my job revolves around expertise in Internet-based programs.  Shut up.), I was finally able to review the weekend workouts.  This immediately precipitated the first of what will probably be many “I trust your methods, but….” type communications.  I immediately started negotiating for longer distances.  Jack’s thinking long-term goal.  I’m thinking of how rare it is to have an overcast, cool day in July.  Jack is right.  This will have to be my mantra.  Jack is right.  This is not easy for me.  I am very independently minded, i.e. stubborn, so I will have to teach myself to trust the person who actually does know what he’s doing.  

I think it really started to hit him today how deep the hole he’s in with me.  We had a lovely chat.  It started with the thunderstorm problem.  He gets to figure out how to incorporate 8-15 hours of outdoor training a week in the summer for a client who won’t go outside when there’s a chance of a storm.  Then he asked how I felt on my ride.  “Well, my hip hurt, and of course my shoulder is all messed up, and the achilles tendon problem….”  I challenge any octogenarian to outdo the list of aches and pains I whined about on this call.  Finally we jumped into the emotional baggage I still carry around from my failures in elementary school gym and how that makes me afraid of swim class.    If you were searching for Jack this afternoon, he was probably shaking his head over a stiff drink.  

When I stumble across the finish line at Beach to Battleship, Jack will have earned his share of that glory.  The medal, however, will be mine.  

The Dotman Cometh

The surrounding circumstances and exact time period are fuzzy to me now, but I do remember how I felt the first time I learned about the Ironman triathlon.  A relatively new convert to fitness addiction, I was on the cusp of preparing for my first marathon, which I was attempting because I wanted to achieve what I believed was impossible for me.  And then someone, I don’t remember who, told me of a race that begins with a 2.4-mile swim, followed by a 112-mile bike ride and capped off with 26.2 miles of running, all in a 17-hour time limit.  While I don’t remember the details about how I acquired this knowledge, I remember precisely how I felt when I got it.  I was enraged.  What kind of psychotic lunatic would dream up such a thing, and who were the masochistic idiots participating? 

I’ve since learned of other endurance events that either parallel or exceed the insanity of an Ironman.  The Badwater Ultramarathon is a good example – running 135 miles through Death Valley in temperatures up to 130 degrees.  The Western States 100 is another moronic undertaking, a nasty 100-mile trail run with many thousands of feet of vertical climbs.  Of course there are the other activities of weekend warriors lacking mental stability, such as climbing Everest or competitive free diving. 

These types of events only earned a quizzical headshake from me, no anger.  When I first learned about the Ironman, I thought I was pissed because I felt that an event that extreme in some way diminished my own ultimate accomplishment, the marathon. However, since I didn’t have this reaction when I heard about Badwater, which is essentially five marathons strung together in the desert, I think it’s something else.  I was angry because I believe I knew, even then, that I was on the hook.  Yes, though at the time I was overweight and running 12-minute miles, I knew the Ironman bug had been planted, and I was pissed because I knew it would hurt.

Since that time, I’ve come farther in my athletic pursuits that I ever imagined I could. I’ve run six marathons and dozens of shorter races.  I managed to get my half marathon time under two hours and my 10-mile time under 90 minutes.  I’ve even become competitive in my age group in local 5ks, assuming the fast local middle-aged women decide to sleep in.  I’ve now done a few sprint triathlons, two Olympic tris and two half Ironmen events.   

A full Ironman is an entirely different pursuit.  While the distances are only double the half, the preparation and event itself are exponentially more difficult.  A training plan I looked at recently, designed not for elite athletes but for regular mortal working people, commands two hours of training per day on weekdays, six to seven hours on Saturday and three to four hours on Sunday.  You get one day off of training per week, so you can lay slackjawed on your couch while cursing your diseased brain.  And the race itself has a 17-hour time limit. If you finish in 17 hours and two seconds, you count as a DNF, the much feared athlete acronym for Did Not Finish.  You are not allowed to draft on the bike.  You are not allowed an iPod on the run.  You are not allowed to have people on the course hand you things unless they are official race volunteers.  You have to figure out how to get enough nutrition on the course so you don’t curl like a ball on some roadside because you’ve run out of fuel.  You will suffer.  A lot.  This is a race that essentially began as a bar bet from some navy seals.

I’ve been stumbling sort of ass backwards toward this goal for the past few years.  Last fall, after Poconos 70.3, I decided I really wanted to try to do a Full.  I don’t really know why.  Maybe I’m still trying to impress the child I was, the chubby, awkward, clumsy girl who couldn’t run, couldn’t jump, couldn’t climb.  My greatest athletic contribution prior to my thirties was helping members of the swim team pass math in high school.  Maybe completing this event will finally get that “you can’t do this stuff” voice out of my head for good.

After much research, I decided on Panama City Beach in 2013.  It’s considered a good first-time event as an “easy” Ironman, meaning no ridiculous elevation changes on the bike or run, a relatively calm swim, and less likelihood of extreme heat despite its location, because the race is in November.  I chose 2013 to give me time to improve my swimming skills beyond the boulder-like level they’re at now, to get more comfortable with my bike and to acclimate myself to ramping up my training to a higher level.  I would go down and volunteer at this year’s race and scope the course.  It was all so reasonable, well, at least for the circumstances.

And then while I was racking my bike at Eagleman 70.3 this year, a woman I knew from other races told me that she was trying her Full this year, on October 20 in Wilmington, North Carolina, at a race called Beach to Battleship.    While not an Ironman branded event, the distances and rules are the same.  As soon I was told there were still slots available, the wheels started turning.  Even while I was suffering through the 96-degree run at Eagleman, I was latching onto B2B.  

So it looks like my Full is happening.  This year.  In sixteen short weeks.  I haven’t officially registered yet, but I have sought out training resources and started building my calendar around it.  I have a hotel reservation.  I would register right now, except the fee is non-refundable, so I will wait as long as possible.  I hope this will quell my inner beast.  Whether it does or doesn’t, Badwater’s never happening.  

The Big One

Anyone remember last year when I put all that time and effort into training for the Poconos half Ironman, only to have it converted to a duathlon at the last moment due to weather? Even without the swim, I was proud of the achievement, because I still cycled 55 hilly miles and followed it up with a 13.1 mile hilly run and, even more importantly, I raised $3,000 for the American Cancer Society by doing so. I was thrilled with the result, and walked away from it convinced that I would complete a true 70.3 race and also that I would maintain a long-term commitment to DetermiNation, the endurance program supporting the American Cancer Society.

A week ago, I finally completed my 70.3. The venue was Cambridge, Maryland, which is along the eastern shore. I walked into this race grossly undertrained, having only been out on my bike three times at a maximum distance of 38 miles. I also had no training week longer than seven hours, and most hovered in the five-to-six-hour range.

Because of my thunderstorm problem, I swore that if there was no threat of these, I would not complain about any other type of weather condition. So I won’t complain that it was 96 degrees with blasting sunshine on race day.

The day began with the swim that started at 8:00 am. Because the water temperature was under 76.1 degrees (by about a tenth of a degree), we were permitted to wear our wetsuits. I thought it was the wetsuit that made me feel so good about the first part of the swim. Then I made the turn to come back into the finish and I realized it wasn’t the wetsuit. I had been swimming with the current. Now the current was trying to push me back toward Delaware. And it seemed like it was succeeding. Based on the items in my sight line, I swam in place for at least 10 minutes, except for a few brief periods in which I was moving backwards. I finally figured out a way to actually move closer to the finish line and very slowly made my way there.

After spending too much time in transition peeling myself out of the wetsuit and coating myself in sunscreen, I took off on the bike. But first, a few words about the bike. I love my bike. I did a whole post about my beautiful Scott road bike. It’s a solid, serious machine. My sweet little road bike, however, had to share rack space at Eagleman with nothing but super high-end triathlon specific bikes with wheelsets alone worth at least $3,000. So while I was out on the road, making great time on my ride, I kept hearing the telltale “foof foof foof” of a Zipp wheel that lets you know one of these sleek bastards is coming up to pass you on your left.

The first two hours of the bike were great. At the two-hour mark, I was already at 39 miles. I was also officially on my longest ride since October. And then I fell apart. The headwinds hurt. My body hurt. I was thirsty and my feet were burning because of the hot ground. And it kept getting hotter and hotter. That’s just a notation, not a complaint. The last 17 miles took me an hour and 13 minutes, but I pulled back into transition just a little past 12 noon.

I dawdled in transition and didn’t start running until 12:15. The run course at Eagleman is basically a long, straight out and back. Your visual stimulation is farmland, and not the interesting kind of farmland with cows and horses, but lots and lots of fields. It is on asphalt, and is 13.1 miles without a hint of shade. And it was 96 degrees. Not that I’m complaining. I almost managed to run the first mile. A bit short of the mile marker, I had to start walking. The first water station came up shortly after, and I greedily grabbed two cups of water, two cups of gatorade and a cup of ice. This is when I realized I was in trouble. I tried to start running a few times, but just didn’t have it in me. The good news is I’m so frequently late in getting places that I can walk really, really fast. And that’s what I did – I walked. I finished the half marathon in 3 hours and 47 seconds. That is 40 minutes slower than the half marathon in the Poconos and an hour and two minutes slower than my personal record (set this year) at this distance.

I finished the race with a time of 7 hours and 17 minutes. This was a little slower than what I hoped for, but I was just happy to complete it at all. The race left me with the feeling that I can do this again and beat this time, and that eventually, I can do a full Ironman with the right training.

But it wasn’t the big race. My most important race of 2012 is coming up this weekend. It’s a triathlon. It’s not a half Ironman or a full Ironman. Instead it’s a shorter distance, an Olympic (.9-mile swim, 24-mile ride, 6.2-mile run). Why so important? Because this is the one for which I am raising money for the American Cancer Society. For this one, I am again on the DetermiNation team. Ironmen races and marathons are nice, but unless they are funding cancer research, providing lodging for people undergoing treatment, providing rides to chemo and support groups and all sorts of necessary services, providing advocacy for cancer patients and more government research and funding, then they are really just for fun. There is no athletic event that will mean more to me than crossing the finish line on behalf of the ACS, because of all they have done and continue to do to help my sister, the millions like her, the millions more who love people like her, and the billions more who should never get cancer in the first place.

So, yes, I did my 70.3, and it hurt and it was challenging and it was a big accomplishment. Even if I do a full Ironman this year, however, it’s this Sunday’s Philly Tri that is my apex of 2012.

A Very Different Broad Street Run

Three years ago on this blog, I wrote an account of my participation in the Broad Street Run, a 10-mile race here in Philly that happens on the first Sunday in each May.  It was a long piece that addressed how I felt at each stage, the conditions and the race itself.  I was happy with that race, because I achieved my Broad Street personal record at it, a time of 91 minutes and 11 seconds.  The story, however, was a solitary one.  While I enjoyed the race and loved the results, I wasn’t exuberant, because it was just me.  All about me.

I have since figured out how to fix that, and now the Broad Street Run is not just another race to me, but an event that fills me with joy every time I think about it.  One approach I figured out two years ago.  Drag my poor, hapless sister, who was just a few months from her recovery from cancer treatment, down the 10-mile trek with me in 90-degree weather.  Decorate her shirt so that it screams to everyone who sees her that she was running Broad Street ’10 after doing chemo in ’09.  Pester her every 10 steps to make sure she’s ok, and then tell her to suck it up when she complains of muscle fatigue.  Finally, run that last quarter mile past her kids and husband and all of the other screaming fans to the finish line to collect my very favorite post-race high five/hug ever.  She accomplished something major for herself that day, and I was elated to have a front-row seat.

Cancer, however, is an evil f*** that resurfaced for Shelly and has deprived her of so many things she should have a right to, including the ability to run Broad Street again.  I hate cancer.  I really, really, really hate cancer. 

This leads me to my second approach, which I used this year.  Participate in Broad Street with DetermiNation (I’m on the committee), which raises money for the American Cancer Society.  Everybody at ACS/DetermiNation hates cancer as much as I do.  But the ACS doesn’t just hate cancer, it fights it with advocacy, research and support services.  DetermiNation has given me something I’ve been desperate for:  a way to hit back.

The Broad Street Run organizers are extremely supportive of the American Cancer Society.  This year they granted DetermiNation 700 spots for the run.  They also provided a huge tent and publicity for on-site Cancer Prevention Study-3 enrollment at the race expo.  CPS-3 is a massive and historic study being conducted by the ACS to learn more about the causes and how to prevent cancer.  It is a vital study, and I’d be happy to chatter on about it for a year if asked.  I can launch all sorts of CPS-3 factoids because DetermiNation’s staff partners at the ACS asked me to be the lead volunteer for the Broad Street enrollment site, a post I was deeply honored to accept. 

Alesia Mitchell and I did lots of prep to get ready for the enrollment, and soon enough it was Friday, May 4, the first day of the expo and the enrollment.  On both Friday and Saturday, hundreds and hundreds of people took the time to come into our tent to ask about the study and what they could do to help.  A little bit of blood?  A waist measurement?   A twenty-year commitment to filling out surveys every few years?  No one was fazed at all, because cancer sucks, and I’m not alone in wanting to pulverize it. 

We wrapped up enrollment late Saturday afternoon and went directly to the DetermiNation team dinner.  The team dinner was magnificent, on a large outdoor area of Lincoln Financial Field, overlooking the field where the Eagles play.  Three hundred people came to decorate their race shirts, sign the huge “celebrate more birthdays” banner in honor of their loved ones, eat a great dinner and listen to some truly inspirational speeches.  DermiNation committee member Michelle, a survivor of cervical cancer, spoke movingly about how she stared down her diagnosis at the age of 30 by training for and running the Chicago Marathon while undergoing treatment.  Think I’m hardcore?  I’ve got nothing on Michelle. 

Finally, it was race day.  I showed up at DetermiNation’s start line tent greeted by scores of runners in their blue shirts all set to go.  After engaging in lots of great conversation, assisting with last-minute instructions and bag check and posing among my people in our beautiful team photo, we were ready to run.  I lined up at the start with Don, a fellow committee member and first time Broad Street runner.  I’ve always done this race unaccompanied, so even the running part of it was a new experience for me.  We chatted most of the way down Broad Street and, before I knew it, the finish line was in sight.  This is the first time I felt like this run was easy.  I can credit the perfect weather, but I’m also sure it was the cause, the company and the feeling of being buoyed every time I saw some of the nearly 700 blue DNation shirts that were popping up all over the running field. 

The DetermiNation finish line tent was magnificent.  Hundreds of DNation athletes and their friends and family milling about, sitting at the tables, slurping on a water ice, munching on hoagies and pretzels, or standing in the line to get a made-to-order cheesesteak.  And there was Dan Lavelle, the brilliant ACS staff partner who pulled together the whole thing, taking a few minutes to stand in the corner and just take it all in. 

Now when I think about the Broad Street Run, I don’t dwell on a number or remember the weather.  Instead I feel pride for what I was part of, and hope for a future in which cancer doesn’t exist.

The Best Race of My Life

A little more than five years ago, I looked at my watch as I was nearing the 10-mile marker of a half marathon. I remember vividly how astonished I was to realize that if I could just hold on to the end, I would finish in about 2 hours and 15 minutes. Crossing the finish line at 2:15:14 (a 10:20 pace), I was jubilant. I never thought I could finish a half marathon in less than 2 hours and 20 minutes. In my mind, I was still the lumbering girl who waddled across the finish line at her first marathon in a less-than-blazing 5 hours and 47 minutes (age 33, year 2004). A few months later, I completed my first half in 2 hours and 24 minutes, and I was intensely proud of that.

Yesterday, at age 42, I achieved my two biggest and longest-held running goals: a sub-2 hour half marathon and a sub-90 minute 10-miler, both in the same race. My previous best times for both of these distances were accomplished in 2009, the year I turned 40. At the Broad Street Run, I finished 10 miles in 91 minutes and 11 seconds. I crossed the finish line at the Philadelphia Distance Run in 2:02:53. At the time I thought I was close enough to get the stats I wanted fairly easily. However, despite intensive training, rather than getting closer to my hoped-for times, I slipped further away over the next few years. While I was still getting faster in 5ks, I was beginning to think it likely that I had peaked at distance running, and my sub-2/sub-90 dreams were out of my grasp. After all, I keep reading and hearing about the physical decline that happens as you move through your 40s and beyond.

I signed up for the Shamrock half-marathon feeling like it was my last shot to go for that sub-2. The cooler temperatures of a March race suit me. It’s also a flat course, and a race that I had heard terrific things about. I also signed up for a 10-miler two weeks after Shamrock to go for my sub-90.

My friend and fellow DetermiNation committee member, Ashley, also had her sights set on a sub-2 half marathon at Shamrock. So Saturday morning we loaded up her car with expensive gas and healthy snacks for the 5+ hour drive down to Virginia Beach.

In Maryland, an omen came. We were pulled over for speeding. The state trooper looked at the PA plates, demanded license and registration, and we resigned ourselves to a speeding ticket. Boo! He walked back a few minutes later, handed Ashley her paperwork and said we were getting a warning, no fine, no points. We thanked him profusely, promised responsible law-abiding driving and happily returned to our trek. Yay!

Even with our new dedication to obeying the speed limit, we made good time to Virginia and collected our race items at the expo. Upon checking in at the hotel, we learned that there was a (really nice!) free shuttle to and from the race, that the hotel offered free breakfast early enough for the runners to eat and digest before the race, and that we would not have to check out until 2pm. We went down to the beach for a bit before a really good Italian dinner, and then it was time to rest for the race.

Race-morning weather was perfect. Low- to mid-50s, no wind, overcast and a little humid. Ashley and I went our separate ways at the start line (we both prefer to race alone) and waited for our wave to be released. I had a sub-2 race plan. Run the first mile between 9:15 and 9:20; run the second and third miles at 9:10, run a 9:05 pace through mile 10 and then hold on for dear life. I am forever warning people not to start a distance race too fast. So when I passed the first mile marker and realized I ran it in 8:45, I thought I was doomed. I slowed for the next few miles, but I was still under a 9-minute pace. However, I felt weirdly good. At the 6-mile mark, I looked at my watch and saw 53 minutes had elapsed. I decided at that point to revise my goals. I was going for the sub-90 10-miler, and if that meant I fell apart in the last three miles and missed the sub-2, I would be ok with that.

I continued to feel good through mile 8, which is traditionally where the wheels start to fall off for me in this kind of race. Mile 9 was tougher, but I remembered how close I was to my new goal, and I hung on to capture it. I crossed the 10-mile marker in 89 minutes, more than two minutes faster than my best time.

Mile 11 hurt. I heard a lot of runners in my vicinity voicing their desire for that sub-2 goal, and a few people mentioned at the 10-mile marker that we only had to do a 31-minute 5k to achieve it. Near the end of mile 11, the sun popped out, and it got warm. Boo! But, magically, just a few minutes later it ducked back behind a mass of clouds, and stayed there until almost exactly the moment I crossed the finish line. Yay! That last 5k was hard and slower, but I knew what I wanted and I was going to fight for it.

Approaching the finish line, I had that combination of intense suffering and ecstasy that can only happen when you are having an outstanding race. I saw the finish clock from a distance, and knew for certain that not only would I easily get my sub-2, but if I ran the last bit hard, my clock time (in races unless you are elite you always start at least a few minutes after the race clock is initiated; you actual time is chip time) would be under two hours. Sure enough: clock time 1:59:52, chip time 1:58:05. I stumbled forward happily chirping “big PR!” to the nice volunteers who gave me my medal, a race hoodie, race hat, fluids, pretzels and a shamrock cookie (this event has great swag).

A beaming Ashley found me and announced that her clock time was 1:55. We found out that her chip time was 1:53:27, a nine-minute PR for her. We squealed and hugged, and went into the food tent on the beach to say hi to the Virginia D-Nation folks, who gave us peanut-butter sandwiches and cupcakes, and then collected our beef stew and Yuengling beers from the race volunteers and went to hang on the beach.

A couple of stats that are just killing me right now: My overall placement was 2020 out of 7894 runners. I finished 112 out of 738 women in my age group, and 787 out of 4894 women overall. I beat a majority of the men in the 30-34 age range, which I think of as the most competitive group.

I wanted this. I wanted this deeply, and for years. I worked hard, and I got it. Me, the little chubby kid who couldn’t do anything that didn’t involve a pen. So this was a perfect race, the best race of my life. At least, so far.

Overprogrammed

Just because I haven’t blogged since Poconos almost-half Ironman doesn’t mean I’ve been sitting on my tush gaining weight. Well, ok, I have been doing that, but only in addition to some other races.

It started off well. A week after Poconos I ran a 5k in which I got a 15-second personal record and third place in my age group. Then in November, I ran the Philly Marathon, a race in which I learned that it really sucks to run a full marathon when you did not train for a full marathon. First half = pure running joy; Second half = hoping poachers would declare open season on slow runners and put me out of my misery. In early December I ran the Hot Chocolate 15k at the National Harbor outside of DC. It was the most disastrously organized race I’ve ever done. The schwag was a nice cup of hot chocolate, some chocolate fondue, a cheap ill-fitting windbreaker and a truly nasty cold. Finally, just last week I ran the Disney Marathon. This was, by far, the most fun running event I’ve ever done, and I plan on going back for the Goofy challenge next year (half marathon on Saturday plus the full marathon on Sunday). I learned a word at Disney that will forever dramatically improve my running life: Biofreeze.

In any case, I’ve only been training a few hours a week since Poconos, and I’ve been eating as if I’m preparing for Ironman Kona. Besides eating, my time has been spent signing up for every single race I’ve ever heard of. My spring calendar (so far!) is absolutely ridiculous. It goes like this:

March 18: Shamrock ½ marathon
April 1: Cherry Blossom 10-miler
April 21: 5k for Clean Air
April 27: Out and Back Party Run (4 miles)
May 6: Broad Street Run 10-miler
May 26: Hammonton Sprint Triathlon
June 10: Eagleman Ironman 70.3 (wait list)
June 24: Philly Tri (olympic distance)

The only reason I don’t have my autumn schedule worked out yet is there are too many races on conflicting dates I want to sign up for.

By any standard, it’s too much. It’s too much time; it’s too much money; it’s too much injury risk. It’s nuts. As I was trying to work out my training schedule for this tangled mess, I had an epiphany. I’m self-medicating with races. I would rather blow my savings, my spare time and risk getting mangled than dwell on the very horrifying stressors in my life. Since there are worse methods to use to hide from life, I guess I’ll stick with my crazy race schedule, and even incorporate a bunch of over-the-top goals. For example:

1. I want my sub-2-hour half marathon this year, and I want it at Shamrock.
2. I want a sub-90-minute 10-miler (Cherry Blossom – this means you).
3. I want another PR in a 5k, preferably close to 25 minutes (it’s now at 25:45).
4. I really need to learn how to swim if I’m going to continue to be part of swimming competitions.
5. I have to stop being afraid of my bike.
6. I’ll stick with yoga and core work and weight training. Really, I mean it this time.
7. I want to lose enough weight so the people pictured in finish line race photos with me don’t have to hear “you weren’t any faster than THAT girl?!”

Insane? Absolutely. But not compared to what I'm already thinking about for 2013.