And so it began... My race companion Sandra and I woke up a 4:15 am on Sunday morning, leaving our husbands and children behind to pursue our ambition of becoming 70.3 Iron(wo)men at Lake Winnipesauke. By 5:30, we were sitting in race day traffic and because my morning coffee hadn't kicked in yet, I found myself seriously questioning the decision process that led me to wake up that morning.
But once we arrived at the venue, the sleepiness quickly gave way to race day excitement.
Then a few last minute preparations like packing my bike ride lunch. I got a lot of quizzical looks from my fellow age groupers when they saw me packing a sandwich and hardboiled eggs on my bike... Too bad I didn't think of bacon- it wouldn't have been a bad idea on such a hot day!
Now on to the actual race report.
As I stood in the water waiting till we got called out to the start line, I looked around at the women in my age group (recognizable by their baby blue swim caps), every one of them looked really buff and fit. I wondered if I had accidentally signed up for the wrong age group... all these women look like they could be pros...hmmm. Yikes- I asked one of the girls next to me, and she confirmed that this was indeed "only" the 30-34 age group, but that a few of these gals were usual suspects at 70.3 races. Coach Carlos told me later that the women's age groups between 30 and 40 are the most competitive within the female age groupers because those are the peak years for women in endurance sports performance. No wonder these ladies looked fierce!
The gun went off and after about 600 or 700 meters of kicking and being kicked, I finally settled into a good pace. I felt like I could have pushed a little harder, but thankfully, the thought of the impending bike and run held me back. 36:02 was my official swim time, which means that my pace was roughly 1:51/100 meters.
My transition took 2:33 minutes, but it felt like it flew by. It's odd what your mind hones in on when you are racing. I was so focused on the nutella, peanut butter, honey, banana and salt sandwich that I would get to eat at mile 25, that I forgot to grab my other gels. Oh well, I had my sandwich and there would be aid stations on the course where I would be able to restock on gels.
I rode out of transition, moving my prized sandwich from my aerobars to my back pocket. I was terribly excited to reach mile 25. When mile 25 rolled around, I took the sandwich out of my pocket, only to realize that the paper towel in which it was wrapped had blended into the sandwich!
I desperately tried to de-congeal the paper towel from my precious sandwich, but there was no use- I was not succeeding, and now my bike was covered in peanut butter, nutella and honey. In what seemed to be one of those life defining moments, I was faced with the pivotal decision to either throw away the sandwich or eat it with the paper towel. So I did it. I ate the sandwich AND the paper towel. It tasted heavenly!
After that hurdle was settled, everything else on the bike went alright, though the last half of the bike seemed a lot windier and hillier than the way out. I felt like I could have gone harder during the second half, but Coach Carlos' warned that if I did that, I would likely run out of steam on the run, resulting in a likely DNF.
THANKFULLY I listened To Coach C. The run was brutally hot, but my legs felt ok after the bike. I realized it would be hard to accomplish a sub 2:30hrs half marathon, but if anything, I knew it was the right place and time for a miracle to happen. And it did- in the form of a peer age grouper named Rachel from Boston.
Rachel was also running in a SOAS brand race kit, so we struck up a conversation and chatted about how even if we weren't moving very fast, at least we looked good in our gear. It turned out that Rachel and I were going at the exact same pace, so we chatted about life and took turns in motivating each other to keep going. Had I not met my new running buddy, I'm not sure I would have been able to cross the finish line at 2:24hrs.
All said and done, I am very happy with my 6:09 hrs for the Timberman 70.3 Ironman. I enjoyed every minute of it- including the painful ones, and I want to continue training so that I can get faster and better. Maybe as I age I can also get better at endurance sports...? I've decided my ultimate dream would be to qualify for the world cup in my age group, though with having placed 39 out of 100, that's still pretty far off. But a girl can dream, right?
Thanks to everyone for cheering me along and sending awesome texts, emails and FB notes- I can't elaborate enough on how much those well-wishes fuelled my motivation during the race!
