SS IMTX Race Report
Goal: 11:25 Actual: 11:10 About an hour faster that the last one and warmer temps.
Great plan, great coaching, and a great team with excellent mentors led to huge improvements.
Swim w/ wetsuit goal 1:30 - 1:25 Actual 1:23 (even with swimming a little extra)
Swim was not as bad as I had imagined considering this was my 3rd mass start IM swim. I kept repeating over and over in my head to stay in my box, count my strokes, rotate, focus, over and over, swim buoy to buoy, etc..... I started back behind the main front line and swam straight the first 700-800M but somehow got redirected and swam over to the incoming side of the buoys then back to the outgoing buoys, so swam a little extra and still stayed within my target time. The whole swim I felt the sensation of moving faster than accustomed due to the wetsuit and refocusing on form. While definitely a slow time by most standards, I was elated to finish the dreaded swim leg without a disastrous long time.
T1 - 4 minutes - only about twice as fast as my past. I listened to the advice given, ran straight through the tent, out the other side, dumped the bag out on the ground, handed my wetsuit and goggles to a nice volunteer and sprinted with Helmet on to the bike. Ran with bike to mount line and then put my shoes on and was off to take care of business. The wetsuit strippers had a rough time getting my wetsuit off though they were frantically engaged and committed......
Bike - Goal 5:25 Actual 5:16 on a .74 IF I was glued to the PM like a Gerbil on crack! Passed hundreds on the bike. Wind was wearing people down on the back half but, for me, the time was flying by and I new I was making good time if I could just hold. I held the fist 40 miles at a .72 and then just managed from there forward to a total .74 given I knew I was going to come in sub 5:30 and landed right on my Goal TSS of 285. At mile 60 I had to stop the Perform because I was drinking bottles at each aid station and taking it in too fast. I went with water and salt pills and my stomach cleared up on the back half. Peed like 3 times on the bike.
T2 - 5 minutes - same routine as T1 but forgot to take my watch off the bike quick release and had to go back, find the bike with the volunteer and retrieve the watch......glad I did. Hat, belt, shoes and off I went.....
Run Goal was 4:20 Actual: 4:18 Walked every aid station and focused on 9:30 pace. Source of strength seeing Coach P out there on the course. Perform, Ice, water, sponges at each aid station, then repeat. At mile 18, hit a wall, forgot to use Ice and Water and felt the heat on to mile 19 as I went through my own little hell at that point. Took 10 seconds to pee at mile 19, refocused, got pissed off and moved forward.......Began COKE, water and salt pill at mile 20 and started to come out of my hole and was able to hold until the end.
Coming into the final shoot another male in my AG began to race me and passed me........I took off in a sprint (which I was surprised to see I had in me.) Crowd went wild and got loud to see two sprinting each other........ He cramped up halfway there, my sprint held up fortunately and EN represented well in that last battle coming through!
Miserably hard (as expected) and wonderful at the same time. My greatest memory of this IM is of the team, the individual personalities, and the great teammates I met and got to know. Priceless!
Comments
KMF Man...x2 on everything TC said! You ARE a natural born leader, and were perfect for this group. I can't tell you how much you encouraged me and knew what a rookie needed to hear and when. You are gentlemen and a scholar too!
Great race for you, and I'm glad you didn't snap your peroneal tendon trying to sprint! Your consistent run splits, esp the latter miles is impressive, and that's what I need to do next time.
I sure hope we get to train and race together again soon. IMChoo 2015?....IMLP 2015?...IMCdA 2015?
Congrats on your race and your PR! And thanks for representing in the chute :-) Did you get a video? :-)
@Tim - you keep raising the bar and we will keep chasing........Thanks for the kind words.
@Jeff - contemplating 2015 Lake Placid or 2015 Canada.........Pick one for me and will see u there bro.....
@ Coach R - no video.......supposedly video quality is blurry at those speeds.....LOL......Thanks for building this great Haus!
You were so instrumental in the success of this IMTX team. Truly, you stepped up and lead us all to the finish line. Im so thankful and grateful to you. You da man!!
Congrats to you and continued success to you as you crush your next IM!
Annie
So happy and proud of your performance. Your swim and bike were exactly what we knew they would be. Your next big obstacle - to me- is unleashing that run. I saw your training miles, your paces and your splits, which on many days were blowing away my efforts. You have a sub-4 waiting for you as soon as you believe it and own it. Once that topples, so does 11, and you'll be off to the races. In terms of the swim, well . . . we don't have time for that here. But there's a 15-minute gain there too.
I'm hoping that Brenda will let me start an IMNZ team thread, so that you can post daily motivational posts and faux workout results to keep me motivated on the way to Taupo.
Let's find a race next year to reconvene the group. This was too much fun for one-and-done.
Congrats, my friend. I'm deeply indebted for the experience you helped create that was . . . IMTX.
Great Race! Way to push through at the end.
Thanks for inviting me to join the team. I've learned a lot about how to race an IM in two months.
Strong work - you were very well trained, to hit 074 on the bike, and then hold on during the run. "Took 10 seconds to pee at mile 19, refocused, got pissed off …" Heh-heh - isn't that redundant?
It's amazing how we always have a hidden burst of energy available even at the end of an IM - again shows the value of the specifics of our training.
@ Al - thank you for those generous words. I love the quote on your signature line.
@All - I don't know what to say other than, for me, meeting each one of you, getting to know you and watching each of you accomplish this in your own ways was THE source of strength for me. Each one of you are very unique, strong, smart individuals, obviously. Look at what you just accomplished.
Please don't let this be the last time we all reconvene and go through this journey. This was too awesome to happen just once!
I look forward to battling again through this journey very soon with you all!
SS
Very nice one you wrote, short and higlighting all the key things. Amazing that you were able to beat every one of your goals and even sprint to the finish, we were really close at several points of the race and when we passed each other a couple of times during the bike I could really tell you were completely in the box pushing that 0.74!
Congratulations and thanks for your leadership and guidance during the IMTX training final stretch, I loved the titles for each one of the weeks like "The Grind!" Hope to meet you in one of my next races.
Thanks a bunch for leading our collective charge.