Ralph's B2B IM Race Report
Ralph’s B2B IM Race Report 10/25/2014
Background :
I have been a team member at EN through 1 outseason. I started off just to get faster at Sprints but moved on to longer races This was my first Iron distance race. I chose this race because it was local and had a swim that was in sheltered water and with the current. My training leading up to the race was per the beginner IM plan and was complicated by the fact that for 4 of the final 6 weeks of the plan, I was driving U-Haul trucks moving my stuff to North Carolina on Sat and Sun and so missed some long rides. Some I was able to reschedule for Fridays but even then, I missed the second weekend ride. This is my first race with a power meter. Based on my race rehearsals, I predicted a swim of approximately 1:10-1:12, a Bike of about 6:30, and a run of about 5 hours.
Based on this I projected a total race time of between 12:30 and 13:00 and would be happy with anything under 13 hours. If I made less than 12:30 I would have been ecstatic. With my move disrupting my training in the 6 weeks prior to the race, I had reconciled myself to “race what a brought” and concentrate on my execution. My biggest goal was to negative split both the bike and the run.
About the course : The race is set up with a split transition. The swim is in the channel behind Wrightsville Beach and runs with the tide. It is a mass start from the south end of the island and travels down the channel to the marina where you get out on the floating dock with ladders and run across the street to T1. The T1 area is a large grassy area with changing tents. The T2 area downtown in the convention center. Mandatory Bike checkin is on Friday for the race on Sat. The Bike course leaves the beach and makes a big loop to the north of town coming back into downtown. The run course leaves the convention center and goes through downtown Wilmington for a double down and back layout to end at the finish downtown. Run aid stations every mile.
The race sports drink on course was Heed. I tried to train with Heed with little success to I made the decision to carry my own nutrition. I trained on Perform so I just decided to be a pack mule rather than experiment with nutrition on Race day.
Thursday: Rolled into town and picked up my Race packet. Met the team members for a nice pre race dinner. Back to the hotel and early to bed.
Friday:
Got up and had a big breakfast of French toast. Did a short easy bike and run to make sure all of the gear was working then packed my T2 bag and checked in my bike. I Hydrated with Perform through the day . Since I had to turn in my T2 bag the day before the race and I was not sure that premixed Perform would still be good 24 hours later, I put dry Perform in my Fuel Belt bottles with the plan to get water at the first aid station on the run and mix them on the run. The weather forecast was calling for high in the 70’s which is much cooler than the temps that I had been training in. To carry my nutrition on the bike, I need a bottle on the bars, 2 on the frame, and a rear bottle carrier for two bottles. My granny bike is an older Trek aluminum frame up-fit with aero bars and bullhorn bars so she is not light to begin with but with 5 bottles, it almost doubles the weight.
I ate lunch (fish tacos with nothing spicy) went back to the hotel to mix up 2.5 gallons of Perform (put it in the fridge) and put my stuff in bags for T1, BSN, and RSN. Stopped by the craft store and bought a pink zebra striped bandanna and cut it into 4 strips to help identify all of my race bags. Cut up a pair of my daughter’s softball socks for arm warmers and rolled them up.
Race Day:
Got up at 2:30 and ate 650 calories of applesauce. Back to bed. Up at 5:00 and into race kit with HR monitor under kit. Sipped some perform and headed to the venue. Trying to be proactive, I let my wife put sunscreen on me before leaving the hotel room. Went to T1 and loaded up the bike with 5 bottles of Perform and set out my helmet and T1 bag. Went to body marking and realized that putting on sunscreen prior to body marking is a mistake. Lots of smudging of numbers. Had a powerbar about an hour before the start and a gel about 15 min before. Swim start was a mass start from the tip of the island. I have had some anxiety in past races and so I set up a little to the outside and swam straight out to the middle of the channel before turning which kept me out of the crowd. Started easy and counted my strokes. Sighting was no real problem and I mostly followed the crowd. I swam 3 count strokes with alternating side breathing.
The tide certainly assisted my usual blazing 2 min per hundred pace. The end of the swim is at the floating dock of the marina where they have ladders to help you get out of the water. I used a wetsuit stripper and ran through the warm shower to get some of the salt off. My swim time of 57:23 was about 15 minutes faster than my expected time. Unfortunately, I forgot to start my Garmin at the beginning of the swim so my swim data for the first of the swim was not captured. T1 went very smoothly as I just put on my helmet, glasses, and shoes and hit the road. It didn’t hurt that I had a prime bike spot right by the exit of the transition. My T1 time was 4:31 which was good enough for first in AG and 31st overall.
http://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/620919613
I took a gel right out of T1 and every 30 min on the bike. The nutrition plan that I had practiced was per EN spreadsheet and called for 2 bottles per hour. This worked well on days when the temps were in the 90’s but on my last RR, the temp was much cooler and I had to pee about 5 times on the bike. After talking with Coach Patrick, we had determined that I would take 2 bottles in the first hour and then back if off to about a bottle and a half per hour thereafter. I stayed on the nutrition plan drinking my Perform and having a gel every 30 minutes just like I practiced. For the first half of the bike, I drank all 5 bottles of Perform and took in 6 gels. I peed on the bike within the first hour and then again at the Bike Special Needs. A BSN, I refilled my bottles with Perform and got more gels. I went easy for the first hour at a power of about 120 watts and then my plan was to increase it to my goal of 150 watts for the remainder of the bike. I found that it was more difficult to keep my power steady over the final half of the bike. If you look at the data file for my bike, you will see lots of spaces where I did not pedal near the end, this was not a problem with position or discomfort but I felt like I need to pee and I was trying to pee on the bike again. I never could make it happen the second time so I just pulled over and went. By the end of the bike, I was starting to have some bloaty feeling and backed off on the gels for the last hour as a result. I was able to drink the perform with no real problem on the bike. My only real problems on the bike were that I dropped the chain coming out of BSN which took a minute to fix and one of my behind the seat bottle holders came loose as I tried to put an empty bottle in it so I was unable to use it. That didn’t really matter since I had emptied that bottle anyway. My total Bike time was 6:27:15 with average power of 136w and VI of 1.05. I did get the negative split on the bike with 3:25:23 for the first 56 miles and 3:01:52 for the last 56 miles.
I arrived at T2 in the convention center and grabbed my bag. The changing rooms are near the bathrooms and I took the opportunity to change into my team kit pants for the run. I used Pearl Izumi pants with a thick pad for the bike but these cause some significant chafe on the run as I found out in RR. Put on socks , running shoes, hat, fuelbelt, and racebelt with gels. My T2 time was 5:04 and was 10th in the AG and 93rd overall. Heading out of T2, I felt pretty good, I had some trouble keeping my pace slow enough and had to consciously work to do so. I had a little trouble getting the first couple of miles slow enough and I grabbed a water and mixed up the perform in my fuel belt. Unfortunately, I was not able to drink much of it. For the first 3 or 4 miles, I tolerated the Perform OK but after the first gel, I started to get a really upset stomach. I could run OK but taking in anything by mouth was not working. Over the next few aid stations, I tried Heed (BAD idea), coke, water, and chicken broth. For a while, Coke worked OK but by the time I was approaching the RSN, chicken broth was the only thing working. My off the cuff calorie count and the fact that I had peed 3 times on the bike suggested that I probably was in little danger of dehydration but I was worried about getting in enough calories. I checked my HR monitor but it said 70 BPM which I knew was wrong. When I checked it later in the run, it was up in the 120’s which is pretty much Zone 3 for me so I just tried to hold it steady. At the end, it was chicken broth and pretzels. I did keep a steady pace even though it was slower than I had wished but I passed Lots of folks walking over the last half of the run. I really had my most difficult time about mile 6 of the run and after that it was just pretty steady on. I didn’t slow down at mile 18 but I wasn’t able to speed up much either. My garmin time is a couple of minutes long on the run because I forgot to stop it at the end. Total run time 5:05:51, first 13 miles 2:30:07 and last 13.3 was 2:35:44. Average run pace 12:03.
Total time 12:45:35
My 2 new favorite things are passing folks late in the bike who are on fancy carbon bikes while I’m on my old granny bike and passing folks with their M dot tattoos who are walking on the run.
Basically, I am pleased with this result. I did not meet my best case time goal of 12:30 but I was under my goal of 13 hours. Overall, I feel pretty good about my execution, My transitions were strong and put me near the top of my age group and top 20% overall. I was able to get the negative split on the bike but did not meet my power goal. I missed the negative split on the run by about 5:30 but was able to hold a steady but slow pace overall. I felt like I still had a little left in the tank and I never really got to the place where life sucked even when I had some belly pain. I am taking that to mean that I didn’t go hard enough on the run.
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