Paul Hough - IM Louisville return to form!
Ironman Louisville … returning to
form
11:41:51, 8th M55-59
IMLOU was my 9th IM and 3rd time with
a top 10 finish. After very difficult
races in 2013 (finishing Cozumel with a pneumonia) and 2014 (walking most of
the run at Florida due to stress fractures) all I wanted for Louisville was a
time around 12 hours. With all the talk
of the hills on the bike leg, I was thinking that even 12:30 would be OK. I did not even set specific goals for any
portion of the race. I was just going to
execute and see what the day would bring.
Swim – 1:12:03
This was my first ever, non-mass IM start and I loved
it. I had no intention of waiting for
hours in the cold to get a starting position near the front. Instead, I did not even start putting on my
wetsuit until the race started at 7:30am.
I have always raced with a simple Ironman Timex watch to mark my total
time through the day, but for this race, I skipped the watch and probably didn’t
start until after 8am. Without a mass
start I was able to start slow and then build to just under my anaerobic edge. There was lots of room in the canal and only
the occasional fast swimmer flying by.
Since the water was relatively warm compared to the air temperature,
there was a low thin fog above the water making it difficult to sight but it
was easy to just follow the swimmers up the middle of the canal. Eventually we cleared it and I finally saw
the red turn buoy. I turned the buoy on
the dime without any scrum and then picked up the pace coming down the
river. Only when I hit the two bridges
towards the end did I run into a lot of swim traffic as I was catching a
critical mass of those who had started ahead of me. At the end of the swim, there were catchers
pulling you up onto the steps to exit.
Without benefit of a watch I didn’t know my time but I felt I had a good
swim. At 58 years old, the 72 mins was
right on par with my normal swim on a good day in years past so this was just
fine.
T1 – 6:48
I thought my transition times were slow, but Louisville does
not have a quick set-up. As you ran
through the swim exit balloon after coming up the steps, the wetsuit strippers
were just on your left. I had an
excellent young man get mine off very quickly, then I jogged the roughly 200
yards to the changing tent. You do go over a very short canal bridge with
several steps up and down. I walked
those…no need to face plant on the concrete early in the race. My T1 bag was easy to find since so many were
ahead but there was a line just to get into the changing tent so I put on my
gear right outside the entrance. I had
arm warmers but left them in the bag and took only the gloves to deal with the
cool morning temperatures (probably low 50s about this time). Then I went into the tent, dropped my bag,
and right out to the porta-potty to take a leak. I grabbed my bike and started the long jog
out to the road and mount line while passing many folks who were walking.
Bike – 5:39:04
As soon as I got on the bike and started my Edge 500 I got a
warning that my battery was low.
Fortunately, it lasted the entire ride (with no further warnings) and my
Garmin might have been getting a signal from someone else’s power meter at the
start line. The bike course was very
congested the first 30 miles but folks were just trying to race their own race
and I did not see any pelotons form. The
time trial start is also wonderful for minimizing drafting. I was surprised at the number of people who
I thought were way overdressed. Folks
were wearing vests and jackets all ballooned out from the wind. My new sleeved EN tri suit dried quickly and
gave me some protection and I kept the gloves until about 35-40 miles and
pitched them at a water stop. I followed
my watts, pushing the downhills and gearing down appropriately on the uphills
trying not to spike the watts on the upper portions of the steeper hills. Lots of people were dropping chains
throughout the course on every significant uphill. The last 30 miles I ran into the wind and a
lot of vehicles which affected my time but I felt very good and knew that I had
ridden my should-pace, not my could-pace.
T2 – 7:52
This was pretty much the reverse of T1. I handed off my bike with my bike shoes still
in the pedals. In retrospect, I could
have run better in the cleats than barefoot on the concrete. I got my run bag and this time there was
plenty of room in the tent. I sat down
to put my gear on, but should have remained standing to do it
faster. A volunteer took my bag and I
jogged out of the tent straight to the porta-potties for my 2nd and
last pee of the race. I now had my
Garmin 620 on and started it as I ran behind the changing tents. It wasn’t clear to me where T2 ended and the
run started, but I was within the mile marks on the course by 10 yards so I
must have had it right.
Run – 4:36:04
This was the big unknown for me. I’ve worked hard in the last year to come
back from 2 stress fractures and a torn muscle that dropped me to the street
before IMFL 2014, but I ran out of time this year before the summer heat
came. From July to race day my longest
run was only 15 miles at 11 min mile pace as I staggered in the humidity. I thought I might be able to run between
10-11 min miles at Louisville but was hoping that the good weather would give
me a boost. I kept thinking “stupid slow”
the first mile and had a 9:30. Then I
popped a 7:45. It sure didn’t feel that
fast, but there it was on my 620...like a speeding ticket. I
slowed down more and starting dialing in around 9 to 9:15. By 4 miles my right foot was on fire, but not
from a blister. I moved my foot around
in my shoe, adjusted my stride, and took some calcium tabs, but it kept getting
worse. I started pouring ice water
directly on my right shoe at the aid stations and that didn’t help either. Meanwhile, I seem to have found a running form
that I hadn’t had in a long time on the way to the first turn back to
downtown. But a mile after that my foot
was hurting so bad I wondered if I could finish. Finally, I thought my elastic laces must be
too tight so I stopped for a couple of minutes to work the knot out and then
loosen them up. That was the
problem! I had instant relief, but the
damage was done and the pain persisted in lesser intensity through-out the
run. I thought I was slowing worse than
I really was, but ended up with a 10:32 mile pace that was actually faster than
any runs I did between 10-15 miles in Tampa this summer. My
execution up to the run was EN-worthy, and although my run started to fast, I
think the result was in line with my fitness.
The finish in Louisville at Fourth Street Live was simply
amazing. In the final blocks, all the
suffering was suddenly worth it.
Despite my subpar run, this was my best time since 2011 and I’m in a
good position to continue rebuilding my run now that we are almost out of
summer in Tampa. I want to be able to
run much longer with the form I had the first 10 miles. Going forward, I plan to make sure that I get
at least one long run per month in the summer by scheduling travel and races to
some place with cooler temperatures.
EN was the Division 1 Team Champion at IM Louisville which
was great since we had a lot of mojo going.
Next up – 20th anniversary edition of Ironman Switzerland!
Comments
Glad your medical issues seem to be behind you.
What's next for you? With stronger run focus/training you have to be knocking on the KQ door, no?
It's funny about the swim, some people had a rough one and some reported like you of no contact. I really wish I'd started at the back, was too worried about the finish time.
So true about the overdressed people, the woman in the pink parka! Agree on the finish line fantastic. Congrats again on an awesome race.
So impressive!
Ps I hate those elastic laces...give me real shoe laces with the toggles any time!
All - thanks for the support. I was so buzzed for a few days I kept thinking about doing IMFL anyway, but finally talked myself down off that ledge. I would rather finish my recovery so I can get back to run training right away.
nice work.
i look forward to you getting your run back up there. and maybe beyond.
a trip for me to Switzerland next year would be neat but probably going to stick with Canada on the same day.
maybe see you in texas for 2017 for the cooler month.
I think next year we're gonna get the Paul I saw on the run in IM AZ 2010. Maybe not the same time, but the same guy who was able to put together a great run training build on top of a strong bike and a fearless swim. I can feel the pride you have in your tenacity and gritfeel