Eric's IMWI Race Report
2010 Ironman Wisconsin Race Report
This was my 1st Ironman and it was awesome to say the least.
Despite thinking I would not sleep I slept well on Saturday night. I woke up at 2AM and consumed two Myoplex vanilla shakes for about 500 calories. At 4AM I got up for the day and ate a banana and drank one more Myoplex shake. My wife marked my arms with patience and discipline for reminders on the bike to stick to the plan. I marked my right leg with WTGU (Would Trent Give up). I dressed in my race gear and morning warm clothes then headed over to drop off my special needs bags. Once I took care of special needs I headed over to transition. At Transition I topped off the air in my bike tires and placed an EN sticker over my valve stem opening on my disc wheel cover so as not to give up any seconds by loss of aeroness . Next I filled my aero bottle with water and dumped my Infinite into my speed fill. Then I was off to get my body marked. Body marking went pretty smooth. Once done with transition I went into the conference center and headed down one floor to use the bathroom. (Nemo’s secret) There was hardly a line at all so things went quickly. After using the bathroom I sat down along the wall in the conference room and read all the letters of encouragement from my friends and family on facebook. At around 6:15 I headed back outside and met my family on the helix that lead down to the swim start.
Once I found the family I put my wetsuit on, shot a gel, and prayed with them. I gave all of them kisses and hugs and headed down the helix to the start. On the way down I ran into fellow ENers Jim Hansen, Trevor Garson, and Beth Schwindt. It was cool to see them before getting into the water. I wished them luck and headed across the timing mat and into the water. The water felt cold on my hands and feet but not freezing. I swam out to the area just before the ski jump ramp and began to tread water. This was the area that after to talking to people seemed like a great place to seed myself. I had swam in the pool a 1:20 during race rehearsal. Most of the people around me said they were swimming about a 1:15. The area was starting to fill up fast. I saw Dave Williams in the water, wished him luck and told him I would see him at the finish line. At about 5 min. before the cannon went off people were still getting into the water. The area I was in was getting very congested. When the cannon did go off the washing machine began the agitation cycle!
The entire first loop of the swim was nothing but bumping, kicking and getting slapped into the head by the other athletes. It was completely crazy, I had never experienced this type of a swim ever. I was surprised that people weren’t swimming right over the top of me. I found myself swimming into the back of people’s feet constantly. The second loop thinned out some but there was still a lot of bumping and kicking going on. I only was kicked in the goggle one time which was a miracle. The swim seemed to go quickly I was surprised to round the last buoy and head in.
Once I left the water I ran over to the wetsuit strippers but ended up not needing any assistance. I stripped right out of my suit quickly. Once the suit was off I was running up the helix. I passed several people that were walking instead of running. I was excited to have the swim done and get onto the bike. I ran by my family smiling and waving. Life was good!
I ran into T1 grabbed my transition bag and headed for the changing room. I dumped my transition bag out on the floor then shoved my wet suit, swim cap and goggles into the bag. I slipped on my bike helmet, sun glasses and grabbed my shoes then it was out the door to the bike. I ran bare foot to my bike and then put on my shoes. Once my shoes were on I grabbed the bike and ran with it to the exit helix. I was a little surprised that the entrance to the helix wasn’t more congested. I mounted the bike and down the helix I went onto the bike course.
My plan was to completely take it easy the 1st hour of the bike. I settled into the aero position and watched as people just hammered themselves past me going out to the first loop. My goal watts were as follows:
155 for the down hills and 1st hour
160 goal watts
169 long hills
177 short hills
That 1st hour I was riding about 138 to 150 watts. I was cruising along at about 18+ miles per hour. The other riders were blasting by me. I came up to the first hill on the “stick” and was further left behind. I slowed way down watching the watts while everyone else stood up in their peddles and pushed right to the top of the hill. I did chuckle some when I did catch back up to some of them on the downhill while they were coasting and recovering. It went on this way for almost the entire course. After the first hour I began to take sips off of my speedfill every 15-20 minutes or so. The speed fill holds 40 ozs so I was only taking about 1 oz of liquid at a time. I had a 5 hour mix od Infinit in the speedfill which is 1375 caories. I drank water from the aero bottle as needed. When I was leaving Verona I saw Coaches RnP with Matt riding the course backwards. Right by the first overpass on the course I saw a couple of EN members cheering me on. It was really cool to have the support out there. When I made it out to Old Sauk I watched the group that I had been with kill themselves up the climb. A guy in his late fifties slowed up beside me long enough to ask me if I was eating the paste. I kindly said no just racing my plan. The next two climbs he ask me the same thing. I was really ready to run him off the road by then but I just smiled and said no just racing my plan. The Midtown climb was cool there were a whole bunch of team members there yelling and cheering. Noodle was telling me I was doing great, take it easy, and don’t blow the watts. Those climbs weren’t tough but it was hard to keep the watts down. All the spectators besides the team wanted me to muscle up the hills. I just kept a smile on my face and kept spinning up the hill. When I came into Vernona I was feeling great. I rode through the festival area and didn’t see my family but heard them yelling at me. Starting the second loop I was pleased by how good I felt. When I rode the course back in July it was tough and it taught me a lesson. I was prepared for it this time though and the plan was working. It was a slightly different story on the second loop. Riders would still leave me behind on the climbs but on the descents I would smoke them and never see them again. When I rode across the timing mat just past the Uphill grind coffee & bike shop a girl rider cut me off at the railroad tracks. I yelled Wooo and she asked what wrong. I told I almost ran right into her. Right when she cut me off it caused me to hit the railroad tracks real hard. I passed her but after about a hundred yards my rear wheel sounded funny. I quickly stopped and took a look at it. All the screws that held the disk cover on the wheel were either broken or missing. I thought “WTF”! I didn’t even hesitate; I just ripped the thing right off the wheel without even taking the wheel off the frame. I realized I couldn’t take the pieces with me so I just left it lay alongside the road. Oh well I had to get back into the race! I felt great when I hit Verona and started the stick back. There were many riders that I just blew by. I moved up in the overall from 1200 at the swim to 977. That’s 223 places, hard to believe.
T2 was fast. Ran in grabbed the bag on the way to the changing room. Dumped my bag out threw my bike gear in. Put my visor, socks, and shoes on. Grabbed my Garmin and it was out the door. Started syncing my Garmin and made a pit stop at the porta- john then started heading toward the run out. My Garmin was taking forever to sync. I had synced the day before hoping that it would help but obviously it didn’t. While I was waiting for the Garmin to sync I saw my family cheering me on like crazy. My wife was able to snap a couple of pictures of me standing there waiting for my watch. Finally I said the hell with it I’m heading out. As soon as I went across the timing matt the watch synced up and was ready. Go figure.
The run started out great. I felt great; it was hot out but not terrible. People seemed like they were sprinting by me. I let them go thinking what the coaches had said-“If you are doing the opposite of everyone else you are doing the right thing”. I kept a close eye on my Garmin the first 6 miles. At first I thought it wasn’t reading right. My first 6 miles were to be at 9 min.pace but my Garmin was reading 6:30-7:30 miles. I asked a guy next to me what his watched read. He confirmed that mine was correct. I drop off the pace immediately even though it felt like I was almost walking. At the first aid station I walked 10 steps while drinking some Perform to slow down even more. After the first three miles I had settled into a nice easy pace. At mile 6 I stepped up the pace to 8:30 pace. I was able to hold that for quite a while. When I saw the team at mile 18 on the first loop it was a riot! They had music going and the whole pink Speedo thing just cracked me up. It was a great motivator. When I started the second loop of the run course I could tell it was going to be a hard second loop. At about mile 17-1/2 I beginning to have some pain. Right after mile 18 I was hurting bad. I began just focusing on getting to the next aid station so I could walk for 30 steps. Then after mile 20 I had to start walking half way between the aid stations. This went on until mile 24-1/2 when I decided I was going to just finish running the race. At that point it hurt just as bad to walk as it did to run anyway. I can truly say that I was not prepared for how much pain there was. At mile 25 aid station I was drinking some water and Gina tapped me from behind and told me I could make it and that I was almost there. This was a tremendous boost for me. I pushed on until I came through the finish line. I was an Ironman.
My final numbers were as follows:
SWIM BIKE RUN OVERALL RANK DIV.POS.
1:19:19 6:15:42 4:41:00 12:31:23 833 138
Swim
PACE 2:05/100m
RANK 1200
DIV.POS. 175
TOTAL SWIM
2.4 mi. (1:19:19)
BIKE SPLIT 1
40 mi. (2:16:30)
17.58 mph
BIKE SPLIT 2
43 mi. (2:21:48)
18.19 mph
BIKE SPLIT 3
29 mi. (1:37:24)
17.86 mph
TOTAL BIKE
112 mi. (6:15:42)
17.89 mph
Rank: 977
Div/Pos:157
RUN SPLIT 1
6.35 mi. (56:50)
8:57/mile
RUN SPLIT 2
6.65 mi. (1:02:45)
9:26/mile
RUN SPLIT 3
6.23 mi. (1:09:08)
11:05/mile
RUN SPLIT 4
6.97 mi. (1:32:17)
13:14/mile
TOTAL RUN
26.2 mi. (4:41:00)
10:43/mile
Rank 833
Div/pos138
TRANSITION
TIME
T1: SWIM-TO-BIKE
9:12
T2: BIKE-TO-RUN
6:10
Watt numbers from the bike:
Work: 3177kJ
TSS: 252
Np: 150
I trained for what seemed like a year for this one day and I was blessed when it all came together. I want to thank my wife and family for all the patience they had for me while I was logging in all the hours of training. I would like to thank all my friends that have supported me along the way. Thank you to all the church members and friends that prayed for me on race day.
It has been a great journey and one that I’m going to repeat.
Comments
Eric, by the sound of your report u are amoung the few that didn't get sick or dehyrated!! You had a great race for your first IM!! Whenever I saw you, u looked strong! Fun meeting you and talking on the different occassions we had. Great job, great execution!
OMG, Eric, those RR tracks near the Uphill Grind are what did my bars in that final time!!! What's up with that I wonder? It's like the final bit of jangling that the bike can take if there's something fluky going on. Way to rip off that wheel cover!!!
A great day could not have happened to a greater guy. You worked for every minute of that success, and executed the day perfectly. Congratulations! It was a pleasure to meet you and make friends in person, and to share this entire journey with you in training.
The same RR tracks tossed both my nutrition bottles and I had to stop and go back for them. One bottle was mostly empty and the second bottle was my full nutrition bottle for the second lap, the top on that bottle broke off and dumped bunch of my nutrition. Suffice to say, I'm not a fan of those tracks either. I did the exact same thing on the start of the run too, looked down and couldn't believe I was running 6:50s before I completely put the brakes on.
You looked good out there when I saw you, I'm glad you had a good race and enjoyed it enough to do another one. I had no idea if I'd ever want to do another Ironman after this, but I've been sitting around all week going wishing/plotting/planning about the possibility of doing another one in 2011 instead of my original plan of waiting until 2012.
great job sticking to the plan and hanging in there in the end! you did it!