IMLP Race Report (Official)

The following is an executive summary of this blog and my race report. 
If you've been reading my blog throughout the year, thanks for the support. 
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
I don’t quite remember how or when the IRONMAN seed was planted in my head but last year I found myself at IRONMAN Lake Placid as a spectator. After spending the day watching roughly 2400 athletes swim, bike and run for the majority of a sweltering, hot day, I was infected by their passion, determination and perseverance and decided to sign up for IMLP 2013 the next day. 

It sounds so easy,: “just sign up”. But it was probably one of the hardest parts of my IM journey. Signing up meant standing in line for 2-3 hours. And standing in line for 2-3 hours meant listening to others around me talk about their various tri experiences to-date. And listening to other people’s tri experiences made me think of my lack of tri experience (read: an expired NLS certification from 1998, one RLCT completed two years ago, and a couple of half marathons). And thinking of my lack of tri experience made me want to walk out of that line. And I almost did – about five times. But I didn’t. I stayed in the line. And I signed up. 

The month of August was spent coming to terms with the enormity of the task in front of me. In September I started to train. It went something like this:

Train, train, train. Feelin’ good. Train, train, train. Feelin’ bleh. Train, train, train. “I’m going to rock this thang!"  Train, train, train.  “Holy crap, I’m going to get rocked!”  Train, train, train.

And all of a sudden it was July 28, 2013. 
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RACE REPORT:

THE SWIM
I woke up at 4:30 am having gotten a decent night’s rest. The weather was overcast but the thundershowers they had been predicting all week were holding out. I had breakfast (2 hard boiled eggs, 2 pieces of toast with PB). Put on my swimsuit, my timing chip and my sweats. Grabbed my morning bag - currently with wetsuit, goggles and swim cap (this would be swapped out with my sweats when I got to the beach). Double checked I had all my nutrition, and my special needs bags, then headed to town. 

Bodymarked and getting
ready to warm up.

Got to transition, checked my gear bags and added my nutrition. Left transition, got body marked, then headed to drop off my special needs bags. Special needs bags are available to athletes at the half way mark of the bike and the run. You can put anything in them. Spare tubes, food, clothes. In my bike special needs I had some extra energy bars, shammy cream, extra tyre tubes and C02 canisters. That's about it. In my run special needs I had some candy, a bag of chips, a long sleeve shirt, an extra pair of socks, and another gel belt full of gels. At about 6:15 I slipped on the wet suit, took a gel, and got in the water for a quick warm up swim. I was back on the beach and packed in with the masses by 6:30 when the shot went off for the PROs to start. I then proceeded to wait. 

IMLP swim start.
That's me. Near the back. In the pink swim cap.

With IMLP being one of the races trying out the new SWIMSMART initiative this year, once the PROs started, instead of all the age group swimmers entering the water at the same time, we entered the water in a rolling fashion based on expected swim time. I was expecting to finish somewhere around 1h50 so I was near the back of the pack. I entered the water around 6:50. 

Given the new swim start and the fact that I was closer to the back of the pack, I thought I’d have a pretty uneventful swim but not so. In the first loop, there was a lot of contact with other swimmers and I felt really swum over. I'm guessing this was because we entered the water just before that first swimmers started their second loop. But I won’t complain too much because during the second loop, it cleared up quite a bit. I was able to swim the cable, never had to sight and came out of the water at around 1h30 – a whole 20 minutes faster than my average beach-to-beach time. Bam! Added bonus: Mike Reilly called my name as I came out of the water. Double fist pump! Got peeled (it took two people to get my suit off it was so tight) and headed for transition.

TI:
15 minute transition time. Boo :( 
I did a full change so I was expecting something high, but not that high. I had hoped to at least improve on my 70.3 transition time but instead I up'd it by 5 min. I blame it on getting stuck in my sports bra (not an easy thing to put on while wet) and having to take a 5 min. pee before getting on my bike. Definite room for improvement.

THE BIKE
Key thoughts heading into the bike: 
(1) Stay ahead of my nutrition: Check. 
(2) Negative split: Not so much.

Having bonked on a training ride a week prior, nutrition was top of mind for me, more so than ever before. I had a gel in transition and then ate half a LARABAR about 15 min. into the course and then another half bar every half hour. I took a piece of banana at every aid station and went through three bottles of PERFORM, each with a NUUN tablet. 

I am so thankful for my earlier trips to LP and familiarizing myself with the course. I split it into five parts in my head (climb out of town & descent; Jay & Upper Jay; Ausable Forks; Wilmington; Bears & Cherries) and just started checking them off. First loop was done before I knew it. Took a peak at my watch and freaked myself out a bit when I saw my time (15 min. faster than any of my training rides … with others pulling me.) Thought I may have over done it and would surely blow up on the second loop or the run so toned it down a bit on the second loop. Five parts: check, check, check – potty break (I tried SO HARD to pee on the bike but it just wouldn’t happen) – check, check. 

One of several signs my support crew had set up along
the bike course.  Seeing and reading all the different signs
is such a great distraction at one of the toughest parts of the course.

T2
7 minutes. Meh. Not much to say. More room for improvement.
Seems like a long time just to change my shirt, shoes, put on a gel belt and a hat.  Mind you I had to take another epic pee. Otherwise, the volunteers are amazing. I had just dumped my bag when a volunteer asked if I needed help and not really thinking I just said “no thanks, I’m good”. But bless her heart she ignored me and just started taking things and handing them to me or putting them on me.

Part of my loyal support crew. Passed out.
Being a spectator is tiring. Seriously!

THE RUN
Grr … this is the part that bugs me the most looking back on it now. I ran about the first 6-7 km and then started a cycle of run/walk. I can't help but think it was only mental fatigue vs. true physical fatigue because it was never a struggle to start running again and I still managed to run the hills each time so I obviously had it in the tank. 

Getting some words of encouragement from my hubby
as I head into my second loop of the run course.

Regardless, I was pretty happy during the whole run. My nutrition was still on track and no stomach problems (a gel every half hour, a cup of water and a cup of Gatorade at each aid station and some chicken broth on the second loop) and it looked like I was actually going to finish around 14 hrs when at the beginning of the day, I was questioning whether 15 hrs was possible. If I ever had a down moment, it was at the start of the second loop. I could taste the finish but still had about 2.5 hrs to go. That seemed like a really long time, despite already having completed about 12hrs. But I started talking to a fellow athlete and quickly forgot about it. 

IRONMAN: Complete!
Official chip time: 14:08

The final turnaround on Mirror Lake was a beautiful sight. I conjured all the energy I had left and decided I’m running the rest of the way – no if/buts about it. Not too difficult given all the cheering fans. They're energy literally carries you to the finish. 

Running into the stadium was CRAZAY! Music is blarring, everyone - and I mean everyone - is screaming your name as you pass by. I remember coming around the final corner looking towards the arch, and a kid literally slides horizontally out of the crowd like on some kind of conveyor belt. (It was a family friend sticking out one of their kids. My support crew didn’t want me to miss that they were there.) I gave Erica (friend’s daughter) a high five and then ran through the arches. Funny, now that I think about it, I remember Mike Reilly saying my name but I don’t remember the ‘YOU. ARE. AN. IRONMAN!’ part. Doesn’t matter I suppose. I've got the medal to prove it :)

ONE week to go ...

(Summary of July 21 - July 27)

I sometimes loose myself in my work and when that happens, I typically don't sleep enough, eat particularly well, etc, etc. To prevent this from happening before my race, I took the week off before my race and headed to Lake Placid. I figured it would be the perfect place to relax (my hubby and I go there regularly for short vacations) and do the last bits of my training. So Sunday we packed up my father-in-law's trailer and headed out.

Our home-away-from-home the last week before IMLP.

Monday
I had an hour-long run scheduled. During it, I had to go to the bathroom something fierce. While scoping out some bushes to duck behind, I rolled my ankle off the shoulder of the road. I stopped immediately and dropped a few choice curse words. I took a few tentative steps. Seemed ok. Took a few tentative running strides. Phew. It still seemed ok so, I finished my run.

Ready for my first swim in Mirror Lake.
Gah! Look at those huge flipper feet!

Tuesday 
Today was my last full distance swim. I was to do two full loops of the swim course (essentially what I would be doing on race day). This was my first time in Mirror Lake and my first time checking out this "cable" everyone talks about.

The "cable" is just that, a cable that runs about 3 feet under the water and holds all the buoys along the course. Everyone talks about "swimming the cable" meaning swimming close enough to see the cable to whole time so you never have to sight, you just follow the cable. This saves time. That day, when I swam the cable, I shaved 15 minutes off my average 3.8km time. I was blown away.

Wednesday 
I had an hour-long ride scheduled. I headed for the flat section of the course for some intervals and then ended by doing the Wilmington hill just to remind myself what it would feel like. There was quite a strong head wind on the flats but I powered through and going up Wilmington felt the same as it had before (just dropped to my low gears and spun it out), so some of my pent up worry over loosing those earlier three weeks of training started to ebb. Somewhere on the ride though I lost my bike computer. Grrr!

Thursday
Worst day ever. In a nut shell, my hubby had an allergic reaction to something (we still don't know what) and swelled up like a balloon. I was in town, having just completed my Athlete Check-in (getting my swag bag, athlete bracelet, signing waivers, getting weighed) when I got a call from my husband asking if I could please pick up some Benadryl and head back to the campsite because he's swelling up and having a little trouble breathing. WHAT?! I wasn't scheduled for a workout that day but I definitely got my heart rate up x1000. Turned out the nice people at the KOA took care of him and he was looking (and breathing) normal again by the time I skidded into the parking lot.

Friday 
I headed back into town to attend some seminars arranged for the athletes. The most significant one was about the new swim start.

In previous years, the swim at LP was a mass start (i.e. the gun goes off, everyone's time starts and, unless you're cool with waiting five minutes for the masses to clear, you have to fight for a line of swim). I had heard more than a few horror stories of people getting kicked or hit in the face, swum over, etc. etc. You can imagine this caused a lot of athletes some anxiety. So the good people at IRONMAN had thought up a new way of starting the swim and were testing it out at a few specific races this year. IMLP was one of those races.

The new swim start would be a rolling start based on expected swim time. Athletes that expected to finish under an hour would enter the water first, then those that expected to finish between 1h and 1h10 would enter next, etc, etc. Three key benefits are (1) you enter the water with less people (2) you enter the water with people that are similar in pace so you shouldn't really be swum over (3) your timing chip is only activated when you pass a timing mat at the entrance to the water.

For the whole thing to work out though, athletes really needed to seed themselves honestly. And that's what the race directors were trying to stress the whole time. There were a few IM vets that didn't like the change though. Something about not knowing where your competition is. But meh, it didn't bother me. I wasn't vying for a spot at KONA.

Saturday
After checking my bike and gear bags into transition, I went back to the site to relax and spend some time with friends who had come up to watch the race. I got a pleasant surprise in the afternoon when everyone showed up wearing custom t-shirts. So sweet!!!

My support crew,
minus three crucial members
(Brenda, Joan & Vickie)

TWO weeks to go ....

(Summary of July 13 - July 21)

I had been having some issues with my coaching in late June and had briefly mentioned this to my tri-mom when I did my first beach-to-beach swim in early July. Whether she mentioned this to her coach (who had swam with us that morning) I don't know but, ever since then her coach totally took me under her wing and did everything she could to make me feel 100% prepared for my race: she gave me a second opinion on my July training schedule (i was scheduled to do too much), invited me to her group training sessions, answered numerous questions (based on her experience of doing 8 IMs!), and even included me in a send off she organized for her other athletes that were doing IMLP). I am eternally grateful.

Sweet Swag Bag from Bring on the Bay!

At the reco of my tri-mom and her coach, on Saturday I did Bring on the Bay - a local 3K open water swim event. Great event, very well organized, and it provided me with a taste of what the IMLP swim might be like (i.e. lots of bodies around me, getting jostled about, and having to navigate through/around other swimmers). I did it in 1h15. About 24 min. a kilometer. If I managed that pace in the IM, I’d be out of the water in 1h40. Sweet.

I followed the swim with a 70km ride. It should have been 120km but I ran out of time. I made up for it the next day with a 2h30 run followed by a 2h ride. I won’t lie. It felt like crap. I had a good cry - again, thinking I wasn't ready. My husband tried to placate me, saying it was likely because of the sweltering weather and the fact that I was still getting over my earlier bug but ... I could not be consoled. I was convinced that my chances of completing the IM were very low. I didn’t really speak of this to anyone though as I was horrified that someone might agree with me. Anyway, I sucked it up and continued that week ...

Monday - off
Tuesday - run
Wednesday - ride
Thursday - off
Friday - beach to beach
Saturday - long ride + short run.

Saturday was to be my last long ride (90km) and I figured I would do it myself somewhere around my house, but early Saturday morning I got an email about a group ride starting at 7:30 that morning. Knowing that the group ride would be waaaaaay more enjoyable than a solo, i bolted out the door to make it on time.The plan was to ride from Andrew Hayden Park to Pakenham and back (about 100km). I found myself struggling within the first 20km. Again, the doubts started to creep in ... "You can't even handle 20km of flats,  how do you expect to handle the hilly 180km LP course?" For the next 10 minutes I dropped further down into my pit of despair until it donned on me. In my rush to make it on time for the ride, all I really had to eat was a piece of toast with some peanut butter. So although I may not have felt hungry, my body was likely in need of food. So I scarfed down and energy bar and my PERFORM and within 15 minutes I was doing ALOT better. Made a mental note that I never want to feel that way again.

The (early) Taper

(Summary of June 24 - July 13)

So I kind of started my taper for IMLP a little early. About three weeks too early. 

The short of the long is that during the bike portion of Syracuse, I experienced quite a bit of back pain -- and quite a bit the days following. After seeing my physio and telling her about some symptoms that arose during the race, the hypothesis was that I had aggravated a disc. This was causing some swelling, which was pressing up against some nerves, which was radiating pain throughout my lower back. So I decided to take the week off in the hopes of fixing the problem and getting rid of the pain completely.

The following week I continued to take it easy ... finding it hard to get back into training and feeling a little gun shy about getting back on my bike. Near the end of the week though, I started to come out of my funk thanks to an invite from my tri-mom. (a term of affection I use for a woman who I have trained with here and there over the past few months and - although not actually old enough to be my mom - has provided me with a lot of tips, advice, and reassuring words along the way. I’m very appreciative of her support). Anywho, my tri-mom invited me to join her and some of her friends for a beach-to-beach swim Friday morning. 

Beach to beach is pretty much that - a swim from one beach (Blanchette) to another (O’Brien) at a local lake (Meech). It’s perfect training for IM triathletes because it’s the exact distance of the IM swim component : 3.8km. 

I was a little nervous as I had never done the distance yet, even in the pool but, I figured I would just take it one stroke at a time. And I did. And I finished. I ended up doing it in 1h53. A little slow to be honest. I had expected something more like 1h40 but given it was still within the 2h20 limit, I was happy. This happy feeling stayed with me through Saturday when I completely my longest run to date: 2h45, and in the sweltering heat no less. I was back in it. Or so I thought. 

Monday rolled around and I was sneezing all day. For me, that typically means I’m getting sick but I chalked it up to ghost symptoms as a result of my taper. Tuesday though I started getting congested and coughing so I figured my body was actually fighting some sort of bug. Gah! Wednesday: still congested, sounding worse but was supposed to do another beach to beach swim so hoping I would burn out whatever bug I was fighting instead of making it worse, I went for it. It didn’t feel that bad. My time was still about the same. And come Thursday, I didn’t feel worse, but I also didn’t feel much better either. So I took Thursday/Friday off. 

And there you go. Three weeks gone, with not much training, when they likely should have been my peak training weeks. If truth be told, I was freaking out, thinking that this would result in a premature end to my IM experience. 

COUNTDOWN IS ON ... 6 weeks to go.

(Summary of June 17 - 23)

This week was pretty much spent in recovery. I did very little, which was ok because I was supposed to be tapering anyway for my Syracuse 70.3 (Half Ironman) on the weekend.

I took a lesson from the week prior and got to bed early most nights and ate plenty. Given I had no "drag-my-ass-out-of-bed" mornings, I think it did a lot for my overall recovery. However I did have a specific issue with my back.

Monday morning I woke up and it was SOOORE. Felt like I had a huge knot in my lower back. I sucked it up for most of the day knowing that I had a physio appt. in the evening and she always fixes me up good with some dry needling. This time it didn't do the trick. Come Tuesday and Wednesday though, my back was still sore.

Despite the sore back I did manage a swim Wednesday morning. I really needed to get some kinda of gauge as to where I was at with my swimming (since I hadn't swam since the Sprint Tri two weeks ago) so Wednesday morning I headed out to Blanchette beach with a friend from work. She kayaked beside me while I swam out a kilometer and back in. Verdict : 2km in about 53 minutes. I'll take it!

With that load off my mind, I went back to physio on Thursday with the hopes of getting my back sorted out. She needled me again with a specific focus on my right lower back. I left feeling hopeful given I had felt some really good twinges (releases) aaaaaaand ...  Friday morning I woke up and things felt a lot better.

Syracuse 70.3

I wanted to make sure I got a good night's sleep Friday night so I took off for Syracuse early Friday afternoon. I rolled into Syracuse around 5:30. I had hoped to do my Athlete Check-In that night to get it out of the way (and ideally get some outlet shopping in on Saturday :) but didn't make the cut-off time so I just hunkered down in my hotel room, unpacked and arranged all my gear meticulously, had a huge dinner and hit the lights at 9:00.

Saturday I headed to the venue for 10am. I checked-in (essentially got my bib, timing chip, swim cap),  then attended an Athlete's briefing (race director goes over the swim/bike/run courses, rules, answers questions, etc.) Surprise #1: Some roads would be open during the race so we'd have to watch out for cars. Surprise #2: no change tents. Grrr ... all this time I had assumed a Half IM event would be just like a Full IM event. Anywho, more about that later.

Had to get this T-shirt.
Back logo is made up of
the names of all participants!

Next:
- Checked my bike into transition.
- Checked out the swim course and went for a quick swim (surprise #3: Swim course is weedy!)
- Checked out the merchandise tent and got a t-shirt.
- Drove the run course (Hilly!)
- Drove the bike course (Hilly!)
- Returned to hotel.
- Dinner
- Packed my gear for next day.
- Repack my gear for the next day.
- Repack my gear for the next day.
- Hit the lights at 10:30

My name!

Race Day

4:45 AM - Breakfast
5:00 AM - Double check my gear bag again.
5:30 AM - Leave hotel
6:00 AM - Get to race venue, get body marked, set up my transition station.
6:30 AM - Get my wetsuit on. Head down to the water to warm up.
7:00 AM - Stand on the beach nervously and watch as the first wave of swimmers takes off.
7:20 AM - MY SWIM START!

I stayed to the back of the coral and walked into the water so I started swimming pretty easily - not much jostling amongst others. I felt like I got into a good rhythm pretty quickly and then just kind of went into auto-pilot ... left stroke, right stroke, left stroke, right stroke. About half way through the course there was a point where I felt a bit swum over (hands on feet, jostled on the side), but again, nothing like the nightmares I'd heard of. Anyway, the swim was over before I knew it and I came out of the water, stripped out of my wetsuit and headed to transition.

*Best piece of advice I got from someone about getting out of the water: Remember to breath deeply. I credit that for not having the same dizzy/queazy feeling I had coming out of the water when I did the Riverkeeper Tri.

Transitions were the part I had been stressing over since I found out they'd have no change tents. I don't have a fancy tri-suit so somehow, I would have to change out of my bathing suit and into my bra/shirt/bike shorts without flashing anyone. I ended up doing it half in the open (stealthily) and half in a near-by porta-potty.

8:25 AM : On to the bike course.

I had been warned about the bike course:

"It's hilly. Don't worry about dropping your speed if you have to, or walking."

Says I: "Phhhtt - I'm not walking?!?... "

And I didn't, but there were two pretty killer hills and plenty of people walking their bikes up. I just made sure to get some good speed going before both and get my gears changed in time. The 5 and 10 mile markers came and went pretty fast. Seemed to take a lot longer to get to 15 and 20. I don't remember 25 and 30 but when I saw 35 and new I was past halfway, I said a little "F*CK YEAH!" to myself.

Some random memorable moments on the bike :
- At one point I finally hit an actual flat and, despite feeling a little worn down, I figured I'd make the best of it, hunkered down into aero and pushed a little harder. Passed a lone spectator and, god bless her, she gave me an encouraging "You look STRONG! Keep it up!"
- Came up on an aid station. Slowed down, grabbed a banana from a volunteer at the start of the aid station. Peeled it open with one hand-mouth, shoved it in my mouth and chucked the peel (expertly luckily) into the last garbage can at the end of the aid station. Volunteer said (no joke) "Like a BOSS!" That totally cracked me up.
- Hit a series of rollers and was chugging along. Veteran triathlete passes me saying, "You're doing great. Keep it up."

11:55 AM : Rolled back into transition.

Again, stressed about changing. Was going to change into my run shorts but stayed in my bike shorts (chammy didn't feel like too much of a diaper) so just changed my top, put on a hat, runners, bib and fuel belt (with gels) and was off.

By this time, the weather was a HOT, 31 degrees with wall to wall sunshine. The run course offered some shade but not enough. I was thirsty within five minutes of being on the run course. Didn't have anything with me though as I didn't want to carry the extra weight and I was expecting aid stations every mile. Turned out to be about every 2 - 3 miles. Not horrible. I survived, but not ideal.

Run course was tough. It's pretty much down one side of an old river bed then up the other side and back. Two loops of this. Because of the heat, my strategy quickly went from running all of it to running the downhills and flats, walking the up hills.

- First three miles felt like forever.
- Next three miles felt like I finally got my legs back. Finishing my first loop I could hear the announcer calling out the names of finishers. I couldn't wait to hear my name being called.
- Heading back out for my second loop I could see some seriously dark clouds headed our way.
- At the turn around point of the second loop it started to rain.
- At about mile 11 it really started to thunder. I could hear the announcer urging people to take shelter.  I ran faster, worried that they would stop the race before I finished.
- At about mile 13 there were two really big claps of lighting that made me jump... and run even faster.

My new piece of
BLING!

2:31 PM - I cross the finish line. 7 hours, 11 minutes.

When I crossed the finish line, it was pretty anti-climactic. The announcer was gone. The mass of cheering spectators had dispersed and the volunteers were huddled under a tent. One ran out to take the timing chip off my ankle and scoot me over to another tent where I got my finisher medal and hat. Ducking from one tent to another, I loaded up on food, collected my morning bag, then went back to transition to collect my (soaked) gear. I trudged back to my car, loaded everything up and then waited for an hour for the parking lot to clear.

The rest is a blur until Monday after noon sometime when I got an email from a woman that I had gotten to know from my swim program and had trained with on and off. She congratulated me and a few others on finishing the 70.3. She'd heard about the crazy weather conditions (stinking hot combined with a thunderstorm) and quipped "it's races like these that get you hooked." And you know what? She's absolutely right :)