IMC 2011. First Ironman. How it all went down.
This time my story starts in the fall of 2010, in Todd's brick class at Tri-it one Saturday morning. A bunch of athletes were talking about
their experience at Ironman, and I left the class thinking "I think
I'd like to be fit enough to do an ironman."
Fast forward 10 months, and Todd was telling me "you can do it," as I
wondered if I really could with anywhere from 5-10 hours of training a
week. I'd get my weekly notice that my workouts were online, and I'd
think "I might make a swim, and if I'm l'm lucky I'll make the group
ride on Saturday and do a 90 minute run on sunday." But every time I
did a long ride or run, I'd think "Todd's right, I can do this."
Then suddenly it was Wednesday of IMC week. I wrapped 5 days of
shooting in Ft. Saskatchewan over the past couple of weeks, I had the
usual "what did I miss" anxiety about the shoot, and had Thursday
morning to stop by the office, come home and pack for the race, and
drive to Penticton with Nina. We got to Penticton, maybe ate something
bad on the way, because we both woke up on Friday feeling like hell
and needing to nap for a good chunk of the day. I was still worried
about the shoot, hoping we had enough footage, and telling myself
"okay, I have a day to start thinking about Ironman."
Saturday I felt good again, and started to feel excited about the
race. I took a short nap in the afternoon because everyone says it's
tough to sleep before Ironman. But then I slept like a rock Saturday
night, hit the snooze button for 1 snooze, and then got up and headed
over to Chris and Lesley's site to get a ride to transition at 5:30
sunday morning. We walked up to transition and I started to get the
usual pre-race giggles that I love so much. The whole thing was crazy
- thousands of people everywhere, lineups for the porta potties,
people walking around in wetsuits up to their waists, sun coming up,
music playing on the loudspeakers, the whole triathlon comedy.
And then we were in the water with the cannon going off and marching
forward to our swim. I started swimming, noticing how much easier it
was to swim in Chris Kennedy's wetsuit than my old one. Didn't stop me
from my typical open-water swim technique, having the guys in the
boats tell me I was way off course, imagining what the garmin was
going to say about my sighting... But it all ended eventually and I
was out of the water crossing the mats. I got into transition, put on
my helmet, and had the strap come off right away. So after several
tries I got it to work and off I went.
The bike started fairly comfortably. I lost my chain on the first
hill, which was fine - put it back on and kept going - though I did
wonder if I should have had my bike tuned up before the race.
Nevertheless, a nice little ride to OK Falls, and then my stomach
started to feel off. A bit of pain, didn't feel like eating or
drinking, and I wondered how I was going to get my nutrition in. Cool
to see Lyndsey and Mike on Richters, but I had this constant stomach
thing going on that I was doing my best to ignore. By the time I got
into the rollers after Richters I was feeling pretty bad, overheating,
I had gotten through 2 mars bars but couldn't stand the thought of
eating any more - stingers, mars bars, sports drink, all my go to
things just weren't working for me. I could only drink water, I
couldn't get any water into my aero helmet, so I kept pouring it on my
face, my back, my legs when I could.
Then I got to the out and back, and all I could think was "where in
hell is that damn special needs station?" It wouldn't end. I grabbed a
coke from my special needs, had a gel, and headed toward Yellow Lake.
By the bottom of Yellow lake all I had was half a bottle of coke. As I
went up the hill I was barely creeping along, feeling emotional and
thinking "okay, feeling emotional is either dehydration or a salt
issue." So when I got to the aid station at the top I stopped and as
John Howey hosed me down with a bottle of water I had a salt tablet
and drank some of the coke he told me to keep drinking. The ride back
into town was hell. I couldn't stay aero for more than a couple of
minutes at a time, I rode along slowly and thought "how on earth am I
going to run after this?" I was in pain, my stomach was bloated and
painful, I didn't think I had enough nutrition, I saw the guys headed
out on the run and wondered how it was going to play out.
Lorne in transition helped me put my singlet on, and I hobbled out to
the run course for my first marathon. I decided I would walk every aid
station, but keep running between them. So I did. I couldn't eat
anything, my stomach hurt to run, and I just kept thinking "okay, keep
plugging away." I did my brother Gord's trick of thinking of the
marathon as a series of 5k runs. Every 5k I thought "done, I only have
8 of these to do." And as the aid stations went by I got rid of my gel
flask, kept popping salt tablets, and putting ice in my cap. Rose Madi
Jordan and Janelle all gave me little pep talks and I kept jogging
along. Lots of cheering fans, the lake looked awesome, the sun was
out, it was pretty damn nifty. The hills near the turnaround were
rough, but I kept at it and they eventually went away. Then around 25k
I drank some coke at an aid station, it went down fine and I thought
"hey, my stomach feels good!" Jordan came by again and gave me another
pep talk, so did Suzanne, and I decided I could pick things up quite a
bit. I did, and started passing people. I had heard how hard 30-40k
were, but after the hell of the bike and the first half of the run, I
surprised myself by how nice 25-35k were. The last 7k were hard, but
it was the hard of running steady, not the "oh my god my stomach feels
like it's going to blow up and I really don't want to be here." By the
time I got back to town I couldn't look at the people coming in on
their bikes, it was too much to imagine doing that whole marathon
again.
And then suddenly I was thinking "2k" then "1k" then "holy shit I'm
going to do this." I crossed the finish line, smiling, happy to see
Erin who held me up and got me sitting down and eating pizza.
Nina found me eventually, and we hung out with Todd, Chris, Lesley,
Kendall, Ian, John H, Suzanne... I got to congratulate Doug and Raf.
It's a solitary sport, but when I think of the day what is so striking
are the people I connected with in some way. All the people who's
names I should remember and don't, all the people who cheered whom I
never met and might never see again, all the friends who took pictures
or encouraged me in some way, the people who cheered and I didn't even
see who they were, the incredibly helpful and excited volunteers, and
the fact that there were so many fit, tanned, happy, helpful people
all the way through the course. As cheesy as it seems, that atmosphere
was what made the day for me. Every section of the course I think
about now I think about someone on it.
We came out to watch the final hour, and stood with Myron, Jill and
Chris, and Madi and Jordan and cheered. Jordan Rapp came out and
cheered on the final folks, and I just kept thinking "this is
awesome."
The next day Nina and I went to the pavilion, I bought the watch, we
went for lunch, went parasailing, and drove home with a quick stop at
the Serpicos. Got home at 1AM, put my feet in the kitchen sink for 10
minutes with cold water on them to try to get the swelling and pain to
go down, and then next thing I knew I was directing a photo shoot by
the middle of the day today, feeling tired, but back to my life, which
I have to say is damn good. Nina has been a rockstar through this
whole process - so many triathletes say that about their spouses, but
it's totally true. From cheering and taking pictures, to buying
supplies, getting my stuff from transition, cleaning up my mess, and
more than anything being a very good sport while I dominated yet
another weekend of our lives with my hobby.
My legs are stiff, I have some tendon pain on the top of my left foot,
I haven't slept well yet, but I feel good. This is a cool sport, and
though I thought "okay, that's checked off the list" after I crossed
the finish line, the next morning I looked at the times in the paper
and thought "I wonder how this would go a second time around."
Rob
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