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Date:14 September 2009
Crazy Ironman Adventure Part 2
Exactly 2 weeks after IM Kentucky, I win my 6th title, who would have thought. My whole career I’ve tried to prepare thoroughly and focus everything on one race at a time, trying to achieve the ultimate goal - winning. After a string of 2nd places, and then a disastrous DNF in PE this year, I figured “what’s the point?” We spend so much time focusing on one race and then something out of your control ruins it. So now I’m going to race as much as possible, train as little as possible (for me that‘ll be around 30hrs a week, I‘ve got 20 years of base behind me, I probably never have to train again), and enjoy success when you least expect it.
After 2 weeks of recovery training, my legs were feeling pretty good this morning, and I was looking forward to a nice tough race. The route here is hard. Lots and lots of hills on the bike especially, but on the run too. And hot. And a 26°C swim with wetsuits. And an IM in my legs from 2 weeks ago. There was no doubt in my mind that it was going to be a tough day. But I had no idea how tough.
10 Minutes into the swim I was over heating. After the first turn buoy I started cramping in my feet. Pretty soon after that I started throwing up, and all this while trying to hang onto the back of the lead swim pack. I could deal with most of the issues, but the vomiting became a problem after about the third or forth time. I was losing all my calories, and the day had hardly started. I exited the swim with an almighty headache, probably from overheating in the wetsuit, but I’m sure from dehydration starting to make itself known. But I was still close to the leaders, so on I pushed.
At the start of the bike I again didn’t feel too bad, my legs were good, but as soon as I tried to get anything down the hatch, it just came straight back out again. I continued to push hard at the start to try stay with the leader, but after 40km I couldn’t keep up any longer, and decided to let him go so that I could take it easy for a while and try get something into my stomach. To no avail, for the next 3 hours I could not eat or drink without bringing most of it up. Some must have stayed, otherwise I’m sure I’d still be out there somewhere, but most didn’t. There must have been at least three moments on that bike course that I almost packed it in, but figured I didn’t have anything else to do today. One of those moments was when the usual bunch came passed at 105km, 6 guys, absolutely hauling (or may be I was just going so slowly by then), and left me for dead. Once they were about a minute up the road I told myself that if they disappeared, my race was done. I don’t know how, but from somewhere, I found the strength to catch back up. It took about 30km, but I got there eventually. Now the trick was just to stay there. For the last 40 km I hung in at the back, throwing all my nutrition away and just drinking water, trying to cleanse my system. It seemed to work, and by the end of the bike I started feeling better.
I lost a lot of time at the start of the run, taking my time in transition to just sit a while, eat something, and drink a bit more water before the start of the marathon. Then I started the run very slowly. By mile 2 the legs started loosening up, however the leaders were putting decent time into me. But at this stage my priority was just to finish, and I knew if I could run anywhere near 3 hours on this course (last year the fastest run was 2;56), I would podium. By mile 8 I started feeling good, and even pushed a little every now and then. By mile 11 I could see the leaders were blowing up from racing each other so early on, and I started thinking about that podium, but I was still concerned about the guys not too far behind who seemed to be running strongly. At about mile 15 I went into the lead, but it was way sooner that I would have liked. With 18km left, I was now where everyone else wanted to be, and therefore being hunted. There are a few opportunities to see your competition, and at the last of those, with a 4 minute lead and 4 miles remaining, and still moving forward fairly comfortably, I believed I could do it.
Despite all the problems I had during the first 4 hours of the race, after nearly quitting a number of times, and suffering like a township dog, 8h45 minutes (and 3 weeks after leaving home) later, I crossed the line to finish the 2009 Ironman Wisconsin in what felt like the greatest victory of my career. 5 months ago I thought I was done in the sport of triathlon. Ironman win number 6, now I can’t wait for the next one.
Raynard
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