Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Ironman baby, Ironman

June 22nd, 2008, that's the date.

It's official, one year from now my buddy Chris and I will be competing in the Ironman Cour D' alene in northern Idaho. 2.4 miles of swimming, 112 miles of biking, 26.2 miles of running ....and a lifetime of bragging.

Well, that's what the ironman official video says anyway. I think it should go more like, 2.4 miles of swimming, 112 miles of biking, 26.2 miles of running ... and a hell of a lot of work to get there.

We talked on the phone after signing up and agreed that this was a huge undertaking. We both just competed in the Pacific Crest Half Ironman in Sunriver, Oregon this last weekend, and it left us pretty tired.

The idea of running out onto the beach after that 1.2 mile swim this weekend, and jumping back in for a second lap, is pretty freaky. The 1.2 was hard enough (and slow enough, but more about that later), 2.4 is just plain daunting. What's more, the 112 mile bike course has been changed for 2007 and on at CDA (Cour D' alene), and it looks really tough.

On top of all that... to run a marathon? I just don't know. I ran my first marathon in May, with no swimming or biking before it, and it just about killed me. Of course, I didn't train for the distance, but still, very difficult.

What's the hardest thing you've ever done? What's the furthest you've ever pushed your physical and mental limits? Have you challenged yourself to the absolute maximum in your life? Is now the time to start?

I have my answers, do you have yours?


So the Half Ironman:

Chris beat me again. Damn that Chris Rodes! He finished in 5 hours and 4 minutes and I was 5 minutes behind him (in time anyway, physically, we started in different waves so we were further apart).

That's pretty incredible, to swim 1.2 miles, bike 56, and run 13.1 over the course of 5 hours and end up within 5 minutes of each other, we're pretty closely matched.

The swim was sad, not terrible by any means, but not good. I had a swim time of 44 minutes, 4 slower than my goal, and about 10 slower than where I really want to be. I hung back a little at the start and just really never got in the mix, ended up swimming alone the whole time and even going a little off course at 2/3 way through. I came out of the water all but dead last time wise (370 out of 443), had a very quick transition and headed out on the easy bike course.

Oh, wait a minute, the bike course we thought was going to be easy turned out to be pretty tough. My time was 2:30, a pretty fair bike time for rolling hills, which put me 84th time wise for the bike and in 122nd place.

Now the run, that was the bad part. 1:50 it took me, far from my goal of 1:30 or better. Right away on the run I had terrible cramps in my sides. My legs actually felt pretty good. In fact, my legs felt pretty good the entire time, I just couldn't get any more out of them because of my stomach and how tired I was. I walked every aid station, drinking gatorade, pouring water on my head and even stretching at every station. I probably threw away a good 5 minutes, but I felt like I had to have a reason to get to the next aid station. In any case, my body just is not used to trying to run 13 miles quickly after biking for so long. I ended up finishing 97th out of 443, and 9th in my age group.

So for now on, I'm going to do one long brick workout every single week, at least 50 miles on the bike and 8 to 10 on the run. People have all these different training philosophys and techniques, but here's what I think it comes down to: You have to DO in training what you expect your body to DO in a race. If I only ever bike 56 miles and run 13 in a race, how the hell am I going to expect myself to place high up at the finish? I can't, that's just it. You have to teach your body to do it. It's the same with everything in life, like they say, 'the losers are our figuring out how to do what they want to do, while the winners are busy fumbling through it, making mistakes and eventually succeeding'.

I'm so keyed up right now to go workout, but unsure of whether or not it's a good idea. It's only Wednesday, and I just raced hard on Saturday, how soon is too soon? I don't know! No one does! It's all individual. I think I'll swim.

Lastly, I was freaked out about signing up for the full Ironman, but mainly because it costs 500 bucks. I'll get ready to race physically, but that 500 bucks is huge! Well, it just so happens I got an email last night and I'm got a small modeling gig for Thursday and the pay is 400, so there you go!

I also found out yesterday that the listing appt. I went on last week (and did not get hired for), I lost out to the Leske Group, one of the bigger players in the area, so though, yes, I was dissapointed to not help those people sell their home, I was happy that they said my presentation was just as good as the other guy's. I'd rather loose out to a professional than a nobody, you know? The only reason they went with him, they said, was because he had shown them houses a couple months back and they never purchased, so they felt obligated to use him if his presentation was as good as mine.

So darn and hooray!

Until next time,

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