Every race I do I like to take time to reflect and evaluate on my performance so I can learn and develop
from the experience – and wow what an experience! So here is my Ironman Lanzarote 2013 race report....
Lead
up to race
Laura my Wife, Ollie my training partner and
I arrived in Lanzarote on Tuesday 14th May, nearly 4 full days
before the race. Tuesday was spent building the bikes, getting settled in and
going out for a 40km cycle to ensure there were no issues with the bikes.
Following the cycle Ollie and I had a 30min run on the race course. I felt
great both cycling and running and was able to run race pace with ease, no issues what so ever. I was in high spirits
for the race.
On
Wednesday Ollie and I did not exercise we just registered for the race at Club La Santa on the other side of the island. We took the opportunity to drive some of the bike course to refresh our memories of it. The course was now sign posted in preparation for the race. Much to our amazement we found there were a few small sections in the first 40km that we had not interpreted correctly and as such had practiced a slightly different opening route, no disaster but just shows how easily mistakes can be made! Registration is always a process I find interesting, you get to see all the other athletes. Ages and experience are varied but the majority of the athletes look in great condition and it is easy for self doubt to creep in. This is where I try to remind myself of my experience and my previous good results.
On Thursday Ollie and I swam a loop of the
race course and practiced some beach starts and exits that we would need to do
in the race. This was a lot of fun and again made me feel more at ease and
confident I was well prepared. After this we had a few hours relaxing on the beach taking care not to over expose ourselves to the sun. In the afternoon Ollie and I headed out on our bikes again, just for an hour this time at an easy pace, following this we ran for 25mins, the race course was being set up as we ran so this was quite exciting and gave us a feel for what we would experience on race day.
Race
morning
My alarm was set for 04.45, although as
usual I woke before the alarm! I stayed in bed until it went off anyhow, then I set about the routine of putting on the race kit, sunscreen and having
breakfast. I had the usual nerves and chomped away at my breakfast, it went down easier than normal so I squeezed in an extra protein bar,
something I now believe could have been a potential issue.
After breakfast I headed to the race start
and did the last preparations to the bike, such as inflate tyres, clip on shoes
and leave out helmet and sun glasses which I wasn’t sure I would need as it was
raining quite hard!! I was concerned about the rain making the bike course
slippery, in particular some of the steep descents. I brushed the concern aside quickly though as weather is an uncontrollable and is the same for everyone, so there was nothing I could do.
Race
At 06.45 I had my wetsuit on and had a quick
warm up swim in the sea to get acclimatised to the temperature and open out the
lungs. I was ushered out onto the beach with other swimmers just before the
start. I position myself at the front but got into some jostling that left me
about 3 swimmers back. I was not concerned about this as I had a line picked and
was ready to go.
Swim:
A beach start with 2 loops of 1900m with a land exit in between loops
On the gun I sprinted to the sea and
jostled for some clear water for a dive, I got some okay space but had lots of
contact which was simply unavoidable, I got a few elbows, feet slaps, and clips
around the head but nothing major. I hammered the first 160m to the first turn
buoy where the pack funneled causing lots of contact, I got a good few
mouthfuls of water and a few push downs on my feet and hips which I reacted to
by kicking violently to help me pull away and intimidate the swimmer behind. As
planned I got into a rhythm along the lengthy straights and felt good,
certainly not bad but not exceptional either. I focused on swimming a tight
line around the course and pretty much achieved this except for a few occasions
where I got boxed in by other swimmers which slowed me down a touch and
deviated me slightly of course. I felt I was holding a good pace and was pleased
to see 29mins on the race clock at the halfway beach exit, which I felt I did
exceptionally well along with my second run in and dive. I did feel quite
anaerobic at the start of the second loop but again settled into a rhythm
way into the second loop I saw an opportunity to draft a swimmer close by and pushed to get on their feet, upon getting up to their feet I went to sight to ensure we were on a good line and got a huge mouthful of water that timed with my inhale going straight into my lungs, this was not nice at all and a few years back would have caused me to panic, stop, cough and splutter, but experience has enabled me to deal with this on the move. I exited the swim and saw that the time was 59mins so made haste to cross the timing mat before the 1 hour mark. My primary goal was to swim 58mins however it is always a secondary goal to achieve a sub 1 hour swim and I have done so on many occasions however on bad swim days or poor conditions I sometimes go just over the hour.
Overall it was a solid swim that put pretty
much on schedule with my race goal, it was not a personal best but it was no
shocker for me either.
Bike:
1 loop of 180km with approximately 2500m climbing
My Transition went to plan, I was
methodical, finding my swim to bike bag with no problems, particularly with
some guidance from a very helpful volunteer. In the change tent I stripped my
wetsuit quick, had a brief towel down and put on my arm coolers whilst another
volunteer applied sunscreen to my shoulders, lastly I grabbed my nutrition and
run to find my bike where I slid on my helmet and sun glasses. I had a smooth
mount getting my feet swiftly into the pre clipped shoes and begun the bike leg.
I planned to ease into the bike and conserve energy over the first 60km ready
to push after this, as such I started easy, however after 5km/10mins into the
ride there was a left turn sending me up a short incline into the wind. I went
to push up this short climb and found my legs pushed back! They did not respond
at all, they felt like I had done a big ride the day before and had some
fatigue in them, particularly my right quad which was tight and felt like it
was being poked. This was really confusing and I must admit I started to worry.
I had to deal with it so I decided to gear down, spin it out and hope that the
legs would come good. Around 15mins I started my nutrition intake, here I had
another shock when after 30 seconds or so of taking the first gel I did a small mouth
vomit, not a full vomit by any means, however it was a signal that the
nutrition was not welcomed by my stomach, which also begun to twinge slightly. I
was now a touch worried and had little choice but to continue to bike
conservatively in the hope things would come good. To be honest the first 40km
were a real slog, I couldn’t seem to generate any power and felt mentally
sluggish. My training partner Ollie also passed me in this time which was a
touch surprising for both of us for two reasons, one, Ollie is a much better
swimmer than I am and was expected to hit the bike course before me and two,
the expectation was I would bike quicker than Ollie. As it turned out Ollie had a shocker with his
goggles in the swim requiring him to stop loads, this meant I just nipped him
coming out of transition so he was behind me, but then was cycling well to pass
me. Ollie and I had pretty much agreed prior to the race we would not speak to
each other if we passed each other or if we did we would not expect a response.
When Ollie did pass me no words were spoken. I was certainly confused and after
speaking to him post race he was as well, he was not expecting to pass me and was concerned he was biking too
hard when he passed me.
After a long fast descent into El Golfo I
felt I might be getting my energy back, I passed lots of people on the descent
including Ollie and my spirits lifted a bit. 10 or so minutes later we were on
another climb and again I found my legs were not generating power well and
Ollie passed me back. We then climbed for the next 40mins which included fire
mountain which is a long gradual climb into the wind where you can see the road
disappear into the mountains, As I climbed this I watched a bunch of
triathletes which included Ollie pull away from me, I tried to respond and chase
after them but simply had nothing! I was by no means cycling slow relative to
the rest of the field however I was by my standards, my bike is my best weapon
which was simply not working, The rest of the ride was a struggle, I did have
moments where I felt slightly better and after 80km I was able to trickle in
nutrition without any sickness but generally I was sighing a lot and at one
point thought I might fall asleep on my bike! If I was video’d round the course
I would have been caught shaking my head in confusion on a number of occasions.
The conditions on the bike were good and
the morning rain cleared after 40km. There was the usual Lanzarote wind as
expected but to me it did not feel any worse than I had experienced when training on the island.
One thing of note on the bike leg was when
I witnessed the worst bike crash I have ever seen. Descending down from Mirador
del Rio which is one of the highest points on the course I was overtaken when
travelling between 65-70km/h (I last looked at my Polar cycle computer at
66km/h) by a triathlete who was clearly very confident and taking some risks,
he was about 50-60m in front of me as we hit a sharp corner and he got it
wrong, I saw his front wheel go into a wobble then he smashed into a metal
barrier, his bike splintered apart, wheels and carbon went everywhere and he
flew over the barrier down a 15-20ft drop onto rocks! I couldn’t believe my
eyes, I immediately sat up and slowed right down, a spectator on the corner run
over to the crash site and as I cycled past I debated stopping, I glanced back at
the spectator who made eye contact with me and put his thumb up which I took to
mean he was okay dealing with the situation or that the triathlete was okay. A
triathlete that was between me and the triathlete that crashed saw the whole
thing even closer and was clearly in quite a bit of shock he was just free
wheeling in a daze, I cycled up close and put my hand on his
shoulder and let him know I thought the triathlete was okay, just down the road
I passed a support car and informed them of the crash, I then cracked on with
my ride.
Run:
3 loops (1x 21km, 2x 10.6km) making up 42.2km
On arrival at T2 I was relieved to get off
my bike yet was pleased with myself for battling with myself mentally and mustering
up a ride that was sub 6hrs on such a tough course. At this point I was also very unsure how my legs would be
on the run but know from experience that your bike legs do not necessarily
carry over to your run legs so I had some hope that they may come good on the
run.
I crossed the line with a run time of 3hrs
55mins and a total time of 11hrs 5mins.
Overall
Unfortunately this was far from the race performance I was after, I wanted somewhere between 10hrs 15mins and 10hrs
30mins (something like a 5hr 45min bike and a 3hr 35min run). This said I was pleased with my effort and my will to continue given I did not feel great on race day. In 13 races I can only recall one other time I have felt that bad on the bike and that was Ironman Wales when I bonked from under fuelling.
Post
race recovery
Some might assume after an Ironman that you would sleep well - for me this is not the case and I do not believe it is for Ollie either. Personally I have broken sleep, tend to twitch an awful lot, have weird dreams and wake up the next morning with very sore legs and something like a hangover! Recovery is a slow process and for me starts with mental recovery! I usually begin this with some excessive eating and drinking which was easily achieved in Lanzarote! For physical recovery I use various techniques such as active recovery, compression, cold baths, massage, trigger point therapy and a gradual increase in activity over a two week period to get back into training - I will be doing a post on recovery techniques shortly.
What’s next?
Next up I have Ironman Frankfurt in approximately 7 weeks time on the 7th July. This is a race I have done before a couple of years ago. I went 10hrs 8mins previously so am looking to improve on that race performance. More to come on this......
Short Evaluation
With Ironman Frankfurt in mind and 7 weeks to progress I will now consider and act on the following:
Some might assume after an Ironman that you would sleep well - for me this is not the case and I do not believe it is for Ollie either. Personally I have broken sleep, tend to twitch an awful lot, have weird dreams and wake up the next morning with very sore legs and something like a hangover! Recovery is a slow process and for me starts with mental recovery! I usually begin this with some excessive eating and drinking which was easily achieved in Lanzarote! For physical recovery I use various techniques such as active recovery, compression, cold baths, massage, trigger point therapy and a gradual increase in activity over a two week period to get back into training - I will be doing a post on recovery techniques shortly.
What’s next?
Next up I have Ironman Frankfurt in approximately 7 weeks time on the 7th July. This is a race I have done before a couple of years ago. I went 10hrs 8mins previously so am looking to improve on that race performance. More to come on this......
Short Evaluation
With Ironman Frankfurt in mind and 7 weeks to progress I will now consider and act on the following:
- 1 week active recovery - unstructured training, do by feel, focus on retrieving 'freshness' from low intensity and lots of recovery work.
- 1 week gradual build in volume and intensity, include some running on trails/grass.
- 4 week block followed by a weeks taper.
- 4 week block focuses:
- Swim - Maintain endurance and keep working on speed. I have a few 3.8km open water races and will put in some lake sessions doing sessions like 10x 400m repeats.
- Biking - I will have a focus on this to put my mind at rest that I am in great bike shape. The better shape I am in for this anyhow the fresher I will be for the run. Example focus session: Long rides of 5-6hrs with 10km TT efforts at race pace.
- Run - Continue to work on endurance at race pace via high volume interval sessions such as 15x 2km repeats
- Leg strength - Put a 4 week progressive block of dead lifting and front squats into routine
- Electrolyte consumption pre race. I did not mention this in the above but in the days leading up to the race I consumed more electrolytes than normal via electrolyte tablets. Both my Wife and Ollie noticed I was urinating an awful lot which means something was going on with my body. Since my return from the race I have looked into overconsumption of electrolytes and have found some common symptoms which are: fatigue, nausea and weakness and that urination is a way the body tries to excrete excess and restore balance! This is something I will research in more detail and do a future post on. Either way I will not electrolyte load prior to next race.
- Pre race breakfast - Stick exactly to planned consumption! I believe the extra protein bar was a touch too many calories which have contributed to the early sickness on the bike due to my breakfast not being fully digested.
