Okay - warning first, this is a long post and it could have been a lot longer!
As always time
seems to be flying by, I suppose that is a good sign I am really enjoying life - which I certainly
am! I have been busy though, since my last post prior to Ironman Austria in June I have moved
house, changed jobs and I have tried hard to balance being a Dad and Husband who
is involved and present alongside Ironman training. This has meant I have had very few
spare minutes and as you can probably imagine some compromises have had to be
made.
Since my last post
I have raced Ironman Austria and the Ironman World Championships in Kona. This
review will predominantly focus on Kona but I will mention my Ironman Austria
race and build up to Kona.
Ironman Austria
was at the back end of June and it was my second time doing the race, I
previously raced it in 2010. My lead up to Austria was okay. I experienced my
usual dip in swim times as bike and run training load increased over April and
May but a few open water swim races confirmed my swim was pretty much where it
had been in previous years – around the 60min mark for 3.8km. I also believe I
have somewhat improved my ‘kicktastic tendency’ having improved my arm turnover
and body rotation so whilst I may not be moving faster I believe I am more efficient. My cycling was pretty minimal; for the most part it consisted
of three cycles per week, a recovery spin on Monday, one interval session in
the week and a long ride on Saturday. My cycling volume really has taken a hit.
Prior to having Betsy (my child) I was able to get two to three quality 2 hour
turbo sessions in each week after work. Since having Betsy though I have had
two main challenges: Less sleep – this has meant when I get home from work I
have been tired and have somewhat ‘wimped out’ of doing turbo sessions.
Additionally I mostly leave for work before Betsy is up so my only chance to
get to see her is in the evenings and frankly seeing Betsy has been my
priority. It is certainly not an easy choice to go and bust yourself through a
tough turbo session when you are tired and wanting to see your baby! Some weeks
where I was at home in the morning or home early in the evening I did get the odd session in
but it was far from the consistent quality I have achieved in the past. My
running consistency was very good though and I got in a very consistent pattern
with my long runs on Sunday and some shorter runs in the week. I did feel more
fatigue than previous years on my runs though but I put this down to the reduced
sleep and cycling volume resulting in less recovered legs!
Ironman Austria
rolled round quickly and I found myself on the start line in reasonable shape.
The swim: Out of the 16 Ironman's I have done this was without doubt the worst swim start I have ever had! I got absolutely battered. My
feet were consistently pushed under and I was knocked from both sides, at one
point I was ‘head locked’ and ducked. I am not sure it was intentional, I think
it was more a case of the swimmers arm who was next to me wrapping around my
neck by accident. Either way it was rough and I was forced underwater for some time resulting in me swallowing a lot of water, I struggled to breathe and lost my composure. It was the first time I would say I experienced panic emotions in a swim! It took a good 20-30mins of self talk and a wide line to find
some open water before I fully regained composure and got back to racing. I
exited the swim in 1 hour and was satisfied with that considering.
The Bike: It was a long T1 but it went smooth and I got out on the bike all organised. This was my first race with a power meter
and my target wattage was 180-190watts around 2.7-2.8 watts per kg. I held this pace comfortably initially. Quite a few riders flew off and my instinct told me I could
have gone after them but I stuck to my target power with the goal of saving
myself for a better run. After about 40km packs were forming on the bike and it
was a draft fest. Lines of riders would go past and I literally had to free
wheel to keep legal distance. On a couple of occasions I expended a lot of energy to get round big
packs exerting a lot of power to do so only to have them pass back 2-3km further up the
road where my power would drop as I had to free wheel again to keep legal distance from the draft zone. It was very difficult to keep an even power output. Some steep hills and fast
descents in the later stages of the loop also challenged my ability to keep my power up and even. I did not do
a very good job of holding target power. My average watts slowly crept down and
ended up being an average of 176 with a variability of 9% - tut tut! My ride
time was 5.11 and I was not happy with this as my previous time in 2010 was
5.02. Including Austria I have only ever done 3 Ironmans twice but this was the
only time where on the 2nd attempt my bike time was slower!
Run: As I got off the bike and started to run I did feel good and thought maybe a more
conservative bike may have left me in a better position for a decent run. I
planned to do a 4km run, 45s walk strategy. (walk every other aid station).
Target pace was 4.55 – 5.05 (around a 3.30 marathon). My first 16km was pretty
much at this pace but at the dreaded half way point in the marathon I could
feel the quad fatigue creeping up and I tried to combat this with some
stretching and caffeine gels but to no avail. In fact I suffered from some
cramping and challenged breathing which I believe was caffeine related. I am
very sensitive to caffeine and think I overdid it. Anyhow by 25km I was crushed
mentally and physically to shuffling between each aid station bringing me home in
a 4 hour marathon and a finish time around 10.20. I was disappointed with this
race. Despite my training volume being reduced and generally more fatigue day
to day I had had some good sessions leading into the race that showed promise so I was hoping for more.
Reflection over a
couple of weeks of recovery pre Kona build lead me to conclude I needed to
remove caffeine out of my race nutrition and significantly reduce it on a day
to day basis as I believe it was acting as a ‘band aid’ to combat my tiredness.
I also decided to increase my focus on the bike as no doubt my lack of fitness
in this area was not just causing my bike times to suffer but was also hurting my 'weak link' - the run!
Kona build went
well and weather was very accommodating at the weekends for long rides. I
banked four 200km rides each time achieving slightly better wattage with one ride averaging 192watts after a 5km swim. For a non-competition solo ride I was pleased with
that and it was the best ride I had logged with a power meter so I felt good
progress was being made. As would be expected, increased bike volume and
intensity meant increased fatigue in the legs for running and some of my longer
runs took more out of me than I wanted and fatigued stayed with me through the best part
of the week. I can't remember a time I have recovered so slow from workouts but I tried to reassure myself I was getting key sessions done and
the other sessions were less important. At the end of August/Early September the house
move took place and there were two weeks where sleep and recovery were very poor. Mid September I paid the price and went down sick for a day which is
extremely rare for me. I felt ‘flue like’ being shaky and weak with temperature
fluctuations, I also developed a sore throat and was coughing up phlem.
Basically I had to cancel the weekend and a few extra days of training. The time off my legs probably
did them good and my last long run (36km) prior to the race went very well and
I held 3.30 marathon pace the day after a 150km ride. This gave me some confidence I had improved my fitness since Austria.
Kona: I arrived in
Kona on Monday October 6th and was immediately shocked by the heat
and humidity and realized that in an ideal world I would have come out a week
earlier to acclimatise. A serious age group podium contender certainly would
have been out earlier but I wanted some time in Hawaii after the race with the
family and two weeks was the maximum I could have. I stayed at Waikoloa beach
resort about 30 miles or so from Kona along the Queen K. The resort was
beautiful and great for training. My first training ride on the Queen K was up
to Kawaihae and part way up Hawi. I had two further shocks. 1. How the heat
reflects of the road magnifying what is already an intense heat and 2. How
gusts of wind could come out of no where and ‘unnerve’ you on the way down from
Hawi. I did a couple of reps down a small section of Hawi to try and get used
to the wind. It is pretty scary when you are travelling at 60km/h plus on a
bike and get smacked by a strong crosswind! No doubt on race day there would be
some very good bike handlers that would embrace this and make it look easy! I
hoped to be one of them!
The week leading
up to the race consisted of some swims in the beautiful waters, a couple more
shorter bikes to orientate and acclimatize and some short runs in the heat. The
key was to try and shake of any travel fatigue and get rested and aware of the
course.
I loved training
on the island, it really is all about the ironman the week leading up to the race. Athletes
are everywhere including the pro’s. It was very inspiring and somewhat
intimidating to be in such an environment.
Swim: I got into
the water about 10mins prior to the age group male start and got a spot in the
center about 3 back from front. I had a ‘crazy’ American next to me shouting
out things like 'this is what dreams are made of’ ‘time to get it on’ which I
found quite funny and settling, judging by the grey focused faces of many
around me I guessed they didn’t. When the cannon went off I braced for contact
but I didn’t get any! I must have been very lucky as I was surrounded by
swimmers yet I had about a meters space in each direction. I swam hard but
conservative and got a few drafts, I believe I held a good line with the buoys
after drifting in from the centre. I spent most of the first 1500m chuffed to
bits with the little contact I had and simply tried to enjoy what is an
epic swim. I got a small amount of contact at the turnaround but nothing major.
It was further out that I really noticed the swell and chop but I thought I was
swimming well, I had no clue on time though, it seemed to be passing quick and I was hopeful of a good swim time. I had heard that Kona is about 5min slower than most typical lake Ironman swims so in my mind I was thinking I may get out about 1hour and 5mins but as it turns out I was 5 mins slower at 1hour 10mins. I thought I swam well so felt a bit impartial about my time. I thoroughly enjoyed the warm choppy waters and the incredible underwater view. Swimming up to the pier towards the swim exit steps felt surreal to me, I had seen it on so many DVD’s /ironman clips it was cool to actually be there.
Bike: I got my gear and was out of T1 in around 5mins. Immediately
on the bike I felt weak, I was hitting target wattage initially, but it felt
significantly harder than on training rides, I thought it was to early to judge
for sure and hoped I my legs would come good so I kept on the gas. Once up Palani hill and on the Queen K there was a tail wind on the way out and the first 40-50km up to
Waikoloa was pretty quick but then the winds changed to a head wind and picked
up and I was having to push 200 watts just to move around 20km/h! After a short
fast descent at Kwaihae, it was time to ride the climb up Hawi. It was here I
saw the pro’s coming down, they were hammering it and it was an inspiring lift
seeing Kienle, Crowie, Marino, Raelert etc doing there thing. I rode up to Hawi
very conservatively trying to keep the nutrition going in and the temperature
down. The descent from Hawi was awesome, hair raising with the crosswinds but
awesome. I was certainly glad I practiced in the crosswinds. There were long
sections were I was moving over 55km/h and upto 70km/h and I didn’t need to put
down big wattage to achieve this, I was able to stay under target. One 10km
split was 13mins and some change! Once down from Hawi I started to suffer, the climb
up to Kwaihae felt tough and I was grateful for a short section of tail wind back
to Waikoloa however the remaining 50km was all into a strong headwind and
things started to go wrong. All of a sudden I started to feel really hot and I
was conscious I was getting sunburnt on my shoulders and arms. I think my sweat
and ‘water pouring over the head’ must have removed my sunscreen. I struggled
to keep my power up and the speed I was clocking was slow, I was leaking time
and becoming a touch demoralized when I worked out my bike time would be around
5.40ish. I was aiming for more like 5.15-5.20 and at the time was very confused
with my lack of bike power.
After the race:
Once the race was done it was great to be able to go and meet my wife, daughter
and parents. It was magical to be able to share the event with them. During the
remaining time on the island a few drinks were enjoyed, some sight seeing was
done and some general relaxing took place. The island of Hawaii is simply
stunning. Dolphins, turtles and beautiful swimming spots are abundant as are
lots of day trip adventures. I particularly enjoyed a trip to Waipioa valley waterfull
and Mauna kea Volcano – thanks to my friends James and Sarah for this day, it was
very special indeed.
Thanks for reading
