Ironman Mont Tremblant 2016 - Ironman #4

Ironman training went really well. I can’t complain at all. I was calm, cool, collected and did what I was supposed to do throughout training. I knew that baring all mechanical issues, weather related stoppages, and full body breakdown that I was going to be an Ironman today and I would do it in about 15 hours – this is a first time that I truly knew this as I went into the race. I was going to be an Ironman today, no questions asked. It is racing that makes me an intolerable, anxiety ridden, crazy person. I was almost in tears several times over the course of the days leading up to the race. I even started race day telling Joe that although I love training and competing, the anxiety I have leading up to it is almost intolerable and I really don’t know if I can keep doing this to myself. I am usually like this all through training but hadn’t been since my coach told me multiple times to “shut up and train.” He’s a great coach but none of us have figured out how to get me over this anxiety yet. So, having not slept much and feeling like I was going to cry, we left our hotel room to do the normal pre-race activities. Nothing exciting here. Joe was my constant supporter – I really don’t know how he deals with me and prepares to race at the same time but time after time, he does it and he does it without question. I married a really good man. The way the waves were set up, he started 12 min before I did. He got into the lake to warm up before I did and almost immediately, U2’s Beautiful Day was played and I saw him stand up, turn directly around to where I was standing and look at me because that is the song that means IRONMAN to us – every year it was played at the start of Ironman Lake Placid until our first year doing the race 2009 (weird, right?). After his warmup, he came out, gave me a kiss and said have fun out there. I was in full breakdown mode at this point so I decided it was time to warm up. I got into the lake and started swimming back and forth, adjusting the swim cap and goggles. I watched Joe’s wave go off – wait did I say I was in full breakdown mode, oh, no, now I was – who knew I could escalate it and I can’t imagine what I looked like to other people. I kept telling myself to just “shut up and race” – this was my motto for the day but I just couldn’t stop it at this moment. I stood up and was just in need of someone I knew to just smile at me. And I looked up and there was Kristen Hislop. I vaguely know her – she coaches people I know and is friends with my friends, we have been introduced before – but in this moment, I needed her to be my friend. I went over to her and she saw the fear. She reassured me that I was ready, I did all the work necessary to get here, and I would be great. In my mind this equated to “suck it up buttercup” and off I went through the arch where they said “You are all going to be Ironmen today.” Cue crying again….. And this is how the swim started – me trying to stay calm and me failing horribly. Once I was in the water, like a light switch, I was fine. The swim started great. I had lots of open water. The first 3 bouys were easy to see and I swam perfectly at them – literally, I was skimming them with my left arm as I went around the inside of them. I was calm. I can literally shut my brain down and stop thinking when I race – it is amazing how I can do it once the rhythm of my swim starts and I just count strokes and sight. Then after buoy 3 the current started to change – no big deal, that is kind of how the 70.3 was too. The farther away from shore you get the more choppy the lake gets, I was mentally prepared for that. And then the waves. I mean WAVES. I swear I was being lifted into the air and then put back into the water. This made sighting and finding a straight line difficult. The kayakers were struggling to stay in a place. They were busy too – this swim was beating people up. I stayed calm though. I knew that I just needed to keep my form and find the next buoy – which seemed to be scattered around and not in a straight line. I would make a beeline to one then try to find the next and it was off to my right. I just kept doing that. I was getting nauseous from motion sickness because it was so rough. Ok, buoy #9. There were 13 buoys, then the turn buoy, then #14 then another turn. Then 13 back… That is a lot of buoys! Around buoy 5 on the way back to shore, I puked due to the motion sickness – there went my banana! Sorry to whoever was swimming behind me. But still calm, stroke, stroke, sight…..getting pummeled by waves. Still pretty open water – this was potentially the best swim from a participant standpoint that I have ever had in that I didn’t get beat up at all during the swim and mostly swam in open water. It was great! That being said, it was so rough wave wise that I went 1:33 – that was not even near the plan. That was 8 min slower than the plan. But I was alive and, from a discipline standpoint, 33% done with the race. AND it wasn’t raining yet…. The run from swim exit to transition is soooo long. It just kept going. Joe and I had a conversation on Saturday about making sure to be prepared out of transition since the weather forecast was really bad. So, I entered transition and found a spot to sit. I ate my honey stinger immediately. I went through my bag and decided I needed my jersey since it was not super warm and humid like they had predicted and we knew we were going to get wet from the “passing showers and thunderstorms”. Arm sleeves, nope – it isn’t that cold out. I don’t want to carry things I do not need. Rain coat, nah, that thing will get me warm when the storms pass and I don’t want to deal with that. Sunscreen – definitely – you don’t want to be stuck out there if it is sunny out…. ALL THE WRONG DECISIONS!!!! 12:53 I left transition disappointed that I was 8 min down from what I had planned already and I wasn’t even close to being done but I let it go and immediately found my comfort zone – I just kept reassessing my effort and saying you’re trying too hard, down shift. I was immediately happy to be on my bike (Ms. Jackson). We had a little conversation about how we were going to be Ironmen today and how excited I was to be taking her to reach that goal. (Yes, I talk to my bike.) I saw Kristen, my adopted spectator who told me I looked good. Then about 5K in, the rain started… It was not only raining but it was raining and it was a cold rain – not in the weather predictions – showers and thunderstorms with high humidity and mid-70s. How about some cold, driving rain. I actually craved climbing hills – at least if I was working on climbing, I was warmer. My feet were numb and my hands were blue. My goal now was to maintain body temperature. At this point I also was having intestinal issues which I promptly ignored since I was in maintain body temp mode and was worried about stopping and not moving and getting too cold. I saw Joe on the out and back and we made sure we knew that we were both ok so that lifted me up a little bit. 1st loop was status quo – me thinking are you riding within yourself, me answering yes. I ate and drank and took salt caps on schedule too – salt caps get pretty gross when exposed to the rain several times during a race. Also, when you can’t feel your fingers you almost dump half of your daily supply of salt caps on the ground when you go to get one. Oh, and did I mention it was raining and cold. Yup, the entire 1st loop. I was trying to convince myself that the clouds were getting lighter, then it would downpour again. The amount of times I told my brain to shut up when it was saying I was too cold was impressive. I finally stopped right before the turn around to go to the bathroom. Well, sometimes you just have do to things (my mantra of the day – thank you Scott Jurek and your book “Eat and Run”.) Ok, back to work. It was still raining. I was still having intestinal issues. I saw Joe on his way back to town and we made sure the other knew we were ok and then head back down and kept going. Then the aid stations ran out of the only food product I needed from them – bananas. Well, that sucks. It is Ironman day and it is all about dealing with what comes your way whether good or bad, so I just needed to handle it. It was now a crazy headwind and raining. But it could be worse at times because in the flats, there was a cross wind – that was just a blast!!! It couldn’t rain the entire 112 miles could it??? No, no it couldn’t. But could it??? I had a good 6 miles at the end of the bike course on the hardest hills on the bike course where it just sprinkled here and there but no downpours and no rain that felt like I was being attacked my needles so there was that. I was so excessively happy to get off the bike. Oh, and there was Kristen again – cheering for me! 7:51.21. Since my fastest Ironman bike before today was an 8:19, this was stellar. Transition: Again, take your time, get your feet a little dry and a little less gritty then get ready. 8:26. I was still having intestinal issues at this point so another porta potty stop had to happen as soon as I left transition. Then I started running. I was comfortable. VERY comfortable. I could run this pace for a while. And I did. I saw Joe within the first 20 min of my run and he and I were both all smiles so I knew he was crushing it and almost done and he knew exactly where I was now. The first loop I wasn’t eating a lot but I was keeping up with salt and drinking Pepsi and chicken broth when it was available – this was the plan, eat scratch when I could and get in all other calories through broth, Pepsi, oranges, and bananas. I had to stop again at an aid station about 3 miles from the turn around since my intestines were not happy still. I could hear the fluids sloshing in my stomach. I thought of Scott Jurek and his book again so I evaluated the issues – sloshing stomach… I had read about a strategy to fix that but I couldn’t think of what that strategy actually was so I decided more salt would fix it, ok, lets drink chicken broth and have a salt cap. Nothing else to do. So I had acknowledged the problem, tried to fix the problem, and moved forward. My knees hurt – ok, nothing is easy about Ironman or as my coach would tell me “You didn’t sign up for an easyman.” Problem acknowledged, nothing can be changed, thus keep running. I saw Joe waiting for me when I was about to turn around and he was happy and excited so I became even more happy and excited. He was even happier when I didn’t have any swear words to say to him about how I felt. I didn’t know how long I could hold this pace but I was trying. At this point I knew that I didn’t have my reach goal of 14:40 but I still had my realistic goal of going sub 15 hrs within reach and I wanted that more than anything. So I run by Joe again and head back out. Still running well until it became dark on the path and the lights came on. Then I got dizzy. Ok, evaluate the problem – I am dizzy. What could be causing the problem – too much caffeine, not enough fuel. Solution – do not drink Pepsi at the next station and eat more scratch chews and some pretzels. Done. More dizzy. Then I realized it wasn’t nutrition at all. It was the shadows moving from the people running and the way the bike path got darker in the woods and the light to dark , light to dark from the lights they had set up. It wasn’t something I could control at all so I decided I needed to move faster but I couldn’t tell how fast I was moving since I couldn’t see my watch. I wasn’t risking falling off the bike path to look. All I knew is that I needed off of this path fast! There was a man I passed who was commenting that he was feeling the same way and that made me feel much better about my situation. I really was happy though with how I wasn’t thinking – I was literally shutting my brain up and just running. Yes, everything hurt. Yes, I wanted to be done. I was starting to see the lights in the sky from the finish and I could barely hear Mike Reilly but I knew he was going to say my name soon. So I just kept running. With 5K left I had 40 min to make my goal. I was going under 15 hours and I knew it, so I just kept running. I had been running from one aid station to the next getting fuel and then running again but at this point I skipped a few because I was going under 15 hours. I got back to town and I just smiled! It was an amazing finish line. I had just hit a goal that I wanted so badly and I did it on a day that was riddled with bad weather and I did it. I heard my name from Joe even though I couldn’t see him with all of the lights. I was done! #4 was done. 14:54.11 with a 5:08.27 marathon to wrap up the day! I haven’t gone sub 5:11 in at least 8 years in a stand-alone marathon let alone during an Ironman. Just wow. Post race – after the race all I wanted to do was see Joe. I made a bee line to leave the finish tent. I found him and we were happy for each other and then I really needed to sit down. I literally left everything I had out there. My legs were throbbing. I was exhausted. Then there were 2 medics speaking French to me and I was like why do they think something is wrong – isn’t this how all Ironmen look when they finish. They were very reluctant to leave me but I assured them I was fine. They assured me that they were there if I decided I needed them – they were like vultures around transition waiting for us to go down. I finally got up, grabbed my transition bags and bike and went back to the room. Our goal was to have me eat real food within the hour of my finish. I took a shower. Then we went out and I actually ate! I was on the verge of the nauseous mess I usually become but once I started eating I was fine. That has been a huge step in my recovery already. Although Joe is disappointed that he doesn’t get his meal and mine when we sit down to eat, I have been able to eat for 2 days and that is a very big deal in post ironman recovery. I still feel horrible body wise – I have a toe that looks pretty like a children’s coloring book and chafing in places I would never have anticipated due to the road grit. But I am a 4 time Ironman and that is all I wanted! These are just small reminders of what I accomplished. It was a horrible, wonderful, amazing day!