Boise Ironman 70.3 Race Report

Boise Ironman 70.3 Race Report (2009)

2009, 2008

Swim: 40:09, 41:26

T1: 5:07, 8:31

Bike: 3:05:00, 2:57:40

T2: 3:56, 2:49

Run: 1:59:31, 1:59:01

Total: 5:53:43, 5:49:27

PRE-RACE: I’m never satisfied with my preparation for these races, but it seemed really weak this year. I’d jumped into a ½ ironman training plan with 5 weeks to go after running the Eugene marathon in May. So my running base was ok, but I hadn’t done a lot of speed work, and my swimming and biking work was not deep at all. I had done one 2.5 hour long ride on the bike, but that was all. Also, for many reasons (poor roads, no regular riding partners, crazy drivers, being tied to home due to call, etc…) I do ALL my bike training on a CompuTrainer. As realistic as this is, it just doesn’t prepare as well as actually getting road miles in. I drove to Boise, stopping overnight at a campground in Eastern Oregon and sleeping in the back of the minivan. Expo was fine, and I dropped my bike off at T1 the afternoon before the race. Ironman 70.3 Boise has this 2:00 pm start time, which was just a totally new experience for me. I went back to the hotel later that evening and cooked up some Mac & Cheese on a backpacking stove in the bathroom. I also had some avocado, baby spinach leaves, and an Odwalla Superfood (detailed enough for ya?). It was weird to sleep in the day of a tri, but I got up at 7:30 and had a normal cereal and yogurt breakfast at the hotel’s complimentary “buffet”. I drove to a parking garage in downtown Boise about 50 yards from the finish line and got there about 3 ½ hours before my shuttle bus left. I dropped off my T2 bag, and bought lunch at a local restaurant (turkey sandwich) which I ate about 3 hours before my start time. Then I basically killed time laying out in the back of the minivan in the parking garage, watching old Scrubs episodes on iPod and occasionally listening to my triathlon playlist to psyche myself up. Took the ½ hour bus ride up to the reservoir where the swim start was and got there about 45 minutes before they closed T1. I filled my two bike water bottles (I took off my aero drink bottle for this race, it tends to just give me trouble), each had already about 4 scoops of Perpetuem in them, and put salt tabs, some sport beans, and a power bar into my bento bag. Helmet, goggles on the aerobar, along with my Garmin wrist unit (my bike computer had busted). Got my tires pumped up to 120 psi by the bike crew there (bringing your own pump was discouraged) and cleared out of T1.

SWIM: My wave was 2^nd to last, bleah. It this point in the day, it was about 2:00 pm and quite warm. Put on my sunscreen and waited till about 20 minutes before we had to get into the chute to put on my wet suit. Walked around in my wetsuit just pulled up to the waist, feeling a bit conspicuous with little spot bandaids on my “chest”, but ya know, with all the rain, I’m only too glad they were there. Anyway, last year the swim was bitterly cold, my worst swim experience ever. This year I brought my full wet-suit (used a sleeveless last year, what was I thinking). I also bought this excellent Tyr thermal cap at the expo which is sort of in-between a regular cap and a neopreme hood. I have the neopreme hood, but the chin strap makes me feel like I’m being strangled, so I hate it. I have a latex allergy, so I need something under my colored swim cap anyway. The combo worked great, and the water felt at an excellent temperature, even getting in (water temp was 64 degrees). By the time our wave started, a wind had kicked up, and it was pretty choppy. The swim was not too noteworthy otherwise. I don’t have the straightest stroke, and always tend to veer left, so I had to keep aiming to the right of the buoys to not get too far off track. It wasn’t too crowded, but I did get one good smack to the face that made me have to clear my goggles, and I think I accidentally did the same to someone else. The timing mats at the end of the swim are up a 50 yard hill. They had wetsuit strippers which, if you haven’t ever used them, are so nice. You lay down and two people grab a hold of your wetsuit and just yank that puppy right off.

BIKE: The run to the bike is in this big parking lot, full of gravel, so by the time I got to the bike, I had to sit down and try to get the gravel off my feet. I shoe up before the mount line (never really worked out for me to keep the shoes clipped in), so I put on my socks, shirt, helmet and goggles and ran out to the bike start. I knocked my bike over at the start (I can’t remember why) before getting on it; one of my bottles fell out. Some kid on the other side of the barrier asked his mom “How come his water is all brown?” The first 2 miles of the bike are downhill. At 8 minutes into the bike course, the rain started. RAIN was definitely the hallmark of this race. About ¾ of the bike course was in the rain, and about half of that was torrential downpour. The rain didn’t bother me too much, but I was (excuse my French) shitting bricks about lightning. I’m not sure where a healthy respect ends and outright phobia begins, but if I don’t have lightning phobia, I’m as close as you can get. The bike portion is out on this high plateau with basically nothing around you but flat high plains. You can see the weather systems for miles in every direction, and for most of the ride, you’re the tallest thing around. I heard thunder twice, and saw lightning bolts twice also. During the 3 hour ride these systems would move through, and the whole sky for a good 100 degrees of the horizon would be black, with the streaks of rain visible on the sides where there was enough light to see it. Most of the systems skirted to the East of us, but not all of them did, and when they went over, instead of the drizzle, we would get a downpour. I had my Oakley Blades on, but it was near impossible to see, and there was nothing dry on me to wipe my goggles with. Of course, everything on me was soaked. There were occasional periods of no rain, lasting for up to about 20 minutes, but most of the time it was wet. At one point, at about mile 30, the sky looked like the sky looks on that TV show Storm Chasers, and some rider next to me was making cracks about tornados. The wind was very strong as well, which sometimes worked to your advantage and sometimes not. I was glad I didn’t have any disc wheels, because there was enough buffeting around as it was. There are a few hills on the course, which was also a little trickier because the brakes were only working about 20% due to the wetness. The last 5 miles of the race are through the outskirts of town , and the crews due a great job of opening up all the roads for the race, but the traffic is backed up for miles. The end of the bike portion (for me) was during another hard downpour. The other weird thing about the bike was how dark it was. All the clouds and the evening hour it was after 5:00 near the end, made for dusky / dark skies. With my shields on, it was like riding in the fading light of evening, and was a little disconcerting.

RUN: T2 went ok. The volunteers are great, and someone came and helped me unload my bag and pack up what I needed. I stopped at the porta-potty before heading out on the run. It felt SO good to finally get off the bike, mostly because I made it without getting hit by lightning. My legs felt surprisingly fresh at the start of the run. I did the first couple miles at an 8:00 minute pace, which is a little slower than I would have liked, but I was sopping wet. My stomach got a little queasy after the first couple miles, and I remembered I hadn’t taken ANY salt tabs. Usually I need to replace 1-2 tablets every hour, and here I was 4 hours into the competition and I hadn’t taken any. But, I wasn’t sure how much I’d sweated since the rain had provided most of the sweat for me and luckily, the GI stuff settled down. The first 6-7 miles felt pretty good, and I was optimistic that it’d stay that way, but it didn’t. It was raining for most of the run, and the course was full of big puddles so my feet were soaked (had been the whole race, actually). At about 9 miles I got some stronger fatigue setting in, and my pace dropped considerably over the next 4 miles. The run is a double loop, and the first loop takes you about 25 yards from the finish before sending you out for another round. It’s a little cruel since some of the people you’re running with at that point get to finish, while you turn around for another 6 miles. The last ½ mile felt good, lots of die-hard fans cheering us on, even in the rain.

POST-RACE: Not a ton of food but I picked up a little. One of the sponsors was Idaho Beef Council, so they had beef tacos at the finish. Not really my thing after a race, but the pizza was warm and salty and tasted good. I picked up my clothes change bag, went to the van and did a Handi-wipes bath, put on fresh clothes and picked up my bike.

ADDITIONAL STUFF: The winner of the race was Craig Alexander. He came riding by in the other direction when I was at about mile 10. Still, how cool is that? Craig is the current Ironman World Champion, and here we are in the same race. That’s one of the things I love about triathlon, average guys like me get to be in a race with the pros. It’s like being in a golfing tournament with Tiger Woods or at a swim meet with Michael Phelps. There were other professionals in the race as well, but I won’t drop any other names. I’m still deciding if I like the afternoon start. On the one hand, it was cool to not have to get up at 4:30 am and sort through your T1 stuff in the dark. On the other hand, afternoon races in thunderstorm prone areas are probably not the best idea, and having the race so late in the day gives you a lot of time to just sit around and be nervous about it.

Ok, that’s plenty.