Ironman USA Lake Placid

The race was held 1 week ago today. It was my second IM finish. Although I was 20 minutes slower than the first one, and had hoped that I'd be 1 hour faster, the bottomline is that I finished. I'll have a full report coming soon. I've just been too lazy and living off the high from finishing it. At the same I'm down that there is no IM for me on the schedule for next year. However, it will be a much needed year of rest from long course. Stay tuned!

Getting Ready

This morning I completed my last pool swim before IM. I cut it short because I ran out of time. It starts to make you wonder and doubt. Did I train enough for this year's race? I'm compulsive about stats so I start to look at what I did this year compared to last. My swim yardage was about the same in distance so I'm not concerned there. Plus, I had a half-Iron time in Eagleman 6 weeks ago that I'm quite happy about (<38 mins).

There was alot more mileage on the bike this year, which was good because my bike time in IM last year was not satisfactory (7:26:57). I feel I'm positioned to attack it a little more this Sunday. On the flip side, my running time and mileage is off due to a foot injury that kept me sidelined for almost 2 months (April to mid-May). But the way I look at the run in IM is to just survive. I'm still confident that I can beat last year's overall time and all I need to do is improve on the run by 15 minutes. It's definitely do-able. Of course, I'm looking for a faster bike (by 45 minutes), the same swim (1:19:27) and a better T1 (last year...15:45) to get that desired time. I took a nap in T1! Can't do that this year. Plus, if the knee and feet feel good..then who knows?

It's a long day and it has to be approached that way. Stick to my raceplan and everything should be ok.

Week 30

Well, tonight my final training week of the 30 week plan I used for IM was entered into Training Peaks. (*Sigh). Thus, at the stroke of midnight, Ironman week begins. All the pain, heartache, injuries, family tension, etc. are about to melt away. Now all that remains are the last, light workouts leading up to race day. The numerous checklists of gear, nutrition, race plans, etc. The travel arrangements, the last minute details, the everything's I need to remember. But now it's time to enjoy the fruits of the labors of the last 29 weeks.

No More Fridays

The fun part of taper for Ironman is knowing when I get up early on Thursday or Friday or anyday for that matter, this time next week I won't have to anymore. Like, no 6 AM Masters class on Wednesday's after this week. I'm done. No Thursday morning bricks. It's over. No early morning Friday swims. Finished. And the best of all: No more long Saturday rides and long Sunday runs. This weekend it's 2 hours on the bike followed by a short run and 1 hour long run on Sunday. Feels very good. Feels fantastic!

Ironman Week Approaches

I leave for Lake Placid 1 week from today. At this point, the training is effectively over. You either have or you don't. And of course Race Day will have it's final say. Anything can Happen and Anything is Possible. But before I leave there are a few things still to do:

-Get the bike tuned up
-one more cortisone shot in the left foot/ankle
-convince the doctor to give one in the right foot as well
-make dinner reservations for Saturday night before the race
-get my haircut
-solidify race nutrition
-check my Tri List. Twice.

On and on and on. I'm one of those super organized people. I'm so organized that I'm disorganized. I'll be writing more as we appraoch July 22 so stay tuned.