I have just completed my first Half Ironman, and I truly believe that I have found the race that is ideal for me! Since I have started participating in triathlons about 10 years ago, I fell in love with the sport, but, until this weekend, I never knew that I would say that it was perfect for me. Now, I do.
In this post, I recount my long race day in Mallorca, and, as usual, I take away the lessons learned, what went right, what went wrong, and what I need to do to improve. This may be of interest to you if you are planning on taking on such a challenge, as I have treated it as a total newby. Main conclusions at the end.
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| The 3 Egyptian finishers of the race :) |
For a start, I was doing the race with 2 other Egyptians, one of whom I was sharing an apartment with, and the other was there with his family. We had different start times, with the guy I'm staying with starting 15 minutes after my start (his age group was 25-29), and the other starting 25 minutes before me (his age group was 35-39). My age group was 40-44. As I haven't asked their permission to mention their names, let's just call them A and M.
Pre-race routine hasn't changed much from all my other races. I have always had the habit of arriving a few days early at new race locations to get familiar with the place, buy last minute items, do a course recce once or twice, and just get comfortable with the surroundings in order to have one less thing to worry about on race day. So, no change here.
Carb loading, hydration, lots of sleep, and some last workouts were all done. Race briefing the day before, then bike AND gear check-in. This is one different aspect to the ITU and shorter races I'm used to. Transition is different. The bike is racked, but nothing else is left around the bike. All gear is stowed in bags, one for T1 and one for T2, each containing what one needs to change into and leaves what they change out of in it. The bags were accessible on race morning, so, at least I wasn't left without shoes for long (I only had one pair of trainers).
Race morning started with the alarm going off at 05:15. A decent sized bowl of porridge with some extra honey, a shower, some peanut butter, raspberry jam and a sprinkle of salt on some rye bread, and down to transition to put nutrition on the bike and last bits and pieces in the transition bags. Then, back to hotel to get ready. Good thing I was staying across the road from the race, so didn't need to figure out where to leave things, etc. I could just walk out of the room in my wetsuit to the start line.
08:05 I walk out in my wetsuit down to the swim start. An additional bag containing items needed for after the race could be left at the finish line area, so I had my phone, keys and a towel. I go for a light jog on the beach for 15 minutes and do some stretches. The start was done in waves, and now that it was 08:30, my wave was to start in 20 minutes. I see the orange swim caps of my wave start to group around the start line, so I join in.
08:47, music is playing, and what's playing now is my son's favourite song. I smile to myself and join in the singing (keeping it to myself, you'll be pleased to know). I say a little prayer, and the gun goes off at exactly 08:50.
It is a beach start, and as I get in the water, I realise that arriving early at the start wasn't necessarily a great idea, as I was third row (out of about 20-30 rows) and right in the middle. The first 400-500 metres are absolute mayhem! It seemed like people were getting me in a headlock every other stroke, and there was absolutely no spacial awareness from most of the guys around! Not a pleasant start, and quite a few minutes lost in fighting my way through, over and under people, but, a few elbow throws later, I'm through to relatively clear water, and now all I could feel are a couple of people drafting behind me, as they seemed to want to let me know by grabbing onto my foot every now and then. Not a big deal, as just an extra kick keeps them at bay.
When I did the swim course the 2 days before the race, I thought it was brilliantly done, with a big marker buoy clearly marking the course at every 100 metres. This was still the case on race day. After my race in Sharm, where I had to swim a few hundred extra metres, this time my watch showed that I swam 1,865 metres of a supposedly 1,900 metre course. So, good result on that front!
I get out of the swim at 09:25 feeling nicely warmed up, glance at my watch, and, as I expected, due to the lost minutes during the fighting start, I did it at a similar average pace to my warm-up pace. Not disappointed though, as I still have a long day ahead of me. I still need all the energy I could possibly have.
Transition is about 200-300 metres away from the swim exit, so it's a long way away. Transition itself, from where I would pick up my bike to where I would actually get on the bike, is another 500 or so metres, the longest in any Ironman organised event, according to the race briefing! So, I take my time. I pick up my bike bag, go into the changing tent, get out of my wetsuit, take in the energy drink I prepared for that point, I put on my sunglasses, helmet, socks and cycling shoes, drop my bag off and walk leisurely to the bike. I pick up the bike, and walk to the end of transition before mounting the bike and starting the bike leg at 09:32.
The bike course is rather pleasant and scenic. A long stretch runs along the coast between Alcudia and Port d'Pollença, on the east coast of Mallorca. It's especially sunny and very warm even at such an early time, so I make a mental note that I cannot possibly skip or skimp on any planned hydration or nutrition. I knew that at around 18-20km, the steep climb will start, so I had to save my power as much as I could. My plan was to average just above 30km/hr for the whole bike leg, so that first stretch I kept at around 32-35km/hr, nice high cadence of 90-95rpm, and feeling smooth.
The hill climb starts, and it is difficult, but I know it will be over in 15km. I start off by going a bit hard, but then I remind myself that my goal is to "finish" the race and not to break any records (or bones), so I just keep the climb at a very leisurely pace. I enjoy the amazing sights of the mountain.
Then, a rather entertaining thing happens! I overtake a guy called "Kevin" then another one right after called "Perry"! Now, for those who aren't familiar with recent British comedy, this will probably not mean anything to you, but, basically, two rather well know British comedians, Harry Enfield and Kathy Burke, made a silly film in 2000 "Kevin & Perry Go Large" about two teenage boys whose dreams were to become famous DJs and pick up girls. It is not a film for those who get offended easily, but anyway, in the film they create a song that ends up being played in a famous club in Ibiza, and the song was "All I Wanna Do Is Do It". So, since I was just thinking to myself about wanting to finish the race, as I passed Kevin and Perry, I couldn't stop thinking about this song in my head (yet not in the sense meant in the film). It was a rather amusing thought that kept me entertained for the next 4 hours of the race.
At just after 29.8km, my bike computer decided to pack in, so I lost the reference I was using for speed. I switched to my watch, which was showing time and distance, but I didn't bother to switch the screen to one that shows the speed. So, I was cycling purely by feel for the remaining 60km. I knew that the climb was to end around 35-36km, so it wasn't long to go now. "A" just overtook me on the hill, and he looked strong. As I am coaching him, we had a specific race strategy for him and a target time, but he looked like he could smash this time, so I shouted at him that he could go for a sub 5 hour time. Then he disappeared into the distance.
I got to the top of the hill, and the descent started. With so many cyclists around, a very steep descent and a lot of very sharp curves, I had to make sure that I would stay safe and not to overdo things. A fall would be very dangerous indeed. As I expected, quite a few riders were not very aware of others around them and used the full width of the road, so I had to make sure I gave them a wide berth while overtaking. In the meantime, some overconfident mad riders were just going way too fast at the curves, with a few near misses and skids, but nothing major happening, at least in front of me.
Descent finishes, and I get on the relatively flat road. After some shade in the mountain, the sun is shining down on the road once again. I keep reminding myself of nutrition and hydration, and I can't get that silly song out of my head. I eat one energy bar (homemade, of course). 52km, I get to the aid station and pick up water, add it to my front aero bottle, and throw it away. I decide to eat another half a bar. 65km, final aid station, another bottle of water, fill my bottle, throw their bottle away. Keep going. On the main motorway now back to Alcudia, and the wind seems to be one minute coming from behind, and another from the side, then from the front. I just keep my head down and keep spinning. I look at my watch and do a bit of mental arithmetics and I am way off my planned pace. At least 10-15 minutes behind. Anyway, I think to myself, I just need to complete the race. I'm not here to beat any records.
I get back to transition, get off the bike, look at my watch, and I have done 14 minutes over my planned 3 hours. I stroll into transition, walking in my cycling shoes, rack the bike, get my T2 bag, get into the changing tent, and take my time taking off my socks, applying Vaseline to my feet to avoid blisters on the run, put on some fresh socks, running shoes on, take a small flask with salt, honey and water with me, and get out of transition 6 minutes later.
The start of the 3 lap half marathon run doesn't feel nice. I have done so many runs after bike rides, whether in training or in races before, so I was expecting this anyway. The only difference now is that this was not getting any easier as I have always been used to. I get to the first aid station, about 1km from transition, have a quick drink and pour some water over my steaming head. I continue my running at a pace around 5 seconds slower than my original plan, so I thought to myself, this should be ok as long as I can keep it up. As I approach the second aid station, at around 4km, I can't help but feel like going to the toilet. So, I enter into one of the portable toilets at the start of the aid station and start to negotiate my way out of my tri suit! Not a very easy task under normal circumstances, and now I have to do it in the middle of a race inside a tiny cubicle! Anyway, I get on with my business as quickly as I can, negotiate my way back into the tri suit, wash my hands and face, get out, and grab some water from the aid station to drink and pour over my head. I continue with my slower pace, come across "M" on the other side of the road who gives me a shout out and says that he's on his final lap. I wish him good luck and I continue with my run. I get towards the end of the first lap, get my first band, get to the aid station at the start of second lap, get some of my salt and energy down with some water, and then as I try to increase my pace, my legs aren't responding the way I'm hoping. Not a great feeling, but nothing I can do. I think to myself, as long as I make sure I don't cramp and just get to that finish line.
Second band and second lap done, I start to feel the onset of a cramp in my right quads, I take in some salt and slow the pace slightly, all is good, but I am knackered. 17km done now, only 4 more to go. The last 4km seem like they are just never ending. Every kilometre seems to take forever to complete, so I get back to my silly song, which helps a bit. I get the third band, which proves I've actually done the 3 laps, and start heading towards the last 2 kilometres. I can see that I'll end up doing the half marathon in at least 15-20 minutes more than my usual time. I get to the last aid station, pour a lot of water on myself, and just make my way to the finishing chute. I haven't looked at my overall time, but all I could feel now was how delighted I was to be near the finish line, and how much I would have loved to have my wife and kids here! I cross the finish line with as huge a smile on my face as I could possibly have after this gruelling experience, and look back up at the sign to see my name with the time next to it reading 06:04.58. I really didn't care much about the fact that it was over 6 hours, or even that it was over half an hour more than I anticipated. All I could think of was: I'VE DONE IT!!!
I get my finisher's medal, make my way to the area where I could pick up my bag with personal items, which they have misplaced but I eventually found somewhere else, called my wife immediately, found my friends, had something to eat, went to hotel for a nice cold bath, changed, checked-out bike and gear, attended the awards event, went for dinner and had a massive steak, and went to bed.
"A" has smashed the target time we've had for him but just missed out on going sub 5 hours, but it is an absolutely amazing achievement for a first time! "M" did amazing, as he is just a beast on the bike and a decent runner! And I finished the race! All in all, a great end to a great day!
My main conclusions:
1. This is the perfect distance for me! I just love it, and I think it is just right!
2. I need to make sure I start the swim on the far side and not in the middle of the pack.
3. I need to work on my swim speed a bit. Not as a main focus, though.
4. Leave the cycling shoes on the bike, like I do in shorter distances.
5. I need much more strength on the bike.
6. I need to work on my bike speed.
7. I need to make sure I have the speed in front of me at all time during the bike leg, whatever happens.
8. I need to work on muscle endurance in both the bike and the run.
9. My heart, lungs and bones seem to handle this distance just fine. It is the muscles that need my attention from now on.
10. My race nutrition is spot on as it is.
11. It may be useful in the future to avoid gluten and dairy the few days before the race.
12. I might want to add caffeine in T2 or at some point during the run.
13. I need to take an extra pair of trainers for such races.
14. I have to go back to Mallorca with the family.
See you there next year!
Next stops: WTS London 1st June (Standard distance), Ironman 70.3 Luxembourg 21st June (Middle distance), The London Triathlon 3rd August (Standard distance).
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