I was pretty nervous before the start, but not too bad. I had estimated my split times to be 1:30 for the swim, 7:00 for the bike, and 6:00 for the run. I thought I might be able to do these times, but I knew that I had quite a bit of extra time to play with if I couldn't.
My biggest concern going in was my nutrition plan. I had been training for the most part only eating Clif Blocks, but I thought I should probably not just eat that all day... I thought that might make me sick. So I planned to mix in some gels on the bike too. For the run I just figured that I would mix it up with what was available. Overall, this worked out pretty well. I stayed away from Gatorade on the bike (I think that made me somewhat sick in Boise), and I was eating blocks or gels just about as much as I could... around every 20-30 minutes. On the run I did just mix it up, I ate cookies, pretzels, chips, gels, bananas and drank cola, gatorade, and chicken broth as well as water.
So now to the actual race. I had done the practice swim to check out the water temp on Saturday. I knew the water was going to be pretty cold, so I got in the water as soon as I could to adjust to it. I got up near the start line too... I know I'm not one of the fastest swimmers, but I figured I would be getting passed (and maybe passing people) anyway, so I might as well start close to the front anyway. While waiting for the start, they played Ironman by Black Sabbath (which was fun), and then the national anthem. The pros started, and then 10 minutes later we were off. I felt ok starting off, but my arms felt a little heavy/tight... I think mostly my triceps were tight. I just kept going and was still swimming fine, so I just ignored it. I had on a big patch of moleskin on my neck too... it seemed to be helping with the chafing problem I've had with my wetsuit...but again, at that point there wasn't anything I could do about it, so I tried not to worry about it. I think I did end up getting a little bit of chafing up in my hair, right above the moleskin patch. I was wearing my watch, and checked it a few times, but I don't really remember what times I saw. I mostly wanted to make sure I got to the first turn by 45 minutes, and I believe I did. All told I finished in 1:23, which was great... 2:11 pace, really good for me. Got helped out of the water, got help with taking my wetsuit off, and it was on to transition.
For T1, we needed to grab our bike gear bags and change... there were tons of people around just changing outside of the change tent, so I assumed it was too full and did the same. I got my cycling jersey on (loaded with food), but it was nice at the time, so I decided not to put on the long sleeve shirt I had in the bag... later I would regret that. I got some sunscreen put on by the volunteers and went and picked up my bike.
I think I came out a little hot on the bike. There was a bunch of traffic near the start and it was kinda tough to weave past them... but it was kinda fun too. After a couple of turns, I started noticing my back tire seemed a little squirrelly... I stopped once to check it even, seemed a little soft, but not too bad... but I couldn't get it out of my head. At the next aid station I stopped at the Landis tent and asked them to check it. They pumped it up and it was a lot better. I was shooting for doing each half lap in an hour, and the first one was pretty close... that gave me a lot of confidence. Turning around into the wind didn't help, but I just pushed through it. I managed to stay in the aero position quite a lot (and could tell the difference it was making too). Each leg out was pretty nice, each leg back was torture with the wind. I ended up doing the whole bike section in 7:23, a little over my hoped 7:00, but I was happy with it. There were parts with rain, apparently some hail too... it was cold a few different times, and I had no sleeves or pants even in my special needs bag (just food and tylenol in there).
I got back to transition and hit the bathroom and the change tent. I took my time changing, had some chips for the salt, some water, and eventually headed out to the run.
I knew I could do quite a slow run and still finish by midnight... I couldn't remember when the cut-off was (I later remembered it was that you had to start the third lap by 10:15), so I still wanted to make good time to make sure I wouldn't be in danger of that. I started off running .2 miles and then walking .3 miles... I think with this strategy I had managed 12:00 miles during my training. I did this quite a bit, but it just eventually fell apart, and I would just run a couple tenths when I could, then walk a while, then run some more. I was trying to make 2 hour laps, and the first one I think was around 2:10. I just kept getting slower and slower, but I knew I still had plenty of time to play with. I kept this up, eating, drinking... walking, jogging... until I was on the last lap. Then I was able to count down the miles left to go. I wanted to pick up the pace as much as I could. I think I did go pretty well for a few miles of the last lap, but then I just started hurting more and more. At the end, I couldn't run at all anymore, both feet were killing me, giant blister on my right, and some kind of compression ankle thing on my left. I tried a few times to run a bit, but it just hurt too much, so I saved up and walked... I always have to run through the finish, and usually the crowd is enough to motivate at that time through whatever pain is going on. This finish chute was the best I've been through... lots of cheering, lots of people giving high-fives... the announcer guy saying "
So, my total time was 15:47:09... I'm so happy that I was able to finish. Considering I'd never swam that distance before, never biked over 100 miles before (never over 62 really), and never run a marathon before (15-ish at most)... I think it went great. Now the real question is whether I will do more Ironman distance races or not... right now I'm not too excited about the prospect, but I think the fact that I haven't ruled it out means I probably will end up doing it again. I had thought before that if I do, I will continue picking interesting races to travel to, maybe overseas... which would be great.
