Black Bear Race Report
Saturday Pre-Race (Day Before Race):
Silvia and I drove up to the small town of Lehighton, Pennsylvania around noon on Saturday. After MapQuesting the directions from my crib, I looked at the total distance from my house to our hotel – 70 miles! I laughed at the thought of this being roughly my race distance I’d be completing only 24 hours from then. I met up with my friend Mike, who I swam with in college at Boston University, to head over to the pre-race meeting that would start at 3pm. Sunday would be Mike’s first half ironman as well. We are both endurance sports virgins but were eagerly looking forward to Sunday.
When we arrived at the race site for the pre-race meeting, I was really blown away with how beautiful the setting was for this race. If you ever find yourself anywhere near Lehighton, PA, you really owe it to yourself to spend a day at Beltzville State Park. It is really gorgeous. I wish I had more time there to relax and unwind. Perhaps after that little race on July 22?!
The pre-race meeting was pretty uneventful. There was, however, one point during the discussion that made my nerves shake a bit. Someone asked the race director what the bike course was like. His response was to ask if anyone had done Ironman Wisconsin. A few people proceeded to raise their hands. He then said, “well…it’s kinda like that.” Some people laughed. Some people gasped. I just stood silent and motionless. I was nervous.
Following the pre-race meeting, Silvia was gracious enough to drive Mike and me through the bike course. As we started driving the skies opened up and it rained cats and dogs for about an hour. There was some of this water left on the course on Sunday, but not enough to be concerned about. I really wish I had worn a Depends diaper for the drive, because I really wanted to shit my pants while observing what I’d be dealing with on Sunday morning. The hills were endless throughout the entire course. My immediate thought was that I’d never be going my average speed during the ride. In other words, if I averaged 16mph on Sunday, I’d never actually see 16mph on my cyclometer as a current speed. It would be either under 10 or over 30 basically the whole way.
Following the ride, Silvia and I headed back to the hotel. We watched some really trashy MTV show called “X Effect”. Good stuff when you’re looking for mindless TV to ease your nerves! Following the trashy show we headed to the local Italian restaurant for a big ass carbo loading meal. I’m pretty sure just about everyone else doing the race on Sunday had the same idea…it was packed with shaved and buffed triathletes. You could say we stood out like a sore thumb compared to the motorcycle and leather-clad locals.
I managed to fall asleep by 11pm, which allowed me to get 6 hours of sleep before my 5am wake-up call. Not ideal, but better than no sleep at all.
Sunday Pre-Race (Race Day):
As I mentioned, I woke up at 5am. Prior to putting any calories in my body, I took a quick shower to help me wake up. Following the shower I proceeded to drink four 8-ounce Boost energy drinks. This totaled 960 calories, which I think is a pretty good pre-race total. I have found throughout the course of my training that I have a much easier time taking in liquid calories in the morning compared to solid food. 960 calories of solid food would be a hell of a lot of food in my stomach. 32 ounces of fluid doesn’t seem too bad for some reason. Especially considering some of this gets peed out prior to the race. Please feel free to share your pre-race nutrition with me if you feel you have the holy grail of pre-race nutrition! Silvia and I headed over to the race site around 6:30 and arrived there at about 6:40. There were actually two races being run at the Black Bear triathlon. The half ironman and a sprint distance race. The sprint race started at 7:30am so the transition area closed at 7:10am. They didn’t want half ironman athletes milling around the transition area when sprint athletes were coming through, so we had to go down to the swim entry area 50 minutes before we were slated to start. I didn’t think this was ideal, but I understand from the race director’s perspective why this had to be done. I’m a pretty laid back dude and don’t flip out about stuff like this. Between 7:10 and 8:00am, Mike and I sat on our asses and sipped some hydration. Watching the sprint tri’ers go off in their swim waves reminded me of the Philly Sprint tri, which was my first event on the road back to my health last year. This made me smile.
The Swim:
At 7:55am my swim wave was called down to the entry area. I was nervous but excited. I was doing my first half ironman and felt pretty awesome about the fact that I had just made it to the starting line! As my wave entered the water, the race director got on his megaphone and announced that the far right buoy on the inverted triangle course had blown away. I estimate that this took off about 200 yards from the swim. So if you’re a stickler, feel free to add about 3 minutes to my swim time.
The swim waves were pretty small in terms of total people. There were only about 250 people who toed the line on race day and there were 4 waves. You can do the math on how small each wave was. Truth be told, with this few competitors, I’m not sure why the director didn’t just opt for a mass start. 250 people really aren’t that many to send off all at once. 2500 people will mass start with me on July 22 at IMLP. Now that’s a mass start! With less than 70 people in my wave I figured I’d have clean water pretty much for the entire swim. Because the buoys were always on my right, and I breathe left, I would have to really work on my sighting unless I had a pack of toes that I could sneak behind. This was my first swim with a wetsuit, and I have to say that it was an awesome experience. It’s like getting the buoyancy of a pull buoy but still having the opportunity to kick. I actually rarely kick anymore in my swimming though. I figure I need my legs for the bike and run! For the entire swim I never found any toes to follow. There was a pack of very fast dudes that smoked me by about 3 minutes, and besides that there was really no one else in between me and them. I’ll be honest, in a race with so few people in my wave I don’t obsess about finding people to draft off of. In Ironman you really have no choice – there will be bodies everywhere. If you are banging into me on a wide open course with only 60 something other swimmers, you’re just a jackass. Learn some general swim etiquette. A few guys tried to be heroes early on in the swim. One fella smoked me in the head a few times. There’s just no reason for this on a wide open swim course. After some battling to the first buoy, I settled in nicely. The water was pristine and was a real treat to swim in. I had clean water for as far as the eye could see and I just focused on taking it easy, breathing well and keeping my heart rate low. I really wanted my swim to just be my bike warm-up. I could really bang much faster if I wanted to be a swim hero…but if that’s what I wanted to do I’d call myself an open-water swimmer and not a triathlete. A couple of guys settled in behind my toes and let me do all the work during the swim. I am fine with this. Call it pride, but 10 times out of 10 I’d feel better about the fact that I dragged your ass to the finish rather than vice versa. At some points it was actually down right ridiculous how blatant their drafting was. As I mentioned before, the course was sort of an inverted triangle. The buoys were quite far apart and sighting was challenging. The aforementioned ass clowns behind me simply refused to do any of the work with sighting. There were a few points where I’d reach a buoy and stop for 2 or 3 seconds, do a few breaststroke pulls and gain my bearings. The second I pulled out of my freestyle, these guys followed suit and refused to continue on until I did. Maybe if I just sat there for a few minutes, they’d actually race their own race?! Who knows? Anyhow, the swim went well overall. My pace was good and I was happy with my result. I exited the water 12th out of the 243 finishers (4th out of 23 in my age group and 12th out of 187 dudes). My swim split as I exited was 26:58. Although as I mentioned before, the course was a couple hundred yards short, so if you’re a purist, you should add about 3 minutes to my swim. On the official results, my swim time is listed as 29:25. Reason being that the timing mat was about ¼ mile away from the water exit and was an uphill run across sand, pine cones and large tree branches. I walked a fair bit of this as I wanted my stomach to settle down after being horizontal for nearly 27 minutes.
T1:
My time is listed as 3:07. It should list 5:34 considering this is how long it really took to get from the water exit to the bike mount. I took my time through T1. Some people pride themselves on fast transitions. I actually pride myself on slow transitions at this point in my tri career! I feel like it’s better to take that extra minute and do a triple check that you have everything you need for your next leg. I was 171st out of 243 (18th out of 23 in my age group and 130th out of 187 dudes) for T1. Yahoo! I saw Dave Hartman in T1 as well. He had a terrific swim and looked ready to rock the bike. He joked that I should be long gone from T1 if he was there. I joked back that I figured it was the only time I’d see him during the race so I might as well wait around for him. He ended up demolishing the course and finished 13th overall. Check out his own race report for his experience!
The Bike:
The course was an absolute beast. I found this profile of the course on trail.motionbased.com, and it certainly backs up anyone’s assertion that this was one bad ass course. 5700+ feet of climbing in 56 miles! My cyclometer clocked the course as being 0.77 miles short of 56 miles, so if you want to dock me 3ish extra minutes, go ahead! The hills hit you fast and hit you hard on this course. I was really humbled by them. For the first seven miles, you basically climb, climb and umm climb! I saw many people who actually opted to walk their bikes up hills. I never walked once. For some walking was probably a smart decision. I think my low speed on the hills bottomed out slightly below 6mph. 10 minute miles…you do the math…walking for some was probably not that bad in some spots in terms of time lost. After about 15 minutes I started taking in nutrition. My plan was to try for one 24-ounce bottle of Gatorade (150 calories) per hour in conjunction with one Balance Bar (200 calories) and one PowerGel (100 calories). This would total 450 calories per hour. Unfortunately there were 1.5 Balance Bars and 2 PowerGels left in my bento box when I rolled into T2, so my nutrition plan fell about 500 calories short for my bike ride. I was disappointed with this, but the hills really threw a wrench in my nutrition plan. It’s very hard to take in calories when you are either going up a nasty hill or screaming down one. I really have to work on this over the next 6 weeks. Although my total calories were lacking, I was glad I did put down one bottle of Gatorade per hour. I think this is good.
I was passed by many many people on the bike. Such is the life of a swimmer. My bike fitness continues to be my biggest limiter as a triathlete. As scary as the climbs were, the downhills were equally frightening. I topped out at 38.8mph on the downhills and I was being a total wimp on the downhills! There were people flying by me in their aerobars and looked to be going about 50mph. There were spots where the roads were a bit bumpy on these downhills, and I had to chicken out and take my hands off the aerobars and onto the bullhorns close by the breaks. At the end of the day I lost some speed, but this is my “B-Race” leading up to IMLP, and I’m not about to break my shoulder, or worse, because of my crappy bike handling skills when I’m on the aerobars. At the bottle exchange at mile 18 I was glad to take on some cold Gatorade. I was confused during the pre-race meeting as the race director mentioned both Gatorade and HEED. I train exclusively with Gatorade because it will be on course in Placid. When I picked up my bottle at the exchange, I was very happy that it was Gatorade and not HEED, which I have never tried. It turns out that the bike course was Gatorade and the run course was HEED…but more on that later. There were only 2 bottle exchanges on the bike course. I thought this was a bit stingy, but not really a big deal. In actuality, there was only 1 bottle exchange, but you hit it twice as the bike course was 2 loops.
The up and down hills really never did end. I can’t remember a single spot on the course that had a sustainable flat for even 1 mile. As I mentioned earlier, I’m nearly certain that my cyclometer never showed me what ended up being my average speed (16.2mph). The 55+ish miles were very very hard. I was really pleased with the fact that I made it through by grinding up the hills and doing my best to stay calm on the screaming downs. Very few people managed to have even a 20mph average, so I knew this course was a beast.
I rolled into T2 with a HUGE smile on my face. I was bobbing my head with a shit eating grin. The crowd was loving it just as much as I was. For all of the hills and hard work I put in up to this point, I was still coherent and happy to be out there. 3:25:14. 127th out of 243 competitors, 13th out of 23 in my age group and 114th out of 187 dudes.
T2:
I saw Silvia for the first time in hours. She was amazing all day for me! I owe her the world. We had a brief conversation. I told her I felt wonderful. It wasn’t a lie. I really did feel good. Although I didn’t hit my calorie target, my legs still felt good. I was still hydrated. I felt like I could finish a half mary. All reasons to smile. I gave Silvia a big sweaty kiss and headed out on the run. 2:26. 163rd out of 243 competitors, 19th out of 23 in my age group, 128th out of 187 dudes.
The Run:
Although I managed to drive the bike course the day before, I’d yet to see any of the run course. It was described to me as mostly grass and gravel trail running with a few challenging hills. Here’s the run profile as well which I again lifted off of trail.motionbased.com. As you can see from the elevation profile, we weren’t exactly given a reprieve from the hills after our beast of a bike course. I hit the first mile in 9:03 and was very pleased with that result. I thought I could run roughly a 10 minute pace for this half mary if I felt okay and didn’t crumble at the end, so this was a fast start to my run. My stomach had a few knots in it, which really didn’t let up during most of the run. When I hit the first aid station I took a full exam of what they had to offer. As I mentioned before, I was psyched to have Gatorade at the bottle exchange on the bike, but was not happy about HEED on the run. In retrospect, my biggest mistake of the race was to not bring my own bottle of Gatorade on the run. I know it. I love it. I trust it. End of story. I was stupid to think I could wing it with HEED during my first half ironman. I ended up taking my first drink of HEED at mile 1. My stomach was not happy with my experiment. It basically told me to eff myself and it wouldn’t tolerate this new substance for the rest of the day. Great! I’m one mile into my run and already know it’ll be water for me from here on out. No sodium. No potassium. No sugar. NO CALORIES. I was basically biding my time until my bonk. Not good. I was staying hydrated. I just couldn’t take in calories for the rest of the run. This will hopefully not be an issue at IMLP. My darling Gatorade will be on course. There were two significant hills on the run course, which was a two loop course so you’d hit both of them twice. The first big hill on the first loop I ran up just fine. The remaining three I’d resolve myself to a powerwalk and death shuffle. They were very tough and humbling, but I made it through. The course was a bit rough on my feet. I don’t have the strongest ankles in the world from a career as a competitive swimmer, and this run course was a cross between an XTERRA triathlon and a normal triathlon. There was basically nothing in the way of concrete. It was a combo of grass and gravel. There were even a few spots that required you to jump over very large ditches. I heard a few people on course fall over due to cramping as a result of these ditch jumps. That would have royally sucked! I felt bad for them. Aside from the difficulty of the course, it was a really beautiful run. All sorts of streams, cool rock formations, and even a traverse across this really kick ass dam which was well over a mile round trip. My miles kept on clicking away. Most were between 9:45 and 10:15. I kept up a routine of taking two cups of water at every aid station. One cup to put down my throat. One cup to dump all over my body. In retrospect, I probably need to focus more in terms of getting more down my throat. I lost a pretty significant amount of weight during the race, which I assume is due to dehydration. After 10 miles I was on pace to run about a 2:08 half marathon. Not bad considering I ran a stand alone 1:59 half mary at the Philly Distance Run only last September. It was at the 10th mile that I was introduced to “The Wall”. I had been without calories for about 90 minutes, and my body would not tolerate it anymore. I began to slow. I saw Mike at my 11th mile. He was on his first loop, and was around his 6th mile. We both had a long day and I am very proud of him for powering through all the way to the finish line. I slowed in my 11th mile down to about 11:30 pace. This was also my pace for mile 12. Mile 12 was where I hit the really really huge wall. I think mentally I was so overwhelmed with the idea of finishing my mind just began to shut down. It took me 8 minutes to get to mile 12.5. I was so out of it that I couldn’t even estimate how long it would take me to get to the finish line given my 8 minute half mile. The last 0.6 miles were such a relief. I could hear the finish line announcer, which really willed me to the line. In the last quarter mile you pass under this beautiful covered bridge. It was pretty awesome. After the covered bridge I saw the finish line. I got passed a few yards before the line by a hero runner. No worries for me though. I was just trying to enjoy the experience of finishing my first ever half ironman. I raised my fist in the air and crossed the line. I was a half iron man. The run took 2:15:58. I was 139th out of 243 competitors on the run, 11th out of 23 in my age group (still can’t believe I was above the median runner in my age group) and 111th out of 187 dudes. If all I did in miles 11-13 was hold my pace up to that point, I would have finished the half mary leg in about 2:08. I would have been ecstatic with that, but considering the course, I am okay with my result.
I finished the race in 6:16:10, which was good enough for 113th out of 243 competitors, 11th out of 23 in my age group and 97th out of 187 dudes. Not too shabby for an endurance rookie!
Post-Race:
I received my finisher’s medal and leapt into Silvia’s arms. She kept saying how proud she was of me. I was a space cadet at this point and was having a tough time. I needed to sit down immediately and found a park bench in the shade. I really was not in atrocious pain, but for some reason I started to cry a bit. Maybe it was out of joy. Maybe it was because I was reflecting on the past two years of my life and how far I’d come. Maybe it was pain, happiness and a whirlwind of emotions. It took me nearly 15 minutes to compose myself before I could make it over to the food line. I scarfed a burger, fruit salad, cookies, water and two sodas over the next 30ish minutes. I wanted to wait around for Mike to finish, but I had to high tail it out of Lehighton to go home and take a shower so I could hop a plane for Chicago to see one of my closest friends graduate from medical school, which is something I just wasn’t willing to miss. I headed back to the transition area to gather my gear and head home. I ran into Dave, who I congratulated. We walked through the transition area together and as I gathered my stuff I eavesdropped on a conversation Dave was having with a competitor who’s done IMLP before. Prior to hearing this conversation, I have to say I was to the point where I thought that if IMLP’s course is this brutal, I am in for one horrible day on July 22. The guy told Dave that the Black Bear course is HARDER THAN IMLP. I really couldn’t have been happier to hear this. I just completed a course that someone who’s done Placid thinks Black Bear is harder! Hell yeah. For some reason, this really made my day.
After having about 5 days to reflect on this race, I am pretty damn pleased with my result. Many folks have said that this course ran about 20-30 minutes slower than an average half iron course. The course was crazy hard. I’m not sure if this will deter people from doing the race in the future. I think it could go one of two ways: It’s too hard and people won’t bother in the future or it could become a cult classic and possibly the preeminent tune-up for Ironman Lake Placid.
I certainly have huge room for improvements across all facets of this sport, but last Sunday I toed the line and I finished. That was my goal: FINISH. The time is just a matter of pride. I need to not get caught up in that at this point in my tri career. I took a few days off of training while I was in Chi-town, but I’m back in Philly and back to the grind.
As I said in a prior post, I’ve never felt more alive than I feel right now.
70.3 baby!
Silvia and I drove up to the small town of Lehighton, Pennsylvania around noon on Saturday. After MapQuesting the directions from my crib, I looked at the total distance from my house to our hotel – 70 miles! I laughed at the thought of this being roughly my race distance I’d be completing only 24 hours from then. I met up with my friend Mike, who I swam with in college at Boston University, to head over to the pre-race meeting that would start at 3pm. Sunday would be Mike’s first half ironman as well. We are both endurance sports virgins but were eagerly looking forward to Sunday.
When we arrived at the race site for the pre-race meeting, I was really blown away with how beautiful the setting was for this race. If you ever find yourself anywhere near Lehighton, PA, you really owe it to yourself to spend a day at Beltzville State Park. It is really gorgeous. I wish I had more time there to relax and unwind. Perhaps after that little race on July 22?!
The pre-race meeting was pretty uneventful. There was, however, one point during the discussion that made my nerves shake a bit. Someone asked the race director what the bike course was like. His response was to ask if anyone had done Ironman Wisconsin. A few people proceeded to raise their hands. He then said, “well…it’s kinda like that.” Some people laughed. Some people gasped. I just stood silent and motionless. I was nervous.
Following the pre-race meeting, Silvia was gracious enough to drive Mike and me through the bike course. As we started driving the skies opened up and it rained cats and dogs for about an hour. There was some of this water left on the course on Sunday, but not enough to be concerned about. I really wish I had worn a Depends diaper for the drive, because I really wanted to shit my pants while observing what I’d be dealing with on Sunday morning. The hills were endless throughout the entire course. My immediate thought was that I’d never be going my average speed during the ride. In other words, if I averaged 16mph on Sunday, I’d never actually see 16mph on my cyclometer as a current speed. It would be either under 10 or over 30 basically the whole way.
Following the ride, Silvia and I headed back to the hotel. We watched some really trashy MTV show called “X Effect”. Good stuff when you’re looking for mindless TV to ease your nerves! Following the trashy show we headed to the local Italian restaurant for a big ass carbo loading meal. I’m pretty sure just about everyone else doing the race on Sunday had the same idea…it was packed with shaved and buffed triathletes. You could say we stood out like a sore thumb compared to the motorcycle and leather-clad locals.
I managed to fall asleep by 11pm, which allowed me to get 6 hours of sleep before my 5am wake-up call. Not ideal, but better than no sleep at all.
Sunday Pre-Race (Race Day):
As I mentioned, I woke up at 5am. Prior to putting any calories in my body, I took a quick shower to help me wake up. Following the shower I proceeded to drink four 8-ounce Boost energy drinks. This totaled 960 calories, which I think is a pretty good pre-race total. I have found throughout the course of my training that I have a much easier time taking in liquid calories in the morning compared to solid food. 960 calories of solid food would be a hell of a lot of food in my stomach. 32 ounces of fluid doesn’t seem too bad for some reason. Especially considering some of this gets peed out prior to the race. Please feel free to share your pre-race nutrition with me if you feel you have the holy grail of pre-race nutrition! Silvia and I headed over to the race site around 6:30 and arrived there at about 6:40. There were actually two races being run at the Black Bear triathlon. The half ironman and a sprint distance race. The sprint race started at 7:30am so the transition area closed at 7:10am. They didn’t want half ironman athletes milling around the transition area when sprint athletes were coming through, so we had to go down to the swim entry area 50 minutes before we were slated to start. I didn’t think this was ideal, but I understand from the race director’s perspective why this had to be done. I’m a pretty laid back dude and don’t flip out about stuff like this. Between 7:10 and 8:00am, Mike and I sat on our asses and sipped some hydration. Watching the sprint tri’ers go off in their swim waves reminded me of the Philly Sprint tri, which was my first event on the road back to my health last year. This made me smile.
The Swim:
At 7:55am my swim wave was called down to the entry area. I was nervous but excited. I was doing my first half ironman and felt pretty awesome about the fact that I had just made it to the starting line! As my wave entered the water, the race director got on his megaphone and announced that the far right buoy on the inverted triangle course had blown away. I estimate that this took off about 200 yards from the swim. So if you’re a stickler, feel free to add about 3 minutes to my swim time.
The swim waves were pretty small in terms of total people. There were only about 250 people who toed the line on race day and there were 4 waves. You can do the math on how small each wave was. Truth be told, with this few competitors, I’m not sure why the director didn’t just opt for a mass start. 250 people really aren’t that many to send off all at once. 2500 people will mass start with me on July 22 at IMLP. Now that’s a mass start! With less than 70 people in my wave I figured I’d have clean water pretty much for the entire swim. Because the buoys were always on my right, and I breathe left, I would have to really work on my sighting unless I had a pack of toes that I could sneak behind. This was my first swim with a wetsuit, and I have to say that it was an awesome experience. It’s like getting the buoyancy of a pull buoy but still having the opportunity to kick. I actually rarely kick anymore in my swimming though. I figure I need my legs for the bike and run! For the entire swim I never found any toes to follow. There was a pack of very fast dudes that smoked me by about 3 minutes, and besides that there was really no one else in between me and them. I’ll be honest, in a race with so few people in my wave I don’t obsess about finding people to draft off of. In Ironman you really have no choice – there will be bodies everywhere. If you are banging into me on a wide open course with only 60 something other swimmers, you’re just a jackass. Learn some general swim etiquette. A few guys tried to be heroes early on in the swim. One fella smoked me in the head a few times. There’s just no reason for this on a wide open swim course. After some battling to the first buoy, I settled in nicely. The water was pristine and was a real treat to swim in. I had clean water for as far as the eye could see and I just focused on taking it easy, breathing well and keeping my heart rate low. I really wanted my swim to just be my bike warm-up. I could really bang much faster if I wanted to be a swim hero…but if that’s what I wanted to do I’d call myself an open-water swimmer and not a triathlete. A couple of guys settled in behind my toes and let me do all the work during the swim. I am fine with this. Call it pride, but 10 times out of 10 I’d feel better about the fact that I dragged your ass to the finish rather than vice versa. At some points it was actually down right ridiculous how blatant their drafting was. As I mentioned before, the course was sort of an inverted triangle. The buoys were quite far apart and sighting was challenging. The aforementioned ass clowns behind me simply refused to do any of the work with sighting. There were a few points where I’d reach a buoy and stop for 2 or 3 seconds, do a few breaststroke pulls and gain my bearings. The second I pulled out of my freestyle, these guys followed suit and refused to continue on until I did. Maybe if I just sat there for a few minutes, they’d actually race their own race?! Who knows? Anyhow, the swim went well overall. My pace was good and I was happy with my result. I exited the water 12th out of the 243 finishers (4th out of 23 in my age group and 12th out of 187 dudes). My swim split as I exited was 26:58. Although as I mentioned before, the course was a couple hundred yards short, so if you’re a purist, you should add about 3 minutes to my swim. On the official results, my swim time is listed as 29:25. Reason being that the timing mat was about ¼ mile away from the water exit and was an uphill run across sand, pine cones and large tree branches. I walked a fair bit of this as I wanted my stomach to settle down after being horizontal for nearly 27 minutes.
T1:
My time is listed as 3:07. It should list 5:34 considering this is how long it really took to get from the water exit to the bike mount. I took my time through T1. Some people pride themselves on fast transitions. I actually pride myself on slow transitions at this point in my tri career! I feel like it’s better to take that extra minute and do a triple check that you have everything you need for your next leg. I was 171st out of 243 (18th out of 23 in my age group and 130th out of 187 dudes) for T1. Yahoo! I saw Dave Hartman in T1 as well. He had a terrific swim and looked ready to rock the bike. He joked that I should be long gone from T1 if he was there. I joked back that I figured it was the only time I’d see him during the race so I might as well wait around for him. He ended up demolishing the course and finished 13th overall. Check out his own race report for his experience!
The Bike:
The course was an absolute beast. I found this profile of the course on trail.motionbased.com, and it certainly backs up anyone’s assertion that this was one bad ass course. 5700+ feet of climbing in 56 miles! My cyclometer clocked the course as being 0.77 miles short of 56 miles, so if you want to dock me 3ish extra minutes, go ahead! The hills hit you fast and hit you hard on this course. I was really humbled by them. For the first seven miles, you basically climb, climb and umm climb! I saw many people who actually opted to walk their bikes up hills. I never walked once. For some walking was probably a smart decision. I think my low speed on the hills bottomed out slightly below 6mph. 10 minute miles…you do the math…walking for some was probably not that bad in some spots in terms of time lost. After about 15 minutes I started taking in nutrition. My plan was to try for one 24-ounce bottle of Gatorade (150 calories) per hour in conjunction with one Balance Bar (200 calories) and one PowerGel (100 calories). This would total 450 calories per hour. Unfortunately there were 1.5 Balance Bars and 2 PowerGels left in my bento box when I rolled into T2, so my nutrition plan fell about 500 calories short for my bike ride. I was disappointed with this, but the hills really threw a wrench in my nutrition plan. It’s very hard to take in calories when you are either going up a nasty hill or screaming down one. I really have to work on this over the next 6 weeks. Although my total calories were lacking, I was glad I did put down one bottle of Gatorade per hour. I think this is good.
I was passed by many many people on the bike. Such is the life of a swimmer. My bike fitness continues to be my biggest limiter as a triathlete. As scary as the climbs were, the downhills were equally frightening. I topped out at 38.8mph on the downhills and I was being a total wimp on the downhills! There were people flying by me in their aerobars and looked to be going about 50mph. There were spots where the roads were a bit bumpy on these downhills, and I had to chicken out and take my hands off the aerobars and onto the bullhorns close by the breaks. At the end of the day I lost some speed, but this is my “B-Race” leading up to IMLP, and I’m not about to break my shoulder, or worse, because of my crappy bike handling skills when I’m on the aerobars. At the bottle exchange at mile 18 I was glad to take on some cold Gatorade. I was confused during the pre-race meeting as the race director mentioned both Gatorade and HEED. I train exclusively with Gatorade because it will be on course in Placid. When I picked up my bottle at the exchange, I was very happy that it was Gatorade and not HEED, which I have never tried. It turns out that the bike course was Gatorade and the run course was HEED…but more on that later. There were only 2 bottle exchanges on the bike course. I thought this was a bit stingy, but not really a big deal. In actuality, there was only 1 bottle exchange, but you hit it twice as the bike course was 2 loops.
The up and down hills really never did end. I can’t remember a single spot on the course that had a sustainable flat for even 1 mile. As I mentioned earlier, I’m nearly certain that my cyclometer never showed me what ended up being my average speed (16.2mph). The 55+ish miles were very very hard. I was really pleased with the fact that I made it through by grinding up the hills and doing my best to stay calm on the screaming downs. Very few people managed to have even a 20mph average, so I knew this course was a beast.
I rolled into T2 with a HUGE smile on my face. I was bobbing my head with a shit eating grin. The crowd was loving it just as much as I was. For all of the hills and hard work I put in up to this point, I was still coherent and happy to be out there. 3:25:14. 127th out of 243 competitors, 13th out of 23 in my age group and 114th out of 187 dudes.
T2:
I saw Silvia for the first time in hours. She was amazing all day for me! I owe her the world. We had a brief conversation. I told her I felt wonderful. It wasn’t a lie. I really did feel good. Although I didn’t hit my calorie target, my legs still felt good. I was still hydrated. I felt like I could finish a half mary. All reasons to smile. I gave Silvia a big sweaty kiss and headed out on the run. 2:26. 163rd out of 243 competitors, 19th out of 23 in my age group, 128th out of 187 dudes.
The Run:
Although I managed to drive the bike course the day before, I’d yet to see any of the run course. It was described to me as mostly grass and gravel trail running with a few challenging hills. Here’s the run profile as well which I again lifted off of trail.motionbased.com. As you can see from the elevation profile, we weren’t exactly given a reprieve from the hills after our beast of a bike course. I hit the first mile in 9:03 and was very pleased with that result. I thought I could run roughly a 10 minute pace for this half mary if I felt okay and didn’t crumble at the end, so this was a fast start to my run. My stomach had a few knots in it, which really didn’t let up during most of the run. When I hit the first aid station I took a full exam of what they had to offer. As I mentioned before, I was psyched to have Gatorade at the bottle exchange on the bike, but was not happy about HEED on the run. In retrospect, my biggest mistake of the race was to not bring my own bottle of Gatorade on the run. I know it. I love it. I trust it. End of story. I was stupid to think I could wing it with HEED during my first half ironman. I ended up taking my first drink of HEED at mile 1. My stomach was not happy with my experiment. It basically told me to eff myself and it wouldn’t tolerate this new substance for the rest of the day. Great! I’m one mile into my run and already know it’ll be water for me from here on out. No sodium. No potassium. No sugar. NO CALORIES. I was basically biding my time until my bonk. Not good. I was staying hydrated. I just couldn’t take in calories for the rest of the run. This will hopefully not be an issue at IMLP. My darling Gatorade will be on course. There were two significant hills on the run course, which was a two loop course so you’d hit both of them twice. The first big hill on the first loop I ran up just fine. The remaining three I’d resolve myself to a powerwalk and death shuffle. They were very tough and humbling, but I made it through. The course was a bit rough on my feet. I don’t have the strongest ankles in the world from a career as a competitive swimmer, and this run course was a cross between an XTERRA triathlon and a normal triathlon. There was basically nothing in the way of concrete. It was a combo of grass and gravel. There were even a few spots that required you to jump over very large ditches. I heard a few people on course fall over due to cramping as a result of these ditch jumps. That would have royally sucked! I felt bad for them. Aside from the difficulty of the course, it was a really beautiful run. All sorts of streams, cool rock formations, and even a traverse across this really kick ass dam which was well over a mile round trip. My miles kept on clicking away. Most were between 9:45 and 10:15. I kept up a routine of taking two cups of water at every aid station. One cup to put down my throat. One cup to dump all over my body. In retrospect, I probably need to focus more in terms of getting more down my throat. I lost a pretty significant amount of weight during the race, which I assume is due to dehydration. After 10 miles I was on pace to run about a 2:08 half marathon. Not bad considering I ran a stand alone 1:59 half mary at the Philly Distance Run only last September. It was at the 10th mile that I was introduced to “The Wall”. I had been without calories for about 90 minutes, and my body would not tolerate it anymore. I began to slow. I saw Mike at my 11th mile. He was on his first loop, and was around his 6th mile. We both had a long day and I am very proud of him for powering through all the way to the finish line. I slowed in my 11th mile down to about 11:30 pace. This was also my pace for mile 12. Mile 12 was where I hit the really really huge wall. I think mentally I was so overwhelmed with the idea of finishing my mind just began to shut down. It took me 8 minutes to get to mile 12.5. I was so out of it that I couldn’t even estimate how long it would take me to get to the finish line given my 8 minute half mile. The last 0.6 miles were such a relief. I could hear the finish line announcer, which really willed me to the line. In the last quarter mile you pass under this beautiful covered bridge. It was pretty awesome. After the covered bridge I saw the finish line. I got passed a few yards before the line by a hero runner. No worries for me though. I was just trying to enjoy the experience of finishing my first ever half ironman. I raised my fist in the air and crossed the line. I was a half iron man. The run took 2:15:58. I was 139th out of 243 competitors on the run, 11th out of 23 in my age group (still can’t believe I was above the median runner in my age group) and 111th out of 187 dudes. If all I did in miles 11-13 was hold my pace up to that point, I would have finished the half mary leg in about 2:08. I would have been ecstatic with that, but considering the course, I am okay with my result.
I finished the race in 6:16:10, which was good enough for 113th out of 243 competitors, 11th out of 23 in my age group and 97th out of 187 dudes. Not too shabby for an endurance rookie!
Post-Race:
I received my finisher’s medal and leapt into Silvia’s arms. She kept saying how proud she was of me. I was a space cadet at this point and was having a tough time. I needed to sit down immediately and found a park bench in the shade. I really was not in atrocious pain, but for some reason I started to cry a bit. Maybe it was out of joy. Maybe it was because I was reflecting on the past two years of my life and how far I’d come. Maybe it was pain, happiness and a whirlwind of emotions. It took me nearly 15 minutes to compose myself before I could make it over to the food line. I scarfed a burger, fruit salad, cookies, water and two sodas over the next 30ish minutes. I wanted to wait around for Mike to finish, but I had to high tail it out of Lehighton to go home and take a shower so I could hop a plane for Chicago to see one of my closest friends graduate from medical school, which is something I just wasn’t willing to miss. I headed back to the transition area to gather my gear and head home. I ran into Dave, who I congratulated. We walked through the transition area together and as I gathered my stuff I eavesdropped on a conversation Dave was having with a competitor who’s done IMLP before. Prior to hearing this conversation, I have to say I was to the point where I thought that if IMLP’s course is this brutal, I am in for one horrible day on July 22. The guy told Dave that the Black Bear course is HARDER THAN IMLP. I really couldn’t have been happier to hear this. I just completed a course that someone who’s done Placid thinks Black Bear is harder! Hell yeah. For some reason, this really made my day.
After having about 5 days to reflect on this race, I am pretty damn pleased with my result. Many folks have said that this course ran about 20-30 minutes slower than an average half iron course. The course was crazy hard. I’m not sure if this will deter people from doing the race in the future. I think it could go one of two ways: It’s too hard and people won’t bother in the future or it could become a cult classic and possibly the preeminent tune-up for Ironman Lake Placid.
I certainly have huge room for improvements across all facets of this sport, but last Sunday I toed the line and I finished. That was my goal: FINISH. The time is just a matter of pride. I need to not get caught up in that at this point in my tri career. I took a few days off of training while I was in Chi-town, but I’m back in Philly and back to the grind.
As I said in a prior post, I’ve never felt more alive than I feel right now.
70.3 baby!
posted by Jeremy at 1:28 PM
7 Comments:
Great job on a tough, tough course. I am with you on those bike downhills and am a bit of a wuss with my hands on the brakes most of the way.
I would suspect there is no way IMLP will be anywhere near as difficult a course for you.
Hi JL - so your blog just made me gasp (when I opened up that bike profile... OMG...).. the next reaction was - "this guy has done GREAT", followed by "I want some of that" .. I'm doing my first Oly this summer and have been contemplating a HIM maybe next year... Having read this it inspires me even more to reach out to the HIM. THANKS and GOOD LUCK for your IM! :o)
Great race report. Sounds like the rumors I heard about the course were true. It also sounds like you really kicked ass. Great tune-up for the big day.
CONGRATULATIONS!
HOW EXCITING!!!!!!!! Congrats x 1000!
Great report Jeremy! You really had it all during this race. Considering you took in no calories on the run, you actually had a really good time. That was a deceivingly tough run course. Those hills were pretty long and the footing tough. I saw one guy fall on the way down the one hill.
I didn't realize that bike had THAT much climbing. Yep, this was definetly a harder bike course than placid...Which of course we get to see this weekend!!! See you Friday , my man.
Friggen awesome race report! Way to rock a effin tuff course- congrats!
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