In other words….just pretend you know
everything that happened on my journey prior to race day. Like skipping over
the beginning of the book or movie and going straight to the climactic scene.
Not that I’d ever recommend doing that!
Bike ramp leading into Tempe Beach Park
The calm before the storm
My hotel
(Hampton Inn on Scottsdale Road) arranged to have breakfast available from 4:30am
for everyone on race day. I decided that rather than worry about getting to the
race site right when transition opened, I’d just eat my normal breakfast and
then get there when I got there. Having dropped my bags and bike off the day before,
there really wasn’t much for me to do to ‘prepare’ on race day other than to
check my tires and make sure my Speedfil was full. I didn’t want to be
wandering around in the cold for 2 hours before the race start.
So I got up
around 4:30am, rolled out of bed and went downstairs with my Dad to get
breakfast. Needless to say, I stuck to my standard race day fare: A bagel with
peanut butter, and a coffee (Nothing new
on race day!). To be honest, it was nice to have some time to sip my coffee,
eat and watch other people getting ready for the long day ahead. It was the
calm before the storm if you will.
Not that I
was particularly calm. I am pretty sure my hands were shaking as I slathered
peanut better on my bagel – but I was excited and confident about the day to
come.
When we got
outside, it was chilly (Around 50F/10C) but dry. Thankfully, I knew how cold it
was going to be from watching three friends race last year, so I was dressed
well in warm-up pants, long sleeved shirt and jacket. We drove to the race site
and managed to get a great parking spot just across from Tempe Beach Park.
Thanks to my dad for scouting the lot out in advance.
My dad took some start-of-the-day pictures and then we were off to transition. I had all my swim stuff with me, not to mention my special needs bags. I’d rechecked my bags the night before so I knew I had everything I had planned to bring (e.g. a spare pairs of goggles, bike pump, extra nutrition, etc.).
My dad took some start-of-the-day pictures and then we were off to transition. I had all my swim stuff with me, not to mention my special needs bags. I’d rechecked my bags the night before so I knew I had everything I had planned to bring (e.g. a spare pairs of goggles, bike pump, extra nutrition, etc.).
Starting the day with a smile!
In fact, I was pretty sure I was prepared for anything that might come my way.
Aside: You can’t see me, but I’m laughing
out loud as I write this.
It was really
dark in transition, so I was glad I didn’t have much to do when I arrived
around 5:30am. Mostly, I just had to give my bike a once over. If you’re
wondering what I did….I:
·
Put water in my Speedfil – This was easy. I just
filled it from a 1.5L water bottle I brought with me. My Camelbak had my
Carbo-Pro mix in it.
·
Check my bento box – I double checked that the
zipper was working and that everything was still there. It was full of 4 bags
of Honey Stinger Chews (already out of the package so I could eat them easily),
and a couple of gels I could take if I ever stopped (I can’t eat gels on the go
yet).
·
Put my spare Garmin on my handlebars – I came up
with this idea after dealing with not 1, but 2 half-ironman races where my
watch refused to work. Figured with a spare, I’d be covered even if my Garmin
920 decided to fail me.
·
Pump my tires up – This was surprisingly hard to
do since the bikes were so tight on the rack. But luckily I was right by the
bike mechanic so I used their fence to rest my bike so I had more space.
·
Make sure I was in the right gear – This was
mostly a wild guess. I knew I’d be in a crowd leaving transition, so I went
with something easy, but enough to give me a little resistance so I’d get going
quickly. If I recall, it was toward the end of the lower ring – one shift
before I’d probably switch to the big ring.
All in all,
this took me a maximum of 10 minutes. Not long at all. I gave my bike pump back
to my Dad – and then it was time to say goodbye. I got my Dad a VIP pass for
the day, so he headed off to find the VIP swim tent, while I got to look for
the portapotties!
The line for
the loo was pretty long, but I had plenty of time. After I made it through the
line and did my business, it was time to get my wetsuit on and drop off my
morning clothes bag (i.e. all the stuff I’d lugged with me to the race and that
I’d likely want to put on again when I crossed the finish line).
Wetsuit on, I
looked around and found a refreshment table with plenty of water. While it was
supposed to be for people to drink, I took one of the jugs and poured some of
it into my wetsuit.
That may
sound weird, but my coach recommended once (before the Toronto Triathlon
Festival – in Lake Ontario) that when you have to swim in cold water, getting
wet before getting in the water makes the shock easier since you have time for
the water closest to your skin to warm up. I am sure I got some funny looks –
but trust me, it did help!
From there,
I made my way to the swim entrance, where people were already starting to
gather.
Ironman Arizona: Swim
This was the first year that IMAZ had a rolling start.
I admit that the rolling start took a fair bit of my nerves about the
swim away since it would be a self-seeded start where you could pick when you
entered the water. In my mind, this was a lot better than a mass start with
2,500 of my closest friends – even though I’m a reasonably good swimmer.
I get this kind of start sucks for people who might be vying for a
Kona slot (since you don’t know when your competition will start and ‘first to
the finish’ may not actually win you the race), but for average racers, the
time trial start can make for an easier start to the day. And it did – at least
for me.
That’s not to say I didn’t contemplate where to start. As I wound my
way through the later seeded groups toward the front, it seemed that most of
the people were in the 1:15 and up sections. Now, I figured I could swim around
1:13-1:15 on a perfect day – but I also knew that people would likely be
seeding up (i.e. going a bit ahead of where they would actually swim) and I
didn’t want to have to swim over people if I could help it.
Given the 1:10 and up area had a lot less people, I decided to seed
myself to the left of the 1:10 sign. I figured the time wasn’t completely
unreasonable if I found a good draft and swam a good line – and I’d probably
have more space to swim than if I started later.
It was a perfect choice in
hindsight.
Before I seeded myself, I did a few stretches to warm up while looking out onto Tempe Town
Lake. The water was calm, only a flicker of lights bobbing on the water from
people in kayaks and boats. As I was standing there, I got caught by one of the
race photographers. I think that’s a first for me. I rarely get pictures from
before the swim unless they’re taken by friends and family.
Waiting for the sunrise!
The sky lightened very quickly. It was much cloudier than I expected. But the clouds didn't look too bad and it wasn't windy, so I wasn't worried. On the positive side, I knew I wouldn't have to swim right into the glare of the sun.
Once it got brighter out, I vaguely recall they played the American national anthem...People cheered, but it was like I was hearing it from a distance. It was almost surreal. I distinctly heard Mike Reilly say in the loudspeaker, “You are going to be an Ironman today!” And I grinned.
Here's a fantastic picture of the transition area and people in the swim corral corridor. I think it's from the Ironman Arizona Facebook Page...but I really don't know. All I know is it is an astonishing view!
Aerial view of the transition area - before the start
When the cannon (I think it was a cannon – I just know it was loud)
went off for the pro men’s race, I jumped. Then the pro women started.
I started my watch so I wouldn’t have to worry about it. I didn’t want
it failing me – and didn’t care about an extra minute or two on my time.
What seemed like seconds later,
the gun went off for the Age Group Start.
Time of day: 6:50am. Ironman
Arizona had begun!
We were funneled into the water very quickly. I found myself going
down the entry leftmost entry steps quickly by safely. My plan was to swim
left toward the buoy line, knowing the wall curved and not wanting to swim too
much extra.
In hindsight, I swam too far left at first, but at least I had pretty clear water to swim in.
In hindsight, I swam too far left at first, but at least I had pretty clear water to swim in.
My Dad's view of the swim start!
I jumped in Tempe Town Lake, put my head down and started swimming. I had decided
the day before to get a few minutes into the swim before I took stock and decided if I needed to stop to adjust my goggles or anything. Thankfully, I didn't need to.
The swim itself was a million times easier than Barrelman in September. Despite
starting near the front (relatively…still far back from the really fast
swimmers), I didn’t get any hard knocks, nor did I have a girl trying to
clobber me intentionally.
I got into a nice rhythm pretty quickly. I felt strong. I
admit, mentally, I spent a lot of the first half wondering when I’d hit the
turn around, but think that was more nervous energy, excitement and needing to calm down. I had some decent drafting opportunities,
which I took – and also found plenty of people drafting off me.
At different times during the swim, I realized that I wasn’t swimming
the best line. I was sighting well – but I don’t think I actually had a good
sense of what the fastest line was. I thought I knew it going in, but in the
water, it was tough to know if I was there or not.
This was especially true on the way back from the turnaround….I know I
swam much wider than I had to. But hey, if I ever do the race again, I have a
much better sense of where things are and what I should have sighted on the
trip down and then back up the course. Certainly on the way back, I should have
been sighting one spot on the bridge, rather than the buoys.
But all in all, I felt great in the water. It was a perfect
temperature for a long swim. By the time
I closed in on the twin bridges right before the last turn to the finish, I
could sense I was finishing in a really good time.
The turn toward the stairs was one of the easiest parts of the day
because I’d scoped out the sight line the day before. I just put my head down
and swam directly to the stairs, sighting occasionally. I tried to shake my
legs out a bit as I went, which might have looked a bit funny if someone had an
underwater camera…but fortunately no one did.
On the funny side, I didn’t see my dad as I came out of the water – and
later, he said that he didn’t see me (not surprising given what a zoo it was).
Yet, when I looked at one of the swim exit pictures he posted on Facebook as I
was writing this blog….I realized he actually caught me on camera right before
I went up the stairs! That’s me in the
pink cap with the purple goggles!
I took my time going up the steps (a process I’d practiced the day
before) and had no issues. There were a million people yelling and cheering. It
was amazing.
As I walked away from the swim exit I looked at my watch- which I somehow managed to pause
partway through the swim (surprise, surprise!). This moment was kindly caught for
posterity by the race photographers. I was smiling because even though my swim time wasn't completely captured, I saw it was only just after 8am. I was thrilled!
Swim exit - so exciting!
I hit start, switched to
transition mode, then jogged quickly out of the swim exit area, pulling down the top of
my wetsuit as I went. A few steps later, I was ushered into the wetsuit
stripping station. Before I knew it, I was lying on the ground, two volunteers peeled
off my wetsuit in about 2 seconds then helped me up and sent me on my way,
wetsuit in hand. It was awesome!
Lessons Learned on the Swim
Sighting on such a long course when the things around you are awkwardly shaped
(the edge of the lake curved) was harder
than I expected because I couldn’t see far enough down the course to really
tell if I was taking the quickest route (I could only see a buoy or two at a time. I don’t know that I could’ve done much
differently since we were only allowed to swim part of the course the day
before. Really, it was the experience of swimming the course that gave me the
knowledge that I could use to swim a better route next time.
But hey – I was still more than happy with my swim time – especially the
fact that I felt good coming out of the water!
Total Swim time: 1:16:45 (A lot less time than it took to write this blog)
Rank: 26/120 AG, 180/765 women, 865/2,676 overall
Next up: The bike!
Total Swim time: 1:16:45 (A lot less time than it took to write this blog)
Rank: 26/120 AG, 180/765 women, 865/2,676 overall
Next up: The bike!
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