Ironman Chattanooga

This strategy contained a certain amount of risk because of the possibility the end result is not what I had hoped for.  I have also written openly how I try to not base my goals on results but rather on performance targets.  My emotions after the race are very mixed as I am having a hard time not focusing on the results, despite my best attempts to focus on the performance.   The feelings are strong because with 8th place being the result, that is technically the worst finish I have had in an Ironman, but at the same time it represents a massive 20+ minute improvement in my best performance at the distance.

Setting the plan

The plan for this year was simple:  Make a step up in my Full-Distance performance.  We knew I needed to improve my swim as that is clearly my weakest sport.  My cycling had become relatively weak during the past year and we felt like there was some room for improvement there too.  My run has been steadily improving the past years and our goal for that was to simply continue the small improvements and try a bit more aggressive strategy on race day. 

Putting plans to action

From the beginning of my season in December, I have worked toward these performance goals both in training and in selecting my race schedule.  Progress has been clear and satisfying as I could see my numbers in training improving and my race results too.  I worked incredibly hard the past two months in putting 100% effort into my preparations for Ironman Chattanooga and put trust in my training that the work would pay off. 

Race Day

I had a funny feeling when I woke up on race day:  nervousness.  I don’t normally feel nervous for a race but I have learned that if I do feel nervous, it’s a good sign I am really ready to push myself.  I took that frame of mind into the race and focused all my energy, including my nerves, into the process of executing my best performance possible.

Stutter start

Swim is my weakness and I made sure to follow my careful warm-up routine to get a strong start.  They officials held us from getting into the water for a long time and when we did hop in, everyone went in all directions to get a quick swim warm-up.  In the pre-dawn semi-darkness it was rather chaotic trying to see where the start line was amid all the boats and people warming up.  I was swimming back toward the line amongst a few boats and other athletes warming up when the start gun went off without warning… I was still about 100m behind the line.    Great start….

Surfing the crowd

Having started behind the majority of athletes (there were quite many other athletes who also missed the start), I was swimming by myself for the first half until I caught up with a large pack.  I tucked myself into the middle of it and tried to take advantage of the draft.  Coming out of the water I knew there would be a pretty large gap as I had missed the start and ended up in a slower group.  8 minutes was the gap and I quickly set about reducing that on the bike. 

Another athlete who started the bike with me was on equal level so we keyed off each other to move ourselves up.   Unfortunately we kept catching slower athletes who then tucked in behind us and pretty quickly our group had swelled to around 15 athletes.  No one was willing to drive the pace as the others rested behind so unfortunately the pace dropped and we lost a bit of time. 

I knew I needed to wait a bit before separating myself from that group because the others would too easily follow.  With about an hour left in the ride, I pushed a bit over the largest of the hills and quickly found myself back with just the original guy who was equally strong.  So we rode hard together for most of the remaining time and were able to pull back a pretty good piece of time on the athletes ahead of us. 

Ride for show, run for dough

While I love to ride hard, I have learned pretty quickly you need to back it up with and even stronger run performance if you want to finish near the top.  I have learned from my wise coach, how to pace the run properly and took the first half pretty conservatively.  Onto the 2nd half I began to push my effort trying to pull back any athletes ahead who began to fade. 

The plan was working beautifully until about 10km to go when a sharp stomach cramp settled in and forced me to slow down the pace.  I fought hard with the cramp to get in under control and with about 4km left it subsided to allow me to run normally again.  Right at the same time I saw my coach yelling from the side that the next guys were only 40 sec ahead of me.  ‘Damn… this is going to hurt’ were the thoughts running through my head as I started to push 100% to try and catch them.  I could see quickly I was closing ground and with about 2km to go passed the first one. 

With 1km to go I passed another guy but could see out of the corner of my eye there was only a few meters gap and it was not opening.  I kept my foot on the gas and ignored my body’s cries for an easier pace.  The gap stayed at 5-10m as I kept going faster and faster all the way to the line in a full sprint.  I managed to keep the 5m gap but wow that was not an easy was to take 8th place.  I thought that was a pretty spectacular battle until I found my friend Kirill and asked how his race went.  He just laughed and explained he won in a sprint finish with 2 other guys in closest finish in Ironman history!  Tight racing!

Mixed Emotions

This is now my 6th Ironman and my 6th top 10 placing with all my previous races being 6th or 7th place.  So you can imagine I am not thrilled with the 8th place based on this alone.  However the placing doesn’t reflect the level of performance, which was actually a pretty massive step up and one I am proud of. 

The time of 8:21 may have only been good enough for 8th in that race but same time last year would have been 2nd or 3rd so the level of competition has risen significantly at that event.  As a side note, the swim might have been fast because of the river current, but the bike was 8km too long and overall a pretty hilly event.  

So looking at the 8:21 time I notched up, I can be pretty pleased with my 20+ minute improvement.  The answer of how to feel good about these mixed feelings is rather simple:  time.  I am pretty sure in a few days or weeks, I will be happy with the whole outcome of the race and see it for what it really is:  a new level of performance, just like I set out to do at the beginning of the season.

Now I settled down for a few weeks of relaxed sport-free time with my family and enjoy the other side of life.

Thanks for reading!