Rev3 Cedar Point was to be my last race of my American campaign for 2011, I was pretty happy with how the half Ironmans had gone but was still chomping at the bit to complete an ironman. Well I got an ironman out of my system still not quite the result that I would have liked but at least steps in the right direction after my June preformance.
Race day dawned and I was pretty bloody nervous to say the least. I recall saying to a good friend also racing Chris Mac Donald at the start line, dude why do you do this? I am freaking out here, he replied, I wouldn’t if I could swim like you!!! Awesome.
So I pulled my head together relaxed and embraced what was ahead, a long day!
The swim was in the calm waters of Lake Erie quite a nice sight with the theme park behind us. But due to a few storms earlier in the week there was a lot of sludge build up that we would have to wade through to start swimming, nothing like a bit for mud running to start the day! There are some cool videos that you can find at www.rev3tri.com
Once negotiating the muddy mess I set out at a steady pace with eventual winner on my feet. Half way through the swim I wasn’t in much of a mood to have someone sucking my feet for all 3.8kms so when I saw a slight gap open rounding the half way turning buoy I put in a little surge. I was a bit more relaxed then and managed to pull away and get around a minute lead exiting the water.
With a quick T1 I was out on my merry way, with no experience in Ironman, pacing always scares me but I soon found a comfortable pace and settled in for a long ride. Andrew caught me around the 20mile mark gave me his energy through a friendly hand shack and went to the front. Knowing he was a solid bike rider I wasn’t too sure if the next period on the bike was going to be crazy fast or what but soon found myself riding within 30-40secs of him for pretty much most of the ride.

So with only a hand full of seconds down running out onto the run I was fairly confident that if I kept up the calories I would have a good shot at this race. But Ironman can through you at any time and I was never completely confident that I had a top finish in the bag. Hitting the lead after a couple of miles I had good bounce in my step my foot was manageable and I was enjoying where I was at (I have had a niggling foot injury the past 2months). The next 15miles it was COKE WATER COKE WATER. Going into the unknown after half way through the marathon was both exciting and nerve racking, I was feeling good, but my foot was starting to hurt and I found myself changing my focus to trying to ease the pain in my foot. The pain got worse and worse till I was walking, I kept trying to run/jog hoping just hoping that it would ease and I could make it to the line on the podium but found it unbearable and a long walk to the finish line. I made it in about a 4hr marathon not flash at all but at least a finish time on the results, and more importantly I had a faster time at an Ironman than my mother, probably the main reason I hobbled to the finish!!
It was another experience in the bag, and have got this out of my system, for a while. During the race I missed the competitiveness that the Olympic and Half Ironman races offer, Ironman is a LONG day that can wait a little while longer!
So now I am home in NZ, time to rest this foot. Am not too sure on my plans just yet will work on that once I am able to run/walk pain free again, hopefully in a couple of weeks!!