WARNING: This write up is almost as long as the actual
race!
"I think I'm going to do White Lake"
Those are the words I spoke to Johane at dinner immediately
after finishing the Goofy challenge at Disney world in January.
A year previously, I had blown out my IT band doing the
Disney marathon. Since I couldn’t run, I
started going to the pool again and swimming.
Eventually, I could bike again and started doing that too. Since I was already doing the swimming and
biking and running would be soon, I started thinking about maybe doing a
triathlon again, so I signed up for a sprint Tri in Cornelius at the Y. I wound up adding 2 other tri’s to my
schedule, another sprint, and an Olympic distance, the first one I had
done. In the middle of all this fellow
dart-er Todd Hartung told me that I really should start talking to his friend
Tony Read. Tony had done a few Half Ironmans and even a full Ironman and was a
great resource to talk to.
The very next week while sitting outside Summit Coffee with
my wife post run, both Tony and Todd were there, and Todd introduced me. Right off the bat, I had my first encounter
with Tony’s enthusiasm, as he invited me to his place for a group open water
swim. After that day Tony and I have been
swimming a lot, and have even biked and run quite a bit.
So when my knee flared up at Savannah, he reminded me that I
felt best the previous summer when also biking and swimming along with
running. He also started gently prodding
me to do a half ironman. Tony’s mantra
is “ Believe, decide, do”. He kept
asking me if I believed I could do a half.
Eventually the answer became yes, though I was still skeptical. I sometimes have a hard time looking beyond
my next goal to the one beyond that. So
I was focused on Disney, and didn’t commit.
After Disney, I knew I had New Orleans coming up, so I couldn’t commit
completely to it, but I did start ramping up my bike and swimming workouts.
Once New Orleans was over, and I felt pretty good, I decided
to go fully for it (after making sure that Jo would be ok with the long
training hours), and then the training started in earnest.
Basically my training involved a long bike ride on Saturday
of around 4 hours followed by a 30-40 minute run. Swimming 3 times a week of 2,500 yards
each. Runs (in addition to the Saturday
run) of up to 80 minutes on Sunday, a long run of 10-12 miles on Tuesday and a
shorter run of 5-6 miles on Thursday. Plus
my shorter runs on the other days.
For the most part, my training went pretty well. I had a couple of hot days where I started
too late and my nutrition was off and I bonked.
I think in addition to the training for the distance, there was a lot of
training around nutrition/hydration, and I learned a lot.
Sooner than I knew it the day was here. We left after school on Friday and made our
way to White Lake, NC, which is about 3.5-4 hours from my house in a little
town east of I-95. White Lake seems to be
a area that was a resort location in the 60’s and 70’s (much like the poconos
or catskill mountains in the northeast) and not much has changed since then,
including the hotels. We wound up
staying in a little place on the shores of the lake. The lake views were fabulous, the hotel room
view, not so much. After getting to the
location, we went to packet pickup, and got everything I needed, then checked
into the hotel.
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| Hopefully, I'd be seeing the finish line again the next day |
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| The Pier behind our hotel |
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| White Lake at dusk |
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| Tony dispensing last minute advice |
We met up with Tony and
went for pizza and ice cream (yes, I actually ate that!). I like going to these races with Tony since
he’s so calm, that I feel myself calming down.
I had been particularly worried since the forecast was calling for temps
of 90 degrees and upwards. But he also
gave me some last minute tips. More on
that later.
Next morning I was up at 5am. I rolled out my leg as usual, ate my bagel
and peanut butter, and loaded up the car. As I was loading the car, Tony drove
by and said he’d meet me at the start.
We rolled up a few minutes later and the parking lot was already
full. They said you could park 1-2 miles
down the road, so we started driving down.
About ¼ mile down the road there was a guy selling spots on his lawn for
10 dollars. SOLD!!! With the amount of crap I had to carry, I was
truly relieved. Jo and Julia helped me
carry my stuff to the start, and I went to my spot and tried to organize. I ran into darter Brian Helfrich and we
chatted for a few seconds, but I was almost in full panic mode.
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| A small part of the transition area |
I visited the port-o-jon a couple of times and
then started heading down to the swim start with Tony. Halfway there I started waffling on having a
gu before the start. Tony patiently told
me to go get it and I scarfed it down quickly and then headed for the
water. I think the water was warmer than
advertised, but was very glad we got to wear wetsuits. Definitely swim better with it on. Tony and I ran into another friend of his
that I’ve swum with at his house and we chatted for a while. They both kept telling me not to go out too
hard on either the bike or the run, because with the temps in the 90’s I’d pay
for it.
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| The swim starting pier |
My group was earlier than Tony’s
so I headed out to the start. I saw Jo
and Julia on the pier and had a chance to swim in their direction and have them
take a pic and wish me luck.
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| In the water and ready to go |
Before I
knew it, it was time to go. The
countdown started and we were off. I
tried to stay towards the outside, since last year when I was in the middle at
the Lake Norman Sprint, I got completely abused by being kicked. The good part about the first 500 meters was
that I didn’t have to do any sighting of buoys.
I was neck and neck with some other guy, and I just sighted off
him. After the first 500 when I was
warmed up, I pulled away from him and then the sighting fun started. They had buoys every 100 meters for the first
600 meters. After that they seemed to be
every 200-300 meters. I was going pretty
good for a while. The course is a sort
of rough triangle, going out around 700 meters, turns right, then goes for
another 700, then turns right again and back in for 700. The last 700 felt a bit dicey for me. I had a hard time sighting on the buoys and
it felt like they weren’t in a straight line.
Luckily, the swim finish has a giant balloon man, so I just sighted on
that and headed for home. It was
rewarding passing not only people in my wave, but then people 2-3 waves ahead
of me. As I got to the pier to leave
Tony Tip # 1 popped into my head. (Tony
Tip # 1 – don’t go for the first ladder on the pier, everyone does. Skip by it and go for the second) This was dead on. There was a line getting out at the first
ladder, and absolutely no one at the second ladder. Got out and started running towards the
transition area, taking off my swim cap, goggles and nose plug.
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| Out of the water |
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| Somebody take my stuff, please? |
I saw Jo at this point and she took my
pic. As I entered the transition area, I
ran into another darter, Ashley Ackerman.
Ashley has done a ton of halves and even some full ironmans. He was there as part of a relay team, and he
was doing the run portion. So I got to
see him for a few seconds, say hi, good luck, etc. That got me even more pumped up. I headed for
my spot, took my first dose of salt pills, and prepared to head out.
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| Getting ready to head out on the bike |
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| Tony heading out on the bike, and about to crush me |
And then I made mistake # 1.
I had bought a pair of triathlon shorts.
Tri shorts have a pad like bike shorts but not as think. The advantage is you can swim and run in them
also. The disadvantage is that they don’t
have much padding against the bike seat.
And my tri bike has what’s called a tri seat, which means it’s nice and
light, but can feel like you’re sitting on a sharp rock. For 3 hours.
So I had brought a pair of bike shorts that I planned on putting on over
the tri shorts. I got about a half mile
down the road when I realized I had forgotten them. Instead of going back I figured “how bad can
it be?” Bad idea.
My first bunch of
miles were at a decent pace, though I did have to stop twice, once to go to the
bathroom in the woods, and once when I dropped a water bottle and had to go
back (they’re $20 bottles, and I knew I’d need the water). I was averaging almost 20 mph for the first
20 miles. I settled into a pattern of
nutrition and hydration. I had 2 salt
pills every hour on the hour, and had half a clif bar every half hour on the 10’s
and 40’s. I also made sure to drink a
whole 21 oz water bottle every hour.
Part of my challenge to myself was to see how long I could
hold Tony off. I knew that my swim
started 10 minutes before him, and we’re pretty evenly matched, so I knew I’d
be good there. I knew his transition
would be faster than mine, but not by much.
So I figured it would be just a matter of time. However, I was hoping it wouldn’t be until at
least 30 miles in. But at mile 20, he
pulled up next to me. He had talked
about going out hard and banking some time, because the second half had some
serious headwinds. We chatted for a few
seconds and he was off. Most of the rest
of the bike ride was uneventful, except for a few things. 1) The
lack of padding definitely hurt me. By
mile 50 I was almost desperate to get off the bike. 2) The
was a heavy headwind from around mile 25 on.
3) It started getting hot enough
that I felt it even on the bike going almost 18 miles an hour. All of these factors played into my steadily decreasing
paces until we were mercifully back at the transition point.
I took my time at this transition, almost because I knew
subconsciously that I didn’t want to go out on the run. By this point it was over 90 degrees. I sat down, changed into my Noosa’s, strapped
on my water bottle belt, changed into my dart singlet, put suntan lotion on my
head, neck and arms (I’d be wearing a visor), and at the last second picked up
my other running pouch thing that had my phone in it. I walked until the transition mat and then
started running.
Thankfully, the first mile had a slight downhill, so I tried
to get my running together. Though the
run was all on blacktop and by the time I got to the first aid station at mile
1, I thought I was in trouble already.
It was hot, and I started to feel myself overheating already. Thankfully I got to the first aid station,
and it truly was an aid station for me.
The first thing was that they had chilled washcloths/small towels that
they were giving out. I put one over my
head and that cooled me a bit. The
second thing was something I had gotten from Tony.
Tony Tip#2 – after the bike, don’t try to eat anything (gel,
solids, or anything) for the first 3 miles of the run. Get some of the flat cola at the rest stops
and drink that.
Well that paid off in spades. It sounded weird, but I had the cola and felt
that little sugar jolt right away and I was off. I decided to walk through each of the rest
areas, but try to run in between. I told
myself that If I could make it to the turnaround point while running, I would
let myself walk more on the second half.
I set off between mile 1 and 2 at a slower than usual pace. Due to the
heat, I knew I’d have to so a little slower.
Between the cola and the towel on my head, I felt a little better. I made it to the mile 2 aid station. There, I realized that if I took my visor
off, and put the towel on me head, I could put the visor over it and keep it in
place. I also got another towel and put
it on my neck. From mile 2 on, at every
mile I gave them back their towels, and got 2 fresh (well, mostly fresh
anyways) towels and kept replacing. I
actually felt much cooler than I should have.
By mile 3, the cola was feeling good, and I basically pitched my entire
nutrition strategy. I had planned on gu
every 5 miles or so. However, in
training I had found a few times that gu while running, after getting off the
bike bothered me. The cola seemed to be
working, so I stuck with it. I had ½ cup
of cola at every stop, and 3 times I stopped for 2 orange slices. It somehow worked. I’m sure I couold’ve very easily plummeted
over a clif and bonked but I didn’t. I
kept on this was until mile 5. Miles 5-6
were, for me, the best (except for when it was over).
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| I hear the French Foreign Legion look is in this year |
At mile 5, I decided to call Jo, just to tell
her where I was, while running. We had a
brief conversation which brightened my spirits.
Almost immediately after hanging up I ran into Brian again. He had started before me and was coming back
the other way. I could tell immediately
that he wasn’t doing that great as his shirt had blood on it from chafing. We stopped for a few seconds to talk and I
asked him how he was doing. He told me
he felt like poop and had already thrown up once. I told him he was almost done, and to keep
going. And he was off. At this point, I was looking for Tony. Tony is a much faster runner than me, and I
was expecting to have passed him already.
I figured I missed him. But then
around mile 6 there he was going in the opposite direction. He seemed concerned about how I was
doing. I actually had a smile on my face
and was joking around about how I wanted to strangle him for this, so I’d
imagine he realized I was good. And I
was. I actually knew at this point, that
I would finish in one way or another.
After leaving him, I hit the turnaround, where they were handing out
bracelets that indicated that you had gone through the turnaround point and
not cheated. Strangely, the bracelets
say “finisher” on them, which was a pretty big assumption considering the temps
were still climbing and there was another 6.5 miles to go! Most of the run back
was a blur. Things I remember; a lot of
people down on the side of the road, a woman staggering towards me in obvious
distress, telling the next aid station people to go help her, getting high
fives from the ECU folks at mile 8, calling jo at 11 to tell her I’d be there
soon, and the last mile which, to add insult to injury, was uphill. Throughout all of this I kept running between
rest stops. I had told myself I could
walk after 6.5, but then I told myself 1 more mile, then another, until it was
at the end, and I wasn’t walking that last mile. Next thing I knew I was coming up the hill
towards the finish line. Tony was
walking his bike back to the car, and gave me a “great job” and “see you in a
few”. As I got towards the finish line I
though about taking my towel off my head before crossing for a pic, but then
figured the towel on the head perfectly reflected the race, so I left it
on. Next thing I knew, I was across the
line. I got my medal and some water, and
Jo and Julia were there to greet me. I
had done it. It felt awesome.
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| Coming into the finish line |
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| Finishing it up |
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| done.......and done |
But not as awesome as changing into a bathing suit and
jumping into the lake with Jo and Julia to cool off. THAT was great. After swimming for a bit, we got cleaned up,
changed, Jo and Julia ate some hotdogs, and we headed back to the car. On the way out which was a good hour after I
finished, there were still people coming in.
My car temperature said 96 at that point. It was amazing.
I spoke to Tony later and he asked how I liked it. I said “I’ll be back next year”.
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| Makes it all worthwhile |
