Me and my number 1 fan at the finish line - Next year she will be able to confirm or deny that statement.
I haven't been someone in my short blogging/racing career to knock out a race report hours after the event but I really have taken my time to mull over my IRONMAN Wales 2018 race. Two reasons, my Mac gave up and died and secondly I have been busy trying to avoid triathlon related activity for a few weeks.
Most of you reading this will know already my overall time was 10hrs 56mins, finished 103rd overall and when comparing it to last year I was 1hr 40mins faster!! So initially I was flying pretty high after crossing the line.
However, it has taken me the best part of 2 weeks to get out of the post IRONMAN blues.
Pre race
I have no idea how I was so relaxed on the lead up to the race. Training had gone really well, Tim and I agreed on the the race plan and it was memorised. Therefore, the lead up mainly consisted of banana bread baking until I would be stood on the North beach of Tenby listening to Thunderstruck before entering the water.
After having to change my travel arrangements at short notice due to some work commitments I left for Wales Thursday lunch time. On packing the car I realised my front brake on my freshly serviced TT bike was stuck hard onto the rim..... I rushed the bike back to the shop and we managed to release the break and identify the problem, similar to the lead into Barcelona 70.3 the spring to return the break pad off the rim had given up - great yet again my bike was broken and there was very little I could do about it. I made my way home, packed both my road and TT bike and set off for Wales. I had a 5hr car journey to work out how I could make this front brake work/safe for the race or be on my loyal road bike come race day.
After a fairly uneventful journey where I spent the best part of 2hrs on the phone to Triathlon Sophie - I arrived in Tenby on Thursday evening. My family arrived shortly after and once I showed them around our base camp for the weekend I headed out for a short run in Tenby. I took this opportunity to take on most of the hill in the marathon run for Sunday. This little run went well and the hill wasn't as hard/big as I remembered, my mother quite rightly pointed out I'm in slightly better shape then last year...
So I had 2 days in Tenby to kill and get all the pre IRONMAN admin done. Friday I went for a short 30km bike ride, this was just to check some morning tinkering had fixed the bike, surprisingly it was working this gave me some confidence for Sunday. Once back at base camp I rounded up the family and we set off for a trip around the bike course, it was actually their idea - now that triathlon has stood the test of time for over a year, they were certainly more inclined to learn a bit more about the sport and seeing what the bike course actually looked like was on the top of their list.
To finish off I headed for a quick dip with some Clapham Chasers. This swim speaks volumes about this club, none of us really knew each other, I had scanned the start list, hunted out the members on FB and setup a quick What's app group to set the swim up. It was like meeting old friends.
The water was very refreshing, I even got in for a little dip without a wetsuit.
Saturday rolled around, I met up with another Chaser to head to the race briefing, had some lunch and then racked my bike. It was Saturday morning after doing some final tinkering that the front brake completely gave up, which wasn't ideal. I will take this opportunity to thank all of you who messaged stating "it's a race who needs brakes" unfortunately although it's a race at Wales is relatively hilly brakes were essential.
In the 5hr car journey one idea I had was to use elastic bands wrapped around the forks connected to each end of the brake pad. This was essentially my best chance to ride my TT in the race. So I set the bike up with the bands, did some quick tests and rather surprisingly it worked. Not wanting the dwell too much I filled my tool/puncture kit with 30 elastic bands and headed to check in. The bike made it into transition with no issues. Bags were hung and even a quick picture with PRO bib number 1 Lucy Gossage!!
Lucy Gossage being pestered by a fan in Transition
Now that everything was done it was just a case of picking what I wanted for dinner and then settling in for an early night. FYI I went for a massive pizza with some sweet pot fries and a bottle of electrolyte drink - rock n roll.
My fix for front braking..... elastic bands.....
Race morning
I haven't mentioned base camp yet.... honestly I couldn't have found a better airbnb. We were 300m (yes that's meters) from Transition - this meant I could wake up at 0500ish and not 0300.
I took my overnight oats and coffee (in a mug) into transition added my Garmin, food and drink to bike and was back home by 0530. Absolute luxury. I have already asked the host to have first refusal on the house for next year.
It was then a case of using a ceramic toilet a couple of times, popping on my wetsuit and heading to North Beach. Still very relaxed and not really even thinking about what lay ahead that day.
Upon arriving at the sea front and seeing the swim course things got real fast. I said goodbye to my family and made my way to the front of the queue to the beach.
First bullet point of my race plan ticked off - find the 1hr 5min marker and stand just in front of it.
It was at this point I spotted Lewis Eccelston, he had no idea who I was but I felt like I had to say hello as he is someone I have followed and look up to as top class AG athlete. We shared some light convo and once out pink bags were hung up I left him to it.
As ever the 20 mins stood at the start is one of mixed emotions, you prey to the jellyfish and puncture gods (and in my case the front brake gods), you try and soak in the atmosphere - the reality is you stand there white a sheet staring into the distance and before you know it the gun goes off for the Pro's and you make your way to the start.....
Swim
Unlike last year I was relatively confident about the swim. The main difference being I knew I could swim the distance - in fact unlike how you train for the bike/run, swimming around the race distance becomes a weekly occurrence and therefore my aim to swim at 75% effort became a well drilled effort.
Overall, I couldn't be happier with my swim time - 58min 20secs - breaking the hour mark was something I wanted on my triathlon CV but not one I was chasing at this point.
As for how it went, first 600m were awful. I have never experienced the frantic nature of open water swimming like that. My explanation is a lot of people seeding themselves incorrectly (maybe just so they hear the national anthem on the beach) this made for a lot's of panic and me genuinely considering giving up at this point.
After making the first turn the water became a lot clearer, I managed to settle myself down both physically and mentally and finally got into my 75% effort. Before I knew it I was making the last turn to head for the beach and the end of lap 1. I had now dispelled any thoughts of getting out and quitting.
As I got out the water at the end of lap 1 and jogged around to start lap 2 I took a brief look at my watch and saw something like 28mins...... I couldn't believe my eyes. I committed to staying at the same 75% effort and as I dolphin dived back in I knew that I would give myself a fairly good shot at sub 60mins.
The 2nd lap was fairly uneventful, some slightly better sighting combined with a nice rhythm. As I exited the water and stopped my watch I saw 58min. I then ran up the cliff face with a huge smile on my face, I even had time for a high five from the mothership.
This smile was justified post race when looking at the results, I was 12th in my AG and 63rd overall out the water - an unbelievable improvement on last year - I was 57th in AG and 529th out the water.
I jogged my way to T1 (this is about 1km) grabbed my cycle jersey, shoes and helmet and made my way to my bike. Unlike last year I wasn't making a full change in each transition.
Bike
So the plan for the bike was to hit 220 watts and when required on the up hills keep things in check and stay around 250.
In short the bike didn't go to plan, I had a Average Power of 192watts, Normalised Power of 210watts and my VI was 1.09. This combined with the fact I was scared on most descents through lack of front brake power meant in reality I didn't achieve my desired time of breaking the 6hr mark. Although, I still clocked 06:10 so it wasn't a complete disaster. I just knew that chasing a top 10 finish in my AG was now going to be tough.
As for how it went, the first part out to Angle had gone well, I was being over taken a lot but this didn't bother me as much as what I thought it would. Of course at this point I didn't know I was actually so high up the field.
I was sticking to my plan and the power file shows I did hit my numbers for the first 60km.
From 60-180km is essentially the loop you do twice with the majority of the climbs. I could see I was riding well as I was catching people on the hills by riding a steady effort but on the descents/flatter parts I was struggling to get up to speed for fear of not being able to stop/slow down in a controlled manner.
I have to take some responsibility here as well, I wasn't concentrating as much as I should have been on my power number and one lesson learnt is that in future I will have NP or Lap NP on my screen so I can see if i'm hitting my number. I was just displaying 10 & 30sec power to make sure I was smooth.
As ever the support on the bike course was ridiculous, this year the weather had come good and although there was a fair amount of wind the rain stayed away for the most part which meant the crowds really did come out.
From Saudersfoot to Tenby the street was lined with spectators, I later learnt they couldn't run the bus service which meant everyone had to walk, this probably was a pain for spectators on the day but it made for great riding and running later with the majority of the run course lined with people.
Every 30km or so I was lapping my Garmin and I could see my power number was down, this didn't get to me too much during the race (it's given me sleepless nights since) but I did keep loosing concentration and would look down and see numbers which didn't reflect my goal.
As I came off the bike I could see I had done 6hr 7mins (according to my Garmin). All I told myself was this was a big improvement on last year and don't take any negative energy with me onto the run. I did my new favourite move, a flying dismount which I regretted instantly as I ran bare foot through the Transition car park, whipped off my jersey, popped some socks and running shoes on and I was off....
Bike split - 6:10:52 - 23rd in AG and 203rd Overall - compared to last year 6:50:58 53rd in AG and 445th Overall.
Favourite part of the bike course, descent into Carew past the castle
Run
Where do I start.
In the days leading into Wales I looked over last years run, only 1 km was under 5min/km pace and that was the first one - 4:58 to be exact. In my two short runs in Tenby in the days leading up to the big day I ran on the course and I knew exactly where my watch was going to beep for the 1st km.
For the run I was only looking at HR, I made a deal with myself I would only look at average pace after the first 5km. My target for lap 1 and 2 was to stay at a HR of 150. As I exited transition I took a look at my watch and my HR was already below 150, objective achieved this meant I didn't need to spend any time trying to bring it down.
As I approached the 1km marker or in this case house I was preying to myself my pace was good. I hoped for my marathon time to be around the 3hr 30 mark so I knew I needed to keep my pace around the 5min/km mark, my watch vibrated and I was shocked to see 4:12min/km.
I had a deal with Tim (my coach) that if my overall pace was under 4:50 I would back off. As this was the opening km, slightly downhill, my HR was under 150 and the big hill was about to start I didn't panic.
Heading out on the first lap
The opening lap felt great, my pace was bang on 4:50 this is after going up and down the hill. I started to grow in confidence. I had a small hand held bottle which had 5 gels in, the race plan said to finish this by the end of the 2nd lap, ultimately mistake number 1 on the run was throwing this away half way through the second lap, although I made sure I pretty much finished it before dumping it, it was really starting to annoy me from the minute I left T2.
With nothing in my hands the second lap was great, it was my fastest of the day and I kept my HR under control. My pace was still around the 4:50 mark and I started dreaming of that 3:30 marathon.
Then the wheels came off a little. No where near as big as Barcelona. But my gut started to cramp and I think the lack of nutrition for 7-8km really hit me. Now the 25-35km of any marathon is never going to be easy but this was hard. I immediately deployed the run walk tactic to keep moving and this helped. I passed my family and asked if I was in the top 10 yet, they had no answer for me, I was sure I was doing well but what I really wanted to hear at that point was yes your 9th!!! That would of helped me through this dark patch.
I don't really remember much from the 3rd lap, it was the loneliest I have ever been. Which is odd as I love being alone and will quite happily go whole weekends without any face to face interaction with a human.
The look on my face says it all on the third laps, this is even downhill
As I started the 4th lap I managed to consume a caffeine gel and a handful of jelly babies, within minutes I felt better and managed to get moving again around the 5min/km pace.
My 4th lap actually wasn't far off my 1st and I managed to pull my average pace back from 5:11 to 5:07 according to my Garmin. Looking back now i'm proud of this, in Barcelona I completely blew my doors off, I showed some level of race maturity in Wales and knew what I needed to do to finish strongly.
Once again I improved on last year drastically. Odd as I probably walked more this year then last year. Hint for all you reading, walking in an IRONMAN marathon doesn't equal a slow time.
3:39:24 13th in AG and 98th Overall - compared to last year 4:21:47 55th in AG and 442nd Overall.
Next year I will crack that 3:30 barrier.
Off to the finish line :)
Overall
What can I say, to go 1hr 40min faster in similar conditions minus the rain is a big achievement and is the reward for 39 weeks of consistent training.
It's fair to say those close to me have experienced some rather odd comments from my self over the past couple of weeks. For example I attempted to get people to believe that "that was my last triathlon".... what a joker.
What I will say is when I started this journey 18 months ago I didn't expect to be in this position. I genuinely believe if I had gone sub 12hrs last year I probably would have gone back to playing rugby. You always have to remind yourself how far you have come but you also have to remind yourself what the original goal was.
So now that goal has been ticked off and my toys are now back in the pram, I have worked on a plan for next year. I submitted that plan like a piece of coursework (It was 6 A4 pages) to Tim.... he accepted most of it.... and now it's time to put my feet up and relax as I have some pretty big goals for next year and beyond.
I will sign off with a huge thank you to those that supported me on the day, through training and via social media/tracker. It really does help. Crossing timing mats knowing that you're sending that information to friends and family really does help with accountability.
Thanks
@Triathlon_Ross