T1 - 4:14
Cycle - 3:00:57
T2 - 3:56
Run - 2:17:38
Total race time - 6:09:01
As I rode into the resort where the race was being held at the end of the bike leg yesterday I was nearly in tears. Thankfully not tears of pain or sadness, but relief. I'd ridden strong and hard, and still felt great despite the heat. Unlike all my long course races before this one I hadn't spent the last hour on the bike dreading the run, and although I wasn't relishing it, I knew that I had it.
I'm sure it's been clear from my last few blog entries that my anxiety around the Tour de Force has been really high, to the point of near debilitation, and that of course had spilt over to my feelings about this race. I've written before about my near pathological fear of fucking things up, and I can see now that I had set this as some type of test for myself to be ready to go on tour.
The lesson: training works. Training really really hard works. Cycling up some hills with some cross winds. Not to be glib, but not daunting after the Etape du Dales. Running 21.1km on a combination of bitumen roads, concrete paths and golf greens through a winding course that continually doubles back on itself in 30C heat. Manageable, when you've run a half marathon once a month, alone, before work a half dozen times.
The swim was an ocean swim at Hapuna Beach (not from the IM pier in Kona), no wetsuit (including no covered upper arms or below the knees, as Craig Alexander learnt when he was DQ'd from 2nd place). I was definitely the least anxious I've been for a race swim, partially because I'd done a couple of ocean swims in the week before the race, but mostly because I felt no pressure. My swim training since moving to Norfolk has been pretty patchy (I just can't stand the 25m pool), but I knew I had the distance (I comfortably swam 4km and 3.8km in the pool in Lanzarote, and a 1.5km in the St Neots OD). I'm pretty happy with that time, and even more pleased with how comfortable and positive I felt in the water.
The race briefing had talked up the difficulty of the ride and run, and in our reccy drive up to the turnaround at Hawi the hills looked massive. But my goodness, I had a field day out there on the bike. This was one of the most blinged up races I have ever seen, there were only a handful of bikes that would have been under the $5,000 mark, and everyone was fully geared up. It's pretty satisfying to ride past a lady with a sperm helmet on a Cervelo P5 (RRP at least US$7,000 without race wheels), but it's even more satisfying to overtake a bloke on the same setup when you know he had a seven minute head start on the swim. I'd still love to get a time trial, but this race really showed that training trumps gear, a lesson well worth remembering given cyclists and triathletes love of gearing up.
As I rode into T2 I managed to hold it together emotionally (just) and was a little nervous about how I would handle the heat, and how my legs would go after pushing hard on the bike. It turns out you can take the girl out of the Territory, but nor the Territory out of the girl, and again that training really really hard pays off. Aid stations every mile (1.6km) with a cup of ice down my sports bra, a few cups of water and a nice sponge over my head were sufficient to handle the heat. I felt reasonably strong on the run, until the last 5km. A combination of being really bloody sore in the legs, and concern about my feet (I was convinced I had some gravel in my shoes that had ground through the soles of my feet) had me doing a bit of a walk/shuffle run. Luckily a Hawaiian bloke who I'd encouraged to keep running earlier in the race caught me up and helped me run over the line with him- a great finish to the race.
My upper legs are stiff and sorry today, and I've got some pretty wicked sunburn on my shoulders (there are going to be some interesting tan lines), but I feel pretty fantastic. My feet are fine, they looked a mess when I took my shoes off (due to being waterlogged- they don't remember how to be wet Darwin style), but once dried out there were just a few uncomfortable blisters.
Now to enjoy a week of Hawaii holidaying! And now just 28 days until Le Tour de a Dugong begins!
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