Post by brandy on Aug 20, 2011 12:52:30 GMT -5
So this is obviously overdue, but after reading Rob's 10 IM post I feel like I should share this! It took me a while to sit down and write it all out, but I'm glad I did.
I suppose I should start with the days before. The weather in LP was hot, but the forecast kept showing mid 70s and sunny for Sunday. We could feel the humidity drop Friday and Saturday but it was still HOT. Ryan told us all about 2008 when he raced and the forecast was mid 70s and sunny, and it rained the ENTIRE day. Well, at about 10:30pm the night before the race it POURED. GREAT. In the morning we were all glued to the weather channel and every website we knew of to check the radars and it seemed that the rain would go south of us, and fortunately it did! It was still cloudy for the swim start so I opted for my clear goggles for swimming.
Ryan and I left transition and walked to the beach where we saw Danielle and her and Phil’s parents. We started to put on our wetsuits and Danielle said, “Yours zips in the front? That’s weird!” Uhhhh, no it doesn’t – I just put it on backwards. I guess as cool and collected as I tried to be I was a bit nervous afterall, ha! I got my wetsuit on and we found Chris and Dr. Scott. We all got in the water to stand at the outer right edge while we waited for the swim start. Phil found us over there (have no idea how in that sea of green and pink swim caps) and we all nervously chit-chatted before the cannon went off. (Of course, Ryan swam up to start in the front for his kick-butt swim time.) I was prepared for madness and it was crazy, but not as bad as I thought. Everyone was just trying to survive the swim and there was no violence.
I was able to settle in and swim right from the beginning and never had a moment of panic. Sure, I had people swimming under me, arms trying to stroke ahead of me, feet in my face, etc, but I felt that everyone was doing their own thing and no one was trying to ruin my swim for the benefit of their own (I guess that’s how I always imagined it would be, not sure why). I got out at the first loop and my watch said 39 minutes which totally surprised me! My Rev3 swim was 43 minutes so this was very exciting! At the final turn of the second loop I thought to myself, “this is the point where I’m longer than the Big Swim – after this is complete it’s just the bike and run, and I’ve ridden over 112 miles and I’ve run marathons so no problem!” I finished the swim in 1:20, had my wetsuit stripped (which wasn’t as fluid as I thought it would be, ha) and made my way to T1, smiling big the whole way.
The transition was confusing. I ran over to my bags on the rack, pulled my transition bag and started running to the tent.
Except I had my morning clothes bag, so back I went. I tried to hang it up but screwed it up and knocked the hanger off. Finally got it back on, grabbed my bag and started running to the tent.
Except I had my running clothes bag, so back I went. Third time was a charm and I was off to change, ha. I got in the changing tent and it was chaos. Women were everywhere. I found an open chair and suddenly a volunteer was there pulling things out of my bag for me, getting my socks ready to put on, etc. How amazing! She even put my sunglasses on my face! I put sunscreen on my arms and was ready to ride. We walked out of the tents and to the bike mount like cattle, there were so many of us. I joked with a spectator – isn’t this exciting, woo!! Still smiling like a crazy woman. Finally I got on the bike and rode away.
The first part of the bike was fantastic. (aside: I always wonder what people take with them during these races so I’ll tell you: I took a 24oz and two 16oz bottles of Gatorade with carbopro (approximately 500 calories and 350 calories) and a regular Gatorade in the aerobottle. I had peanut butter filled pretzels in my bento box (about 450 calories worth) and four clif bars (of varying flavors, who knows what I’d want!)) Anyway – the first part of the loop was a bit of a climb, but then there’s the descent into Keene, which I’d practiced and flew down. It was flat, and when I hit the first timing mat at 30 miles I was right around 90 minutes for the ride. I thought, for those who are tracking me online, they’ll think I’m going WAY too fast. I continued to tell myself to take it easy though and checked in frequently to make sure I wasn’t pushing it. I stopped for a restroom break (which I only point out because even at the rest stop the volunteers were amazing- took my bike and racked it for me so I wouldn’t have to!) Then at around mile 35, I got a flat. HOW COULD THIS BE?! I’ve NEVER had a flat tire on my tri bike, ever. Thankfully, Ryan and I practiced changing my road bike tire before the trip so I knew exactly what to do…. Sort of. When I laid my bike down, my high calorie Gatorade/Carbopro (which did not taste good, by the way) started spilling out – oh no! I got my bike propped up and went back to the tire. Right as I was putting the new tube/tire on the wheel, Chris Harris rode up! Being the nice guy that he is, he put his own race on hold to help me out. We got the tire all ready to go, I loaded up my CO2 and BOOM! I blew the tube. Fortunately I had another CO2 in my jersey pocket. I loaded up the CO2 and it went off in my hand – my big fear with tube changing. SHOOT! Chris had a hand pump and pumped his heart out, when all the sudden Dr. Scott rode up to join the party! Unfortunately, the hardware on his seat loosened up and it completely came off his bike and he pulled out of the race. He was nice enough to use a CO2 to blow my tube the rest of the way up and let me leave my two tubes with him as I rode off. What an ordeal! Anyway, most of the rest of the first loop was up, and admittedly I pushed it a bit thinking of my ride speed. I had a great time though, and really enjoyed seeing Jen, Kim and Mark Murphy at the one-mile out and back. Then it was mostly up, but the scenery was so amazing. I looked at the ski slopes on the mountains and the running water beside me. How could I not love this?! One of the last major climbs was Tour-de-France style, which was pretty freakin’ awesome. I got to see Brian K, Bridget and Erin up the climb. And then I got to town, past our house to see Danielle and her camera, smiling smiling smiling. On to lap two, with a little climbing and the awesome descent. I just enjoyed the ride and the scenery, and made sure to eat eat eat, drink drink drink. Nutrition is generally a weakness but I knew on race day I needed to continue to take the calories for the run. Then, out of nowhere a bee flew its stinger RIGHT into my right middle finger. OUCH! I don’t think I’ve ever been stung by a bee before! I thought, well, I sure hope I’m not allergic! But man that hurt. Nothing too exciting happened on the rest of the second loop. I had to grab a few Powerbar Perform bottles to make up for the calories I dumped out, and the hills were significantly harder the second time around, and then finally I was at the finish. (I think I consumed 1800-2000 calories)
I got off my bike and walked into T2. HOLY cow my legs hurt. How in the world was I going to run a marathon? The thought literally brought tears to my eyes, I am not even joking. I slowly walked through the transition area and stopped at a porta potty. Then I slowly made my way to my run bag (which I got on the first try, thankyouverymuch) and into the changing tent. The tent was much less chaotic than the first time. A volunteer met me with a cup of water and started taking things out of my bag. I changed, drank a second cup of water, and chit-chatted with the volunteer. I thanked her for her help and confessed my fear of this marathon. She patted the bill of my visor and said, “Make me proud.” It was adorable – and something my dad used to tell me all the time when I was growing up. I took my time slathering on the sunscreen and another racer confessed her fear of the run too. She reminded me that no matter the goals, we were going to cross the finish line and we’d be fine.
When I started running, I was surprised that my legs felt ok, thank goodness! I smiled to the crowd and trotted along. My stomach bothered me a little, so I pulled off when I found a porta potty. I had to have a little pep talk with myself in there (of all places, sheesh!). I really had no interest in running this marathon, but how could I go home and say I quit? I didn’t train to stop now, and I certainly didn’t train in crappy hot weather, up to three-hour long runs, to quit. So I continued. I saw Lori then and she asked how I was. I think I said, “Eh.” She told me I looked great, and then said, “seriously, you look great!” (I guess everyone tells you that you look great whether you do or not, right?) I walked the aid stations and was jealous of the signs marking the second loop, thinking, I can’t wait until those are my mile markers! Soon I came up on Ryan who was double fisting a drink and some pretzels. He told me that his stomach was bothering him and he didn’t look too happy about it. We decided before the race that we were doing our own thing no matter what, so I went on past him. However, the message I left for him for the run course was “No walking!” – I felt a little bad about that after I passed him, oops. Admittedly I had been hoping to beat him, and thought I might be able to, but this was certainly not the way to do it. But I knew he’d be fine and so I continued with my own race. I had my green SSSMST run singlet on, and had decided to go ahead and wear my green compression socks for the race. Although I’d never done it before, it was probably one of my smartest decisions of the day – it was a crowd pleaser! I got so many cheers and comments from my outfit which just kept me smiling and interacting with the crowd and other racers. Even though I wasn’t feeling the best I ever have in a long run, I was having a fantastic time. I also walked up hills (and there were some pretty significant ones), swinging my arms for as much momentum as I could get. This also garnered a lot of cheers, which made me smile more. I got back up to the house (mile 12 or so) and Ryan caught me! He told me he was feeling better and since he walked the first seven miles, maybe he’d be able to run the rest! Even though I was a little disappointed to lose my lead, I was happy he felt better and was still having a blast. Danielle handed us some notes from Rob Reddy (mine told me that soon I’d be in the oval and I better love every minute) which was pretty awesome, I must say. Ryan ran off and we continued on our own races. The run/walk continued, and sometimes I’d even walk some flats. I sure was happy to use the bigger mile markers on the second loop though! I ate/drank at every aid station, which allowed me to walk a little longer during the breaks, ha. At about mile 16 I thought about just switching to a walk. Heck, people all around me were walking! But I thought it would take me three more hours to finish and I didn’t want to be out that long! And, I figured I really should at least run to three hours, since that was my longest training run. And then I thought I should probably run to 19 miles, since that was my longest pre-race distance run. And then I thought I should probably run a bit more since I walked so much. Then the math told me I could break five hours, which was the fastest I predicted my marathon to be. So basically I’d walk a bit, then start running, which would be around a 9-10 minute mile (which got a lot of “great pace” compliments!) until my heart rate got high or I saw a hill or an aid station, and then I’d walk. The math was working well, and I even realized I might be able to beat Mark Murphy (he told me the day before that he thought I could, and his time was 13:40). At around mile 21, as I was approaching the final turn back toward the finish, I saw Michelle Payne. She said, “Ryan is not far ahead, and he’s WALKING! Lori’s walking with him now.” And then I found Lori and she said, “Ryan’s walking, you can catch him!” I broke my ‘walk uphill’ rule for a bit to catch up and asked if I could walk with him. He said he was tired and was walking slower than I wanted to. So off I went. The victory could be mine, ha! I power walked up those hills, ran/walked through the last few miles, cheered with the Ironfans, and headed toward the finish. I was all smiles, waved to the crowd, heard my “Brandy Smith, from Cleveland, Ohio, YOU are and IRONMAN” and crossed the finish line. Just under 13:30!! Holy crap!
My volunteer led me through the finish and I got my foil blanket, shirt and hat. I asked to hang around to see Ryan finish. Once he got across the finish line I got a sweaty hug and kiss and we went to get our finisher photos. (I’ve been talking about this picture for months – saying we had to find each other at the finish to get our photo together) But just as we got over there, I had to sit. I was super lightheaded and felt like crap. Why in the heck does one race this stupid race!? I just exercised for freaking 13.5 hours and now I want to pass out. Who does this? I begged to lay down. BEGGED. Some volunteers got me to the med tent, where I asked to lay anywhere – the beds all seemed full and I really just needed to lay down – and they finally found me a bed (which, by the way, is one of those tri-fold beach chair things). That was great. My BP measured 88/44 (uh, low) and my pulse was 60 (normal). They gave me a coke and some pretzels and I started to feel better. I asked about Ryan and they told me he got sick and was in the tent, too! Once I finally felt better I went to find him and he actually got an IV! Once he was through we went to find real food. The funny thing about the food: besides the pizza and subway, they had: cookies, grapes, oranges, bananas, coke, pretzels – all the things from the aid stations! Like we wanted that! We enjoyed some pizza and decided we should go home. We had about a mile trek, but it was fine! We cheered on the racers as we went too, and saw Patrick run by, yay!
When we got home, there was a crowd, and we got to tell our tales of woe. Danielle was kind enough to snap our photo in front of the mantle, since after all the trouble, we never got our finisher photo together (bummer). The rest of the group went to watch the last finishers, but we wanted to shower and change so we missed it.
All in all, it was a fantastic experience, and I still kinda can’t believe I did it. I’m not ready to do it again anytime soon – the training commitment is so huge – but will be hard pressed not to think I may do “just a half-iron” like I tease Ryan about saying. My legs were comically sore the next two days, but we still managed some good shopping, eating and sight-seeing on our last day in Lake Placid. It was definitely a highlight to have so many friends there suffering together, and fanning for us. And it took place in a perfect backdrop. I can’t think of a better way to do a first ironman triathlon.
I suppose I should start with the days before. The weather in LP was hot, but the forecast kept showing mid 70s and sunny for Sunday. We could feel the humidity drop Friday and Saturday but it was still HOT. Ryan told us all about 2008 when he raced and the forecast was mid 70s and sunny, and it rained the ENTIRE day. Well, at about 10:30pm the night before the race it POURED. GREAT. In the morning we were all glued to the weather channel and every website we knew of to check the radars and it seemed that the rain would go south of us, and fortunately it did! It was still cloudy for the swim start so I opted for my clear goggles for swimming.
Ryan and I left transition and walked to the beach where we saw Danielle and her and Phil’s parents. We started to put on our wetsuits and Danielle said, “Yours zips in the front? That’s weird!” Uhhhh, no it doesn’t – I just put it on backwards. I guess as cool and collected as I tried to be I was a bit nervous afterall, ha! I got my wetsuit on and we found Chris and Dr. Scott. We all got in the water to stand at the outer right edge while we waited for the swim start. Phil found us over there (have no idea how in that sea of green and pink swim caps) and we all nervously chit-chatted before the cannon went off. (Of course, Ryan swam up to start in the front for his kick-butt swim time.) I was prepared for madness and it was crazy, but not as bad as I thought. Everyone was just trying to survive the swim and there was no violence.
I was able to settle in and swim right from the beginning and never had a moment of panic. Sure, I had people swimming under me, arms trying to stroke ahead of me, feet in my face, etc, but I felt that everyone was doing their own thing and no one was trying to ruin my swim for the benefit of their own (I guess that’s how I always imagined it would be, not sure why). I got out at the first loop and my watch said 39 minutes which totally surprised me! My Rev3 swim was 43 minutes so this was very exciting! At the final turn of the second loop I thought to myself, “this is the point where I’m longer than the Big Swim – after this is complete it’s just the bike and run, and I’ve ridden over 112 miles and I’ve run marathons so no problem!” I finished the swim in 1:20, had my wetsuit stripped (which wasn’t as fluid as I thought it would be, ha) and made my way to T1, smiling big the whole way.The transition was confusing. I ran over to my bags on the rack, pulled my transition bag and started running to the tent.
Except I had my morning clothes bag, so back I went. I tried to hang it up but screwed it up and knocked the hanger off. Finally got it back on, grabbed my bag and started running to the tent.
Except I had my running clothes bag, so back I went. Third time was a charm and I was off to change, ha. I got in the changing tent and it was chaos. Women were everywhere. I found an open chair and suddenly a volunteer was there pulling things out of my bag for me, getting my socks ready to put on, etc. How amazing! She even put my sunglasses on my face! I put sunscreen on my arms and was ready to ride. We walked out of the tents and to the bike mount like cattle, there were so many of us. I joked with a spectator – isn’t this exciting, woo!! Still smiling like a crazy woman. Finally I got on the bike and rode away.
The first part of the bike was fantastic. (aside: I always wonder what people take with them during these races so I’ll tell you: I took a 24oz and two 16oz bottles of Gatorade with carbopro (approximately 500 calories and 350 calories) and a regular Gatorade in the aerobottle. I had peanut butter filled pretzels in my bento box (about 450 calories worth) and four clif bars (of varying flavors, who knows what I’d want!)) Anyway – the first part of the loop was a bit of a climb, but then there’s the descent into Keene, which I’d practiced and flew down. It was flat, and when I hit the first timing mat at 30 miles I was right around 90 minutes for the ride. I thought, for those who are tracking me online, they’ll think I’m going WAY too fast. I continued to tell myself to take it easy though and checked in frequently to make sure I wasn’t pushing it. I stopped for a restroom break (which I only point out because even at the rest stop the volunteers were amazing- took my bike and racked it for me so I wouldn’t have to!) Then at around mile 35, I got a flat. HOW COULD THIS BE?! I’ve NEVER had a flat tire on my tri bike, ever. Thankfully, Ryan and I practiced changing my road bike tire before the trip so I knew exactly what to do…. Sort of. When I laid my bike down, my high calorie Gatorade/Carbopro (which did not taste good, by the way) started spilling out – oh no! I got my bike propped up and went back to the tire. Right as I was putting the new tube/tire on the wheel, Chris Harris rode up! Being the nice guy that he is, he put his own race on hold to help me out. We got the tire all ready to go, I loaded up my CO2 and BOOM! I blew the tube. Fortunately I had another CO2 in my jersey pocket. I loaded up the CO2 and it went off in my hand – my big fear with tube changing. SHOOT! Chris had a hand pump and pumped his heart out, when all the sudden Dr. Scott rode up to join the party! Unfortunately, the hardware on his seat loosened up and it completely came off his bike and he pulled out of the race. He was nice enough to use a CO2 to blow my tube the rest of the way up and let me leave my two tubes with him as I rode off. What an ordeal! Anyway, most of the rest of the first loop was up, and admittedly I pushed it a bit thinking of my ride speed. I had a great time though, and really enjoyed seeing Jen, Kim and Mark Murphy at the one-mile out and back. Then it was mostly up, but the scenery was so amazing. I looked at the ski slopes on the mountains and the running water beside me. How could I not love this?! One of the last major climbs was Tour-de-France style, which was pretty freakin’ awesome. I got to see Brian K, Bridget and Erin up the climb. And then I got to town, past our house to see Danielle and her camera, smiling smiling smiling. On to lap two, with a little climbing and the awesome descent. I just enjoyed the ride and the scenery, and made sure to eat eat eat, drink drink drink. Nutrition is generally a weakness but I knew on race day I needed to continue to take the calories for the run. Then, out of nowhere a bee flew its stinger RIGHT into my right middle finger. OUCH! I don’t think I’ve ever been stung by a bee before! I thought, well, I sure hope I’m not allergic! But man that hurt. Nothing too exciting happened on the rest of the second loop. I had to grab a few Powerbar Perform bottles to make up for the calories I dumped out, and the hills were significantly harder the second time around, and then finally I was at the finish. (I think I consumed 1800-2000 calories)
I got off my bike and walked into T2. HOLY cow my legs hurt. How in the world was I going to run a marathon? The thought literally brought tears to my eyes, I am not even joking. I slowly walked through the transition area and stopped at a porta potty. Then I slowly made my way to my run bag (which I got on the first try, thankyouverymuch) and into the changing tent. The tent was much less chaotic than the first time. A volunteer met me with a cup of water and started taking things out of my bag. I changed, drank a second cup of water, and chit-chatted with the volunteer. I thanked her for her help and confessed my fear of this marathon. She patted the bill of my visor and said, “Make me proud.” It was adorable – and something my dad used to tell me all the time when I was growing up. I took my time slathering on the sunscreen and another racer confessed her fear of the run too. She reminded me that no matter the goals, we were going to cross the finish line and we’d be fine.
When I started running, I was surprised that my legs felt ok, thank goodness! I smiled to the crowd and trotted along. My stomach bothered me a little, so I pulled off when I found a porta potty. I had to have a little pep talk with myself in there (of all places, sheesh!). I really had no interest in running this marathon, but how could I go home and say I quit? I didn’t train to stop now, and I certainly didn’t train in crappy hot weather, up to three-hour long runs, to quit. So I continued. I saw Lori then and she asked how I was. I think I said, “Eh.” She told me I looked great, and then said, “seriously, you look great!” (I guess everyone tells you that you look great whether you do or not, right?) I walked the aid stations and was jealous of the signs marking the second loop, thinking, I can’t wait until those are my mile markers! Soon I came up on Ryan who was double fisting a drink and some pretzels. He told me that his stomach was bothering him and he didn’t look too happy about it. We decided before the race that we were doing our own thing no matter what, so I went on past him. However, the message I left for him for the run course was “No walking!
” – I felt a little bad about that after I passed him, oops. Admittedly I had been hoping to beat him, and thought I might be able to, but this was certainly not the way to do it. But I knew he’d be fine and so I continued with my own race. I had my green SSSMST run singlet on, and had decided to go ahead and wear my green compression socks for the race. Although I’d never done it before, it was probably one of my smartest decisions of the day – it was a crowd pleaser! I got so many cheers and comments from my outfit which just kept me smiling and interacting with the crowd and other racers. Even though I wasn’t feeling the best I ever have in a long run, I was having a fantastic time. I also walked up hills (and there were some pretty significant ones), swinging my arms for as much momentum as I could get. This also garnered a lot of cheers, which made me smile more. I got back up to the house (mile 12 or so) and Ryan caught me! He told me he was feeling better and since he walked the first seven miles, maybe he’d be able to run the rest! Even though I was a little disappointed to lose my lead, I was happy he felt better and was still having a blast. Danielle handed us some notes from Rob Reddy (mine told me that soon I’d be in the oval and I better love every minute) which was pretty awesome, I must say. Ryan ran off and we continued on our own races. The run/walk continued, and sometimes I’d even walk some flats. I sure was happy to use the bigger mile markers on the second loop though! I ate/drank at every aid station, which allowed me to walk a little longer during the breaks, ha. At about mile 16 I thought about just switching to a walk. Heck, people all around me were walking! But I thought it would take me three more hours to finish and I didn’t want to be out that long! And, I figured I really should at least run to three hours, since that was my longest training run. And then I thought I should probably run to 19 miles, since that was my longest pre-race distance run. And then I thought I should probably run a bit more since I walked so much. Then the math told me I could break five hours, which was the fastest I predicted my marathon to be. So basically I’d walk a bit, then start running, which would be around a 9-10 minute mile (which got a lot of “great pace” compliments!) until my heart rate got high or I saw a hill or an aid station, and then I’d walk. The math was working well, and I even realized I might be able to beat Mark Murphy (he told me the day before that he thought I could, and his time was 13:40). At around mile 21, as I was approaching the final turn back toward the finish, I saw Michelle Payne. She said, “Ryan is not far ahead, and he’s WALKING! Lori’s walking with him now.” And then I found Lori and she said, “Ryan’s walking, you can catch him!” I broke my ‘walk uphill’ rule for a bit to catch up and asked if I could walk with him. He said he was tired and was walking slower than I wanted to. So off I went. The victory could be mine, ha! I power walked up those hills, ran/walked through the last few miles, cheered with the Ironfans, and headed toward the finish. I was all smiles, waved to the crowd, heard my “Brandy Smith, from Cleveland, Ohio, YOU are and IRONMAN” and crossed the finish line. Just under 13:30!! Holy crap! My volunteer led me through the finish and I got my foil blanket, shirt and hat. I asked to hang around to see Ryan finish. Once he got across the finish line I got a sweaty hug and kiss and we went to get our finisher photos. (I’ve been talking about this picture for months – saying we had to find each other at the finish to get our photo together) But just as we got over there, I had to sit. I was super lightheaded and felt like crap. Why in the heck does one race this stupid race!? I just exercised for freaking 13.5 hours and now I want to pass out. Who does this? I begged to lay down. BEGGED. Some volunteers got me to the med tent, where I asked to lay anywhere – the beds all seemed full and I really just needed to lay down – and they finally found me a bed (which, by the way, is one of those tri-fold beach chair things). That was great. My BP measured 88/44 (uh, low) and my pulse was 60 (normal). They gave me a coke and some pretzels and I started to feel better. I asked about Ryan and they told me he got sick and was in the tent, too! Once I finally felt better I went to find him and he actually got an IV! Once he was through we went to find real food. The funny thing about the food: besides the pizza and subway, they had: cookies, grapes, oranges, bananas, coke, pretzels – all the things from the aid stations! Like we wanted that! We enjoyed some pizza and decided we should go home. We had about a mile trek, but it was fine! We cheered on the racers as we went too, and saw Patrick run by, yay!
When we got home, there was a crowd, and we got to tell our tales of woe. Danielle was kind enough to snap our photo in front of the mantle, since after all the trouble, we never got our finisher photo together (bummer). The rest of the group went to watch the last finishers, but we wanted to shower and change so we missed it.
All in all, it was a fantastic experience, and I still kinda can’t believe I did it. I’m not ready to do it again anytime soon – the training commitment is so huge – but will be hard pressed not to think I may do “just a half-iron” like I tease Ryan about saying. My legs were comically sore the next two days, but we still managed some good shopping, eating and sight-seeing on our last day in Lake Placid. It was definitely a highlight to have so many friends there suffering together, and fanning for us. And it took place in a perfect backdrop. I can’t think of a better way to do a first ironman triathlon.
