Kona Race report... well, part of it

Here is the first part of the race day report. I was typing it on the plane ride home from Kona on Sunday, and then got tired, as I'm sure you will too when reading it. 2nd installment will be coming soon.

Well here I am on the plane coming home from Hawaii. Yup, it’s the red eye. I had my ginger ale and I have seemed to get some necessary energy to remove the computer from the bag and get typing. I have to say that I am in the most uncomfortable seat in the world… the middle. I don’t know how we can have about 15 plus people we know on this plane and I end up in the middle, after racing Ironman, for a friggin’ 5+ hour flight. What did I do wrong? Regardless, the time will pass and we will eventually be in Spokane.

I did not get to give a race report, so I thought I would get that going first… not that anyone cares, but it allows me to reflect and be honest about it with myself.

I got up, as normal and all things seemed to go fine… breakfast, pills, etc. Jessi was going to drive Ben and me down to the race start to be there at about 5:45. Greg came along to with his camera... or was it that the camera came along with Greg? I joke with Greg telling him that his camera can get him in to a lot of places just because of how big it is. I guess it’s the lens. I’m not sure if he’s compensating for something, but it’s pretty impressive. He took some early shots of Ben and me and after Jessi dropped us off near the race site, Greg followed us to body marking. I think I have mentioned this before, last year, but body marking in Hawaii is ‘official.’ That is they use these specific stamps and there are about 4 people per person doing all the numbers. It’s a pretty serious thing. On a side note, I always find it a bit humorous that no matter where I put my tattoos (temporary sponsor ones) they always seem to find a way to purposely cover hem with the numbers. I wonder if they do it on purpose, or if someone told them how much it pisses me off and they just keep doing it to get a good laugh in the bushes.

After the body ‘stamping’ we headed to transition. There were about 50 volunteers (no joke) lining the way to the transition area. There was not way that Greg was going to be able to get in without a pass of some special ‘band.’ So we parted our ways. I got to my bike, aired the tires, got my nutrition set up on the bike and in my bags, and was feeling pretty solid about how things were going. Just then I looked up and saw Greg taking a picture IN the transition area. I started laughing asking him how in the world he got in there. I thought it was so cool, but I also knew that is was nothing short than an act of God to get him in there. So it was another nice face to see in the pre race transition area. I am sure he got some great shots that I hope to see sometime.

As the start was getting closer, I figured I needed to dump my clothes and bag so I connected with Jessi. It would be the last time I would see her and Emma before the race. I always feel like a kid on the first day of school and my mom sending me out the door. But I always like to get a kiss from them and Emma normally always says something sweet. This time she said to ‘beat all those guys out there.’ Kind of a tall order, but I figured it was a pretty good goal… short lived.

I eventually made it down into the water and swam out to the start. Last year I started a little too far back and too close to the buoy line. So I got pretty beat up for how fast I swim. This time my goal was to swim a little more conservative and potentially come out a little further down, but with a less stressful swim. So I lined up what I thought to be the middle of the line more in the front. Probably 2nd row. I looked down the line and realized that they extended the start line much further down and now, once again, I was pretty close the buoy line which would mean another stressful swim. But there was nothing I could do because the start was near and I felt good where I was in term of being in front. The officials on the surfboards were paddling back and forth to make sure that people stayed back. But this was like the line awaiting the open of the doors of Wal-Mart the day after Thanksgiving. It did not matter who you were, what you were on, or what you said you would do, this anxious group was going to go. If you got in their way, you would get run over and that was just part of the game. Kind of like a mob mentality.

The officials were getting a little anxious and I saw one guy turning his board towards the course and yelling at the other guys saying that there was 2 minutes to go… very anxiously. I thought something was up, not too sure, but something. In about 1 minute the cannon went off and anarchy ensued. Here we go.

That start went well. The typical panic in some, people going the wrong direction, over the backs of your legs, arms hitting you in the head, etc. It’s a little crazy but I know that people are not intentionally doing this, for the most part, they are just trying to do the same thing you are. And when people breathe to their left, and you are on their right, they never see you so when they tend to ‘drift’ into you, they never knew you were even there. But I will also say that it gets pretty annoying when the same person keeps hitting the top of your head over and over.

We finally got out to turnaround and started heading back. I was able to get some clear water from time to time which was nice. I really felt like a ping pong ball. I was just bouncing around quite a bit. But more importantly I was trying to stay calm. If some guy wanted where I was that bad, I would let him have it… pretty simple. It really was not worth it to time. But I also held my ground as well. You can tell the difference from a jerk and people just swimming and bumping into people.. I ended getting out of the water in about an hour… 1:00:54 I think. Ironically Ben got out about 20 seconds ahead of me which is hilarious because we always seem to get out in the same time in the Ironmans we have done. In IM Cda we came out at the 1.2 mile mark one in front of the other. This is never planned. We don’t start in the same place, we just end up finding one another in the race… pretty funny really. So after I came out of the water and grabbed my bag, I saw Ben in the T1 tent and sat right across from him and got my stuff together. He left before me, but we pretty much mounted our bikes at the same time (my shoes were on the bike).

I knew that the bike would be a tough leg today with the lack of sun cover and the winds. But I also wanted to get going and get the intensity going. I could always rest later. This bike leg was no different from last year’s. Lots of packs out to Hawi, and officials giving out drafting penalties. I like to see the officials out on the course and ones that are actually being active in assessing penalties. I understand that there are times that people are simply in a tough spot, but there are plenty of other times that it’s so obvious. I finally made it out to Hawi. That last 20 miles to Hawi (miles 40-60) it was such a tough head wind. Most of this section is uphill too so it made it a little more difficult than normal. After making the turn, there was a bit of a tailwind, but it was also downhill which made it a very fast section. I was pretty much spun out for about 5 miles… probably less, but it felt like forever. The wind was a bit of a tailwind but also coming from the side. The gusts would hit you and body and bike would lean about 30 degrees. It was pretty crazy, but you just had to keep going and not lose speed because of wind.