RACE MORNING! We got up at 4:30 am, had a bagel and some coffee, and by 5:15 we were headed to the race area. It was awesome, ben and I got to be together all morning right up until the gun went off. We double checked our gear, sunscreened up, gave eachother a hug and kiss, and we were off. I was surprisingly calm on race morning. There was one moment of panic as we were standing in the water before the race, when i started to think about how lone I was going to be out here for, but I pushed the thought aside. All I could focus on was the next ten minutes. Making it to the next bouy while swimming and the next aid station during the run and swim. The concept of time just seems to disappear.
SWIM:
THe swim was crazy, seroiusly crazy. You get elbowed, kicked, pushed down, cut off.. it like a washing machine. My main goal was to stay calm, keep my heart rate under control, find any open space I could, and get out of the water as quickly as I could. The swim course is an out and back, and on the way back I managed to find some open space which was awesome! I was definitely so happy to get out of the water. I made it in 1 hour and 27 minutes, and I was pretty much on target for 13-14 hours.
Bike:
The bike, well I'm not really sure how to describe the immense ups and downs that I experienced during those 180 kms. The first 2 hours to oosoyos I was feeling great. It's relatively flat, and I was making really good time. Then you hit Rogers Pass... the 15 km hill. Even there I wasn't feeling to bad, I kept my heart rate under control, passed alot of people, and even managed to have a conversation with a fellow jennifer on our way up. What got me was the rollers after the summit of rogers pass. They say this is the hardest ironman course, and I understand why, after the pass tehre are another 10 mini hills. All I could think about was getting to kilometer 120 where our special needs bags were and I had coke and lays potato chips stashed.. mmm.. But kilometers 100-120 seemed to last forever, as you take a turn off the highway and start heading BACK To osoyoos.. where you just came from!
Anyways, I took a couple minutes to get those chips and pop in, and headed back out. By this point it was 38 degrees outside. Insanely hot. Infact, the aid stations started running out of water, which was insane. There were 3 aid stations that I hit that were out of water, but at least they had sports drink still.
Then, there was the yellow lake hill. What I like to call the hill of death. It is a steep and decent sized hill after 140 kms of biking. It was hot, I was out of water, and my entire body was aching from being on the bike, and then I hit the hill. About half way up I started weezing, then I couldn't breathe... I was having an asthma attack. So I pulled over, and tried to catch my breath so I could take my inhaler. Then a lady came up beside me, started rubbing my back, brought me into the shade, and tried to calm me down with sucess and I was able to take my inhaler. I got on my bike, and at the top of the hill I saw my Dad, my sister, and my uncle! It was pretty much downhill into penticton from the top of the yellowlake hill and they drove beside me cheering me on and taking pictures for a good portion of the bike back. I was still on track, the bike took me 6 hours and 30 minutes, under the 7 hour limit I gave myself.. I was pretty excited. And remember yellow from the oliver race?! I even saw him!
Run:
Pulling into the transition and getting off that bike had never felt so good. By this point it was 4 pm. The thought of "running" a marathon was daunting. But I pictured ben out there, and that kept me going. I kept my eye out for him, because the run course was an out and back and I expected to see him about 2 hours into my run. (Little did I know he had pulled out because of siezed muscles after the bike). But he kept me going. There were aid stations every mile, and my goal was to run between every aid station and to walk through the aid stations. That only lasted 7 miles. It was so hot, oppressively hot. I would get ice at one aidstation and put it in my shirt and by the next aid station (1 mile later) it would be melted. I remember counting down the miles, I was in survival mode. I kept looking for ben, and when I didn't see him I assumed we had passed eachother while going through an aid station. I took the race as 26 individual miles. There was a group of us that were playing leapfrog and we motivated eachother. I remember at the turn around and realizing.. omg I'm only half way. it was 6:30, spectators were eating dinner on the side lines, and I was still out there. I remember being 10 miles from the finish line and I just started crying; Wondering what the heck I was doing. Then I remember around 8 miles to the finish line, the sun went behing the mountains and it started cooling off, and I slowly got a second wind. My brother's girlfriend's grandpa lives right on the course, and I remember passing their house and seeing her family there cheering me on and her dad running out to give me a high five. I remember hitting the 23 mile marker and that was it. It was go time. I pulled way head of the group I had been playing leap frog with. I did not walk the rest of the way. Infact, that last 3 miles was the fastest of any of the previous miles. About a mile from the finish line I saw my family. I ignored them, I had to, I was too close to the finish to get emotional and have another asthma attack. As I was 200 feet from the finish line, I felt a huge blister on my foot pop. But nothing was stopping me. Then, the pain, the agony were all forgotten when I crossed that line, and saw my family. All the training the past 9 months, came to that moment and it was better than I could have ever imagined. My final time was 14 hours 26 minutes. Which was 26 minutes slower than I thought, but I was content, I didn't care. Looking back the heat definitely slowed me down. ( I have a video of me finishing but I'm not sure how to post it, so if anyone has any recommendations).
I got my medal, my hat, my shirt, Ben was waiting with roses, and sam with champagne. It was amazing to have so much support. My (now) husband, brother, brother's girlfriend, sister, mom, mom's partner, dad, uncle, great aunt, and great uncle were all there and aparently the rest of my family watched me on tv. It was an amazing moment.
That night, I hardly slept. Too much adrenelin I think. I had a epson salt bath, put on compression pants, ate as much as I could considering my stomach was pretty upset from gels and gatorade all day. And we drove home on monday and I started thinking about the wedding! .. but I'll write more about that another time.
