8:31:05 1st
swim 59:07 8th
bike 4:29:55 4th
run 2:57:07 1st
I might have to put some Texas longhorns on the front of my bike to show my allegiance to Texas after the month I had there. It was an absolute blast. I met so many wonderful, hospitable and gracious Texans. I got to spend a month in the perfect training location with my awesome friends Roberto & Jeannine and to cap it off I came away with 'The Texas Double'. The win in both the Ironman 70.3 Texas and Ironman Texas - North American Championships. With this win, I've managed to keep my 9-year streak alive. 9 consecutive years of winning at least one championship race per year (World, Regional or National).
inHaus photography Compared to the wintery weather during most of my month in Texas, the weather on IM Texas weekend was absolutely stunning. You couldn't have asked for better. Crisp in the morning, mild warm temps through the day, clear blue skies and not a breath of wind. The water temp, however was right between the pro and age group wetsuit cut-offs. This meant pro women starting the swim at 6:30 without wetsuits and age group males starting at 6:40 WITH wetsuits. I've had one other race where this was allowed to happen, in Frankfurt, and it sets the women up for a ridiculously unfair bike leg. The gun went off at 6:30 sharp, just as the sun was starting to burst up from behind the horizon. I expected that I'd feel pretty sluggish in the fresh water without my Roka security blanket (aka wetsuit) to keep me floating. But we got going and the swim was actually quite enjoyable.
The second half of the swim, the course turned to head down through these narrow, winding canals. It was the first swim I’ve done where spectators can line either side of the canal and cheer within meters of the swimmers. It was awesome. I've always felt that the swim leg feels so isolated from the world, like it's not really part of the race. But this race was different. It seemed a bit more interactive if that's possible with a swim. Lauren Brandon got straight to work on us all, she did what she does best, fired up her secret underwater jets and left us for dead. I think she was through T1 and onto her bike while I was still humming the pre-race American anthem a few strokes into the swim leg. She finished the swim in 48:19. A minute faster than the pro men. Meredith was next, 5min ahead of me and then there was a group 2-3min ahead of me. I exited the water in 8th feeling in control and ready for the race to begin.
The second half of the swim, the course turned to head down through these narrow, winding canals. It was the first swim I’ve done where spectators can line either side of the canal and cheer within meters of the swimmers. It was awesome. I've always felt that the swim leg feels so isolated from the world, like it's not really part of the race. But this race was different. It seemed a bit more interactive if that's possible with a swim. Lauren Brandon got straight to work on us all, she did what she does best, fired up her secret underwater jets and left us for dead. I think she was through T1 and onto her bike while I was still humming the pre-race American anthem a few strokes into the swim leg. She finished the swim in 48:19. A minute faster than the pro men. Meredith was next, 5min ahead of me and then there was a group 2-3min ahead of me. I exited the water in 8th feeling in control and ready for the race to begin.
photo by Scott Flathouse The bike leg was two laps, out-and-back along a dead flat stretch of highway. The first quarter was a peaceful journey for me. No cars, bikes, people, noises. Not even houses or streets. Just me travelling along a big closed-down highway like as if a virus had spread though the city and wiped everyone out. Eerie silence. The pace felt good, under control, how the first half of an ironman should apparently feel.
I expected this race to be like most of my others, put my head down, ride the bike leg solo, chasing down the uber swimmers, passing a few athletes here and there till I get to T2 as close to the front of the field as possible. That's my go-to race plan. That wasn't how this one played out though. This one played out a bit more like Ironman Frankfurt. Some pro men interfered at some point along the way and then eventually age group men became a significant factor in the womens race. Through the second half of the bike leg any previous goals I had of continuing to push ahead in my race were obstructed by people on the course interfering. For me, any group dynamics at all is a foreign scenario on the bike, let alone when it includes males with a completely different set of rules. The race from that point became a frustrating tussle. Trying to spike my watts to get around everyone and continue on with my own race... and the deflating feeling of having age group men slip steam (they are legally allowed to draft for 25sec at a time) up behind me, sling shot around, leaving me to have to sit up and make an effort to get out of his 12m zone. Of course as soon as I do this, the next one sling shots around, and again and again. Frankfurt was about a thousand times worse. But both races leave no room for women to fairly race each other. At this point the womens race gets put on hold, the safety car comes out and brings the field back together until they're free to race again a couple hours later.
I expected this race to be like most of my others, put my head down, ride the bike leg solo, chasing down the uber swimmers, passing a few athletes here and there till I get to T2 as close to the front of the field as possible. That's my go-to race plan. That wasn't how this one played out though. This one played out a bit more like Ironman Frankfurt. Some pro men interfered at some point along the way and then eventually age group men became a significant factor in the womens race. Through the second half of the bike leg any previous goals I had of continuing to push ahead in my race were obstructed by people on the course interfering. For me, any group dynamics at all is a foreign scenario on the bike, let alone when it includes males with a completely different set of rules. The race from that point became a frustrating tussle. Trying to spike my watts to get around everyone and continue on with my own race... and the deflating feeling of having age group men slip steam (they are legally allowed to draft for 25sec at a time) up behind me, sling shot around, leaving me to have to sit up and make an effort to get out of his 12m zone. Of course as soon as I do this, the next one sling shots around, and again and again. Frankfurt was about a thousand times worse. But both races leave no room for women to fairly race each other. At this point the womens race gets put on hold, the safety car comes out and brings the field back together until they're free to race again a couple hours later.
photo by Roberto Florencia For the second half of the bike, I remained in a constant state of emotional turmoil knowing I'd trained months for this day, paid a fortune for flights half way around the world, got everything as perfect as I could in the lead-up... for it all to be wasted as the race for woman against woman slips away with no way to avoid it. My mind flipped like a Schizophrenic from anger, sadness, despair to 'here's my chance go hard, harder, keep going' and back to despair. I can't get a reasonable answer as to why the women are not provided a fair race in Ironman. The most common (but laughably unreasonable) answer I get is the age group men cannot start 10 or 20mins later because it would effect their midnight cut-off time... 17hrs and 20mins later.
I rolled into T2 with Meredith, Michelle and Jodie. Kimberly, Lauren and Jen were ahead, out on the run course already. By the time we made our way through T2 I was onto the run course in 4th place about 5min off the lead. I felt great running and it was difficult to run “slow” enough. I imagine that's a common problem for most during the marathon. Tapering and adrenaline do amazing things. Plus racing a half just three weeks prior makes IM pace feel even slower (at least at the start till it eventually grinds you down). I was ticking off 4min km’s on the flat concrete paths around The Woodlands. I took the lead before the end of lap 1, on a three lap spectator filled, scenic course.
I rolled into T2 with Meredith, Michelle and Jodie. Kimberly, Lauren and Jen were ahead, out on the run course already. By the time we made our way through T2 I was onto the run course in 4th place about 5min off the lead. I felt great running and it was difficult to run “slow” enough. I imagine that's a common problem for most during the marathon. Tapering and adrenaline do amazing things. Plus racing a half just three weeks prior makes IM pace feel even slower (at least at the start till it eventually grinds you down). I was ticking off 4min km’s on the flat concrete paths around The Woodlands. I took the lead before the end of lap 1, on a three lap spectator filled, scenic course.
photo by Ironwomen - livefeisty.com I felt confident on the run. I’d done a few good weeks training back in Australia before Texas 70.3, but there was one thing bothering me. My feet were burning up under my 3rd metatarsal. At 5km they were sore. By half way they were giving me notice that this was going to be a long painful run. By 32km they were screaming out for me to stop. Every step was like running on glass. I had over 10min lead so I decided to take a toilet stop and put my feet up. As I sat in the smelly, hot porta loo I put my feet up and told myself that it was just 10km of running to go, forget that I've already run 32. As I jumped back on the course it was worse than before. Maybe stopping was a bad idea. But I did need to go to the loo so it wasn’t a complete waste of time. The next 10km I stopped checking the splits on the Suunto and just nursed my feet one step at a time. I was trying as hard as I could to heel strike to keep off my forefoot, but jeez heel striking is tough. And tiring.
Finally, I saw the finish line. I wished just for the last 100m that the pain in my feet could have gone away cos I’d dreamt of this sight for the past three weeks and how enjoyable it'd be cross the line first. But all I could think about was getting my shoes off and throwing my feet in a bucket of ice. My body felt good but my feet were in a world of pain. I had mixed emotions after the race. I was stoked at how fit and heathy I was but I was annoyed that I still haven’t quite figured out my dropped metatarsal issue. I'll have to keep practicing to figure it out.
Jared, myself and our homestay Jamie. I'd like to give a massive thanks to all my incredible sponsors who continue to ride the ups and downs with me. A big thanks to my homestay family in Houston, Jamie, BJ & Cooper who were an amazing help and made my weekend run as smoothly as possible. Sorry Jared for yelling “my feet are **** killing me” every time I passed before continuing on with my emotionless-block-the-pain facial expression. And finally thank you to the hundreds of awesome spectators and friends I had out on course cheering my name. It's true, the Texans really are some of the friendliest people around.
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