Augusta Half Ironman Report

Augusta Half Ironman (September 2012) I remember this race very well, and this being my big race of the year I'll be a bit more detailed here. Pre-race (including the day before prep, it was hell) Ahhh...pre-race, that was memorable. So, I suppose I was stupid for making the assumption that the transition area would be near the host hotel. At this particular race, as may be the case for all WTC races, you have to drop your bike gear the day before. So I parked near the hotel, grabbed my bike and gear and started walking towards the river. I wasn't sure exactly where to go, so I looked around for others that had bikes and saw a few and moved their way. When I got to the river, I felt awfully alone. No more bikes around. Just people walking along the river. Oh, forgot to mention, it was in the upper 90's, and humid...typical Augusta weather for that time of year. Sort of a preview for what tomorrow was going to bring. So, back to walking. I knew the TA had to be along the river, so I started walking, and walking, and walking. No sign of anything race related. Finally after probably 30 minutes of walking (every now and then I jumped on the bike) I finally got to the START of the swim. Joy...this meant I had another 1.2 miles to walk. I wasn't the only person who made this mistake as it was at this point that I began to run into more and more lost souls. At least we knew how much further we had...Oh, did I mention it was in the upper 90's and now there was no more shade? Oh, did I mention I was wearing flip flops that aren't overly friendly to long walks? At least I was able to meet a few people along the way, one who who for whom this was going to be his first ever triathlon. Brave man! So finally, after I don't even know how long, the trudge to the TA was over. I got there, found my spot among the 3000 spots, set up my bike, my gear.....then began my 3 mile trudge back. Oh, did I mention it was 98 DEGREES AND HUMID AND I HAD TERRIBLE WALKING FLIP FLOPS ON!!!! A six mile walk in the blazing heat was not the best way to get loosened up for a half ironman. But, in the end, I got it done, got back to my car and headed back to the hotel. I did take the rest of the day off and did absolutely nothing. Race Morning Race day was not as expected. It was overcast in the morning and unseasonably cool. It was in the 60's in the morning, but I still assumed it would burn off and become sweltering, as it is for this race every year. Due to the wonderful format of this race where the start the slowest waves first and the fastest ones towards the end, I was lucky enough to have to get there at 6:30, but not actually start racing until 8:40. To keep my wife and kid from having to sit around forever I just had her drop me off so they could go back and sleep, and meet me later during the run. So I got there, did my thing, and was well done by 7:00, so I had a ton of time to kill. I found a nice patch of grass near the start and just laid down. Nothing much else to do. I won't bore you with the mind numbingly boring details of what I did during that time. Basically got bored sitting and moved somewhere else, etc. Swim Skip ahead to race start. FINALLY!!!! My wave got called so I moved with the rest of the cattle into the starting chute before making our way onto the pier and into the water. This is a point to point swim with the current, so in other words, REALLY FREAKING FAST! There wasn't much to say about the swim other than it was as easy as a swim could get. I swam about 20 yards from the edge, so sighting couldn't have been easier. The current was fast. I wound up with a swim time that had a pace that I would be lucky to maintain for 100 yards in a pool, let alone 1.2 miles. 27 minutes after the start i was out of the water and running the insanely long path to get my bike. Bike I don't remember much about transition, and I tend to have them very well dialed in and do them quite fast so lets just say, transition went great! On to the bike. Here is reason two why the wave start they have sucks. Aside from having to sit around, the bike portion becomes slalom on wheels. Sure it's a huge ego boost to literally be passing someone every couple seconds, but it wears on you after a while. When you have 56 miles to ride it's nice to just disengage and ride and not have to pay really close attention. But for this race, you pretty much cannot ever stop watching. The really fun times are when you had three cyclist spread across the entire lane and you have to go into the oncoming lane to get around, that was awesome! Anyway, despite that I wound up having a fantastic bike split. Beat my previous HIM time by over 30 minutes. I finished the bike in around 2:44:00, give or take. Run Oh boy howdy do I remember the run. My plan going into the run was to maintain 11 min miles for the first three miles then, based on how I felt, adjust my speed accordingly, while also walking every aid station, about every mile. I felt confident that worst case scenario, I could maintain 11 for the duration, but could speed it up if need be. So, on to the run. As is usually the case, the first mile is tough to keep in check. After moving your legs so fast on the bike they tend to want to keep moving at that rate. So what felt slow was closer to a 10 min mile. Much faster than I planned but I felt ok so I stuck with it. Despite my plan, I felt good and was able to maintain this pace for over 4 miles. I was feeling great, and thought that I was actually going well. That was until about 4.5 miles in. That's when things went bad. Really bad. Something in my stomach felt terrible. As if a huge brick just developed in there, and it was brutal. I adjusted my walk ratio to every 10 minutes. That lasted for one iteration. Then it became every 6 minutes. Then it became every 4 minutes. Then it turned into trying to just run for a minute straight. Every mile became slower. By mile 11 I had done a 14 minute mile. I felt absolutely terrible and was just struggling to survive. Once I hit the 11 mile mark and was nearly done, I was able to turn up the speed a little bit and get back to 11 min miles to the finish line. I had never been so ecstatic to get to a finish line. I felt absolutely terrible by the end and was so happy to have a seat and not move for a while.