IM Canada Recap Video

Ironman Canada
Penticton, British Columbia
August 29, 2010
2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike, 26.2 mile run

Going into this race, I was feeling sluggish, not super confident, injured, and did I say sluggish?

The swim started off with roughly 3000 people spread out across a quarter of a mile with plans to meet at the first buoy. I thought that since we would all be meeting there, I would at least get to the front of the line and have people pass me instead of the other way around. This idea popped into my head after speaking with a bunch of other better swimmers and it turned out only 1161 people beat me out of the water. This could have been due partially to my strategy of swimming in a zig zag pattern. Straight lines are over rated and I was very happy with my 1:11 swim which was a 7 minute PR from IM New Zealand and a 5 minute PR from Aquabike in July.

The bike is something that I have gotten progressively stronger on but multitasking is tough which has resulted in nutrition issues, cramping, throwing up... in previous races. I decided this time around to stay in Zone 2/3 (aerobic) so that I would have good legs to run the marathon. Riding conservatively was a very hard thing to do but I stuck to my plan even when people were passing me. That is until the rain started. I was really trying to keep taking in nutrition but when the rain/hail started with about 25 miles to go, I got so cold that I couldn't stop shivering and was therefore unable to grab my water bottles to drink. Plus all my focus was on staying alive as I went down the backside of Yellow Lake at 30 mph in the wind and rain with both brakes fully engaged. Seeing 3 ambulances at the bottom of the hill wasn't very comforting. I was hoping to ride at least a 5:30 but was happy to be off the bike in 5:39 and made up a lot of positions, 1162 to 407 and 131 to 54 in my age group.

When I ran into the transition tent, I wasn't able to put my socks and shoes on by myself because my hands were frozen. Thank goodness for the volunteers! I was nervous starting the run since my legs started to tighten during the end of the bike but decided to just stick with the plan of running a sub 8 pace and walking each aid station. For the most part it worked on the first half with me crossing the ½ way point in 1:46. I quickly realized that the return trip started out with a hill and what felt like a nonstop headwind. My pace slowed a bit but I tried to just focus on drafting anybody who passed me. This worked perfectly as everybody I drafted, I ended up passing ☺ I didn't manage to keep up a 8 minute pace for the return portion but was happy with a 3:44 time which shot me up 140 spots to finish in 267th place out of 3029. I passed 14 guys in my age group to sit finish in 40th out of 247.

Overall, it was a great day with many friends finishing their first Ironman and others pulling of awesome finishes on a difficult day.

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