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Last weekend was the infamous and much dreaded Wildflower Half Ironman race. Lots of my iron teammates were racing so we all decided to camp together. Luckily, Nick arrived with his trailer on Wednesday night and roped off a nice big area with yellow caution tape. A lot of people were getting in on Friday, but I really wanted to get there on Thursday so I would be nice and rested for Saturday morning. Ian and I both took Friday off from work and planned to leave around 4pm on Thursday, which would have gotten us into the lake in the early evening, even with a stop for dinner. Everything was going according to plan: we loaded up the car, double checked that we hadn't forgotten anything important, and headed out of town. I was really tired and cranky, having not slept the night before, but Ian had agreed to drive so that I could nap in the car. We didn't hit much traffic and were almost to Salinas (2hrs from San Francisco) when we decided to stop for dinner.
While we were eating, Ian got a funny look on his face..."hey, did you bring the camping pass?" Me:"No, it was on your desk, I thought you brought it." Him:"um..." So we made some phone calls but couldn't get ahold of any of my teammates that were already there (most people don't get any cell reception) and couldn't get the right number for the parks department to ask if there was a record of it somewhere. Neither of us wanted to pay $200 for a new pass so we decided to suck it up and drive back to the city. This meant that we arrived at the lake around 1am. What with the dark and our brains being fried from lack of sleep and many hours in the car, we couldn't figure out for sure which campsite was the one ironteam had roped off so we just pitched a tent in some open space and decided to find them in the morning. By this time I was delirious, cranky, and paranoid about not being able to find my teammates and/or get enough sleep but as soon as my head hit the thermarest, I was out like a light.
The next morning we moved our stuff to the ironteam campsite, which, in broad daylight was very easy to pick out. It's amazing how different everything looks in the dark. I took a nap and was feeling much more positive about the race when we went down to pick up our packets and check out the festival. Upon seeing the transition area, with its 2500+ places, my first thought was, "Wow! There are a lot of people doing this race." Oddly, this made me feel less nervous...surely if so many people wanted to be here, it couldn't be SO bad. The weather was cool(ish) with some cloud cover and we were all hopeful that it would stay that way for tomorrow.
Race day morning we woke up at 5am to get ready. Everybody had to have their bikes racked in the transition area by 7:15 am but since they had ALL the men starting before all the women, I wouldn't actually start the race until about 9:00. Waiting around for so long I started to get really nervous. Luckily, I ran into Leslie and Judy at the swim start, who gave me lots of hugs and reassurance. The weather was a little warmer than the day before but still relatively cool, for wildflower.
Finally it was time to start. I stayed to the back and side for the swim start as I am usually pretty slow. I started out well enough but when we got past the dock the water became very choppy. Waves were hitting me in the face and I swallowed a lot of lake water. Also, at one point I veered off course and when I looked up to sight I saw a person in a kayak frantically waving at me to go the other way. Between that and the waves, I put in almost the EXACT same swim time as my last half ironman in September. All that work on swim technique and I couldn't take a couple of minutes off my time? I was pretty bummed but I didn't have much time to dwell as I was busy getting ready for the bike portion.
The bike is what really did me in during our practice weekend. What with the heat and the lack of electrolytes it had taken me nearly 5 hours to finish and left me with nothing left for the run. I had adjusted my nutrition strategy for race day, upped my dosage of electrolyte pills, and was hoping to bike faster and feel better at the end of it. Both of these things did, in fact, happen. I finished the bike course in 4hrs, 16min and didn't feel like I was going to pass out or fall over when I was done. I considered this a huge success.
Now for the run...I had been having some weird knee pain for the last couple of weeks and was instructed to "take it easy" on the run. I adopted a run-walk strategy for the first portion of the run which went like this: run until knee pain kicks in, walk until it stops, repeat. Well the first 5 miles or so went very slowly as my knee was hurting quite a bit. I was a little worried about making the cutoff time as I was averaging something like 14 minute miles. Right around mile 7, the run course goes through the campground where all the TNTers stay. Knowing that I would see lots of people I knew, I decided to pick up the pace. I saw Ian and Max walking their bikes back to the campsite, having finished long ago. To be fair, they did start over an hour before I did. Seeing them inspired me to keep running. Miraculously, my knee warmed up, stopped hurting, and I was able to run the rest of the course.
Just after I crossed the finish line, Megan handed me a power recovery drink as she was worried that they would run out...gotta love teammates! then I went to soak my legs in the lake. I felt tired but good, and very accomplished. Final time: 7hrs, 47min. There was minimal soreness the next day and I managed to not get sunburned! All in all, a successful weekend and huge confidence builder.
accomplishedWhile we were eating, Ian got a funny look on his face..."hey, did you bring the camping pass?" Me:"No, it was on your desk, I thought you brought it." Him:"um..." So we made some phone calls but couldn't get ahold of any of my teammates that were already there (most people don't get any cell reception) and couldn't get the right number for the parks department to ask if there was a record of it somewhere. Neither of us wanted to pay $200 for a new pass so we decided to suck it up and drive back to the city. This meant that we arrived at the lake around 1am. What with the dark and our brains being fried from lack of sleep and many hours in the car, we couldn't figure out for sure which campsite was the one ironteam had roped off so we just pitched a tent in some open space and decided to find them in the morning. By this time I was delirious, cranky, and paranoid about not being able to find my teammates and/or get enough sleep but as soon as my head hit the thermarest, I was out like a light.
The next morning we moved our stuff to the ironteam campsite, which, in broad daylight was very easy to pick out. It's amazing how different everything looks in the dark. I took a nap and was feeling much more positive about the race when we went down to pick up our packets and check out the festival. Upon seeing the transition area, with its 2500+ places, my first thought was, "Wow! There are a lot of people doing this race." Oddly, this made me feel less nervous...surely if so many people wanted to be here, it couldn't be SO bad. The weather was cool(ish) with some cloud cover and we were all hopeful that it would stay that way for tomorrow.
Race day morning we woke up at 5am to get ready. Everybody had to have their bikes racked in the transition area by 7:15 am but since they had ALL the men starting before all the women, I wouldn't actually start the race until about 9:00. Waiting around for so long I started to get really nervous. Luckily, I ran into Leslie and Judy at the swim start, who gave me lots of hugs and reassurance. The weather was a little warmer than the day before but still relatively cool, for wildflower.
Finally it was time to start. I stayed to the back and side for the swim start as I am usually pretty slow. I started out well enough but when we got past the dock the water became very choppy. Waves were hitting me in the face and I swallowed a lot of lake water. Also, at one point I veered off course and when I looked up to sight I saw a person in a kayak frantically waving at me to go the other way. Between that and the waves, I put in almost the EXACT same swim time as my last half ironman in September. All that work on swim technique and I couldn't take a couple of minutes off my time? I was pretty bummed but I didn't have much time to dwell as I was busy getting ready for the bike portion.
The bike is what really did me in during our practice weekend. What with the heat and the lack of electrolytes it had taken me nearly 5 hours to finish and left me with nothing left for the run. I had adjusted my nutrition strategy for race day, upped my dosage of electrolyte pills, and was hoping to bike faster and feel better at the end of it. Both of these things did, in fact, happen. I finished the bike course in 4hrs, 16min and didn't feel like I was going to pass out or fall over when I was done. I considered this a huge success.
Now for the run...I had been having some weird knee pain for the last couple of weeks and was instructed to "take it easy" on the run. I adopted a run-walk strategy for the first portion of the run which went like this: run until knee pain kicks in, walk until it stops, repeat. Well the first 5 miles or so went very slowly as my knee was hurting quite a bit. I was a little worried about making the cutoff time as I was averaging something like 14 minute miles. Right around mile 7, the run course goes through the campground where all the TNTers stay. Knowing that I would see lots of people I knew, I decided to pick up the pace. I saw Ian and Max walking their bikes back to the campsite, having finished long ago. To be fair, they did start over an hour before I did. Seeing them inspired me to keep running. Miraculously, my knee warmed up, stopped hurting, and I was able to run the rest of the course.
Just after I crossed the finish line, Megan handed me a power recovery drink as she was worried that they would run out...gotta love teammates! then I went to soak my legs in the lake. I felt tired but good, and very accomplished. Final time: 7hrs, 47min. There was minimal soreness the next day and I managed to not get sunburned! All in all, a successful weekend and huge confidence builder.
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