©2007 Clarke Rodgers/SPORTZFOTO.com 

GOALS:
* Swim (56:30), T1 (2:30), Bike (4:52:00), T2 (3:00), Run (3:03:00) = 8:57:00
* Qualify for pro card by being top 3 overall amateur and within 8% (~40 mins) of the winning time

ACTUAL TIMES:
Overall Place: 18th | 1st AG
Overall Time: 8:49:53 (M30-34 Course Record)
Swim Time/Place: 53:07 / 31st OA | 2nd AG
T1 Time/Place: 2:59
Bike Time/Place: 4:49:18 / 68th OA | 9th AG
T2 Time/Place: 2:39
Run Time/Place: 3:01:53 / 14th OA | 2nd 

SWIM:
SWIM TIME: 53:07
OVERALL SWIM PLACE: 31st
AGE GROUP SWIM PLACE: 2nd
AVERAGE HEART RATE: 174 bpm
MAX HEART RATE: 186 bpm

The swim was a beach start and my plan was to get out hard the first 5 mins to get on some faster feet. In the past I had actually watched my heart rate in the water when going around buoys to make sure I was keeping everything under control. I knew if I wanted to reach my goals I had to get out on the swim and have a good one. The gun went off and I had a great start and dolphin dived my way into the lead with a couple of others and eventually some guys started to go by. I got on some feet and basically just stuck there the whole rest of the race. My breathing seemed fine and I was very relaxed and loose. There were times when I nearly fell off his feet but was able to get back on without a problem. I focused on smooth strokes. When I came out of the water after the first loop I couldn't believe my time but just rolled with it. We passed some of the pros on the second loop after making up their 10 min lead and I was very pumped. Got out of the water and saw my time and couldn't believe it. That was an amazing swim for me.

BIKE:
BIKE TIME: 4:49:18
OVERALL BIKE PLACE: 68th
AGE GROUP BIKE PLACE: 9th
AVERAGE HEART RATE: 150 bpm (for reference....bike LT is ~170 bpm)
MAX HEART RATE: 172 bpm

I jumped on my bike and started hammering for some reason. I was looking down at 300+ watts for a good amount of the beginning of the bike and my heart rate wasn't settling below 160 bpm. After a while I realized that I was on a suicide mission and backed it off but stayed on the throttle a bit. Way more aggressive than I've ever been on the bike during an Ironman. My legs felt good and the watts were coming easy. I was passing a lot of pro men and women and in the back of my head knew that this could come back to haunt me later. Eventually I caught a small group (two pro men and a pro woman) and paced with them for quite a while. I'd never ridden with the pros before so it was neat to see how they interacted in a group. It was also neat to have the camera crew taping the woman in our group because she was in the top 5.

At about 50 miles I started to have a dark moment. I actually thought that I had blown it and thought my day was over. Had thoughts of soft pedaling in but then took down more calories, sodium and water and snapped back within 10-15 mins. My lower back really started to bother me at around 60-70 miles so I would stand and hammer for about 10 pedal strokes because this has helped in the past. It worked for a while but I had to continue to do this so with about 30 miles to go I stuck it in a very big gear and rode around 60-70 rpms and for some reason this worked. I was able to get my watts back up and finish pretty strong. I had no speed data because my sensor wasn't working so I had no idea what kind of time I was going to ride but I thought it would be under 5 hrs for sure. When I noticed that I was coming up on the bike finish I was very happy to see that I had beat my goal time by 3 mins but I was a little nervous about how my legs would feel on the run from riding the big gear for the last 30 miles. Dismounted and was on cloud nine to be on pace to reach my goal of sub 9 hrs that I set two years ago.

ON THE BIKE NUTRITION: In the past I've had serious issues with getting my nutrition right so I worked with a nutrition coach over the past 8 weeks to try and nail this down and it worked great! Here was the nutrition plan:

Every 60 mins: 375 cals of Crank Sports eGel in a flask mixed with water, sipped water very frequently (peed 3 or 4 times), 1 additional SUCCEED! electrolyte cap on top of the 550 mg sodium in the eGel flask. Sodium is my friend!!

Totals: 1875 cals + 4455mg sodium for the bike ride....this was all tested thoroughly throughout the past 8 weeks

RUN:
RUN TIME: 3:01:53
OVERALL RUN PLACE: 14th
AGE GROUP RUN PLACE: 2nd
AVERAGE HEART RATE: 152 bpm (for reference....run LT is ~180 bpm)
MAX HEART RATE: 162 bpm

Before the race my goal for the run was to average 6:30 pace for the first 16 miles and see what happened from there. This is a bit backwards from the way that I would typically try and run the marathon portion of the Ironman. In the past...if I wanted to run a 3:10 split I would try to run 7:15 pace the whole way because I know that even pacing is the most efficient way to get from point A to point B. Unfortunately, that has never worked for me...I think because I've never taken in enough calories, sodium, or fluids in the past. So I wanted to try a different strategy. My goal run time was 3:03 so I decided to try and create a cushon for myself and that way if I fell off pace to 7:30s or 8:30s I'd still have a pretty decent run time. I know this is probably not the best approach but I wanted to give it a shot since I'd never tried this approach yet.

Out of the gates my legs felt surprisingly good! I clipped off the first couple of miles in sub 6 mins and figured it was best to slow the pace a bit after that. Legs felt relaxed and smooth though. Each mile that I was under 6:30 I would calculate in my head and add up how much time I've got stored in the bank to keep me thinking out there. I took sponges at every aid station to cool my head and heart even though it didn't seem all that hot out there to me. Better to be proactive. Instead of taking down my nutrition, fluids, and sodium on set intervals on the run I decided to see how my body felt and feed it what it needed when it needed it. I'm starting to listen to my body and it seems to be working well. I started off the run with mainly just water and then my stomach began to slosh around so at the next aid station I only took enough water down to be able to swallow a Succeed cap. I was feeling better in no time. The run wasn't really eventful on the first loop because I didn't really see too many people out there. At mile 8 I saw Tim Snow (raced White Lake 2006) come up on me and we had a little chat about goals for the run and we wanted to hit about the same paces but then he seemed to pick it up slightly and it was a little uncomfortable for me so I wished him well and he was on his way. At mile 11 I came up on Richard and we talked for a second and wished each other well. Even though I was still on pace I knew that at any moment I could crash and burn because it's happened before so I was very tentative to get too excited. I made the turnaround and some of my friends were cheering me on and trying to assess the damage.....I told them the next loop was going to get rough. The second loop was mentally challenging but the pain was nothing like I've felt before when I've been completely depleted of sodium and dehydrated. I saw my wife Jen at the turnaround and she looked really strong. The last 8 miles were tough but I knew I had a great time going and knew I was first in my age group and wanted to hold Tim Hola off on the run. I knew going into the race that he was the guy to beat as usual. He just raced Kona a few weeks ago so his FL results are amazing.

When I was coming down the chute I saw Jen going out for her second loop and knew that she was just smashing it out there. It was great that she was able to see me finish while heading out for her second loop. What are the chances of that? She ended up finishing in 10:41 and placing 4th in her age group with the fastest run split in her AG of 3:36. That was her first Ironman and third triathlon ever!  We need to work her swim this winter to chop some time off of that 1:23 swim time.

SPLITS:
Mile 1: 5:53 (161 max, 153 ave)
Mile 2: 5:59 (159, 157)
Mile 3: 6:27 (159, 155)
Mile 4: 6:28 (158, 155)
Mile 5: 6:18 (158, 155)
Mile 6: 6:35 (157, 154)
Mile 7: 6:39 (158, 155)
Mile 8: 6:22 (159, 156)
Mile 9 & 10: 13:11 (160, 156)
Mile 11: 6:33 (156, 154)
Mile 12: 6:49 (156, 155)
Mile 13: 6:39 (157, 154)
Mile 14 & 15: 13:49 (158, 152)
Mile 16: 7:00 (153, 151)
Mile 17: 7:14 (153, 150)
Mile 18: 7:11 (151, 149)
Mile 19: 7:41 (150, 145)
Mile 20: 7:38 (147, 145)
Mile 21: 7:12 (150, 148)
Mile 22: 7:31 (152, 149)
Mile 23: 7:31 (152, 149)
Mile 24: 7:46 (149, 147)
Mile 25: 7:42 (150, 147)
Mile 26: 7:50 (162, 151)
Mile 26.2: 1:44 (162, 151)

RUN NUTRITION: 2 eGel flasks w/ 300 cals....took 1/2 of a flask about every 45 mins and then hit up the Coke with 8 miles to go. Can't remember exactly but took down at least 5 Succeed caps on top of that.

SUMMARY:
* I set a two year goal to go sub 9 hrs back in November of 2005 and just accomplished that.  Along with it I qualified for my pro card for next season and broke the M30-34 AG Course Record.
* A lot of people doubted me when I would say that I wanted to go sub 9 hrs at FL even though I'd never gone sub 10 hrs before.  I knew what I was capable of if I got my nutrition right and got a good day.  On paper it was a PR by 1 hr and 13 mins but as far as fitness goes this should have happened a while ago.