6:15am
Tires and bike look okay. I hope nothing goes wrong there. People are letting air out of their tires, but I decide I’ll probably leave well enough alone. Someone’s tire just exploded, better here than out there on the course. I have CO2 canisters anyway, instead of a pump, so I’m not going to risk wasting them for nothing. But at the last minute I see fellow iron virgin Nina walk by with her high-pressure pump and I decide to check my front tire. I’m glad I checked it. The metre says only 100. After putting in another 15 or so I wait for her to get back into the transition zone and pick back up the pump she lent me. I start to think about the fellow 18-24 age group competitors whose bike is parked right next to mine. He’s so mellow and I seem to detect an Australian accent. Dude says this is only his third triathlon-what a coincidence…mine too!

6:35am
Disaster! Where’s my swim cap? The body marking people don’t know where to get a spare. Neither do the volunteers in the transition area. I finally spot another official in the gear rack area. I see on the name tag that he is the President but pretend not to have noticed and ask him. He points to the glasses table and they quickly grab me one. With that done and my wet suit and I think again about how things aren’t going exactly according to plan. I was supposed to be already warming up in the water by this point, not darting about looking for missing equipment.

6:55am
I did a really good warm up in this really nice water.  There’s this really friendly guy next to me chatting about Ironman. I tell him I’m a run specialist-at this point I still was-and he says that’s good. “Remember that this is a running race.” While listening to the national anthem I am sure to take a few seconds and thank God for getting here and pray for a good race.  I take a deep breath, look around, and savour the last minute of my life before I become an Ironman. I think to myself that if life were a huge book, this would be the last sentence of a huge chapter. Four or five months back someone had asked me about doing this race and I shrugged it off as a fantasy and said probably not. Not impossible-no-but probably not going to happen. Yet, I said, just thinking about it makes me nervous for some reason, “…when I think of that swim start…whoa.” And here I am, not half as edgy as I was back then. The race reports I’ve read all seem to place a heavy emphasis on the emotional aspects of the hours and minutes leading up to race start. My discussion is short in this area only out of respect for its sanctity and because of the inadequacy of words. For a first-timer, words could not sufficiently describe it.  Realizing that the tangible 140.6 miles around you at that very moment is all that remains between where you stand and an actual dream, is a feeling without precedence. For posterity I will say that my mind thinks back fondly on the kind efforts of my friends and family during this period, and I would say that it is this support and closeness that made my training and my Ironman such a happy time.

Tips for Next Year…
- 5:30am is more than early enough. Body marking is so
highly organized, thanks to volunteers, that it couldn’t ever take more than 15minutes maximum. I learned years ago that there is not real point to getting to these races hours before they start unless there is no alternative. To what end? You’re much better off getting an extra hour’s worth of sleep, taking your time at breakfast, and making sure everything is in the car before you go.

2.4mi swim 7:00-8:03am
The gun goes off and the air seems eerily calm. Knowing that seeding far to the right is a bad idea like I do, who knows why I did it anyway. Too late to change things now so I’d better make the best of this. Whoops, I’m on the wrong side of the first buoy and possibly the second as well. I hope I don’t get disqualified. Unfortunately my goggles are so fogged already and the field is so wide, I’m practically swimming blind. I have to remember next year to really get a pair of good goggles and extra money be damned. This is the widest and most populous swim start in the history of Ironman-probably the world-but I guess it’s about what I expected. Of course there’s some kicking and arms are everywhere, but I can fight this out. I start to think that not breaking free of this crowd is slowing me down but I try to be courteous none the less. Unlike all the stories I’ve heard I don’t see the scuba divers, but I’m sure they are down there. The crowd does thin out about ten to fifteen minutes before the first right hand turn but gets just nuts at that point again. I can actually hear some guy on the boat shouting through his loudspeaker “stay right, stay right.” Amazing! He must be really loud because I never hear anything when I swim. Somehow I do make it through the turn and stop momentarily to clear my goggles. For the first time this day, but not the last, I think that I might actually make it through. Now things do thin out. This is what Lori Bowden meant when she said that it takes about thirty minutes of swimming before the some kind of an order based on ability develops. The second right hand turn is really no problem, either. I see a chick next to me, not wearing any arms and I think that she probably has the right idea-this water is really warm. I feel really good; arms are light, no stitches. Exactly what I wanted. I do check my watch a few metres after the last turn and see 33min. I figure that’s perfect. I really should finish this under an hour. I think to myself, “how many more of these darned buoys cou

Tips for Next Year…
-Don’t be afraid to start forward right. This was the largest mass start in the history of the sport and it wasn’t that bad. Most of the descriptions I read were exaggerations. First, Lake Okanogan is HUGE. The beachfront is almost about a kilometre across and only waist deep for the first 25-50m at least. What this means is that seeding left is not as important as people say, provided you can swim approximately 60min or less and provided you are willing to be aggressive. I was really far right and did fine. I agree that this is the least important of the events and therefore not worth getting injured or tired-out over. But it is nice to get off to a good start and there is no good reason for going slower than necessary.

-Have no fear. The chances of getting injured or disqualified during the swim are minute and if it’s going to happen it will probably be random chance-which you can’t do anything about anyway. Don’t take this the wrong way. I went to every length in order to prepare for that swim, even becoming an instructor/lifeguard. But once you have done your laps don’t let swim anxiety get the best of you.  People will ask you about it and say it sounds crazy and for that matter they’re right-in a way. It is crazy, but no more or less so than the rest of the Ironman, and if you’re bold enough to take on a 112mi cycle and marathon, this should be a piece of cake. Anyways, if worst comes to worst and your swim turns out crappy, all that means is you’ll be chasing people down all day, and that’s way better than being the one they’re chasing.

8:03-8:07 T1
Wet suit strippers do a good job; I rush into the change tent even though I didn’t think I would have to. Jersey is hard to unzip in the front and I’m pretty rough on it when putting it on. I just hope I don’t detach any of the numbers. Sunscreen on, and I rush out of the tent-OOPS, forgot my socks! I rush back and get them and a volunteer takes care of my wetsuit and I’m off. One minute longer than I expected this to take, but what the heck.

Tips for Next Year…
-Spend the money. In my defence, I did spend quite a bit on this Ironman. None the less there were at least two things I could have bought to speed up the transition. The first is a tri suit to wear underneath my wet suit. Being rushed while getting on a shirt with numbers pre-pinned is dangerous and could potentially stop you dead in your tracks.  If not a tri suit, I’m definitely going to wear my jersey underneath my wet suit and maybe have it laminated. The second is a good pair of shoes that fit well enough that you don’t have to put on socks. I found my feet were pretty wet and I would still have done T1 under three minutes if I hadn’t have had to put them on.

112mi cycle 8:07-1:47
Does it ever feel good to get on this bike! I notice people are mounting their bikes while still in the bike lot and wonder if that’s not illegal. Oh well, when in Rome. My right cleat clicks on just fine but my left gives me a bit of grief. ‘Click’, and it’s finally on and I’m finally off. Oh good, this stupid Bento box under my saddle is rubbing against my legs. I stop and release the top two Velcro straps which lets the darned thing swing downwards and avoids my legs. I start drinking fluids early, remembering Lisa Bentley saying “always keeps your energy levels topped up.” For the first time in the race I hear people shouting out my first name who have looked it up by my race number.

In his race report, one guy mocked the idea of McLean Creek being a hill.  Well, good on him. As for myself-and I’m even a hill climber-I did feel this climb. It isn’t Everest, no, but is none the less a good taste of things to come. I didn’t bother pushing it, but at this point you’re so fresh and fast that you don’t have to. There is one really steep few metres and the road isn’t in very good shape. At this point I’m still passing people left and right and being passed as well, and by about 75min the true order of the
bike ride has been established.

When I drove the course I knew that it wasn’t nearly as difficult as people had described and I could easily see that all the way up to the base of Richter Pass was going to be extremely fast. On this, I was exactly right. Turns out the Cat Eye on my bike was not accurate but I estimate my average speed on this part was 37kph or more. I knew I was in for a long haul so I stopped once twice to make, shall we say, ‘small adjustments’, and get out two Clif bars. I know that we were in for one heck of a payback for all this downhill so I hold back a little bit while still treating this like a race.

I see the big Husky flag and I am not nervous. I’ve anticipated this so much that I’m eager to start climbing. No flats yet, although everybody else seems to have gotten one and I’ve seen no less than 100 people on the side of the road with various problems. I also did notice a disproportionate amount of shiny things on the road up to this point, and I figured it might just have been my imagination. As it turns out, I didn’t know it for sure at this point but I had my suspicions, there were tacks on the road. At any rate, as I make my right hand turn the bend in the road that begins this pass seems welcoming. I yell out to a fellow rider “This is where the fun begins!” She isn’t smiling like me. I do stand up out of my saddle fairly early. I find that it helps to alleviate back pain, which hasn’t given me any trouble at all and I’d like to keep it that way. I heard some Hawaii champ say that it’s good to do that. The other reason for standing up is that my saddle is sloping down and loose and moving backwards when I need it all the way forward. I realize that eventually I’m not going to be able to go aero at all and by T2 I might not even be able to even sit down. I’ve already tried to bang it back into position with my fist, thinking that it’s important to be as comfortable as possible, but to no avail. I’m not going to stop again and risk breaking it altogether. If I were doing a training ride, a problem like this would have pissed me off extremely but today I really took it in stride. Sometimes you react really poorly under pressure, sometimes really well, and this was one of those times. I figure it wouldn’t do any good to get upset when there’s nothing I can do about it…I can’t believe I’m saying that!

I remember seeing all kinds of writing on the shoulder.  One message says something to the effect of “This is the way to become an Ironman,” and I repeat that in my mind. I see a Clydesdale in front of me, who’s really working hard to make it up. It makes me think of my friend Nina again, whom I’ve seen twice so far but wouldn’t see again until about mile twenty in the run.  She’s also a Clydesdale and although a terrific cyclist, she really struggles on this kind of hill. I’m super light and so fairly fast. That never ceases to amaze me since my legs are so tiny. I quickly wish her the best and yell way-to-go at the Clydesdale as I go past. I’m surprised at this so far. Somehow the first hill on Richter looked a whole lot steeper than I’ve found it so far. To top it off, it’s followed immediately by a steep downhill. I’m still waiting for this get really difficult but it never does. I figured this would take me 40min and it started about 30min ago, so how could it already be over. I haven’t even slowed down that much! I’ve probably averaged 20kph, how can that be? At the crest of Richter the crowd is really thick and the announcer is there to say my name as I go past. I also see my friend Carl Olson by the shoulder and his wife Colleen. I had forgotten that they were going to camp out there to watch the race. It’s so good to see them and I’m still smiling as I go by.

Although I’d read about it before, I had to see it for myself-the immediate downhill after Richter. It is immediate and it is long and steep. I can never make it to 80kph like my friend Nina or some of these crazies but I do reach about 70kph and that’s as fast as my mere 135lb can muster. Since I’ve read the race reports and seen the elevation profile for this course, I know that the rolling hills are about to begin. Once again, I smile, albeit just a bit less radiantly than on the foot of Richter.

Since I’ve trained in Calgary, Alberta I know hills. I know that I can take any hill, especially rollers. The highway I ride on, called 22X, is virtually all rolling hills, with the occasional mountain thrown in for good measure. What’s more, in the winter and beginning of spring and summer I
spend all my cycling hours on a Lifecycle and Preference bike doing intervals over and over and over and over again…and then over again just for ‘fun’. I know how to do rolling hills and I’ve never been more thankful for that than at this point in the course. And as for the difficulty level, I
can only say that it’s do-able. We had fairly good luck this year with merciful winds and, for the most part, reasonable temperatures, so I can understand the difficulty level increasing during a race like ’98. None the less, these rollers are no different than the ones you’ve done in training so don’t sweat it. At this point, I do slow down somewhat and let my speed go below 20kph during some inclines, thinking that I’m better off saving some effort for the Yellow Lake climb. Even I have to admit that the scenery here is beautiful, and simple trees and grass don't usually impress me.

The next thought that comes to mind is that I still have two hard parts ahead. First is the Cawston out-and-back, which Lisa Bentley warned us not to underestimate. I’m somewhat discouraged by the impending right hand turn
I know is coming up, but I’m also curious to see what all the fuss is about-not having driven this section on Friday. When the turn does finally come, I’m surprised that the course would take a detour like this. It seems really narrow and rutty. Right as I’m making my turn I see another cyclist just coming out of this area with a HUGE smile on his face.

Yes, it is mentally tough to know that you’re going to have to immediately double back on every kilometre you cover in the Cawston section, but at this point in the race I was just too tickled about having made it incident-free. I’m pretty sure my Cat Eye is inaccurate; the only question is how much? I see a marker on my right saying 132km and I’ve only been out for 3:15, so a quick calculation tells me that if I completely dog the rest of this I’m bound to annihilate my PR and do 5:15 for the course. The same calculation also tells me that’s impossible. I have heard of inaccurate km markers before and this must be one. As I pass him, I tell a fellow competitor that either my computer is out or that last sign is wrong. He says nothing at first, then as he passes me he confirms that we’re actually only at about 115km. I see a hairpin turn up ahead and with considerable delight I think this must be the end of Cawston, only to discover a while later that it’s not even close. I think the temperature has gotten pretty high and the sun is really bright so I decide to take in as much fluid as possible again. To my dismay, I’m out of energy and the last aid station could only offer me a measly third of a Powerbar-vanilla flavour, too, which usually sickens me. I figure that’s okay, since the special needs is up ahead. I’ll just have to be sure to pick up the nuts and energy that’s in that bag. When I do finally get there, though, something goes wrong and I somehow didn’t get my stuff. I briefly consider turning around and trying again but decide against it.  First, I don’t want to cycle against the traffic, and second I wonder if I might get some kind of penalty or something. I’m not exactly hungry at this point, but I can tell that my energy supply isn’t topped up either. I do what I can, grabbing an electrolyte powder from my jersey back pocket and pouring it in my aero drink and I take a salt tablet, and pray for the best. By the time I get back onto the main highway I don’t even realize it at first. I notice a quain

The last 20% or so of this climb did challenge me a bit more than the rest. By this point my saddle was just brutal and I could barely sit down at all, much less go into the aero position. At the crest of one steep hill, a volunteer shouted out “just one more” and I saw a huge crowd lining up ahead along with a huge back up of traffic on the other side of the road. The amount of support that we got here was absolutely phenomenal. It was almost like being in the Tour de France. Shouting and screaming and banners and the whole deal. I felt really good and did give a strong push on the final hill.  In retrospect it was quite steep, too, although I barely noticed that at all amidst all the chaos.

Now I am starting to feel exponential energy drain and welcome the steep downhill to guide me smoothly back into Penticton. Once again people are passing me, doing about 90kph, and I think to myself “At least my ability is
real cycling-on the flats and up hills-and not just riding a strong wind.” I can’t wait to cream them in the marathon.

All I’ll say for the rest of the course is that, yes, it’s into a wind and that does negate some of the downhill effect.  Yes, the ruts here are terrible, by far the worst, and it’s a miracle I didn’t either get a flat or wipe out completely.  That’s no exaggeration either. I saw a crater no less than 4cm deep and who knows how many slipped by unnoticed. And no, it doesn’t fly by effort-free. Maybe it’s because I didn’t get my energy back in Cawston, but this was the longest and most gruelling part of the whole day, and I thought it was never going to end. I couldn’t believe how this mere 20km stretch just kept going on and on.  By the time I finally got back into Penticton I couldn’t break 30kph on flat ground and probably couldn’t have cycled up a hill at all. I have to admit that this was one of the most difficult bike rides I’ve ever completed, not entirely because of the hills but mainly because I ran out of energy.

I was relieved to be able to hand off my bike to someone and be rid of the damned thing, but would have been in better spirits if I’d actually had some energy left inside me. I don’t remember exactly how I handed it off or what it felt like to be done, but I do remember seeing people out on the run course and thinking “Good God, how on Earth am I going to run a marathon?”

Tips for Next Year…
-Eat stupid! This could be interpreted as either “Don’t
be stupid-eat,” and/or “Eat like you’re stupid,” either one would be correct. As an exercise physiologist, I had a hard time believing you’d need to consume more than a maximum of one energy bar per hour-that would equal approximately 375calories-ontop of the energy drinks which themselves have calories. Looking back knowing what I do now, I’m still a bit sceptical. But I have to admit that it appears to be true. You need to eat practically like there’s no tomorrow. A marathon, in and of itself, requires your energy stores to be topped up completely. If you tack on 2.5miles of swimming and 112miles of cycling onto that, you’re in need of serious calories. Eat whatever you can, not just before you get hungry, but before you begin to get hungry. Carry enough food on you to last without getting anymore. I did plan on eating one bar per hour and had I been able to do so, I still believe I would have been mostly okay. Unfortunately, I only brought three Clif bars, and I needed at least one more, probably two. I just thought I would get it either at Special Needs or from aid stations. Nine times out of ten this would probably work, but in my case it didn’t and you don’t want to take that gamble when most cycling jerseys have ample space for at least a half dozen bars. Next year I’m going to enjoy knowing that when I’m on that course I am completely self-reliant.

> >>CAUTION POTENTIAL IRONMAN<<
None of the women in this race broke ten hours thanks to technical problems. The winner lost 10min on a flat and I saw well over a hundred people stopped dead on the side of the road. Some of the pot holes after Yellow Lake are not only as prone as tacks are to popping tubes but damaging entire frames and throwing you well clear if you
don’t keep an eye out for them. If you’ve been lucky so far, good for you. But don’t gamble on your luck holding for IMC. Plan for tire replacements and just pray that the technical problems don’t go beyond that. I only brought one spare tube and no spare tires. That could have ended things in a hurry. Next year I’ll bring two tubes, maybe three, and at least that many CO2 canisters. It’s unfortunate that Ironman has this technical aspect, but it is none the less up to each individual to make the best of a bad situation.

1:47-1:51 T2
A kindly older man who reminds me of my sister-in-law’s Dad helps me through here. Once again, everything is a blur and I don’t remember much, except that I quickly changed into my running shoes and decided against changing into a really cool pair of shorts I had bought yesterday. I looked around desperately for any kind of food and somehow didn’t find as much as I expected. I ate as much bagel as I could and took the rest in my hands and didn’t think too much about what lay ahead.

Tips for Next Year…
-Change your shorts no matter what. For a few extra seconds I could have changed into the really cool shorts I bought just for this race and not only would I have been more comfortable but mentally would have so much more happy throughout the next…let’s just say throughout the
somewhat strenuous duration of the next event. For that matter, maybe that would have speeded me up. What’s more, I had bruises where no one needs them for the next week all because of those confounded cycling shorts I didn’t change out of.

26.2mi run 1:47-6:40
As I begin to run out of town I imagine that my brother and parents must be here somewhere but who know where. Much to my amazement they do find me and Jon is waving a sign saying “Go Jer Go” and I hear my mother’s voice yelling as I go past. This, I think, is probably the last shade I’ll see for a very long time.

Not long after this I slow to a walk and take my first left hand turn. I imagine that with the huge amount of food I’m taking all at once I’m going to have stomach problems if I run at this pace and that’s the last thing I need. I finish off my bagel bits and make an instantaneous decision to walk-run this course, aid station to aid station, and hope for the best. I do feel a little embarrassed; after all before now a 3:15 marathon was unthinkably slow for me. I just tell myself that I am still running, albeit slow, and things might just pick up eventually. Also, I’m incredibly lucky that I didn’t have any bike problems and that I made it through that course even though I was short on energy. Those thoughts put a smile on my face. I also remind myself that from this point on at least nothing technical can go wrong and that try to remember that this is my event. The marathon is where I started as an endurance athlete and today it’s where I’ll become an Ironman. As I watch Peter Reid breeze past me I feel fortunate just to have done well enough to still be far enough ahead in the race to have begun my marathon before he finishes his.

I didn’t imagine that I would take Pepsi at the aid stations, but then I didn’t think I’d take grapes either and I started that at about the 5th kilometre. I find the grapes soothe my stomach and I hope the coke will give me energy. I wash it down with water and Gatorade and right before running to the next station I’m sure to slip ice in my baseball cap in order to keep cool. Although I did put on sunscreen before leaving T2, it’s washed off by 15k and I realize that I’m going to burn pretty nicely. After finding some at about 20k I don’t get any more for another hour or so and by then I know that the damage is done.

It’s hard to describe this marathon. Like Tricia-Tri Baby-Richter I would say that every step was a parlay into the unknown and a step forward. I saw my fair share of crashes and I can’t say I was ever that far off from crashing myself. I have two predominant recollections. First, that my knees KILL. Your guess as to why is as good as mine. I will say this. It wouldn’t have slowed me down by as much as it did-nearly 50%-if I had gotten my energy at bike special needs. To deal with the pain, I think about other things but mainly tell myself that Ironman has been kind so far and it wouldn’t mean as much if there weren’t any serious obstacles. Second, as sorry as I probably look, I’m not doing THAT bad, and as usual I welcome hills. Like in the bike, I clean up on hills, even more so during a marathon, ordinarily at least, and even during this one. I find the incline soothes my stomach and relieves the pain in my knees.

I also remember getting the special needs bag and Mum’s little gift. She gave me a card with a pig telling me to “get back out there…” so we’d still have something to brag about. The other present is a little bronze pig with a lucky penny in the middle and I tuck it away in my jersey pocket. Crispy Mini’s, I find, were indeed a good idea for this bag-they taste even better after running a half a marathon with another half still to go. After making the hairpin turn at half way I know that I’m now beginning the toughest part of Ironman. As far as I’m concerned the real test of Ironman doesn’t begin until this point; the moment you realize all that’s going to get your from here to your goal is your own resolve to do so.

Some point after this I pass by my friend Nina on her way to the turn-around. With respect to Nina, she herself would be the first to admit that our seeing each other on the marathon course this close together was probably the last thing we would have predicted happening. I find myself thinking that if I don’t keep moving at least this fast she might just catch up to me. My mind is confused at this point by conflicting emotions. For sure there is a comfort in knowing that I’m almost at my goal. There is confusion at having gone so slow. There is physiological shock beginning to set in-which later in the evening would worsen considerably-just from having been on my feet, working non-stop for so long. As I watch the road ahead curving around lake Skaha I focus my mind on pushing ahead to reach small goals-that tree just up ahead, that bend in the road. I think, “if I just make it that far I’ll be able to see Penticton for sure and I’ll be there in no time”. I’m waiting for stomach pain to set in from having eaten things in my race that I didn’t train to eat while running before but somehow it didn’t happen. I remember that having found my running rhythm, as slow as it was, and having settled into it I am shocked at my very narrow stride length. It seems that this was affected even more than my cadence and is mostly responsible for my lack of speed. For someone flexible like myself, suddenly having extremely tight muscles was a very rude awakening. Just as I re-enter Penticton I see my friends Carl and Colleen again. Colleen yells “Suck it up Jeremy!” and I wonder if she’s ever seen me running this slow before. Oh well, she of all people can appreciate what I’m going through.  Running down Main Street was one of the most difficult parts of this race-don’t ask why. Not just a bonk-no-I was really on the verge of breakdown. I was giving a little push and not bothering to stop for even aid stations anymore and that’s fortunate because stopping would have had serious consequences. I truly, for the first time in my lif

If I had to choose the single toughest part of this race or decide what exactly I did to deserve the title ‘Ironman’ I wouldn’t hesitate at all. It was one mile. Just one among over one hundred others in this race and thousands of others in training, that almost broke me but didn’t. Lisa
Bentley called it “the cruellest joke,” and she had it just right. It begins with a left hand turn, no more than 25m short of the finish line, and goes on for a tawdry one half-mile on either side, in order to make this a full 26.2mile marathon. Although I’d known well in advance just what I was in for in this race and the agony of this last part I could not fully have imagined it. Never before in my life has such an inconsequential distance felt so Herculean. Perhaps if I were to go back tomorrow and walk the few extra blocks we had to run before the last hairpin turn it wouldn’t seem so long. Or perhaps I’d see it from an entirely different perspective and maybe that’ s the whole point. Maybe that’s what makes an Ironman different from anyone else; a fresh perspective. From where I sit now, I see the precious miracle behind every single step I take because at this point in my race I saw and felt the full difference that just a tiny bit of distance can make in a life. What is more, in my lifetime I’ve never wanted something so badly that I could only get from myself. I thank God for that and for those last thousand metres I somehow made it through. I will live the rest of my life with the joy of knowing that while it may have been the slowest I have ever run, maybe even for that very reason, it was my finest moment.

Tips for Next Year…
-Do not skimp on sunscreen. Make sure you have an SPF of at least 30 and don’t bother with spray on crap, get real white stuff so you can easily tell if you’ve got it on. By the time the marathon rolls around, you’re not going to bother treating this delicately, it literally just slops on and fashion be damned. I’m going to get a fuel belt and put sunscreen where I can get at it anytime.

-Use ice under your hat. It worked for me, probably more than I’ll ever know, and every aid station-almost every one-has it.

-Bring Ibuprofen for joint pain. Always better to go without it, yes, but thinking back on this, who knows how much time I could have shaved off that marathon with just a little bit less knee pain. I would have done almost anything for relief. Just test it out during training to make sure your stomach can take it.

-Believe in yourself no matter what. I read this during a race report from ’98 and it’s just so simple a piece of advice that you can easily overlook it. Repeating this a few times, especially near the end, really did make a difference for me. I’ve always felt as if I had an endless supply of optimism because at the end of tough marathons I always had lots of positive thoughts to draw on. But Ironman left me drained like I’d never been before. And nearing the end, when I started to think that this distance was hopeless at the speed I was going, this thought was almost all I had left to keep my feet going.

Overall tips…
-Ironman running is attrition. I believe that to really appreciate the Ironman run requires you to actually experience it personally. There is a subtle but pivotal difference between running fresh and running tired. It does not compare to my half-ironman runs, or even to the finest marathon running I did before-even the fastest running (and I was fast enough to win medals) on the toughest courses on the hottest and windiest days. This run was a million times harder. It is a sport in its own right and requires training to meet its specific demands. You couldn’t say that the Olympic 10, 000m is the same as the 100m sprint-even though they are both technically running. One is so much longer than the other that it is in fact entirely different. In the same way, the Ironman run is so much harder than a regular marathon that there is absolutely no comparison. To be successful in my next Ironman I am training to run on tired legs and to run slow…but still run. My priority is to minimize time spent walking during aid stations and cut down on walking overall. My goal is to have a strong enough running base to be able to cover a minimum of 7miles per hour during the Ironman run. I am mastering the art of running when I don’t feel like it, when my legs are tired, when my muscles are sore, conditions are tough, and when I know that I won’t be fast. If you don’t do that during training you’re in for one hell of a surprise on race day. I simply cannot over-emphasize the importance of this. It is the most beneficial thing you could ever do to train for an Ironman.

Summary…
One of the stupidest mistakes I made during this ordeal actually occurred the morning after. I was in so much shock and disbelief that I wasn’t thinking straight-and in all fairness, who could have expected I would have been. Therefore, instead of taking advantage of my guaranteed spot for next year, I let it slip by. I’m now left scrambling trying to find a qualifying race to do and praying that I’ll be fast enough to win a slot for IMC 2002. I just might make it-I have Someone up there looking out for me who seems to come through all the time. But my brother took one of my dares much more seriously than I thought he would, and now he too hopes to be in the race next year. We could have lined up the next morning and guaranteed his getting in, but we made the decision to let it fly. Also, next year I’m going to be much more prepared for the run component and less anxious about the swim. This year I had a fairly nice bike but it wasn’t ideal for my dimensions and my seat problems were a major annoyance. Next year I’m getting nothing less than top-of-the-line, and cost be damned-I’m making sure that it fits my dimensions exactly. I’m going to be much more confident and prepared to take risks during the race in order to make placement gains.  In the back of my mind I think I knew that I would have to do one slow Ironman just to get used to it before I could worry about going fast and now I’m ready to switch into high gear. Overall, I’m pleased that I finished Ironman, I enjoyed my training, I made a few mistakes but nothing catastrophic. In the light of day I feel now that during the summer of 2001, I became a tougher athlete than I imagined possible.  ‘Tougher’ is probably the right word. After all…they don’t call it ‘Iron’man without good reason.

Special thanks…

Colleen Parsons-Olsson (for never letting me get away with crap and always making me account for my actions during training),

Carl Parsons-Olsson (for really believing in me right from the start),

Ella Kinloch (for helping me to find my faith in God and inspiring me every day),
Nina Cunningham (for being there to turn to as a fellow athlete),

Joani Schnuth (for getting me out and pounding the pavement on all those cold mornings way back when),

Fariyal Sampson (for being a role model and the finest competitor I’ve ever run with),

Oriana Rollo (for telling me I’m so awesome when I needed it),

Christine Sazie-Stewart (for your unwavering friendship-you leave me in awe of your bravery to pursue your dreams),

Kevin Wride (for the ‘Boyz Club-In God all things…),

Sherry Victor and Tania Zacharias (for all your hard work with AIA),

Leslie Nasmith (memo: have a nice day-if you must!),

Elizabeth Hamilton (for teaching me how to break the rules),

My Family (let’s face it, for just about everything including, but not limited to, about a zillion rides and not-so-small favours).

JEREMY PERESSINI IMC 2001 11:40:21

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