2009 NYC Marathon Timelapse from mdkmc on Vimeo.

Kristin trained with the Endurance Base Camp group for the 2008 Chicago Marathon and just missed her goal of qualifying for Boston.  After training with us this past summer to complete her first Half Ironman Distance Race (Muncie Endurathon), she decided to get back to that Boston Marathon goal.

Below is her race report discussing how it feels to run her 10th marathon, set a personal best by almost 7 minutes and qualify for Boston!  Congrats Kristin.

Race Report – Marine Corps Marathon – 10/25/2009

The Chaotic Morning

We woke up three hours before the race, to consume our bagels with peanut butter and honey and have plenty of time to prepare for the big race.  We were planning on heading to the start a little before 7:00, since it was only a little over a mile away – the perfect little warm-up… until Jill went downstairs for coffee and when returning to the room at 5:45 informed me that all of the runners were catching a shuttle because the start was actually over three miles away!  I am very frustrated by this misinformation.  I specifically picked this hotel because it was so close to the start!  We scramble to get ready.  We walk about half a mile to the shuttle pick up and wait and wait.  In the meantime, I realize I forgot to take ibuprofen and put sunscreen on.  I decide the shuttle isn’t coming any time soon, so I can head back to the hotel to grab these items.  As I go back all the employees are questioning why we are all taking the shuttle.  “The start is only a mile away!” they say, “Why don’t you just jog there as your warm up?”  I get even more frazzled now, and head back to the shuttle stop to tell Jill the news.  When I arrive she is at the front of the line, so we hop on the shuttle anyway.  It dropped us off a couple blocks from the hotel – and we still had to walk most of the way to the start!! We got there around 7:30.  The race started at 8:00.

Once arriving, we wait in line for a very VERY long time for a port-a-potty.  We listen to the national anthem in line.  We see the fly over in line.  As a matter of fact, just as we are leaving the line, we hear the gun go off for the start of the race.  (Thank goodness for chip starts!  My pre-race nightmare has come true!) We run to the start and push through the crowd to reach our pace groups and give up when it is wall to wall people and we’re stuck in the 5:00 pace group.  “Okay,” I tell myself, “This is okay.  You’ll be passing people the entire race.  That’s a great strategy.  Just keep picking them off.”  We crossed the starting line over 13 minutes into the race.

Fighting the Crowd

Given the situation, I can honestly say the first five miles were probably the hardest and most frustrating miles during the race.  There were 21,000+ runners in this race, so space was a limited commodity.  I spent much time on the un-even brick side walks, the grass, and pushing through weeds to pass runners and stay on track.  It didn’t help that the first section of the race was the hilliest.  This made it even harder to pass runners pacing themselves for a 4:30+ race.  The pace was much slower than I needed it to be and I couldn’t use the down hills to coast, because of the crowd.  I wasted a lot of energy in the beginning of the race, and am not sure it was worth it.  I was able to keep my pace down this way, but almost acquired an additional half mile of distance, which threw my average pace off between my Garmin and the reality of the race.  A lesson learned on future situations like this is to just take it easy and make up the time once the crowd opens up.  I could have just relaxed and gotten the first few miles in at a lower heart rate and not have the stress and extra mileage as extra baggage.

The Fun Begins

After about mile eight, we head from Georgetown into the national mall area.  The fans are fabulous.  The weather is perfect (high in the low 60s, sunny, 8 mph winds).  There atmosphere is completely moving.  Every mile or so, I pass a runner carrying a huge American flag.  There are fly bys from more military aircraft and helicopters than I’ve ever seen.  The service men and women are stationed at practically every block supporting us the entire race.

Although miles 12 – 15 along the Potomac Golf Course were the loneliest, they helped give me a chance to focus.  The crowd was no longer an issue and I was able to concentrate on how I was feeling and evaluate my energy at half way.  The frustrating part again, was that my pace on my garmin was right on for a 1:47 half, but since I ran the extra half mile, the pace my garmin told me didn’t matter.  I crossed the half at 1:38:30.  I didn’t let this bother me though.  I felt great and knew I had the energy reserves to make up the time.  At mile 15 we left the golf course and entered the national mall.  The fans were everywhere.  The monuments were incredible.  I actually got emotional (first time I’ve ever cried during a race) because the atmosphere was so moving.   I was going to qualify for Boston.  I had no doubt.  I had God, the fans, the marines, the weather, my family, and my friends at home watching their computers on my side.  We were going to do it together!

The Energy Reserve

When I passed mile 17.5, I made a point to re-evaluate my energy.  With the White House to my left and the Washington Monument to my right, I had no trouble maintaining my energy level and motivation.

Mile 20 was over the bridge.  This could have been a lonely bridge, but I wouldn’t let it.  It was a fabulous bridge and I was running the strongest I had all day over it.  At mile 21 I could tell “the wall” was headed for me soon, but not just yet. In honor of the marines, I remembered Corporal Nich Dieruf (http://www.corporalnich.org/), my dear friend Emily’s past husband who was killed during combat in Iraq when he was 21.  He helped push me through every step of this mile.

The Wall

Mile 23…ahh…mile 23.  Well, I was beginning to lose focus at this point.  There was an out and back, and I apparently saw the wrong sign or was becoming delusional. I was pretty disappointed when I got to 23, because I thought it was time for mile 24.  In this instant, the wall hit me.  Hard. (Looking at the data from my garmin is pretty entertaining.  You can clearly see when this moment happened.  I switch instantly from an 8:00/mile pace to a 10:00+/mile pace). I looked at my watch. I was tired and ready to be done, but I was still on track. I had 35 minutes left to still qualify for Boston.  I knew that I could continue the pace I was at and break 3:35, or, I could kick back, relax, walk through the rest of the water breaks and still qualify for Boston.  I picked option 2.

It was such a great feeling knowing that I had the energy and the time reserve to meet my goal.  I felt better after this marathon than any in my past (this is my 10^th one!)  My tendonitis or IT bands are usually inflamed and throbbing at the end of the race.  I had no pain.  No chaffing (I think this is because of better posture).  I had three blisters on each foot.  That was it.

The funny part about all of this is that going into this race, I was ready for the pain of running fast to be over.  I wanted to hurry up and qualify for Boston so racing could be fun again.  The ironic part is that this race was probably the easiest and most fun marathon I have ever run.  And now I’m wondering to myself what’s next and how fast could I go?

Lessons Learned:

• No matter what kind of shape you are in, the wall is going to hit.  It’s a matter of how prepared you are for it from a mental, physical, health and nutrition standpoint.
  • Mentally, I was ready for anything.  At mile 23, I had an energy and time reserve.  I knew I could have broken 3:35, but I also knew I could coast the rest of the race and not have to worry to qualify for Boston.
  • Physically, I trained for a 3:30.  I knew there was no reason not to run a 3:40.
  • I was very healthy entering this race.  I was healthy through the entire race.  I didn’t have irritated IT bands or tendonitis.  Besides the bottom of my feet being sore, I felt great!
  • My nutrition is usually off somehow.  I think it helped that the water stops were about 2 – 2.5 miles away from each other.  I think this kept me from drinking too much.  Generally, I have a stomach ache by mile 20.  I didn’t have any stomach issues at all or feel like I ate or drank too much.  Many times I’ll start to get really cold and my hands will get swollen and I’ll lose feeling in them.  That didn’t happen at all this time.  I took 5 gus total.  One before the start, then one about every 5 miles.  I took poweraide at the stations when I didn’t take a gu.
• Find the start the day before the race.  This will save a lot of energy and confusion on the morning of your race!

Remaining Thoughts

I did leave something at the end.  I left probably five minutes at the last three miles of the race.  Why did my strategy change?  Although I still qualified for Boston and I still PRed by almost seven minutes, why didn’t I just go for it at the end?  At the time, it seemed like a great idea. And I don’t regret my decision. But looking back it makes me wonder what is left and if I should go back for more.  And when should I go back for it?  Do I take some time off from “competitive” running or do I continue with the base I have acquired and move on to 3:35 or 3:30..  What’s next?  And what is fast enough?

This week one of our teammates, Kendrick Riggs, was recognized for his accomplishments as an attorney, father, community member and triathlon participant.  The magazine, Business First of Louisville wrote an article -  Power Attorney : Kendrick Riggs tackles his utility and energy practice, triathlons with quiet determination

I always say that the one thing that impresses me the most by some of my athletes is their ability to prioritize and manage their time.  Kendrick is way above average when it comes to displaying this characteristic.  He also displays something that I only hope I can do as well as he does when the time comes – put my family first.

I do not have children so I can not even begin to understand what it takes to be a father first and triathlete third to fifth in the line of priority.  As an outside observer – Kendrick has discovered how to put triathlon into his life and still be an active father.

Congratulation Kendrick on some well deserved recognition.

There are different responses to the way I handle this question, but here are the four general responses I get:

1. Just tell me what to eat and when to eat it and I’ll do it!  My response:  Well,  I am not a registered dietician so creating meal plans is out of my scope of practice and isn’t something I do.  I think a good place to start would be to assess where you are at and we can begin to make small changes to improve your diet.  While I understand you don’t want to have to put any thought into what you are eating and don’t want to make any decisions about your food, maybe that’s a sign of some psychological/behavioral changes we need to address first?

If you are interested in a structured meal plan to get started, then we can seek some advice from a dietician and begin working with them.  But we need to make sure they understand the demands and nutritional needs you’ll have to support your training.

2. I don’t eat vegetables, I can eat some fruit and I limit the amount of meat I eat. My response:  What do you eat?  Are you willing to try eating real foods and varying your diet?  Can you find time to make your own meals?

3.  I don’t really need help with my regular diet, just tell me what sports drink and sports nutrition I need to use before and after every workout. My response: This depends on a lot of factors.  For example, what part of your season are you in?  Are you doing off season training (which in late September many of us are) that doesn’t require a whole lot of extra caloric intake.  Or, are you in the middle of your specific preparation period that requires you to be diligent about your caloric intake while training and post workout recovery nutrition?

4.  Can’t I just workout a little more so I can eat what I want? That’s not the way it works!  Bob Seebohar has said it best when he said, “Eat to Train, Don’t Train to Eat”.  We want to create healthy eating patterns not a disordered relationship with food that we justify because we are training 8, 10, 20 or 30 hours a week.

How do I know these responses are slowing people down:

If you would walk around an Ironman race, it is interesting to see the different body types that are taking part in the event.  It doesn’t have to be an Ironman; it could be the local 5k, marathon or sprint distance triathlon.  I never get into the business of guessing how well a person will do at an endurance event based on what they look like, because I’ve seen many runners and triathletes have amazing performances that “don’t look the part”.  (I have an excellent story to tell about my first marathon, but will save it for another day).

But what puzzles me at times is how someone can be so obsessed about making the right equipment decisions, getting in all the right workouts at the proper intensities, yet they are limited in their ability to manage food and eating choices that would propel them from the back of the pack to the middle of the pack or even further.

There are several reasons that I think making these nutritional choices are harder than making the training decisions:

1. Marketing — we are sold the “magic” pill every day as athletes when it comes to sports nutrition products.  Use this product to increase your endurance, that product to hydrated more optimally or this substance to recover faster.  I see people that wouldn’t eat a Snickers bar in a million years take two Snickers Marathon bars on bike rides with them “because they work.”

Let me be clear, I’m not against the proper use of sports nutrition products!  Nikki and I have a bunch of Infinit nutrition products and egel’s left over from the pre Ironman Louisville training.  But the products need to support your training, not increase your positive caloric balance for no reason.

2.  We are told we work hard and can “afford” it.  Here’s a confession, my personal nutrition this past year has been a mess!  If it wasn’t for Nikki’s hard work and our CSA membership, I would probably live off of packaged meals and soda.  The interesting thing for me is that when I start to discuss with my clients about how I’m struggling with eating well, they always say:

Well, you can afford it with all the exercise you do.

Not true!  Not only is that not true from a weight management perspective, but it is especially not true from a long-term health perspective.  And the reality for most of us non-Elite age group athletes is that we are doing this to have fun and be healthy.  Eating 2 pounds of sugar a week is not healthy, no matter how much you exercise!

So how do I know that people are who are responding in one of the four ways mentioned above are slower than they probably could be?  Because their responses show me that they are not taking full responsibility for their eating habits.  And without a full investment into their daily nutritional needs, in addition to their training nutritional requirements, my guess is that they are carrying around a few pounds of excess body fat that is causing them to be slower on race day.

Did my nutritional habits this past year slow me down? I think they did.  I haven’t had my body fat tested in a few years, but my guess is that even though my weight is a few pounds heavier, I’m likely carrying 8 pounds of additional body fat and have lost a few pounds of muscle.  Despite my regular injury prevention work in the studio, I’m as weak as I’ve been since 2005.

Triathlon is a body weight to power sport!

Prior to Ironman Louisville I was riding with a power tap built into a pair of Zipp 404’s.  The use of power lead to several conversations regarding the bike course in Louisville and our debate about whether IMLouisville was a absolute watt or a watts/kg course.

I believe it was in the book, Lance Armstrong’s War, where the author (Coyle) discussed a test that Lance did prior to the Tour de France to know how fit he was leading up to the race.  The test was essentially a graded exercise test that he did on a hill climb (on some island, somewhere).  He knew he was fit and ready if he hit a specific watts/kg ratio at his lactate threshold. (If I remember correctly it was 6.7 watts/kg?)

The concept of improving your watts/kg ratio is something that is discussed a lot in cycling.  One thing that influences that is the exponential growth in age groupers using power devices on the bike.  But this concept is not isolated to cycling.

Does power to weight ratio matter in running?

This answer may not be quite as obvious because we don’t have simple tools  that measure power output on the run, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a  relationship in run performance.  One of the most obvious ways to logically think this through is to think about one of the quickest ways to get faster on the run – lose weight!

You don’t have to do a scientific study to start and view patterns of body type among elite runners.  They are lean!  I just read a very interesting article that discussed the relationship between body weight and running speed titled,  The Holy Grail in Speed Training written by Barry Ross.  Ross was the high school coach of Allyson Felix when she broke Marion Jones’ high school 200 meter record and ran the fastest 200 meters in the world that year.  Here’s one of the most interesting statements he makes in the article:

What they found was the Holy Grail to faster running speed. The old equation was still partially correct, but incomplete. It was missing the most important element – the Bodyweight.

(Sidenote: if you read the article, then there is a discussion we could have about how to improve the power and strength side of the equation, but for now we are discussing the body weight factor.  Power discussion will come later)

In triathlon, I personally believe this is where we see many of the poor nutritional choices – during the run.  The absolute power that some of the bigger guys possess allow them to overcome that extra body weight on the bike (at least appear to make up for it), but late in the run when fatigue begins to set in and the power output begins to fall, that power/body weight ratio really starts to slow the athlete down.  And when the fatigue really sets in, it is game over and it becomes survival, not racing.

There is a very interesting discussion regarding body weight and Ironman performance over at Endurance Corner.  The podcast was an interview with Chris McDonald, where they discuss the trend about how Ironman was being dominated by “Big guys racing small”.  That was something I was surprised to witness when McDonald won Ironman Louisville in it’s first year and I got to be at the finish line – He was much bigger than I expected.  If you listen to the whole podcast, a little later in the discussion Chris talks about the balance between size and strength and how he was dealing with it.

Eating Healthy does equate to eating for performance!

I’m going to say it again – your first nutritional decisions should be made to eat a healthy diet.  Once you start changing your food choices over to consuming more vegetables, fruits, quality meats and healthy fats – then you can start to look at the more “complicated” nutritional needs.

Here’s another piece of advice for beginner’s:  If your diet is disordered and full of processed foods, sugars and lacking in the above mentioned foods, then I suggest that you SLOWLY build into your training program.  As someone who is new to an exercise program, if you start to add in too many workouts or add too much intensity, it will make changing your nutritional habits even more difficult.

In a sport that partially depends upon your power/body weight ratio for success, the quickest way to become a FASTER Triathlete is to clean up your nutrition and lose that excess body fat.

Eat Healthy = Get Fast!

Some Extra Resources:

The Paleo Diet for Athletes: A Nutritional Formula for Peak Athletic Performance – by Loren Cordain and Joe Friel

Nutrition Periodization for Endurance Athletes: Taking Traditional Sports Nutrition to the Next Level -  by Bob Seebohar

Nutritional Videos on STACK TV – by Bob Seebohar

Team First Endurance Blog – it’s a product company and while I don’t use their products, there’s some good info here

The ZoneDiet’s – ZoneCompete – again a company with something to sale, but good info

Mark’s Daily Apple – an interesting blog written by Mark Sission, a former elite runner and triathlete. The blog contains a lot of information on living a more “primal lifestyle” with nutritional, fitness and health discussions.

If the video doesn’t show up, use the link to the blog post: Sprint Drills with Keats and Patrick

So let’s assume you are beyond the debate of whether to use or not use a heart rate monitor and you are ready to buy, what heart rate monitor should you buy?

What I have used:

Sigma Sport
I began using a heart rate monitor back in 2000. I had run a couple marathons by this time and needed to find a way to train more intelligently, because after running a 3:53 and a 4:00 marathon, I wasn’t satisfied. As a college student that was waiting tables to cover tuition and living expenses, I found the cheapest monitor I could find. I ended up with a Sigma Sport. It worked well for the first couple years, but it gave just the very basic detail. It gave me the time (chrono) and my current heart rate.

Looking at their current site, it does look like they have current models that include more advanced technology.  But I can’t give any testimony to their current devices.  I can say that back when I was using their product, they had some of the best customer service that I’ve ever had to deal with.  Even with a cheap monitor, they worked with me and completely replaced my unit at one point.

Suggestion:  You will find something more common in use among other triathletes and runners, which in my point of view is valuable knowledge.  And despite the good customer service, I have never bought another Sigma Sport, which also says something.  I’d find something that is more actively used in our endurance culture.

Polar
When I wanted to upgrade the heart rate monitor I chose to buy a Polar.  One of the reasons that I bought the Polar was due to the fact that Polar heart rate straps were what we used in the exercise physiology lab.  At the time, it seemed like Polar was well known for their reliability and I believe that they still are.

I have had two different Polar heart rate monitors, but the main device that I’ve used over the years is the Polar F6 .  I have really liked this monitor for a general purpose watch.  It is pretty basic in relation to all the advanced watches they offer, but it has worked well for my purposes.  Here are a couple Pro’s and Con’s:

Pro’s — I like the size of the watch.  It fits like a watch and not a computer attached to my arm.  I also like the basic and user friendly settings.  It stores the last 12 workouts that you can pull up on the watch.  Those records include time, percent fat used, average heart rate and max heart rate.  It will also pull up exercise totals and a diary.

Con’s — This watch is in the Fitness line of their devices, which means it lacks some basic features that a runner or multisport athlete would want.  The biggest feature that I would like is a lap function.  It was a bit frustrating at times when I first began using it to realize that I had to stop the watch and restart a new session to get my splits during a race.  If you look at my Ironman Wisconsin finisher’s photo you’ll notice I am wearing two watches, a timex wrist watch on my left wrist and the F6 on my right wrist.  I have done this for all my races the last few years so I’m used to it now, but not ideal.  In fact, at Ironman Louisville I came out of T2 and didn’t stop and restart the watch.  So when I was finished I only had the cumulative splits of Bike/T2/Run for heart rate.

The one big negative about a Polar monitor is when the batteries die or you need to have something worked on.  Even changing a simple battery requires you to send the unit to Polar to be serviced.  A major bummer!  It will leave you without a unit for a couple weeks and it will also start to add to the expenses because of the shipping and the cost of the service.

What I would buy next time, if I bought a Polar:

The athletes that I know that use their running / multisport watches don’t have the lap problem.  Even the beginning Polar watches in the running and multisport category like the rs300 sd or rs 300x g1 offer all the features I believe I would need.  They do offer the rs 100, but I think the ability to add the speed and distance with the rs300 sd or the gps capabilities of the rs300 g1 would be nice.

I had an athlete that trained with the Polar RS800CX for Ironman Louisville.  She seemed to be very happy with the unit, hopefully I can get some additional comments from other athletes.  I’ve included links to amazon so you can read some of the reviews (and provide a little side bonus to me should you chose to buy through them).

Garmin
In 2007/2008 I coached the running team for our local chapter of Team in Training.  As a “Thank You” gift from one of the athletes, I was given a Garmin 305.  I was incredibly excited because I had wanted to use gps to track my running and cycling.

In 2008, I used the Garmin for every single run and bike I did (ok, I may have missed 1 or 2 workouts?).  I even used the monitor when I used the treadmill so that I could have the heart rate data.  This would have worked out really well if I had the foot pod so I could get the distance without the gps syncing.    Here are some of the Pro’s vs Con’s:

Pro’s — I enjoy getting all the data.  It can be a type A personality athlete’s best dream.  You get a lot of data on the go:  lap pace, overall pace, heart rate, lap heart rate, distance – Here’s a link to the specs at Garmin’s site.  I also think that Garmin has the best online integration with their devices, Garmin Connect is a very nice and easy to use site.

Con’s — There are a couple things about the 305 that I don’t really care for: #1 is the size of the watch.  It is something I put up with while training, but not willing to do while racing a triathlon.  That being said, Nikki used her’s during Ironman Louisville.  I also know others that used them at IMLou and during many marathons.  Actually, I have used them during a couple stand alone marathons too, but I do think if I was seriously racing the constant feedback might be a little too much.

#2 – The other issue is the battery life.  I really dislike that I have to constantly worry about getting the watch charged.  And at times, I forget and it runs out mid run.  The battery often lasts around 6 to 8 hours, but Nikki has had it last much longer than that a couple times – not sure how?

Other Garmin Products:

I have a couple people I know that are using the Garmin 50. It is there basic watch that is only a heart rate monitor. While the Garmin 50 doesn’t have a gps, you can purchase the foot pod and still get speed and distance. The other thing that I really like the 50 is that it uses the ANT+ wireless system, which makes downloading your data much easier than the docking system that I have to use with my 305.

The other Garmin products that I have known people to use are the Garmin Forerunner 405
and the newer Garmin Forerunner 310XT . A lot of the feedback about the 405 is that the user controls are difficult to manage and are very sensitive. I know one runner who went back to the 305 after using the 405 for a period of time, but I also know those that have been using the 405 and have gotten used to the user controls. The 310xt is new enough that I have not had enough discussions to determine how valuable it is. The two positives the 310xt presents is the long battery life (20 hours) and it is water proof, which makes it a more multisport friendly watch.

Suunto

I have been intrigued by other runners and triathletes that have been using the Suunto watches lately.  I have one triathlete/runner that has started using one for his training in the past few months, but I don’t have enough experience to give a good review.

I have asked a few people to share some thoughts on their experiences with the different units, hopefully I can get some more information and pass it along.  I will have to say that looking through their catalog of products, they do seem to be innovating for the fitness and training demographic more than some of the other companies.  Products like the memory belt and the Team Pod are very interesting devices (Although I’ve heard Mike Boyle discuss that the way the company goes about selling the team pod system makes it unattractive and impractical?).

So what would I personally buy today:

If I had to buy a new monitor today I would buy either the rs300 sd, rs300 g1 or the garmin 50.  The sole purpose being that I am fairly cheap and buying a $400 watch would probably make me resent the technology more than appreciate it.  Those three watches all give me the basic functions I need, heart rates, times and when paired with the right accessories speed and distance.

Now if I had a little more time to review options and save up to buy a top end watch, I’d look at the Garmin 310xt (although it still seems large), the Polar rs800 cx (and just use trainingpeaks.com for all my downloading) or continue to learn more about the Suunto line of watches (you can check out a few thoughts from Bret at Zentriathlon here).

Hopefully that helps you in your decision when choosing the right heart rate monitor for you and your budget.  I also hope it will create some discussion about the pro’s and con’s of the different products so I can learn about some of the newest technology I haven’t been able to play with yet!

Added Note:  If you want a great discussion comparing the Garmin and Suunto units, check out the blog Zentience written by Morten Leibach.  Here’s the link – Garmin or Suunto?

Yesterday I posted my Ironman Louisville race report and a few minutes later I received an email that said:

Gary, I just read your race report and a couple of the articles linked to therein.  I appreciate your perspective.  It was nice to see you in L’ville, meet Nikki, and talk with you after the race.  And congratulations on finishing your 4th (right?) 140.6!

Over the years, I’ve received similar responses from others through email, at races and on my blog.  Endurance sport is a self-improvement project for me and I realize that our events can mean so much more than “first to the finish line.”  It’s very hard to have that mindset at times but when I’m willing to view our sport in that way, it begins to be incredibly more self-fulling.

I also realize that sport is not so noble at times.  Endurance sports take a pretty big beating at times, especially cycling.  The level of drug abuse and cheating is sad, disgusting and takes away a lot of my excitement for what they accomplish.  It doesn’t only happen at the professional level as we consistently hear more and more issues with age grouper doping.  Team sports can also be ugly, as we saw on opening night of this years college football season after the Oregon vs Boise State Football game (video here).

This brings me to a personal hero of mine – Tom Osborne.  When I think of Nebraska Football, he is what I think of.  As one of the most successful college football coaches of all time, I remember him as a very humble and down-to-earth person.  The only experience I have with him in person was at a McDonalds while I was in college.  He was there with what appeared to be his grandchildren.  As most people were looking and pointing, he didn’t appear disturbed.  And when a fan finally went up to say ‘hi’ he replied and didn’t appear to be bothered by a fan interrupting his time with his family.

As a freshmen at the University of Nebraska, I remember walking back to my room in Abel Hall after the football team had just won it’s 3rd national championship in 4 years (1994, 1995, 1997).  As I walked into the dorm I saw 18, 19 and 20 year old college males in distress and some so much so that they were crying.  Why?  Because Tom Osborne decided to retire.  It seemed like we were being left out a little bit, like it was way too early for him to retire.  Look at JoePa at Penn State or Bowden at Florida State, why did he have to retire so early?

That’s what I’ve always admired about Osborne.  He has the ability to look beyond sport and understand a greater meaning within life.  I could go on for a long time discussing why I admire Tom Osborne, but I don’t need to.  His actions and character have done well for themselves.  He has just written a new book: Beyond the Final Score: There’s More to Life Than the Game.  I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but I’m excited to pick it up.

If you are interested to hear him speak about the book, just watch the video below. Some people may listen to him and think, “that guy is a little dull”. But when I listen to him I think about all the wisdom he’s offering and how he doesn’t make it about him. You might not think that he could motivate athletes the way a coach that yells and screams does, but if you think that …. then you never watched the Huskers play on a Saturday afternoon while he walked the sidelines – never cracking a smile or throwing a fit.

Also think about this: The last four years he coached college football, his teams were 49 – 2, with 3 national titles. Then like a great western movie, he walked away into the sunset. (Well at least until he came back to save our program as the athletic director).

Overall Place: 204 / 2353
Age Group Place: 36 / 266
Overall Time: 10:42:15
Swim Overall Place: 579
Swim Time: 1:15:17
Swim Pace / 100 Meter: 1:57
Bike Overall Place: 592
Bike Time: 5:51:27
Bike Pace mph: 19.1
Run Overall Place: 84
Run Time: 3:27:10
Run Pace min/mile: 7:55

Pre Race

Nikki and I woke up early to get our nutrition in a few hours prior to the race start.  So we were up and I was drinking my bottles of Fortify at 4:15am.  I had a little coffee and my usual 3 trips to the bathroom.  I tried to lay in bed as much as I could, but I wasn’t resting well, so I decided to get up and moving a little earlier than I wanted.  We ended up leaving our hotel to make the walk down 4th street and to the Great Lawn around 5:30am.

It was interesting walking right by the finish line on 4th street on our way to the start.  Knowing that at some point during the day I would be running (hopefully) through the finish line that was so abandoned and empty was a little poetic.  I prayed that this feeling was a foreshadow to being a part of something great.  Not only for myself but for thousands of other athletes and family members that were on their own Ironman journey.  I had a little visualization of finishing strong.

We made it to the transition area at 6:00am and as soon as we walked into the area we heard them start calling out that the transition area would be closing in 15mins.  It was very comforting to see so many friends in the transition area that morning.  Jeff, Neely and Casey were all there to help us.  Tyson was there to prep his stuff too.

The amazing thing for me was that I never had too much anxiety the couple days prior to the race or on race morning.  I attribute a lot of that to taking the time to write out my last post: Perspective, Priorities and Racing Ironman Louisville.  When you are willing to take a step back, it can really change your approach to something as simple as a race.  I also think that seeing other people completely freaking out made it easier on me to realize that I didn’t want to spend my emotional energy in that way.

Swim

We ended up getting in the start line next to Ron Shashy.  He and Nikki swam the 2.0 mile open water swim at Cave Run together, so they were a pretty good match to try and stay together during the swim.  Once the race got started, it was amazing how fast people started moving.  I got my goggles on just in time to run on the deck to try and stay in line and jump off the dock. I thought that a time trial start would create less of a crowd in the water, but I had a lot more issues swimming around-into-over people during this swim than I did at Ironman Wisconsin in 2007.

The first segment of the swim is done against the current, but I’m not sure how much it slowed us down?  It didn’t feel like the current was too strong, but I was struggling to find a straight line to swim more than I was worried about the current.  Directions I was given by Gordo after the Cardinal Harbour Race in July were:

A – increase my Monday and Friday swims so that I was swimming 4400 meters during each workout

B – Float the swim at Ironman Louisville

I continued to think about that as I was headed out to the turn around.  Not too far from the turn around I saw other athletes walking in the water.  It seemed a little odd because the Ohio River is not a small river and it should be pretty deep where there where at.  Not too many seconds after that I hit a log in mid stroke that stopped me cold.  I guess they must have been walking across the log.

After the turn around I put myself as far out into the river as I felt comfortable and could maintain my bearings.  The swim back in was fairly uneventful.  I tried to catch a few people’s feet but that wasn’t working out too well, so I used random feet from time to time, as long as I felt like I wasn’t working too hard to stay there.

T1

As I exited the water, I saw that my swim time was 1:15.  Not exactly the start to the race that I was hoping.  I thought that 1:10 to 1:15 was reasonable depending on the water conditions, so at least I was within range of what I thought was acceptable.

Jeff and Neely were again in the transition area.  As I ran my bike out to the mount line, Jeff yelled “Nikki’s about 3mins ahead of you.  She needs some encouragement!”  This was a piece of good/bad news for me to know.  The fact that I was within 3mins of Nikki coming out of T1 was either really good news for me, or fairly bad news for Nikki.  I chose to make it good news for me… thinking that it must have been a tough swim for everyone.  (BTW, Nikki swam 1:09. I’ll let her tell her story).

Bike

The bike starts out on a very flat section of the course.  Nikki and I talked on Saturday about using the terrain as a way to get our effort levels where we needed them to be, opposed to getting caught up in the race and start thinking about riding “fast”.  One sign that I knew things were going my way was when I looked at my heart rate and saw that it was below 150bpm.  This was such a good sign to see because at Cardinal Harbour I spent a lot of time on the bike trying to get my effort levels under control.

Knowing that my efforts were in order, I worked on getting comfortable and drank some water to clear out the Ohio River’s deisel fuel taste.  I also started paying attention to the power meter (that I had thanks to Alan Hawse) to cross check if my heart rates were providing the same feedback that the wattage was saying, it did.

After you get out of Louisville and onto Hwy 42 the terrain starts to become more rolling.  You are also very early in the ride when you start to encounter these hills, which can bring about bad things if you don’t have discipline and stay under control during this segment.  One of the advantages that I had was that I had been in many discussions about how to approach the race day with my athletes and Nikki prior to the race.  It was interesting to see how all the things we talked about not doing, I saw hundreds of athletes doing.

I’ll admit that it is very difficult to slow myself down climbing hills so much all the time.  Being such a light weight guy (136 pounds 2 days prior to race day), it’s pretty easy to climb some hills.  But I continued to cross-check my heart rate monitor and the power meter to keep things under a “lid”.  What was the lid?

Heart Rate – 155bpm.  I did a great job all day of not getting over this cap.  I don’t ever remember a time that I saw it over this level.  I rode between 144 and 148bpm pretty much all day.  There were brief periods that my heart rate dropped below this while I descended but it bounced back.

Watts – 210 to 220.  I was told that I should consider having a “FIRM” cap of 210 on the bike.  So when I saw the watts go over 200 I took notice, when I saw it go over 210 I would back off a little, if I saw it over 220 I did everything I could to get it back down.  Here’s the link to my trainingpeaks account the powertap file from the bike ride: Gary’s IMLou Bike

After riding about 75 miles I decided to look at my average pace to see how things were going.  It said, 18.7mph.  Bummer!  But I knew that I was riding my race and the speed was what it was.  The one thing I also knew was that I felt really good still and felt much better than I did last year at the Great Illini and at Ironman Wisconsin.  The boost to my bike came after the last turn onto Hwy 42.  There must of been a good tailwind because at the same heart rates and watt output I was flying.  It also felt nice to actually pass a few cyclists, opposed to the normal routine of watching people come by and dissappear into the distance.

Power Summary:

First Half – 158watts
Second Half – 156watts
VI – 1.08

I really like this bike course.  I also really appreciate the effort and time I have spent to learn how to descend more comfortably.  If we could find a course that was all uphill, I might enjoy Ironman even more.  The only thing about the loops that were not appealing was the big Ironman painted in the road with a large “don’t” sign painted over it.  Apparently someone doesn’t appreciate the bike traffic.

The other thing that made me nervous on the bike were all the flats.  Just after the second turn onto Hwy 42 that leads you back to Louisville (about 33 miles left), there were a ton of flats.  It made me nervous because I had a hell of a time getting the tires on the Zipps earlier in the week and I knew if I had to do it on the road, already fatigued, I might not get it done.  I have heard people say there were tacks on the road, but I can not confirm or deny that information.  If there were tacks, I guess I was just a lucky guy.

T2

Again a pretty quick and uneventful transition.  The only difference this year was that I changed out of my tri shorts and put on my RaceReady running shorts so that I could carry gels in the pockets.

Run

The great thing about being able to run well and using a conservative race strategy is that you get to the run and feel excited about what lies ahead.  As I started running, I was pretty confident that it was going to be a good day.  The weather was perfect and my legs had no sign of fatigue.

But this good feeling also made me think back to the Great Illini last year and Cardinal Harbour six weeks prior.  In both situations I had some pretty serious break downs on the run.  So even though I felt great and was moving past some athletes pretty quickly, I kept a constant look at my heart rate monitor.

I had an early cap of 160bpm on the run.  Even with this cap, I went through the first mile in 6:58.  “Yikes, that’s too fast!”  So for the next couple miles I really backed off the effort and my heart rate was sitting in the 150 to 155bpm range.  The second mile was even faster – Huh?  I’m pretty sure that the mile markers early on were not properly placed?

By now, many people know that I’m a big believer in the run:walk method (Episode 172).  And I had a plan to run:walk this marathon – so I did.  Here was the final plan:

first 10k : walk 30sec every other aid station
second 10k : walk 30sec every aid station
third 10k : walk 40sec every aid station
fourth 10k : walk 40sec every aid station or until I felt confident to rip to the finish

That’s also what I did.  I’m pretty proud of how well I stuck to the plan early on in the run because everything felt so easy.  I did allow my heart rate cap move up to 165bpm once I started walking every aid station.  What I noticed was this:

1. The longer the run went on the less my heart rate dropped during the walk portion

2. The middle of the run my heart rate would get back up to the cap pretty quick

3. The last 10k I didn’t have to worry about the heart rate cap, because I needed to work pretty hard to push it up to 160bpm… but it was possible, which wasn’t the case at Ironman Wisconsin.

4.  I walked only at the aid stations.  At Ironman Wisconsin and Great Illini, I used a run:walk method, but by the end of the run I was fatigued enough that I either had to walk longer during the aid stations (GI) or take more walk breaks (IMMoo).

Here are my run splits:
FIRST RUN SEGMENT -  3.38 mi. (22:47),  6:44/mile  (again, there’s no way this is right)
SECOND RUN SEGMENT - 8.25 mi. (37:10),  7:37/mile
THIRD RUN SEGMENT - 13.1 mi. (38:38) 7:57/mile
FOURTH RUN SEGMENT -  15.33 mi. (18:17) 8:11/mile
FIFTH RUN SEGMENT - 20.19 mi. (40:17) 8:17/mile
SIXTH RUN SEGMENT - 25.04 mi. (40:32) 8:21/mile
FINAL RUN SEGMENT - 26.2 mi. (9:29) 8:10/mile

Again the run was where I gained on a lot of people.  I came off the bike in 500th place and finished in 204th place.  Being able to run well at the end of the Ironman is a good feeling, but I still believe that there’s more in my run.  Doing the Ironman Run under 3:15 is something I feel is very doable.

Final analysis:

I love the Ironman distance.  Triathlon is a lot of fun, but Ironman is what I really enjoy.  Maybe because it allows me to never really get good at the swim/bike portions and still do ok.  I have no idea when I’ll be able to do another Ironman, but I found myself looking at the 2010 schedule the other day.  Maybe 2011 or 2012?

What do I need to do in order to continue improve my ability to race with people faster than me?  I have been told:

My hunch is that in terms of your development from here you could benefit from a run focus. For a smaller athlete there is even more upside to devoting energy to the run. However, at the paces you’re running now, you’re probably getting to that point that pure running fitness may be limiting your ability to ‘hold back’ for the marathon. While it is tempting to assess your splits in relation to the rest of your AG, it makes more sense to assess relative to others with similar body type. Generally it pays to play to your strengths.

And

The swim will be a key part of getting you up into the Top 20 in the AG.

The interesting thing as I look at people in front of me (203 of them), only 4 of those 203 people had a bike split that was slower than mine and even those times were close to mine.  I guess this just means I need to continue to improve across the board – swim, bike and run.

Good thing I love to do all three (well… swimming is a part time love).

The one thing I like to do each year prior to doing my A+ race is reflect and gain perspective.  I start by asking myself simple questions about the journey:

1. what  I’ve done to prepare for the race?
2. what expectations I have for the event?
3. what it means if I accomplish those expectations?
4. what it means if I don’t meet those expectations?
5. where does the enjoyment and happiness come from regarding my event?
6. can I share these lessons so others can also find more enjoyment along their journey?
7. and if I can share those lessons, what is the best way to share them?

Here are some links to answers that I’ve come up with in the past during pre/post race analysis:  Define yourself and be positive, 4 days to first 140.6 triathlon , Einstein, Relativity and Triathlon Training , My FU philosophy and why I want to be an Ironman , Happiness: The Ironman let down and lessons for everyone who wants to be happy.

I would like to share some of the thoughts that I’ve been having regarding Ironman Lousville in this post and then I’ll come back and share what this decade long journey has included.

Ironman Louisville Perspective:

Since returning to Kentucky and getting married in 2005, I’ve known that I had a 4 or 5 year window that I could use to focus on training myself.  Why 4 to 5 years?  Because I knew at some point I would have to put my own training on the C priority list and start thinking about things like starting a family and being able to economically support a family.

As the timeline unfolded and my Ironman journey kicked into full gear (2006), it turned out that I would be on a 4 year plan.  Knowing that I had this sort of timeframe has actually been very good for my journey.

2006 – when I did the Runovia full distance triathlon, this perspective allowed me to be mentally prepared to “just finish”.  So when the floods occurred and they canceled the race, it didn’t bother me.  When 6 athletes decided to stick around the next day and do a semi-supported race, it excited me.  When I finished and was still alive, I was proud.

2007 – having a long term perspective allowed me to approach Ironman Wisconsin with a “it’s your first MDot race” mentality.  Be smart, be conservative and don’t make beginner mistakes – that was the mantra.  It worked well.  I made some mistakes, like killing the “Devil’s Hill” climb.  It was just too much fun and excitement and felt like the Tour de France.  Why not?  During the race, I don’t ever remember feeling pressured to – Go Faster.  I do remember getting into T2 and feeling a little let down because my bike split wasn’t good enough but the run changed the entire perspective of the day.  And I knew there were changes to be made to enable a better run.

2008 – we knew that doing an Ironman race wasn’t going to be possible financially, so I decided to seek other races that were long distance triathlons.  I also knew if I wanted to take the time to train successfully for an Ironman in 2009, I’d have to establish a little bit of financial freedom to make those choices.  In the end, I decided to do something significantly challenging to my endurance and mental strength – which resulted in what I called EndureChallenge.  I learned a lot of lessons in 2008 about surviving and enduring.  I tried to share those as much as possible through my blog, podcasts, youtube and twitter.

2009 — So that brings us to my journey this past year.

I will be the first to admit that there are aspects to this past year that I’ve enjoyed more than any other year that I’ve sought to be called an Ironman.  I have really enjoyed mentoring the group of athletes that trusted me with their training programs since October of 2008 until this very week.  We’ve had some great experiences too: like the Triple T weekend in Ohio and our Cave Run Training Camp (which was as tough a  training period as I’ve ever faced).

But I also have had a major cloud hanging over my head this year that has been there from the beginning.  That cloud is the knowledge that Ironman Louisville is the last opportunity I have to “get it right”.  Will Ironman Louisville be my last Ironman?  I doubt it.  I hope that there will be a period of time that I’ll be able to train for and do an Ironman again, but it will likely not be in the near future.

Part of this perspective is just a natural outflow of my personality.  I have a strong tendency to think in “All-or-nothing” paradigms and I also have a habit about being compulsive with thoughts and behaviors.

So how am I reframing my perspective?

The interesting thing about this IM Louisville cloud is that I pride myself at being able to assist athletes with these very difficult mental blocks.  My ability to assist athletes is likely from my own inner struggles with balancing expectations and experiences.   So here are some things that I would share with an athlete in this situation and what I’m trying to implement on my own:

1. Ironman Louisville is not the RESULT it is the REWARD.  We train for a year (or two or three) looking forward to an event.  The outcome of that race is not an end result of what made up that year; the race is a reward that we can enjoy as a result of living out our desire to be healthy, fit and active.

2. Ironman rewards humility and patience.  If we are willing to use those two character traits early and often, then during the race we will be able to use our fitness more successfully when it really matters. Ironically, I believe that the key to achieving your best in an Ironman results more often from a focus on inner awareness than it does on a focus on outcome.

3.  Strive for the positive and the positive will happen.  In the book Spontaneous Healing , by Dr. Andrew Weil, he talks about finding a four leaf clover.  The idea goes something like this:  when you are looking for something it is more likely to be found, all it takes is a change in the paradigm that you are using to search with.  He used the example, stating that once he started looking for a four leaf clover (something that seems rare) he actually started seeing them everywhere. (Sorry if I butchered the story it’s been a long time since I read it, but that’s what it meant to me).

By putting so much importance on Ironman Louisville it can be easy to think of all the things that might go wrong.  What if I wreck (as I’ve talked about), What if I get a flat (which I worry about), what if the sky turns red and I can’t see the road because I’m color blind and everything goes screwy (luckily I’m not that delusional yet).

We often find what we search for!

4.  No one cares.  Honestly this is hard for me to accept.  I have put so much effort and commitment into this race that I want to believe that I do well everyone will be excited.  The truth is that if I do well, barely finish or DNF – it won’t really matter to anyone but myself.  My parents probably forgot that I’m doing the race this weekend.  And if they do remember they probably don’t remember exactly what an Ironman is.  Nikki has her own race to be consumed by.  My friends that don’t run, bike or swim think I’m crazy anyways.  And my personal training clients are already impressed that I’ve decided to do an Ironman (which they also don’t know what one is).

So it really doesn’t matter – to anyone but myself.

That essentially puts me in a place where I can start to shave off all the expectations.  Expectations that I understand are just false realities I believe will make me a more happy individual (read: Ironman Letdown).  Without those expectations creating that Ironman Louisville cloud, I can remember why I started this journey of endurance in the first place (check out: My FU Philosophy).

To summarize my whole perspective on racing Ironman Louisville this year:  IMLou is not an event that I want to  define who I am; the process of training for IMLou has merely been the kiln that I’m choosing to use, to help create the environment I need to mold myself into the person of character I hope to become.

We’ll see how well that molding process has worked on Sunday in the way I approach the day!