The time has come for the inaugural
Ironman 70.3 Kansas. Carolynn and I headed out to Lawrence today for the Expo, packet pickup, body marking, bike drop off and final instructions. Tom Ziebart and crew did a very good job of bringing this event together. I remember old Tom from down in Florida. He used to work with
Exclusive Sports Marketing which was the company that produced most of the triathlons in Florida when I lived there.
The Expo was packed with racers. I think everyone was like me and waited until the last minute to pick up their race packets and then head out to drop off their bikes. The Navy Seals were on hand and they had a little section where you could test yourself with a climbing net, pull up bar and sit ups. The record on the climbing net was 3.6 seconds. I wanted to see how close I could get, but I was afraid of injuring myself. A couple of young studs took a shot at it and one finished in about 5.5 seconds and the other got to the top at 6 seconds flat. There was plenty of cool tri gear available at the expo. While in the Inside Out tent I was checking out their wet suits that were on sale. The sales guy asked me what size I wore and I said large or X-large depending on who made it. He said I was crazy and needed a medium (that was the largest size they had left) and referred me to the sizing chart. I assured him that my fat arse was not going to squeeze into a medium wet suit. Had he not seen the size of my arms???
After the Expo was the supposedly short drive out to Bloomington Beach. About 45 min later we finally arrive at the race site. Parking lot was already full so we had to park along the road. One thing I don't like about these big events are all the lines you have to wait in. It took about an hour just to get up to body marking. Once past body marking it was off to rack your bike and finally get to leave for home. My race number is 570 which put me in the far North West corner on the transition area which is very nice since it is easy to remember where to go after the bike leg.
Carolynn and I had planned to go to my Manager's annual party tonight, but after standing in lines all day and dealing with the heat, I decided to stay at home and rest the best I could. That 3:45 a.m. alarm comes mighty early.
It takes a lot of gear to do a 1/2 Ironman triathlon. I laid most of my gear out to make sure I had everything. I am going to stick with the food I used in training which is primarily
Accelerade gels and drink mix combined with CliffBars and Power Bar products.
Wish me luck tomorrow with the 80+ temps and above average humidity!
Next event up is the MTB National Marathon Championships out in Breckenridge, Colorado. For the second year, the Firecracker 50 will host the Marathon Championships.
