Ironman 70.3 Kansas - Race Report

Quick results and some pics for now.

Swim 1.2 miles (including long run to T1) 39 min.
Bike 56 miles: 2:42 for a 20.8 mph average
Run 13.1 (nausea - stomach stopped digesting) 2:20

Total time including transitions on my watch was 5:40:25. My goal was to break 5:30, but that first lap of the run really hurt that chance. I had to walk several times during the first 6 miles. The next 3 were not that bad as my nausea went away some and my stomach started working again. I really pushed it the last 4 miles to try to get close to my goal time. The cooler weather from the approaching storm front helped with this. It turned out I ran a 1/2 marathon for nothing.

They called the race during the run due to some storms coming in. I really don't understand why they did this. The weather was not bad at all. We ran the entire course, but our times are not counted? That is a bunch of crap if you ask me....In looking at the results only the top guys got their run counted - the ones that qualified for the 70.3 Championships to be held in November.

Update:

The final results have been posted with the run times. The official results have me 59th out of 112 racers in the Male 40-44 division. However, some of the guys listed in front of me actually did not run the entire run course (the race officials started directing athletes directly to the finish without finishing the course due to weather), but were given a finishing time ahead of racers who completed the entire course. Oh well...

I fell from the top 25 which is really depressing since I felt I was doing well until the last 10 miles of the bike. I guess I drank too much of that warm Gatorade out on the bike course and it just sat there in my stomach. There is always next year :-)

The Lawrence Journal has a nice story about the event.

Ironman 70.3 Kansas - Pre Race

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!