St George Ironman 70.3

WHAT A RACE! 

My client Alisha decided she wanted to go for it first thing in the year. She'd never done this race, nor ever thought possible that she could do an Olympic triathlon, let alone a half iron-man. We spent a lot of time training together, particularly on the bike. It was good and bad. She really doesn't enjoy the bike and can be mentally pretty negative while training, so it was a bit of a struggle, but we both made it across both the start line and the finish line. It was great to see her feel good about her accomplishment and realize how strong and able she was to do something she put her mind to. We stuck to the same plan I did the first year I did it, and felt good about the time and miles I put in.

Picking up our packets and dropping our gear!

All my gear all laid out, ready to go! This is one of the tougher things about triathlons- making sure you have everything you need in the right spots!

Gavin helped me take my bike out to check it in on Friday night. I borrowed my friend Elizabeth's bike again. She luckily is amazing and nice enough to let me borrow it. My bike is a sore spot for me- since the guy who sold it to me, sold me the wrong size bike and went out of business shortly after and didn't give me all that was promised with my bike. FRUSTRATING!

All ready to go!

The kids did the IronKids run later that night. We joined up with Cam and Josie to have our kids do it together. I love having them close! Cam decided to do his first Ironman too! He did an awesome job! It was fun to see him out on the course. He cruised past me on the bike, but I caught him and ran with him for about a 1/2 mile on the run and then cruised past him there. So much fun to have good friends out there along the way! I was really proud of Cam's finish on this race! He did great!

Jaylen was so cute, offering the girl's rides to the car. He's such a big kid!! Holy cow!

Alisha and I in the morning! It was cold, windy, very overcast. Not ideal race conditions at all! The weather had been bad all week, contributing to a lot of anxiety about race conditions for all of us racing.

This was a funny story. I found this ambulance by the start line to nurse Miles before I got in, so I would have a full baby and a non full chest during the race. Aaron had a camping chair and I sat towards the front of this ambulance to be out of the way but still be able to see when we were supposed to head down. I begin nursing, when the Star Spangled banner came on, and everyone turns my direction. I was sitting underneath the flag pole on the other side of the ambulance. It was pretty awkward, but oh well! Got to do what you got to do!

This is Tiffany, one of my favorite clients. SHE IS HILARIOUS! I just love her. Well, her family volunteered at the start. She stripped my wetsuit and we got some pretty awesome pictures. It looked super awkward. I LOVED seeing her out there. She was so sweet and excited to see me and just gave me so much positive energy going in!

Off to the bike!

These didn't all load in order- shoot! Oh well. Here's coming in to the finish! I loved seeing my sweet kids and Cam and Josie's kids lined up, excited to give me a high 5! BEST CHEER SQUAD EVER!

I made it! 6 hours 6 minutes!

We waited around for Alisha to finish a couple hours later. She looked so strong and awesome coming in!

Yay! She earned those donuts for sure!!

I forgot my wetsuit at the finish line, so after I'd been home and showered I realized I left it and went back to grab it. As I went back over, Justin Bandley (one of the tri club members) pulled me over to go up on stage with the group to accept the champion award for our tri club! Pretty neat!

Josie caught this one. High 5s to my boys!

Tiffany and I laughed pretty good over this one. Most awkward photo ever! It looks like she was delivering my baby or something. She was just ripping my wetsuit off!

 

 

RACE REPORT:

I was a little burned out going into this one. I was excited and so happy to be back out there racing, but dealing with some negativity throughout training from Alisha was challenging for this race. I was excited and wondered how this one would go once I was out there. You always wonder on a race of this size, if what you did was enough and how it would workout when you put it all together. I loved training for it, but weather was a little crazy going in towards the last month. We'd had lots of windy days (which on a bike is the WORST!) and stormy weather that isn't typical. The lake never really warmed up- it was 60 degrees- BURRRRR! It was quite the adventure that added to the fun of it all.

I picked up Alisha at 4:30 am and went to the finish line to take the bus out to the start. I actually slept really great the night before and woke up ready to go! 

SWIM:
Cold, windy morning. It was so crazy getting in the cold water with it being that cold! Wow, that was intense. I was fine once I was in and in my grove. I actually felt really great on the swim! The water was choppy but I didn't feel like it bothered me too much.

BIKE:
It started raining on me on about mile 5 I think. It was miserable. I almost didn't take my jacket but decided to last minute. BOY was I glad I did. It was windy, pouring rain, miserably cold the whole time. It was very mentally and physically draining. I felt pretty good, despite that, until Snow Canyon, which is a very tough climb. It's beautiful and rewarding, but it's a lung/leg burner for sure! I saw people off on the side shaking uncontrollably. It was kind of scary. A lot of the athlete's weren't prepared for the cold. Usually it is way too hot (like 95 degrees the last two years!). I was over it by the time I got to the top. Shew! My hands and feet were so numb and I couldn't use my brakes very well with how numb I was. It was a miserable, horrible ride into town.

RUN:
I could hardly unbuckle my helmet on the way back in. My hands were SO cold and numb. I luckily brought an extra pair of socks so I could have dry socks for the run. I was happy to be off the bike for sure, but was nervous about how to run when I felt so cold and worn down. I kept wanting to pull off to the side to take the pieces of rocks out of my shoes. By mile 3 I realized it was just my numb feet unthawing and felt like big pieces of asphalt in my socks. Once I got my feet working again I felt really good. I saw Cam up around half way and kept up, seeing if I could catch him. I finally caught him on mile 11ish and he was having some cramping issues and he slowed it down, so I sped off to finish this dang race! HA!  The run was actually perfect with the cooler weather! It didn't rain too much on me during the run, but it was SUCH a relief to have it be so much cooler this year.

I felt really good about my finish. I worked hard and felt great. My training definitely paid off. It was very fun this year, knowing way more people out there along the way. It's fun to race with friends, accomplishing a hard thing together. Triathlons are in my blood. I love the challenge! I'm grateful for a supportive husband who helps me train and complete these races that I love! I could never do it without him.