doubleohdeelybopperhead on 
Before
When I woke up, I had a bowl of oats, my stomach was feeling very nervous – had a banana and a mug of tea, followed by a mug of coffee and then headed to the beach with my mom in tow. We left the house at 4:45, which was a bit later than I wanted to get away, but we got down to Ironman City at 5:30, which seemed okay.
When we stepped out of the car, I realised my special needs bags and my swim bag (empty swim bag) were still lying next to bed at home, but rather than letting it unnerve me, I walked into the convenience store opposite the site and grabbed some bread, peanut butter and bananas and stuffed them into some spare bags that the volunteers were handing out. The swim tent allowed me to drop my backpack rather than the official bag and we were okay.
My mom brought me another cup of coffee, but by now, I was so nervous that I was NEVER going to get that down. I kept sipping at my sports drink that I had in one of the bottles that I brought along, went to my bike, made sure the wheels were okay, added the drinks, gels, CO2s and my lucky gnome to the outfit and then stood in line to wait for the official start.
The swim – 1:21:59
I got situated in the 1:40 camp and waited for the canon – one of the guys in the 1:20 camp very loudly proclaimed that he expected to swim 1:40, but rather stood in the 1:20 camp so that he didn’t get slowed down too much. I remember it annoying me, but I removed myself from near him and went to the far right side so that I wouldn’t be blocked in and get yet another hit on the head like I did at IM UK 70.3 last year.
The canon went off and with it, 1800 very jittery athletes. By the time I got to the water, I was already surrounded by a huge amount of people and any hope of not getting beaten in the washing machine was gone. I tried to keep calm, keep relaxed and just position myself in a comfortable place. Unfortunately I was between 2 people that had obvious problems with the chop – which was particularly bad on this beautiful day – and when they swam up onto another person with a “stop-and-go” problem, I was stuck. I was only alerted to the newcomer of the group when his particularly strong kick hit me in the ribs, blowing a fair amount of air out of my lungs and into the water.
Around the first buoy we went and as per normal, there was a fair amount of people that stopped and tried to sight on a buoy that wasn’t visible – you had to get onto one of the higher swells and hope you spotted it in the distance, but if you followed the group, it was generally easy. The 760 meters to the second buoy felt hard – only then did I realise that the current had turned and we were swimming against it – I hadn’t lost my two troublesome mates yet and every now and again it seemed they wanted to just let me know that they were still there, giving me a push, a shove, a nudge, a slap on the back of my head or on my back.
At the second buoy, I managed to get closer to the buoy and catch a few swells that made it easier to get to the third buoy, which, as luck would have it, gave us another swim against a current. The sea wasn’t making the experience easy for us. I managed to get out of the group, except for one person who must’ve felt I was his soulmate. He clung to my side like I was the only person that knew where I was going. I kept sighting on the pier until I could see the fourth buoy and then headed for it – against waves that surfers would’ve rejoiced at seeing.
From the fourth buoy to the beach I tried to ride every wave I could and before I knew it, I was on the beach.
The moment I got upright I felt a sting in my achilles – the pin that I had used to keep the neoprene band from falling off was sticking into it – so I pulled to the side and removed it, tied it again and then carried on. I heard the commentator say that there was about 2 minutes until the first swimmers were expected and was a little shocked to see the clock show 45 minutes, but I hobbled back into the rough sea and started my second lap.
The second lap there was a lot less people around me – no knocking about and I somehow managed to get outside the current that was against us on the way to the second buoy – the swim between the third and the fourth buoy felt a lot shorter as well and when I got to the beach this time, I felt like I could’ve gone another round. I got up and jogged towards the stairs, up the stairs and into transition.
As I crossed the line, the magic numbers were : 1:21:59
T1 : 6:54
The Bike : 7:20:19
The first thing I realised as I left on the bike was that my gloves weren’t on my hands. I didn’t want to panic, but for just a second, I did. Then I figured that there wasn’t anything I could do about it at that point and carried on. The first water station was 1 km away and I grabbed a banana (the one I ate in transition didn’t feel enough) and got comfortable on my bike.
The day before I went for a little spin and my tri bars felt loose – the bike mechanics didn’t have a clue how to help, so I had removed them in fear that I would end up using them and fall. Right about now I was wondering about the wisdom of this move, but as it was the start of the 112 mile ride, I wasn’t wondering too much – there was a 9 mile hill ahead of me and I wasn’t going to be able to use them for too much in any case until the top.
About a mile into the ride I heard the sickening sound of something popping and even though I wanted it to be one of the people around me, I knew I had my first puncture of the day. I stopped and surprisingly, managed to change the tube in about 5 minutes. The fastest I’ve EVER done that.
With a new tube, I was off – just in time for the first bit of steeper climb – and I was enjoying the people around me, even if some of them were already blatantly trying to get into that zone where they could draft. I tried to keep the 7m rule, passing and being passed and just kept going. The climb took a lot out of me – my legs didn’t feel like they were coming to the party, but with the temperatures rising, that was going to have to change. The sea water was cold and my muscles probably just needed some warming up.
Having salt every hour, a gel every half an hour and water every 15 minutes, with some sports drink thrown in was working for me. Thankfully the special needs disaster wasn’t too much of a disaster as I had some of the mix that I threw into my bike bag the previous day with me so I could mix the water whenever I wanted.
I got to the top of the 9 mile climb and grabbed one of the gels that someone offered to me. Coffee flavoured gel was a bit of a surprise, but it went down surprisingly well. I only grabbed it because I didn’t want to open my bento to get out one myself. As it turns out, I have a new favourite flavour!
A LOVELY descent from mile 9 to about mile 10.5 gave my legs a little bit of rest, but not before I ensured that I had picked up enough speed to help me along a little. At this point I started spotting various people that were having trouble with the rough roads and their wheels. I only hoped that I wasn’t going to be one of those people again.
I got to the first turnaround and nearly went off-road, but thankfully managed to stay on. The ride towards Schoenies was hot and the aid station seemed a long way off – they seemed to have it either at the top or start of a climb.
Towards the end of the first lap I was into a rhythm and enjoying the ride, despite the heat soaring.
I don’t remember much of the second lap – I was soaking up the atmosphere, keeping my legs going and enjoying the ride. The 9 mile climb felt hard, but because I kept smiling at people it went along faster than I would’ve liked.
The start of the third loop was the start of my first dark spot of the day – I shouted for my special needs bag, but when I got to the point, the volunteer said that I must’ve asked for it before – it wasn’t there anymore. I’ve heard the horror stories of special needs bags going missing, but didn’t quite expect that. I kept going and as I climbed the hill tried to keep my mind on the next goal – I wanted to get to the top and enjoy that ride down and see how fast I could go. As I hit the bottom of the descent I was a little sorry that it was the last time I was going down there, but I carried on and just a little before the turnaround, I was reaching for a gel when I heard a “clink” sound and realised that I had lost one of my CO2’s, but I figured that as I had a few more, I was safe to carry on.
By now my toes were cramping and my left leg had mysteriously started feeling like a hot coal.
As I got near IM City, I smiled, tried to keep the cadence going and when I got off the bike, I begged my shoes to stop hurting my feet.
I grabbed my run bag and headed into the tent.
T2: 9:44
As I changed into my running shoes I noticed a blister underneath my right big toe and a matching one under my left big toe. I put on my socks, but didn’t pull them up all the way as the sun was still out and black socks were bound to cause me a bit of pain. I ate a banana, drank some ginger ale, had a mule bar and grabbed a marmite sandwich from a volunteer. I wasn’t hungry, but I figured it didn’t do any harm. Another volunteer packed so much sunscreen on me that I thought I was never going to be able to get it all off. And then I was off for my run.
The Run : 6:49:53
The run started off sane enough. I would run for 200 steps, walk 50, run 200 steps, walk 50. At the aid stations, I grabbed sandwiches, potatoes, bananas, gels, sponges, water, just about everything on offer, as long as it was done with 20m after the station. I stuffed my top with sponges to keep cool and threw water over myself. I collected my first armband (out of 3) at km 2 and headed towards the university. As I ran, the crowds made me laugh as they misinterpreted my top – it went from ‘Orlando Pirates’ (a SA football team) to ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ to ‘Toxic and Dangerous’ – only one of the women (also a competitor) got to the ‘Ship of Fools’ and everytime we passed each other we’d cheer each other on.
The only real uphill on the run course was between km 6 and 7 – incidentally the longest time between aid stations (km6 – 9 and then km 9 – 12) – and a lot of people were walking along this bit of path. It was the loneliest as well as the crowds stuck closer to the end – the furthest they came out was to km 6 and then picked you up again at km 12. I finished the first loop and felt good, I was now running a bit more often and walking through the aid stations.
Everything went well until km 21. My groin seized up and so did my back. I walked while I tried to stretch the muscles, but it wasn’t giving up. I calculated how fast I’d have to walk to make it to the end and for a short time my calculation abilities must’ve given up, because I was certain I couldn’t walk 13 miles in 5 hours. I kept going, trying to power through the pain. I high-fived kids along the road.
When I hit the final loop I was sure I was going to make it, but I wasn’t sure about being able to run again. At this point in time it was cold – I pulled my arm warmers over my arms and pulled my socks up. Unfortunately the water that I’d been using to cool myself down was now everywhere and kept my arms cold, although my legs seemed to not mind as much.
As I passed the 9km point for the last time, with only 5km to go, a volunteer handed me a moon blanket – she figured I was going to fall over. I wrapped it around me and declined any offers for food. My stomach couldn’t take it anymore and I didn’t want to get sick.
The final 5km was probably the hardest – it was dark, there was no-one around me, and I had to remind myself that within 3km I was going to be able to get to the crowds again. I got to the final 2km and felt like I couldn’t even add 2 + 2 to get to 4 – at this point I couldn’t even drink water anymore. I kept walking and with 500m to go, the familiar faces of my brother and mom popped out of the crowd. Suddenly I had energy again. I felt like a million pounds. I started jogging. I handed the blanket to a little boy that wanted a cape. I ran through the shute and over the little ramp to get over the finish line and smiled at everyone that was looking.
Hearing “You are an IRONMAN!” was the best feeling in the world – very little can beat it – and it made me look forward to the next one!
Afterwards
The pizza that the organizers offered was a lifesaver. My mind didn’t want it, but I ate it and felt better for it. I couldn’t stop smiling. My legs felt stiff, but okay. I collected my bike and bags and headed home where, after a short phone call with Andy, I was very fast asleep. I was dead to the world. The following morning I woke up at 8:30am on my own and half an hour later I had packed my bike. Another half an hour later I was on my way to the IM headquarters to collect my finishers shirt, my certificate and my finisher’s photo. My body felt remarkably well until about 1pm on Monday when I was in desperate need of a sleep.
The flight on Monday night wasn’t ideal and I’m still having a few issues with swollen feet, but I’m sure that with enough water and keeping them raised, that’ll pass soon enough.
And I still only have those 2 blisters 
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