Ironman Coeur d’Alene - The Bike
T1
I emerged from the water battered and bloody, got my wetsuit off and ran to grab my transition bag and headed towards the tent. As I was headed towards the tent I saw a stack of plywood outside the tent door and I just sat down on that and proceeded to get ready. I was wearing my biking shorts so I didn’t need to change those so I figured I could save 30-60 seconds by not going into the tent and finding a seat.
I put on my arm warmers, my Texas jersey, bike shoes and my fancy Aero Helmet that I had borrowed from Corey May. The Aero helmet allegedly gives you as much benefit as race wheels but for a lot less money. So it is totally up my alley, potentially better performance without extra training and not a lot of money. Wooo-hooo.
I left T1 after spending 8:22. I think I could have gone faster, but it was still almost 2 minutes faster than my previous Ironman. Bring on the bike, for the next 6.5 hours. Oh boy.
The Bike
The bike course is a fairly hilly course, at least compared to Ironman Florida, so I knew my time would be slower, but it was supposed to be a very pretty course so I was looking forward to it. The course looks like this:
The first 15 miles or so went by fairly uneventfully, a couple minor climbs and some nice downhills, then we would head towards the monster climbs from about 18 until 30. We’d gain about 500 feet, which I guess really isn’t that bad. But by the second lap it sure felt that bad. I saw Claire Secker riding up the hill and gave her some encouragement. Claire was yet another person who kicked my ass on the swim. Climbing up the hill I had to get out of the saddle to make the climb. You can see my super fast aero-helmet in the below picture as well as the awesome view of the trees and the lake. Once again thanks to Corey May for the helmet. This was just an amazingly pretty part of the course. I still felt really good at this point, I still had 3 full water bottles and wasn’t tired. Of course I still had at least 5.5 hours remaining.
I wanted to make sure that I stayed hydrated so I was drinking the entire time. I was taking a bottle of Gatorade every ten miles and refilling up my Aero Bottle. So I figure I drank 3 water bottles full, plus ten more bottles that I picked up along the way. The first lap went by pretty well, I felt strong but I knew the second lap would be slower as I hadn’t gone more than 72 miles in training.
About 30 miles in I had to pull over and use the facilities. I had been drinking so much I really had to pee. This would be an ongoing problem for the rest of the ride. I pulled into a porta-potty and spent a good 3 minutes emptying my bladder. I got back on the bike and headed out again.
I pulled into the special needs bag area about halfway through. I downed a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, drank an Ensure, refilled my bottles, drank some coke, stuffed a half can of Pringles into my Aerobars. The Pringles taste so good at this point. This was one of the things I learned in my first Ironman. The sodium in the chips was badly needed and after a couple miles the can was empty. Somehow riding 60 miles makes food taste much better. The PBJ and chips was one of the tastier meals I had eaten in a while. Which is actually pretty sad, but on race day, Yum!
I wouldn’t see anyone else that I knew on the bike ride. They were all so far ahead of me out of the water and more so during the bike.
I settled in for the remaining few hours and just ground it out. I would have to stop one more time for another 3 minute pee break. I really wish I knew how to pee while riding. Tricia would learn how to do this on race day and I was very jealous. After I got to around 90 miles I could tell training more would have been a good idea. Those last 22 miles were the hardest. I just really wanted to be done, but like a horse that can smell the barn I knew I would be done soon enough.
I would finish the bike in 6:34:17, which was close to the 6:30 I had as a goal. If I could pee faster, or maybe drink less, I could have made those 4 minutes back. I was very happy to ride into transition again and get off the bike seat.
T2
I ran into the transition area to change into my running clothes. This time I did have to enter the tent as I needed to change out of my bike shorts and into running shorts. I reapplied Body Glide, changed socks, and shorts, grabbed my running shoes and handed my back off to a volunteer who made it disappear.
On the way out of the tent I saw a urinal and having to pee badly again I got in line. The guys in front of my seemed to have the same problem as I did as they took forever to finish. 4-5 minutes later I headed out of the tent in a time of 7:09. I could have been out in less than 3 if I didn’t have to pee, but it is what it is.
Popularity: 20% [?]
Good words.