Namibian Viking

Slightly delayed, but here is the race report from my second race of the year, the UK Ironman 70.3…

Ben and I had a great build up, we found a little stream and pitched out tent in a field next to the stream. After fire by the stream, hot chocolate, evening dip, it was time to go to bed. 10am, and we were looking to a 3.45am start!!

Once at the race site you could feel the energy building. This year we had problem with the fog moving in and the organisers didnt want to let us into the water until the fog cleared, turned out to be a late start, instead of 6am, we got off at 7.20.

PANIC struck as I started to swim. I am a much more confident swimmer this year, but I had forgotten all about what it feels like when you have people literally trying to swim on top of you! My head got pushed under a couple of times. The first couple of times I made the mistake of not continuing to swim and more people swim on top of me. There is only one thing to do, and that is to keep swimming. Panic struck me a couple of times, and I would be lying if I didnt say that I was contemplating to put my hand up and get rescued by the boats… Luckily I kept going and after 10-15min or so it all cleared up.

I managed to front crawl the whole way around the course this year and I came out of the water 8 min better then last year. A quick job with the websuit strippers and I was out on the bike course. My bike was great on the first half of the loop (we do same loop twice). Small gentle hills and I was able to power up for them and fly down. I was overtaking people left and right. But before long I was at the start of the hill section, and I remembered Ben’s word about maybe I would not be able to cycle up them, since my bike has not got a third cog at the front and hence no really easy gear option. Many people got off their bikes and walked up, especially on the second lap, but I managed to keep my honour and not get off the bike. I got in just under 3h30min on the bike course, which for being the toughest bike course on any Ironman 70.3 I was very happy with. I took off more than 30min from last year’s time.

I got off the bike and out on the run course. At the very start I felt much better then last year. I could slowly jog from the very start. However this would soon change. The fact that I had not run since April started to give me problems and I just felt that there was nothing “in the tank”. I pushed on and in the end finished it in 2h15min, a disapointing 15min longer then last year for the run.

All in all I had improved my time with 30min from last year, so I was really pleased.

Onwards and upwards from here, and in my 5-event race schedule I now equalised it to 1-1 for me against the races *smile*