What an amazing experience! It was my first Ironman and I had the perfect race for me. 2.48 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride, 26.2 mile run. 11 hours, 55 minutes.
I stood on the short beach for the mass start. The water was a cool 59.5 degrees, but felt great once I got in. 2500 other racers all jumped in once the gun went off. I was standing close to the starting gun and lined up on the buoys, and had a ringing in my ears from the starting gun. For the first few minutes, I had to take a breath on every stroke. A woman next to me started to have a panic attack. I could see her trying to wave to the kayakers to be rescued, but there were probably 100 people in between her and the kayaker, and I was one of them. There was really nowhere for us all to go. I can see why she was panicking. It was noisy with people shouting and a rescue helicopter overhead. I got bonked on the head by someone's elbow, which caused both ears to ring. At that point I suddenly relaxed, and the Beach Boys Good Vibrations popped into my head.
At that point, I just lived in the moment. Any anxiousness about being surrounded by thousands of people flailing in the water went away. It really didn't thin out for me that much as the swim went along. The first buoy corner was horrible. Another big pile up of people. I attribute this to my general lack of swimming abilities. Since I was in the pack, I was going to be surrounded by people the entire time. If I had swam out a little more away from the buoys I could've probably had more space. Fast swimmers up front had plenty of room around them, especially since there weren't as many of them.
I came out of the water in 1400th place, roughly middle of the pack for the 2500 racers. I made a quick 5 minute transition out of the wetsuit and onto the bike. I felt so great on the first 30 miles of the bike. Just felt great to be out of the water at that point and in the race. I drank an entire bike water bottle of gatorade every hour of the 6 hours I was on the bike.
I ended up passing 700 cyclists and getting into 700th place after the bike. My legs cramped up at mile 80 and I backed it off, but overall the bike ride felt great.
Just one split-second decision. My gear bag which had my CO2, tools, vittoria pit stop for the tubulars started bouncing off my rear tire. Well the dudes that sold me the XLab gear bag didn't know you can't use the XLab straps on the XLab XWing (a carbon attachment that fits on the back of the seat post) because the straps wore through rubbing against the carbon! They have to be screwed in using the alan screws used for the optional water bottle attachment.
Oh well, my gear bag was bouncing off my rear tire hanging only by the velcro attached to the seat post. So I thought - "I don't need this" - and I jettisoned the gear bag. This was mile 40. I then thought for the 72 miles remaining, maybe I should've kept a few of those tools in case I needed them. So I got lucky there, I wasn't thinking so clearly in the heat of the race.
When I got to the bike to run transition, I was in roughly 700th place. Another 5 minute transition and I was out on the run. It had warmed up a bit by this point, about 7 1/2 hours into the race. I think it was about 76 degrees outside at this point. The first 7 miles I saw a number of people throwing up and delirious on the side of the running path. A beautiful running path along Lake Coeur d'Alene. The run seemed so easy for me for the first 13.1 mile lap. There were spectators and volunteers everywhere. I got to have pretzels, bananas, oranges, gatorade and water at every aid station. When I got to mile 18 everything dramatically slowed down. I could see the field ahead and they were all noticeably moving slower.
A few brave souls pushed ahead through the morass at a higher tempo. I felt pretty bogged down, but I knew if I pushed myself I could possibly break 12 hours. I needed some inspiration. At mile 21 there was an aid station sponsored by Ford that had a big LED screen that triggered messages based on your timing chip. To my surprise, Erinn and the kids had entered a message for me: "Daniel Warner, U R a true jedi!" So awesome! Then Rush Tom Sawyer started blaring over the speakers. I was pumped and powered my way to the finish line arms in the air victorious.
