New Balance Victoria HIM - Heidi

[Heidi]

As most of you know this was my first Half Ironman. The week leading up to the race was filled with a mixture of nervousness and doubt, every ache and pain imaginable and a bit of excitement. Mostly, I was resigned to the fact that it looked like I was actually going to have to go through with it. So here’s my blow by blow account of the day. Yep, it’s long, with more detail than anyone probably cares about, but oh well.

Tony, the kids, and I headed up to Victoria Friday morning after retrieving my lost wedding ring (long story). After taking a wrong turn in Tsawwassen, we arrived just in time to miss the noon ferry. We got on the next boat and arrived at the hotel around 3:30. At check-in we were give a 2-room suite (instead of one bedroom with a pullout couch). Score! The rest of Friday and Saturday were spent doing a little sightseeing, checking in the bike, getting all the gear ready, etc.

Pre race:
Up at 4:30 and ate my oatmeal with raisins and walnuts and a cup of coffee and started drinking my Nuun. I was feeling okay, not a great night of sleep but not horrible either. I had lots of anxiety dreams, like forgetting all of my nutrition, couldn’t find my socks, etc. Tony and I headed down to the lobby to meet up with Kyla, my friend that talked me into this mess and who I did a lot of my training with. She had 2 people with her who were without a car a looking for a ride, so we toted them along as well. We got to transition about 5:30 and got in line to pick up the timing chips and get body marked. Got everything set up and hit the Porta Potty line. Saw Chris and Lee and wished them luck and got some good last minute advice from Chris. Struggled into the wetsuit and went down to the beach to “warm up”. I even tried to do a couple of pickups. Okay, one.

Swim:
I swam over to the start area to scope out where to line up. I went to the inside, but pretty far away from the main pack, which may mean I didn’t have the straightest line to the buoys (although it looked straight out from where I was standing). I placed myself a few rows back from the front in a little pocket of space. I was standing on my tippy toes (waist deep water for most). The howitzer went off and I started to swim. The water felt great and I was swimming steady looking for my first draft. There were lots of people all around, but it wasn’t the melee I was expecting. I was doing a good job of swimming hard, but not too hard, I felt. I found lots of drafts, but would always seem to lose them to someone else. Generally, I always had someone to swim behind, or a group not too far in front. I felt great and the buoys kept appearing at regular intervals. In no time I was at the first turn buoy, swam another 100m or so and then the turn for the home stretch. About 20 yards from shore I got clobbered and had to pick my head up, which forced my legs down and I got a gigantic calf cramp. I swam the rest of the way in with my foot flexed, which helped and it seemed to be okay when I reached the shore. I actually enjoyed the swim!
Time: 36:33

T1:
My plan was to take it easy in transition and get my HR in check. I decided to go with arm warmers, socks and toe covers, since it was a little cool and I was happy I did. I strapped on my Garmin with a lot of difficulty and then as I went to start it realized it was upside down, so I had to redo it. In hindsight, I should’ve tried to speed things up as it still took a couple of miles on the bike to get my HR down anyway.
Time: 3:11

Bike:
I felt good right away, although as I mentioned the HR was up there. I wanted to take off, but reminded myself I had a long ride ahead. On the first little uphill I decided to shift to the small ring, and like an idiot dropped my chain. I greased my whole self getting it back on and rejoined the race. About 5 miles into the ride, my Garmin started beeping at me, the screen said “Lap database full, delete oldest laps.” So I did. Except it just kept beeping at me and saying the same thing every time I pressed enter. Eventually I gave up and turned it off. So much for keeping an eye on my HR and pace for the run. Oh well. I was riding a pace that felt sustainable, spinning on the hills and not worrying about my speed, just thinking about saving my legs. I started drinking my Infinit at 15 minutes in and every 15 minutes throughout the ride. I felt great, except for having to pee. I had been undecided about what to do when this happened. About 2/3 through the first lap it started raining pretty hard, which seemed like a good time to go, so on a downhill I stood and well, went. Lovely feeling, filling up your shoes. Maybe I didn’t do it right? Nobody mentioned any particular technique. Thankfully, the rain gave me a good rinse and I rode through some puddles that splashed me as well.

Finished up lap 1 and headed back out. There was more of a headwind on the 2nd lap and I was feeling it a bit from the continuous up and down of the course. The bike course was tough, but a really nice ride. I enjoyed the whole thing. I knew I was going to have to pee again, so I waited for the rainy section again, but it had cleared up. I remembered Bryan’s advice about getting water at the bottle exchange, so I waited until after the aid station. Not as easy as the first time as I waited so long to go. Guess I must have hydrated well! Hit the out and back and made it back to transition.
Time: 3:11

T2:
During the bike I had thought about how clever I was to have dry socks in T2 for the run (I have been having some blister issues and wanted to wear my “special socks”), since my feet were soaked from the rain (and pee). Now it dawned on me that it had rained in transition too. Doh. Oh well, I changed anyway, ditched the arm warmers and useless Garmin and headed out.
Time: 1:30

Run:
As I came in to transition I saw I had caught my friend Kyla (good swimmer, 29 minutes), we both hit the exit at the same time and I was glad I would have somebody to run with. My legs felt great, not that tired and no cramping. Yay! She had her Garmin, so I could check my pace and make sure I didn’t start off too fast. Lap 1 went well, no issues, took a Powerbar gel every 20 minutes and water at the aid stations, and we came through right at 54 minutes. About 2k into the 2nd lap Kyla wasn’t feeling as peppy and told me to go ahead. I latched on to a guy right in front of me and tucked in behind him. At this point the outside of my left knee was getting progressively tighter (IT band?), but it wasn’t anything I needed to stop or slow down for. My pace seemed pretty even. About 3k to go I tried to pick it up, I’m not sure if I did, but it felt like it. I finally made it back to the park and saw my family. Tony said the kids wanted to run in with me, I said I wasn’t sure if it was allowed and he said lots of kids were running in with their parents so I said okay. Of course, they start running pretty fast and are talking to me and trying to high five me, and I’m thinking they’re going to knock me over. I look up and see the clock says, 5:40:52, and I want to make it before it changes to 5:41, so I try to sprint and my legs say, “WTF?” I believe that is what you see in the picture Lee posted.
Time: 1:47

Overall time: 5:40:56

Well, I met and exceeded any expectations I had of myself and racing this distance. I really loved it and had a great time the whole race. I will do another Half. You read it here. Ironman? Never!

P.S. I’m sore.

heidi, great race, and great race report!! glad you included all the gorey details and the pic of you sprinting in with your kids is great!!

[Lee]

Nice job Heidi. I am glad I got to talk to you when you finished. Also, I got out of the water 5 seconds before you and it was nice hearing your name on the PA as I headed to T1. I had a feeling our swim time was going to be close!!

[andrew]

never riding behind you again. well done heidi...fantastic race

Thanks for the gory details! I love it. Awesome race. It sounds like you really kept your head about you, depsite all of the technical difficulties. Congratulations on such a great race!! I can't wait to hear more. I love the picture of you and the kids.

Kara
P.S. You should be sore!!!

[max]

Great race and race report Heidi! I also said no to an Ironman after my first half Ironman two years ago

[Deb Rubens]

I can't believe you were worried you weren't even going to finish. You smoked it Heidi!

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Vo2 Multisport > Race Reports > New Balance Victoria HIM - Heidi Reply to Thread Welcome, Deb Rubens.


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Thread: New Balance Victoria HIM - Heidi Reply to Thread

[eriks]

Great Job Heidi!!! Great race report. Doesn't it feel good to accomplish a half.

[BryanU]

Dang Heidi - for your first time, you sure made it through without much trouble and with a great time. I think the half might be a little short for you.

I remember the first time I peed on the bike and felt it all running into my shoes and the same thought occurred to me about whether I was doing it right. (I'm laughing out loud just thinking that any person would wonder if they were peeing themself correctly or not!)

IM? Never say never!

Great job - congrats!

Great job Heidi! Yeah, when I saw your time I was smiling about how worried you were at Kara's BBQ - you killed it!

A few random thoughts...

- It takes my HR a long time to come down after a swim for me too - sometimes something like 30 minutes before it'll be normal for how hard I'm riding. So that's normal and just a cue to ride comfortable and not be freaked by the number...

- I've found the best way to execute the Combat Pee is to stand and push the bike over to one direction as far as it'll go, then put the other leg so that the knee is forward so it's not a straight leg down onto your shoe. Works for boys at least...your mileage my very. If it's not racing, a good rinse is a good idea with some water, mostly because it's abrasive...

- Good job just turning off the Garmin rather than continuing to futz with it.