IMMOO (aka, Ironman Wisconsin) - Race Recap - or better yet - SHARON SHACHAR YOU ARE AN IRONMAN
Yes, I'm about 11 months behind on this race recap. I am 5 days away from starting my second ironman distance triathlon and have been spending time thinking about this year's race plan, nutrition, packing list, and just generally obsessing about the coming race. I though it would be a good idea to reflect on last year race and finally summaries what it felt like. True, memories that are 1 year old are not as fresh as right after the race, but that's all I got. I promise next week a more timely race recap. For those who are not sure exactly what is an ironman (or IM) distance triathlon it is a one day event comprised of 2.4 miles (3.8 km) swim, 112 miles (180 km) bike and 26.2 miles (42.2 km) run. This total distance of 140.6 must be completed within 17 hours. For many years the thought of that scared me, and it still does, that is why I must start with the months/weeks leading to the race and then move to the race itself.
I'm signing up for Ironman Wisconsin - what? me? no way!
When my friend Jeannine asked me several years back (when I still lived in NYC) when am I going to go an ironman, my answer was NEVER. Well, I guess I now learned the meaning of the phrase, "never say never" as 2013 should have been the answer. Yes, when I lived in NYC and worked at a large law firm it was very hard to commit to training for an iroman, so back then this is how I felt. It all changed when I moved to Chicago for an in-house job, which provided me with a better work life balance, so the notion of doing one started to poop into my head. It also helped that we were new in the area and didn't know that many people so social commitments were not in the way, and the tipping point was that my other half, who understood what it takes (well, neither of us really understood what it took), was 100% supportive.
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| Volunteering at IM Wisconsin 2012 |
Training for my first IM
How do I train for something like this? I had no idea. Before signing up to IM Wisconsin, I have done about 6 half ironman distance races, a few Olympics and sprints, but this is different, I'm going to have to run a marathon after I rode for 112 miles, oh yeah and swam 2.4 miles. So being the logical person that I am and acknowledging the fact that I have no idea how to train for this (plus having the tendency of over-training), I hired a coach and was trying to follow the the training plan he developed for me, while balancing my work, need to travel and wish to spend time with my other half. Lucky for me, my other half is also a triathlete, although shorter distances, so part of the training we were able to do together. It helped a lot. I also joined Vision Quest Coaching (VQ in short) to have people to train with and facilities as well.
I wont bore you with details of all the long hours of training, but I will say that I probably rode the IM bike course in every possible weather condition (well maybe not in snow, but there was freezing rain, brutal winds, hot days, and nice sunny windy days). That course is no joke, it is relentless, ups and downs, turns and bad roads. I've hit some lows on that course in training, I even broke down in tears doubting that I could actually do this once or twice and I hit also hit some highs. When I got to race day, I felt like I knew the course and knew what to expect.
My biggest fear was the swim. 2000-3000 athlete all starting at the same time, plus the distance, I have never swam that far before. I am not a strong swimmer, but more like middle of the pack, and I've always had issues with open water swimming, so a lot of my training focused on fixing that (or at least trying to). Living in Chicago (vs NYC) made it easier to practice open water swims. In the weeks leading to the race, I tried to swim at least once a week at Ohio street beach (where most triathlete practice open water swim in downtown Chicago, well at least this is what I was told), which helped. I also signed up for the Lake Monona open water swim for the 2.4M distance. After that, I knew I could finish the distance and I had a good idea of where to position myself for swim start. I was still nervous about the swim, but there is nothing else I could do about that, well except of obsessing of course.
I also spend a lot of time reading about IM distance races, race reports, different race day plans and strategies, race day nutrition, pacing etc. A blog that I found highly useful, and ended up adopting her run race strategy was Trimarni's blog, I read every possible post she wrote on IM races and more. Thank you Marni for your amazing blog. I also got help from a nutritionist on race day fueling, which helped a lot.
As the race was getting closer, I was more and more worried about pacing myself on the bike. Everything I read suggested that not going too strong on the bike is key. I kept reading statements like "you must pace yourself", but to me it was very hard to conceptualize - What does that mean? how do I do that or how do I know I'm doing that? I mentioned my concern to Robbie Ventura, founder and owner of VQ and a former professional cyclist. Immediately he had the answer for me, he booked me in for a lactate threshold test and based on its results he was able to determine my pacing watts/HR. Very scientific, focus on the numbers, which worked perfectly for me. All I needed to do on the bike (well, other than keep pedaling and watching the road) was to make sure I maintain the said wattage, not go above the max wattage, simple as that (I just needed my power meter to work well that day :-)
After long months of preparations race week finally came, not without the small hump. 5 weeks before the race during IM 70.3 Steelhead I bruised the bottom of my foot and it was painful to run. My friend Ken Chin had the perfect solution. Within minutes he scheduled me to see Dr. M. Chin from Chicago Running Institute and within 3 laser treatments the pain was all gone and I could run again pain-free.
I felt like I did everything I could, I had a plan and I was going to stick to it and I had a goal - to finish (and of course I had my secret goal which added "in under 13 hours"). I was nervous for sure, but the work was done, we were heading to Madison.
Race Weekend
Luckily, Madison, WI, is a short 2.5 hours drive from Chicago, so we loaded the car on Friday morning and were there before noon. After checking into the hotel we headed to packet pickup. The line was long, and I was feeling the pressure. All I wanted to do is be in and out as soon as possible and go hand out with my friends.
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| Race bags all packed |
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| Love the M Dot cut |
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| View of the finish line Pre Race |
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| This is what the transition looked like on Friday |
Saturday was spent mostly in the room resting and watching Ironman inspirational movies. We did go out to have a large breakfast and walk around the expo for a bit, raked the bike and the transition bags, but mostly per all the advice I got, I tried to stay off my legs.
Race Day
To my surprise, I was able to sleep for a few hours the night leading to the race, but only a few. I woke up with the first buzz of the alarm clock (or 4 alarms, can't be too safe). I had my usual pre race breakfast, garbed my stuff and we all headed to transition for final preps and then to swim start. As we were heading from the transition towards the lake, I looked at the water, the lake that was so calm the day before looked a "little" choppy. I immediately looked to the other side, trying to block the negative thoughts. I was nervous and was trying not to show it.
Swim - Time to go into the water. I remember the music was blasting, and I was trying to relax, listening to the music, moving my head to its sounds and walking slowly towards the water. As planned, I positioned myself on the right side in the water. My intention was to start in the back, but I ended up being in the middle of the right side, which stressed me out a little, but too late to change it now. It's almost 7am, I can hear the countdown and then the cannon went off. Like a machine, I turn my Garmin on and just started swimming, I immediately got into a swimming groove. Hmmm, that was surprising, no panic attacks. Excellent. I kept swimming and swimming focusing on getting to the next buoy. The lake was choppy and as I was making my way to the far side of the swim course it got choppier, but I was just thinking, keep swimming and get to the next buoy. I had some other swimmer bump into me, grab my foot, but I did not let that stop me, I just kicked with my leg and kept swimming. I started to swim faster (well my kind of faster) as I was seeing the swim exit, that's it I could stand, volunteers were extending their hands to help me out of the water. I was done, swim is over. I take a look at my watch, wow 1:31h, not bad. I hit lap on my watch and ran towards transition.
Bike - I honestly don't remember much about the bike, yes it was windy (after all most of the course is by the corn fields of Wisconsin), I was focusing on on my watts, not to go too fast, trying to keep my pace up, eating drinking. The first lap went OK, on the second lap, I remember getting tired and slowing down. Then I saw Tommy (one of the VQ coaches) on one of the hills when there was no one else around, that make me pick up the pace. I was starting to get a headache and didn't know if it was from not drinking enough or just all these bumps on the road in the aero position (probably a little of both), I also really needed to pee but really did not want to stop(finally at mile 80 I couldn't take it anymore as I was slowing down too much and just stopped). The one great thing I remember about the bike is the amazing crowd support on the bigger hills on the course. People were standing on both sides of the narrow roads, cheering, yelling, holding funny signs, wearing crazy costumes (I even saw the devil guy, like the one from the grand tours, I am sure I wasn't imagining it). Someone wrote on the road "Shut up legs" and it made me smile. This support totally made me feel like I was riding in the Tour de France. On one of the hills (Timber Line, I think it is called) people were BBQing, the smell of the cooking meat, wow, and all I have to eat is Bonk Breaker and Gel. Lucky me, I though smiling. OK, Sharon, back to climbing. I made it through the bike at exactly the time I was shooting for 6:30 hours. I am heading up the ramp back to transition, take my shoes off, get off the bike, hand it to a volunteer and run to T2 (that's bike-run transition).
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| Still smiling on the first lap |
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| Sprint to the finish |
Run - I put my soaks and running shoes on, grab my nutrition, race belt and hat and off I go, not before I make a quick stop at the sunscreen table (gotta keep those tattoos nice). Off I go, I'm running. I started a little fast and I was trying to slow myself down. My strategy was run and walk the aid station, this way I could make sure I am properly hydrating and eating, but also to give myself a break and something to look forward to and avoid walking the rest of the course. To conserve energy more I also walked the 2 steep hills on the course. Otherwise it was running all the way. The course is 2 loops course and for most of the way there are people cheering. The crowds help a lot as well as the amazing volunteers. I even saw a few familiar faces of friends and VQers that came up to cheer. One cool section is running though the Badgers football field (in the pic to the left). The run was going according to plan, my pace slowed on the second lap, but I was still running. I asked my friends Debbie and Michelle to wait for me at mile 20, where I know things would feel shitty. I was suffering then and seeing the both of them cheering made me pick up the pace.
1 more mile to go, I see the Capital, I skip the aid station and start running faster. I can now see the finish line and I sprint and give it all I have. This is it, I cross the finish line and I hear the words
SHARON SHACHAR YOU ARE AN IRONMAN
(well my last name was butchered, but I didn't care)
I finished in 12:36:41 (as you can see above), well within my hopes of sub 13 hours, and still being able to walk. Extremely happy I walked to find my friend who were waiting for me.
Thank you Debbie (who came all the way from NYC) for being there all weekend and cheering and being there via txt, phone or email when I needed a pick-me-up. Thank you Michelle, for being there during this journey and sharing it with me, I couldn't have done this without you. Thank you Beth and Patricia for all the training rides and driving up to Madison after doing your own century race. Thanks to the VQ team and coaches and to my coach Mike Thompson. Thanks to all the volunteers and the crowds on the race course, without you there will be no race.
I am truly blessed.
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