Busselton 70.3

“Meyrueis, Lozère June 26, 1977. Hot and overcast. I take my gear out of the car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of those lives shocks me”.

The Rider, Tim Karabbe. Opening paragraph.

Shocking

This triathlon thing keeps rolling around season after season. It’s not uncommon to be asked by people outside the sport “How long are you going to keep doing those crazy triathalon things?” Which always struck me as a bit strange – you wouldn’t ask a 40-year-old golfer ‘So are you planning on giving up the walky, hitty ball thing soon?’ But the reality is that endurance sports ARE quite a bit different to golf, in that the physical and mental toll to compete at a decent level in endurance sports is…tough.  Part of me wants to be still smashing out tris in my 60s and 70s like most golfers or lawn bowlers.  But part of me says "Enough is enough and you're already on the way down,  just give it up".

I'll probably be doing this when I'm 90 anyway.......

There is something as addictive as crack about this sport that makes it tough to get off it, especially when you’ve had some success. It becomes such a part of your identity and you tend to begin to classify people as being “in the sport – i.e. they “get it” or outside the sport – “they don’t get it”.  After qualifying for Hawaii, it’d probably be fair to say I’d taken my eye off the ball somewhat. How long could I keep the game up? I’ve acheived most of what I wanted to in the sport, I’m well aware of my strengths and weaknesses and what level athlete I am. I don’t have a chip on my shoulder anymore trying to prove how good I am.  Who was it that said, “Satisfaction is the death of desire"? So many of the best athletes have a tough past with a burning desire to prove their value to the world, and I get that, but it's hard to sustain long-term and I don't really have it any more. I'd even gotten tired of the race-reports, my fans had grown worried - not a year or two would go by without someone saying "Hey what's happened to your race reports, I enjoyed those".

I keep hitting refresh, and still no report!

During the dark moments of race days and training sessions, I’d promised myself a hundred times that I was “done with this shit”. But what was the alternative?  To become a ‘non-racer’ like Tim Krabbe’s strangers on the sidewalk? I couldn’t face it. Not yet anyway. So onwards it is to another season.  Like getting older and slowing down – it beats the alternative. The winter had been a long and busy one, and fortunately for us with many large debts to pay off, business had been great. We were up to 5 locations with over 20 staff; there was lots of powder snow to be shredded and good times in a resort town to be had. Training often took a low priority, but the uber-seasonal roll of our lives and the enforced break in training does make this sport more attainable long term. It’s just that our off-season is a bit longer and more relaxed than most. 

Off season double chins

As well as the distractions of a busy resort life and business, with the haemachromatosis I’d donated/discarded more than 6 pints of blood over 12 weeks trying to get my high iron levels under control. I got on first name basis with the nurses and docs at my hospital in Sapporo. This helped me deal with my high iron and was a good long term investment for my longevity, but was not great for  endurance ability and made training even harder and easier to avoid.

Doing ma bit.

To top it off a HK 7s weekend saw me land in Hawaii for our holiday/training camp in a pretty low state of fitness. We had 3 decent weeks of training in Hawaii in April, but unfortunately not enough to make up for all the sins of the winter. Anyway it was on to the first race of the season with a fair bit of trepidation, knowing that all levels were ‘sub-optimal’. I was swimming pretty crap, bike power was well down, and running was below its usual average level. Coach Woody had been doing some more normal periodisation this season with more longer and easier stuff in Hawaii that meant we were still a bit slow.

Seemed like a god idea at the time. Four weeks 'til Busso

Still we had several friends racing there, it was an easy flight down from Singapore, and we’d never done the half in Busso. The Half Ironman there is run by Triathlon WA and was their key event (the Full is run by Ironman in US) it had a reputation of being almost a bigger event than the full, it sold out in about 4 hours and we’d been on our game and entered, so by hook or by crook we were in and racing.

Busselton has really taken to triathlon over the past 8 years and there could be an argument to say it has become the triathlon capital of Australia, with two iconic races every years, the locals have embraced the events and what the events bring to their town. We got the Qantas direct flight down which was about 4.5 hours and our Life Qantas Club membership and the access to the lounge in Singapore made the choice of airline easy =).

We were staying in the terrific  Beds By The Bay Busselton guest house, which is a really special place, the owners Mike and Beth feel like family members now, and our mate Josh Rix was staying too, to make it more fun. We got word great mate Gavin Stuart and his girl Anna and brother Andrew were in as late entrants too, so some post-race fun was guaranteed. 

Love this joint.

SWIM 1.9kms 30 min

My swim had not been going very well since Kona for some reason. I think the 50m resort pools in Singapore were part of the issue – it’s hard to push yourself in those type of pools, and trying to swim regularly in winter is tough. A few times I’d driven to the snow-covered car park in the Alpen Hotel in Niseko, sat in the car for a few minutes, been unable to face the thought of swimming and pulled back out of the car park and driven home. It’s tough to train in winter blah blah blah, wah wah wah.

Anyway it was good to toe the line with mates Gavin Stuart and Singapore-based stud Mark Jansen, who I introduced shortly before the start, thinking they would be sharing the podium in a few hours, as they ended up doing. The gun went and I just didn’t seem to be able to sustain moderate effort; the swim was uneventful aside from some directional issues and leaky goggles. It was clam and clear, on it’s day the swim in Busso is up with the best in the sport. I was not surprised to see the clock at 30mins on getting out. Pretty crappy time.

Bike 2.12.53

Onto the bike and I knew my mad bike skillz were not as mad as I’d like but I was hoping for some divine intervention on race day to throwback to my days of 350ftp levels. As I knew my power was way down I put extra effort into free speed for this race and think I had as much possible free-speed as I’ve ever had in a race. I reckon I was the most aero dude on the course. I was rocking my new long sleeve race suit and taped over every exposed rough bit and bolt on my bike, had speed-optimised, but high puncture risk wheel, tyre and tube selection, and a few other aero tricks. The wind don’t confront me none. 

Slippery lil' sucker

Our wave started about an hour after the pros which meant they were on their second lap as we were starting on our first and as I jumped on the bike I heard the terrific and highly amusing announcer Simon Beaumont say  - “Here comes professional Matt Burton – he’ll be looking for one of the fastest” bike splits of the day – look out for a 2.04 for him”. I thought he was ahead of me but then about 10kms in and Matt Burton did indeed come by and I though “ I’m hitching a ride on that train” and tagged on his tail - at legal distance, of course! He was being a bit erratic and I could tell he was tiring with his speed varying between 43-40 depending on his mood, it meant for lots of coasting to keep legal distance. The course for the half was pretty much 2 x 22.5km out and back route.

We turned at 22.5kms and he started to sit up and stretch and slowed to into the 30’s for a bit after the U turn. “Stuff this” I thought and was sick of concentrating so much to deal with this bloke’s mood and went to the front. I put my head down and gave it some gas. 5 minutes later I looked back and he was nowhere to be seen. Damn – I dropped a strong pro rider (albeit a neo-pro) not bad for my miserable state. 

I thought we wiz mates, mate.

That was about the highlight of my day and as good as it got.  I went through 40kms in 57.30 and felt OK but I was pretty much riding the race as hard as I possibly could. Anyway he ended up coming back aside me in the suburbs just as we got back into Busso and I said, “Mate what happened I thought we were a team?” He just smiled and we entered the centre of town together. The power and motivation dropped a bit second lap as I was totally on my Pat, just passing waves ahead, and it was hard to stay focused. I managed to keep the pace enough but was still a minute slower than Gav and Mark J who both went about a minute faster than me.

RUN 1.58

Onto the run and I somehow knew it was not going to end well. The hard bike in combination with my lack of fitness left me pretty vulnerable for a capitulation and so it was. After 7kms I was just about spent mentally and physically could not stride out at all. I could only shuffle home at granny pace and could not wait for it to be over. A bad job finished again.

Bad job completed.

The after party was the highlight of the weekend with a good crew joining us at our place which has it’s own wood-fired pizza oven, for some scrumptious home made pizzas. The pizza and wine party morphed onto the awards party and Gav crushed it with an AG win just holding off Mark J - I was stoked for them both and even more so for Anna who had a memorable day after a year or more of injuries, finally getting to the finish line and in fast time too, fourth in her AG!  She even beat Ness who was in a similar stage of her fitness to me and did not have a great day either. We kicked on to another bar after the awards and after busting some fully sick dance moves there, my hips locked up a bit and together with my fatigue, I bent over with hands on knees to rest, but the bouncer was checking me out and thought I was about to vomit all over the dance floor, so turfed me! Josh and Anna tried to reason with him but I was back in the same state as at the 7km mark of the run. Done like a diner again - time to shuffle home. I am sure that meathead was just jealous of the big moves I was pulling.

My hip was just locked up 'Aiight

We stayed down in Busso for an extra day to get another ride in – when it’s not race day, the roads there are like training on an indoor trainer. You keep checking your watch every 10 minutes to see how long you’ve been riding. Pretty boring!

Anyway next up Bintan to try and make it to the finish line this time and I guess IM Cairns, which I will no doubt have a shocker at, but will give it a crack all the same.

Look forward to catching up with old friends soon.

Ironman Hawaii 2013

The Most famous pier in sport?

One of the great things about this sport is that your average punter can compete right alongside the best in the world in the time honoured races.  If you’re a serious golfer, you probably will never get the chance to play a round at Augusta, or if you're a tennis player, you’ll probably never get to hit a ball at Wimbledon, and if you are, and you are lucky enough to do those things, it won’t be alongside the best, while the tournament is on. But in triathlon, if you're lucky and work hard, you can. When we first got into the sport, we weren’t that fussed about racing Hawaii – probably because we never thought it would be possible, and for the first few years, I didn’t think I’d ever be good enough. But as the training hours accumulated; slowly but surely we started to see that it could be possible. This race became the beautiful girl you saw only from afar, and thought you would never have a chance with, but given some persistence and effort, and one day she’s lying next to you in your bed (or you’re married to her!) and you’re bobbing in the water off Dig Me Beach in Kona waiting for the gun. Dreams can come true blah blah blahzzzzzz. 

Me heading out on the Queen K on the run - still 25 kays to go???

The race in Whistler that I’d qualified in was seven weeks before Hawaii – which is a bit of a tricky time between Ironmans. I had done Ironmans 2 weeks and 4 weeks apart in the past, which are almost easier as you get 'two for the price of one' (one training build) and don’t really need to do much in between the two. But 7 weeks is enough for you to lose your fitness. When you take out the recovery and taper, it leaves a tricky window of training. As we’ve been flat out getting our clinic in Singapore off the ground and training motivation was low after the come-down from the highs of IM Canada, it made it all the more difficult. Still, I’d had a pretty relaxed attitude coming into this race, possibly too relaxed as I had missed a few sessions here and there, and knew my condition was not as good as before Canada. I knew that I wasn’t going to be competing for a high ranking here and the race is the World Championships, so by definition, does not lead anywhere else. It was always going to be a hot race, so not really ideal for me, in fact, I wanted to qualify more than I wanted to actually participate in the race at Kona. It’s kind of weird, as some CEO/charity slots go for $50,000 or so on eBay just for the right to race, but for me I just wanted to be classified as a ‘Kona Qualifier’. Or more correctly, to lose the tag of "Chump who missed out lots of times, thinks he’s good enough to make it, but really isn’t". 

Over the last few years, if you were friends of ours coming over for dinner, I could just picture the pre-dinner briefing scene in the car: Husband to wife – “Oh and by the way don’t say anything about the Hawaii Ironman to Bevan – the night will go much smoother, and with any luck we’ll get in and out of there as quickly as possible, with no plates broken.”  

Don't mention it.

My parents and their granddaughter / my niece Maggie had made the trip up from Australia which was great, especially as it was all quite last minute and a lot of the accommodation was booked already. Mum and Dad took a rare flight too as they usually prefer to travel on the earth’s surface, and in fact had just gotten back from a round the world trip where they didn’t take one plane. My sister Evelyn and her man Jack, had kindly paid for Maggie to join along for the fun of the event too. She'd come out to Busso a few years ago and loved it, so was great to have the three of them along.  Vanessa’s Dad David is a GP and came to Hawaii last year to support Ness and had come back again this year again and Vanessa, him and me were all attending the Ironman Sports Medicine Conference the week before the race. Yes it was now a ‘work trip’ =). 

You're All Winners!

This made race week quite hectic as the time outside of the conference was taken up with registration, the occasional workout and the other usual race-week stuff. On the way over Vanessa said to me on the flight she felt some pain in her throat – damn – "That's no good" I said, and sure enough, about 3 hours later, I had the same pain. Unfortunately it developed into a bit of a nasty cold and we both had a few bad sleeps race week as I was coughing and expelling mucous half of the night, we both and had killer sore throats and runny noses. Im still coughing up gunk now ten days after the race. I remembered back to the Tuesday before IM Canada when I got in from a ride and felt some pain in the throat - 'no surely it can't be a cold I thought' and made a deal with the devil and I had some more water and my throat felt fine later that day and it was gone. It reminds me of the tingle I felt on my top lip 4 days before my wedding - the same tingle that had always turned into a massive cold-sore a day later. But somehow this one just went with only a mild discolouration. After somehow getting out of jail for the 'big-one', I always take cold-sores with a bit more grace when they come these days, just as I did this cold. OK you gave me Canada, I'll cop Hawaii.

See you in Hawaii Robert.

We got through the week doing all the obligatory events – Parade of Nations, Slowtwitch Party, the new Triathlon Australia breakfast, which was great as TA reached out to long course athletes for a change, the 7am swims at the pier star spotting, the swim out to the Coffees of Hawaii boat, Lava Java meals and coffee, but this year we missed the undies run which we forgot about! Still thanks to Justin we bagged the lucky money shot from there last year. But as ever you are looking forward to the race being over so you can relax. 

Our taper week

For nutrition, I’d decided to go with three bottles of Ensure plus meal replacement in a water bottle (about 1,000 calories) and for the slower release carbs (Sweet Potato) - after chatting with my mate from Singapore, Mark Jansen, I’d decided to mash the sweet potato and add a fair bit of coconut oil, some avocado and some butter and salt and pepper and chia seeds for the hell of it too. We got the idea to put it in a cake-decorating squeezie thing – which they make in tubes not material funnels these days, I found a pair in the cake section at Safeway that were perfect for the job, and on testing, it squeezed out quite nicely and actually tasted really nice. It was definitely a better solution to getting some slower release carbs and fat in on race day than the undercooked, olive oil soaked, shreds-of-aluminum-foil-embedded mess I had in Whistler. 

Secret recipe

 Onto race morning and we parked at Mum and Dad’s apartment and walked the last mile to the start, with nerves jangling. There’s nothing quite like the tension in the air of an Ironman morning. As the experienced campaigner in Hawaii, Ness was guiding me through all he steps – I managed to avoid the arm markings as I was racing in long sleeves all day and they make a mess of the materials. Tattoos this year.  When I was half way through the way to the bike I realized I’d left my Ensure plus bottle in the freezer and the two tubes of sweet potato mash in the fridge! Damn. I texted David but neither his or my parents phones were working – Damn Luddites! I thought about jogging back to the car but the start was less than an hour away this time and there were still tyres to be pumped and other prep to do at the bike. Vanessa gave me half a bottle of Ensure she had and a bit of pumpkin and sweet potato she had - very kind of her! I’d just have to make do with what was on course and rely on my new super-powers of using my own body fat for fuel, that I’d been working on.

Forgotten feast

Swim 3.8kms 1.03

Walking down the steps on the tiny bit of sand for the swim start was some experience. I stood on the beach for a while as I was waiting for Ness (turns out she’d already swam out the 200m to the start). It was some sight to behold, the famous rock-wall lined with thousands of spectators along the shore as far you could see, helicopters buzzing overhead, Mike Reilly on the speakers, telling everyone to get out to the start. The sky was clear blue and the water was very calm lapping over my feet – damn this is it, this is the place all the legends have stood before swimming out to make history. I took a deep breath scanned around once more, and then did a pee all down my leg. Much more comfortable than doing it while treading water I tells ya!

There were many warm patches in there

 The swim out to the start is about 20m and I lined up on the right, it seemed pretty crowded all over, and I couldn’t be bothered to swim out to the left, which was further away. Everyone was huddled in tightly close to the line with a fair few people treading water with an annoying ultra wide kick; tensions were high. There was still ten minutes to the start. A girl swam next to us with a small blow up boat harnessed behind here, with an Asian girl with some type of developmental problem in the boat. Got to love these inspirational stories. Got to love them even more when they provide an inflatable boat that can be used as a floatation device that you can hang onto for ten minutes instead of getting repeatedly frog-kicked to the thigh.

"How are you doing in there? - And remember you're not only inspirational, you're floatational, so don't forget to help out those less-fortunate than you if you have a chance". "OK Mum, I will".  Atta girl.

The famous cannon went off with an echoless boom, and we were off. It was some rough start!  It goes without saying that most of the field had qualified to get here and everyone here was pretty sharp, so I did not expect that it would be calm after 200m or so like most swims. I was proven to be correct – the flow of the swim soon became apparent; it was rough for a long time, then spaced out for a bit and got peaceful, then we’d come to a buoy and everyone would squeeze in for a minute or two and it was rough again, before separating again after the buoy. I was enjoying the swim more than any other swim I’d done on the course there, as it was often choppy but today it was still and I hit the turn at half way before I knew it. 

And....they're off.

 The swim here is not wetsuit legal, making the times a fair bit slower – especially for non-child swimmers like me who get added bonus swimming with a wetsuit over the real swimmers. With about 1km to go, the pack was tightening up again and a guy on my right was bearing left, and a guy on my left was bearing a bit right, I think I was drifting right too, so I was getting repeatedly hip and shouldered by the guy on my right. This went on for about 100ms or so and I had a good look at the hip-and-shoulder guy I was wishing would piss off - dark skin - sure enough - bloody Assad! My mate from Singapore, it’s uncanny how similar we are on the swim; we always seem to come out of the water together – I knew he was after a podium here and had a good chance to get it; we bike about the same too – I just need to run one minute per kilometer faster at my best for all my races and we’d be the same and I’d be on the podium too – damn don’t know why I’d never thought of that – will do that next time fah sure.  Assad did get on the podium with a 9.00.41 and 5th in 35-39 a truly awesome performance and achievement.

The ol' hip 'n' shoulder gets you every time.

 I eventually relented and stopped swimming for a few strokes and let him go, dropping back off the back of the squeeze we were in - 'You owe me one Assad' I thought - and he later repaid me on the bike, with some sage advice so all square. I was glad to finally see the shallow water, scrape the fingers on the sand, stand up and happy enough with my low1.03 time. About exactly what I expected.

An Ironman swim start is always some sight to behold, especially in Hawaii.

BIKE 180kms 4.54

The changing tent was pretty packed – I’d decided to wear my long-sleeved De Soto top as I think it’s more aerodynamic than skin and it keeps you out of the sun without worrying about sunscreen. Mark had given me the great advice to keep it wet before putting it on so I had it in a zip lock bag folded just so and it slipped on easily. Onto the bike and it was cool going through town for the first 10kms. People riding at crazy paces and crowds everywhere. I saw one or two had crashed on the Kuakini Hwy. Then up Palani I was keeping the watts below 350-400 and people were still passing me like I was standing still. Finally onto the Queen K (damn it’s fun to use these terms like Palani, Queen K, Hawi, Kawaihae like they are second nature – wondered what they meant for ages.). Anyway at the 1 hourish swim time and current bike pace I was in the meat of the field and there were cyclists everywhere. 

Onto the bike and yes my sunglasses have a mirror prism on them so you can see ahead while your head is down.  As you can see the chicks dig it.

About 500m onto the Queen K there were people everywhere nd a French guy, a couple of us were overtaking, decides it would be a good time to have a moan “oh what about ze drafting!” I could imagine the way the Frenchies think he was probably thinking “We will get you to ze Pyreneez and you climb ze mountain, like a real cycleest, zen we zee about ze drafteeng!” As the ride had hardly started, we were over taking him and it was a still a shitfight with riders all over the place I suggested in the kindest possible way to him that maybe we should just worry about pedaling for now and perhaps be just a little more silent.  We ended up crisscrossing back and forth for the next 100+kms without another word uttered – just lovely silence. 

Monsiuer, how well do you ride with zee baguette up your ass?

Things did spread out soon enough and I got into a rhythm. I was grabbing Gatorade at the aid stations and some shot blocks and the occasional banana, which I thought would be enough, don't know if it was or not. I was feeling OK about 60kms in and then I came upon Assad and also Mark J and Arnaud Selukov sprang up from nowhere too. It was funny – probably the only 4 guys residing in Singapore in the race and we were all together at Kawaihae. Assad, Mark and I had a quick chat - we're all part of Red Dot Racing team who have been smashing me on Saturday morning rides all year, I was particularly surprised to see Mark as he is one of the best cyclists in the field and I thought he would be up the road – turns out he had crashed early on and hurt his hip. I said to Arnaud – "How about this? You, Assad, Mark and me from Singapore all together" I was sitting up and pointing. I’d never met Arnaud before but knew of him – he was 11^th in Hawaii 40-44 last year and had actually taken the roll-down slot in Busselton that could well have been mine if I never go that littering penalty and flat. 

He seemed to have no idea who I was and just grunted something that I thought was “Merde” – French Ballet slang for "Good Luck". I went back and had a listen to the tapes and turns out he said, “Shut up you bloodee Australian peasant.... or I will murder you and Merde on you".  Apparently it also means 'shit'. 

 I noted the red mark across his number (drafting penalty) so guessed he wasn’t in a chipper mood. Lucky I didn’t tell him that he owed me a 'thank you' while we were climbing to Hawi like I was thinking about; as he took 'my' slot in WA to get into this race, probably would not hae gone down too well. He was a very thoughtful rider too pointing out dangers on the road that people rarely do in a race. Hitting the turnaround at Hawi was good fun, and despite still bringing up my share of phlegm and few coughing attacks, I felt reasonably good. I’d gone through the first 90kms in 2.12. Damn I thought I'm half way through –that means I’m going to do a 4.24 bike split.There was no tail wind after all, I was just feeling good and super aero.  I can see it now in writing, Bevan Colless 1.03/4.24/3.26 - 8.59. This is going to be easy – put that shit as a status update on Facebook, "Just went sub 9 in Hawaii" and I’d get 100+ likes for sure. Life Choices and Self Worth = Validated. Boom.

Easy Peasey from here on in.

Once I was through Kawaihae and onto Queen K it soon became apparent that there was in fact a tailwind on the way out, and I was starting to really struggle. From the Manu Lani to town is about 40kms and it felt like it was going to take me 2 hours. I was struggling to hold even 200watts – Assad came along about then and in his lovely reassuring voice said “Just stay aero and go with it” I was sitting up and squirming around like Thomas Volker– looking for answers where there were none to be had.  A draft-buster surprised me right when I'd been passed, but luckily I was on a slight downhill and looking for an excuse to stop pedalling when passed so I had done. If the draft buster was there when I was feeling good and on an uphill and was passed, I might not have been so lucky. Stopping pedalling up a hill usually means you'll fall over - one of the many intricacies of the drafting dilemma that seems so simple to most people but in reality is far from it. I really limped home with people and groups passing me and could not even tack onto them and my good bike split went out the window, even if 4.54 was not terrible, but it was a fast day and the ranking was not that good.  I was pretty glad to finally hit town again – always love the sight of the Target logo sign on the horizon on the training rides I done up and down this road and never more than today. Those lava fields are definitely pretty harsh when it’s 30+ degrees you’ve got no power in the legs and there is 40kms left till home.

Remember if the legs have got naffink, it's even more important to sty aero. 'Cause free speed is the only speed you got Mista!

RUN 42kms 4.24

I was glad to get off the bike and start the run – the first 16kms are out and back along Ali’i Drive, which is quit busy with spectators. I stopped for a pee early on, as I did not fancy 42kms soaked in pee and was not too fussed with my time either. It was a bit of a worry that even as early as 8-10kms in I was struggling. Normally the “punch in the face” happens at about the 25km mark, but I was already taking long walk breaks at aid stations 10kms in. Damn, it’s going to be a long 30kms ahead I thought.

A long, long way to go.

 The rest of the time on Ali’i and up on Palani was tough. I walked the whole of Palani – it is a decent little hill. The 10kms out to the Energy Lab and back is a pretty soul-destroying run on a wide highway with not many people about.  I was struggling to run much at all, taking in coke as much as my gut would allow but still feeling pretty terrible. Motivation was hard to come by, I basically knew my day was done, had no goals to aim for and stopped racing all-together in my head. I could not care if I do 10.01 or 12.01.  Just to get to the finish line now. If it had not been Hawaii I may well have DNF'd. Finally I made it into the Energy Lab and I started on the oranges at the aid station and they made me began to feel a bit better. 'Orange Power' as my brother Phil and I used to say when kids after eating lots of them and running amok. I was running/shuffling more, and even jogging the climb out of the Energy Lab. 

Drawing from the Orange Power reservoir in the Energy Lab

Onto the Queen K and there was still more passing me than I was passing, but I was moving along a bit better. 6kms to go and I really started to come good again and put in a few kms without walking at all and was moving along at about 5.15min k pace. My main motivation was one or two annoyingly positive Americans I was running with, some chick with a cute butt, but wearing Newtons and running with an exaggerated forefoot strike that was just an annoying and ridiculous way to run a Ironman at 5.30min k pace and some guys a kilometre or two behind me who I knew from social media that I didn’t want passing me. Oh and of course not to have my run time be longer than my bike time – which is a common source of amusement in Ironman, and would prefer to keep my sheet clean in that regard, even if I had given it a nudge.

As usual, it's a bit of both. but whatever gets you to the finish line is all right.

The turn down the hill on Palani again was pretty sweet, then the nasty little stretch along Kuakini away from the finishing line – when spectators give you mis-information - one guy says 'it’s just a kilometer', and you think 'great – I’ve got this', then 200m later a guy says ‘it’s just a mile to go, nearly there’ and your heart breaks.  Finally arriving on Ali-i Drive for the last 400 metres is certainly oa terrific experience in your life. You walk that bit of road so many times in race week and finally it becomes the finishing shute with chalk everywhere. You’ve seen it so many times before in highlight reels but it still feels like it is far removed from the mythical stretch you’ve watched the champs run down waving the flags with the Hawaiians with flamed torches dressed in native clothes ahead of them.

Gotta enjoy the finish of an IM no matter how the day went.

The post race area was better than I expected, having heard some not so great reports, but there were no showers or changing rooms and just a dingy toilet block. Food was pretty crap with pizzas and french fries. I had zero appetite anyway. I had a chat with Alex Kolesov from Tokyo who had gone 10.03 and had a pretty good day, and then went out to find my parents Maggie, David and Woody, who combined, I’d seen once all day – which was my parents and Maggie at about the exact moment on the run when it all went south. Where was the Love, Brothers?! I guess there was about 1,500 people who looked very much like me out there. I just missed Ness in the finishing shute, she did not have a great day either and we then met her for a meal and back to my parents for a debrief all together.

Bike pick up

Lame-ass post race shot - like my salt tab carrying technique! Maybe I should have remembered to take some...

 I wasn’t sure why I had a bad day. It’s always tough to know. If it’s not enough fuel (nutrition), not enough fitness, being sick, being too hot, lacking the motivation to dig deep, going too hard early on in the run or on the bike, they all mostly feel the same in my experience. You just feel like crap and start going slow. Coach Woody thinks it was the sickness, and maybe lack of calories on the bike, I think maybe it was skipping a few sessions in the lead in from Canada, and lacking the motivation to really dig deep, and just simply giving up. As a bigger guy, to do well in an Ironman run, is a pretty tricky mental exercise, you've got to want it almost more than you want to live. Whatever it was, I’m not too worried about it, I’ve now got some ‘unfinished business’ there and can try and get back there next year, race with my great mate Jess Ripper who qualified in Japan already and hopefully have a better day. As an 85kg racer it's always going to be risky to perform well there, but it won't be impossible. But getting the chance to go back there will not be easy.

Most photographed sign all week - elbows and patience were required to finally get a clear shot of it.

 Next up, I’ve got a very small chance of a slot for 2014 at Mandurah 70.3, but I think the field is stacked there and there will only be 2 slots in my age group. A return to Phuket for the race that got us started in the sport in 2005/6 and then back to Busselton, where I should have a decent chance at a slot, even though there will only be 4 in my age group to go (from prob 400+). The race there is well suited to me if it is under 30 degrees.We were going to have this year off Busso, but as I was sitting on the side of the road there last year, waiting for 30 minutes with a flat I couldn’t change, I promised myself I’d come back one more time next year and finally bag a slot there, so I'll hopefully keep the motivation and training up until then. After that, time for the off-season and snow!

Ironman's latest thing is printing on competitor's names - 3 Woody athletes amongst this lot!