One of my swim group clients, Brad Hobbs and I met once a week for a few months before his Iron Man Triathlon. Recently, I emailed Brad to see how it went. Below is his reply:
PROGRESSION
Slow and awesome. Really…really….really….hot. 97-98 degrees and much hillier than expected. People were dropping like flies on the bike and run due to heat, once I saw that I wisely slowed up and thought “Just finish.” I didn’t want to spend a year training and then have to DNF because of overheating. Biking took about 45 minutes longer than expected. I started off strong on the run and between the 7th and 9th mile, I had a stomach issue. Nothing sounded good and I did a bad job forcing calories down. After a uuuhhh,pitstop…. I felt good and just did the Iron Man shuffle, jog, crawl from about mile 10 all the way to the end.
SWIMMING
As terrible of a swimmer as I am, I’ll be 100% honest. It was the easiest part of any triathlon I have ever completed. Other than your weekly class, I only did a hand-full of long pool sessions so I was a little worried. The big thing your class helped me with was heart rate and breath control, just getting into a groove. I never once felt panicked or like I was working. The gun went off and I just had a nice and relaxing dip in the lake. I was expecting to be on the slow side between 1:30 and 1:40 but I finished at 1:25 and got out of the water totally pumped! That’s a credit to your teachings being put to use!
THE FINISH LINE
The Iron Man finish line is easily the MOST awesome place on earth. I put a beer in my special needs bag and cracked it open in the last mile, chugging as I crossed the finish line. Best moment of my life.
DOING IT AGAIN
I’m not sure how much mentally I’m ready to hard train for something. Iron Man training took a lot out of me, but I definitely want to complete another one. I learned soooo much in the first one.
“The Iron Man Finish Line is easily the MOST awesome place on earth.” – Brad Hobbs
