My coach just won an Ironman.

Wow, that's huge.

My coach just won Ironman Western Australia ... in a time of 8:27, his first IM win. He had a big year, finishing 3rd, 3rd and 14th at IM Oz, IM Switz and IM Hawaii. And, I believe this is his first sub 3hr marathon in an IM ... the monkey is off his back.

Hopefully the training philosophy will rub off on me in the next couple of years.

cheating

So, the question is, does taking caffeine pills during a race constitute cheating? Caffeine is a drug but a legal one. At one time, the World Anti-Doping Association classified caffeine as a banned substance, assuming you were over what equates to approximately 8 cups of coffee. They've since removed this restriction (2004).

hypocrit

Yep, I'm a hypocrit. Way back when, I swore I would never own a cell phone. But, not only do I now own one, I even send the odd text message and sometimes, I take it with me when I leave home (i do take it with me cycling at all times though).

I guess it was inevitable.

can swim/bike/run, need tan

A couple more shots of me from a week ago ... from Sparky Pics.


(notice, goggle straps under the swim cap)




(feet out of the shoes, oh yeah ... steve, you can see the new fizik saddle here)

glad i don't put my eggs in that basket.

Ironman China 2006 has been cancelled!

merry christmas ... tax cuts

You've got to respect the Liberals for having absolutely no shame whatsoever in their annoucement of tax cuts ... they have a surplus, might as well buy some votes with it.

Liberals hand out tax gifts ahead of looming Christmas election

Sadly, it works for me ... umm, does anyone know how to vote from overseas?

HIM Shepparton, 13 November 2005

The long version ...

Preliminaries: First off, a big thanks to Lynn for putting up with me getting up at 6am most days, for tagging along all day in the sun, for taking some great pictures (spectating IS seriously hard work), driving home (with a lead foot!), and being the best all-round support crew a guy could ask for. I owe you big time at your next race.

Thanks also to Mitch for putting together a great program. A tough program, but it did me well.

So, a half ironman ... swim 1.9k, bike 90k, run 21.1k ... do that as fast as you can. Let's just say I've trained more for this race, than any other previous race. Probably even more than for Ironman Canada a little over a year ago. On average, I'm swimming 9-10k, biking 200-250k and running 45-55k per week. I consider that to be a lot. But, it's all relative and I'm in Australia. Here, 200k rides and 20 hour training weeks are not unheard of.

The nutrition plan: 2 Up N Go's (like Boost) for breakfast, 2-3 bottles of sport drink on the bike, gels every 45 min, take whatever you can for the run. Note: liquid diet, a new thing for me at this distance.

The heart rate plan: On the bike, go easy and don't eat/drink anything until the HR settles in the 155-165 range, keep it there for the rest of the race.

Here is how it all went ....

The swim was rather uneventful ... I got in a good pack of about 5 or 6 guys and I sat pretty much at the back for the whole thing. Wetsuit felt great. One of the dudes in the pack had a habit of stopping to sight, so I ran into him about 30 times. Only got kicked in the head once but the goggles stayed on. Out of the water under 30 minutes, so quite happy.


(me on left)

Onto the bike ... 3 laps of 30k. Heart was screaming in the mid-170s so I knew I just needed to be patient. It took quite a while for it to come down, probably 15k. Very little wind, flat course, so it was a pretty quick pace throughout (well, quick by my standards, not the Aussie standard). Few rough patches of pavement, but generally pretty low stress. Had this weird pain in my left leg along the hamstring for the first lap, tried to stretch it out to no avail but it wasn't slowing me down. It went away after about an hour. Second lap the heart rate had settled so I pushed it to the limit (165) as much as I could. There was one section of the course where it felt like there was a head wind, but the leaves in the trees weren't moving. Starting to tire a bit at the end of the 3rd lap, but moving along alright ... race wheels will be a welcome edition. Got my money's worth in free High5 water bottles ... oh yeah. The P3 is very comfy.


(could i be more white?)


(excellent cornering skills)


(fun for all ages)


(where ARE my shoes?)


Off the bike ... 3 laps of 7k. Looked at my watch, it had been 2h 57m total, so I was ahead of what I expected. Right off the bat, I met up with a friend named PAIN. My friend would stay with me for the next 92 minutes. My vastus medialis (inside upper leg) was killing me. My stride felt awful. But, I couldn't bring myself to stop. After about 5k, it loosened up a bit, but not much. It was getting warm, but not hot. Dumped several cups of water on my head, grabbed the odd sports drink and coke when my stomach felt up to it. After the first lap, there were people everywhere and there was no telling who was in what age category or even what lap they were on. First lap, probably got passed as many times as I passed people. Second, passing more, but most were on the first lap. As I was nearing the end of the second lap, I could hear the commentator saying the lead male was in sight. I managed to hold him off and finish my second lap about 30 seconds before he finished. Had a minor celebration, and focused on getting done. The last lap was a struggle (see picture below) and I lost a couple minutes over my previous laps. But, all good. Very pleased with the result.

End result:
(4:28:23, 5th place in M25-29, 39th overall, top Canadian!)
Swim 28:47
Bike+transitions 2:27:26
Run 1:32:10


(nice helmet head)


(who's that behind the tree?)


(looking oh-so-fresh)


(looking strong in the finish chute)


(on closer inspection, maybe not)

5 weeks to do it all again.

16 weeks until ironman.

the skinny

Had a great race in Shepparton!

The short version:

Total Time: 4h 28m 23s

swim 28:47,
bike+transitions 2:27:26,
run 1:32:10
(all personal bests)

5th place 25-29
39th overall
(note that I finished 39th overall and 5th place in age category at the P'boro HIM about 16 months ago ... though a difference in time of 21m 30s! Pretty tough competition here in Australia)

Pictures and such later.

triathlon update

it's official. just registered for ironman new zealand, march 4th, 2006 ... $625 NZD (which is actually much cheaper than im oz given the currency exchange) ... so, here we go again. 16 more weeks to prepare.

luckily, i'm going to make an appearance in taupo for a half ironman in 7 weeks time, after a stop in wellington for a conference and a visit to my brother in auckland. jason is also doing the race. hopefully, lynn can pop by and watch us in our self-induced misery.

and, 3 more sleeps until my first triathlon in australia. should be a fun event, easy flat course, should be the fastest for the distance, with many of melbourne's finest athletes in attendance.

Why John Howard couldn't wait ...

So, here we go. John Howard was very adamant about getting some anti-terror legislation passed and really fast. (read: allowing the police to detain without arrest and all kinds of other powers given to police and authorities). It's a fine line between preventing terrorism and protecting civil liberties.

To be honest, I don't know all the details ... though I did attend a "left of left" anti-terror-law rally a couple of weeks ago. I wasn't that impresssed really. The crowd seemed more interested in bashing Howard simply for the sake of it, then listening to some of the better speakers make decent remarks.

Anyways, here is the reason why the new laws were passed so quickly. BIG (and I mean BIG) shakedown in both Melbourne and Sydney this morning that these laws facilitated.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/051107/2/woy9.html

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200511/s1500149.htm


I'm going to wait for the dust to settle on this one. I hope they have justification for all this, that's all I can say.

On the Juice

Are any pro cyclists clean? Now, I don't want to jump to conclusions on this year's Vuelta champion, but it looks like Roberto Heras is at least getting dragged down in alleged EPO use. I don't know the science of these tests. Are these guys just super duper hematocrit producers ... or is everyone on the juice?

Here is the link:
Heras Vuelta sample positive

It seems like the defense of denying everything and paying a lawyer has been successful so far (e.g. Rutger Beke).

yuck, salt water

did an open water swim (probably ~2km) in the bay this morning. I certainly appreciate the extra buoyancy of salt water, but man, it tastes aweful.