A year of training, sacrifice, commitment and spending money I didn't have and it's over, it took 9 hours 52 minutes and 59 seconds and no, no Kona for me, I missed the plane by less than 2 minutes!
After dropping my Daughter at her Grandma's, Helen and I hit the road headed north for Bolton, the previous day had not been as relaxing as hoped as Helen had gone down with a nasty bug which had kept her and the loo quite well aquainted, leaving me to run around after her and Isabelle. I decided to drive the first 100 miles or so to give Helen chance to recover, a swift stop at the services just north of Birmingham to swap over and grab a coffee and we were back on the road.
We arrived at Leigh Sports Village at about midday to be told by the Rotary Club fella's manning the car park that I was bloody mad and they wouldn't swim in Pennington Flash for all the tea in China, since I don't drink tea this wasn't much of a deterent so I headed in to registration. After queing for my numbers and transition bags, I then got in line for my goody bag, goody bag collected I joined the que for my Spectators Car Park Pass after which I headed for the line to collect my tickets for the Award Ceremony, by now I was thoroughly bored of que's so I built up my bike in the Car Park and strolled round to T1 to rack my steed and to collect a Giro Advantage Aero Helmet from fellow Tri UK team mate Lee Durkin, as it turned out he'd left it at home and promised he'd pop and grab it, I think the term 'pop' should be limited to journey's of 15 minutes or less, 2 hours later I was still sat waiting when he rang to say he was back. Bike racked it was time to head over to Blackrod & Rivington High School which this year served as T2 and rack my run kit.
With registration and racking finished, we headed to the hotel to check-in and get some food before the Race Breifing at 5pm. After the breifing Helen and I walked over to the local supermarket to grab a few things to graze on in the hotel room and then at 8pm it was time for bed.
I awoke on race morning before the alarm, rather frustratingly about 20 minutes before the alarm due to athletes leaving the hotel to get to the shuttle busses and deciding to slam their doors shut. I got up and made a coffee before showering and getting into my Tri-Suit. For breakfast I drank a Meal Replacement Shake as I find it hard to stomach food so early.
Arriving at T1, I wiped down and lubricated my chain after a damp, drizzly night I certainly didn't want to ride 112 miles with a rusty chain! Ensured my tyres were inflated to the right pressure, I ran both at 100psi due to weather saying it would be damp all day, I didn't want to risk a crash riding over inflated tyres on wet roads and finally put some Gatorade onto the bike and I was ready. I headed back out to find Helen and waste time till the off.
As I walked down to the water, I was chatting to a couple of guys that were breaking their Ironman 'cherry' and were very nervous, some gentle reassurance and I got into the water. After a few strokes I looked back and saw 1,400 athletes waiting on he bank to be told to enter... Ooooops!
The swim passed fairly uneventfully, after a fast start I settled into my rhythm and was pleased to see 53 minutes on the clock as I ran up to T1. A quick transistion and I was off out onto the bike course, about 5 miles in I passed Lee who had had a phenomanal swim.
The bike went well, I felt strong until the final ascent of Sheep House Lane when I began to suffer from the strong early pace, with the finish still a fair way off I eased up a little to make sure I had the legs to run strong off of the bike.
The first few miles of the run were off-road down a very muddy, rutted , cobbled track and I was nervous that I'd turn an ankle, I thought it best to take it steady and not risk injury and finish the race, as soon as I hit tarmac again I was able to up the pace, passing Helen at about 8 miles she told me I was running in 20th place overall, and from looking up the road I could see I was gaining on a few guys ahead of me, keeping a steady pace I began to reel them in and as I passed Helen on lap 2 I'd moved up to 16th place.
Shortly after the second turn around I was passed pushing me into 17th place, with only 7 miles left to run I could see how far behind me people were and I knew I had to keep my head down and push, it was at this point I was joined by an athlete on his first lap running strongly, I decided to pace off of him and accelerated to stay with him, Neil's company was very welcome as we ran side by side, then after 23 miles I had to stop with cramp, Neil kept going and I watched as my new friend disapeared up the road, I was soon able to run again and after a hard mile of running I caught up to him again, and more importantly I had caught right up to the athletes in 15th and 16th, I was going well, only a few more miles and I would be on the plane, as I turned right and headed to the finish, my right hamstring cramped and I couldn't run, I couldn't walk, I couldn't move! I started to stretch to relieve the cramp but it was persisting, over the cheers of the crowd I could hear 15th and 16th place crossing the line to the famous 'You are an IRONMAN'! I pulled everything together and started to move, as the adrenaline surged I started running, faster and faster until I crossed the line maintaining 17th place.
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