Pacing

My ride yesterday reminded me the importance of proper pacing, especially during an ironman. I did a hard brick workout on Saturday at close to race day pace as possible without it being race day. This left me pretty trashed for Sunday's (hilly) ride. Because my legs were toast, I couldn't push the rollers and the climbs, and attack certain sections of which I've become accustomed. I worked on either keeping steady pressure on the pedals or maintaing my cadence, in other words, pacing, depending on my energy level. It was during a 2 mile climb that I realized that I wasn't far off the time I normally ride when I'm feeling okay, and that I had really no highs or lows, just steady and even. For some reason, I thought of the several ironman races that I've botched due to improper pacing, specifically Ironman Australia.

Going into Ironman Australia, I was the fittest I've ever been in my entire life. I did all the work, and I was totally prepared to go under 10 hours. But I totally botched it during the first 80K of the bike. I swam 49 minutes and I got caught up in the excitement, and was riding a bit too fast the first 40K. But the nail in the coffin was when a pack of guys I trained with in Sydney went by me around the 40K mark. For some reason (most likely my ego), I stood up and started attacking the next 30K like it was an olympic distance race. The effort shot my heart rate up way too high for way too long, and well, the consequence was my stomach shutting down. It took me until 120K before my stomach came back to life. Though I totally botched the pacing, being the most fit I've ever been allowed me to ride a respectable 5:30. And just like that, I'm slowly finding more reasons to want to take another crack at the damn ironman.

Croatia. The start to Croatia was pretty hectic because I either lost my wallet, or had it stolen en route to the airport. All I know is that when I went to pay for my train ticket to the airport, I went to grab my wallet, and I noticed the zipper to my bag was already open, and my wallet was gone. KCCO. I guess I've traveled enough internationally to stay calm and be methodical. I keep all of my credit card info on an excel spreadsheet so I had all of the numbers and contacts, and I was able to cancel everything. The funny thing is I had decided to skip breakfast that morning thinking I could buy something at the airport. I was starving and I even considered telling my stolen wallet story to strangers in hopes of getting some money for food. Ha ha, how many times have I said "yeah right" to some panhandler using this same excuse. Serves me right. This video pretty much sums up the open water swimming adventure in Croatia. If you and a group of friends ever want to do an open water swim trek, book it with Strel Swimming, they did an amazing job! If the name Martin Strel sounds familiar, he is the (only) guy to ever swim down the Amazon, the Mississippi, and the Yangtze River, yes I know, crazy polluted waters. There is a documentary on him called Big River Man. His son Borut actually runs the company, and if you get a chance to see the documentary, you'll understand why you would not want Martin to be running it.