I signed up for Lake Placid Ironman shortly after finishing the half ironman. My friend Cathy was thinking of signing up and I was sure she would. I had the idea of doing an ironman someday but the idea still seemed crazy. It was a bit exciting to sign up for something crazy though, I was more willing to do things like that when I was young. I sort of think if I started running at 30 instead of almost 23, I probably would have process more logically in my running life. Maybe I won’t have gotten into ultras till way later.
While I started swimming before June, my training for the Ironman didn’t really start until the week before Eagleman where I used a few vacation days to get in some bike rides. I ended up with no open water training going into race day but I had spent more time in the pool than ever before. I still wasn’t doing 4k monster workouts that my beginner training plan said to do but I spent an hour three times a week in the pool. My bike training on weekdays mostly involved riding on the kissena velodrome for 1 to 1:30 hours 2x a week and then a 5ish hour long bike rides on the weekends. I struggled on the long bike rides to be honest, I never got fitted for my bike and I just didn’t have the time to experiment too much. I kept a 50 mile running week, I still had a monster 100 miler to finish only a month after the race. I did plenty of short bricks as well.
I poured a lot of time into training, 1:30 to 2 hours in the morning, getting up at 4:30 and about an hour in the evening. After about a month, however, it started catching up to me and I collapsed in the finger lakes 50 a little more than 3 weeks before the race. After that training went flat, I had to take a week off to recover and I still wasn’t feeling excited and motivated to train afterwards. Cycling was a drag and while I loved going on 30 to 50 mile bike rides with friends, I hated training for 50 miles. A week before the race I took part in the White Face Sky race. Only 25k long that gains 8000 feet. On paper it sounded logical, a short run that goes with taper but with enough elevation gain that starts my final preparations for UTMB. The race went well till the second alpine loop. That’s when my hiking muscles were taxed and I slowed down tremendously. My quads however were strong or so I thought. The following week leading to the race my quads were very sore. This race might have been the single biggest mess up going into the race.
I picked my friend Yin up in Manhattan drove to Lake Placid. Yin pretty much slept the whole way over. I initially had my google maps on avoiding tolls so it took me on an unfamiliar route which I eventually took it off around Lake George to save some time. It didn’t seem like it took much longer avoiding traffic but I made a wrong turn and at the point I just wanted to get there sooner. The only bib pickup was on Thursday and Friday, which was a big shock to our group and probably one of the reasons why I won’t ever do one again, it just seems like a huge waste of a vacation day to me (compare that to UTMB that even has bib pickup day of the race). I checked other locations and it was even worse for Maryland Ironman where you had to pay extra to have the bib mailed to you and still had to check in on Friday. Bib pickup was exactly like the two Ironman 70.3 in Lake Placid. We picked up our Ironman bags from the Ironman store where Cathy heavy debated buying something but also didn’t want to jinx it buying it before the race. Afterwards we did a swim on the swim course. I didn’t venture pass the first buoy, despite having swam here so much, the fear of open water still rang in me. We then washed and cleaned our bikes, mostly with the help of Jackie. Then the group stressed about what to put on the transition drop bags. Unlike the half ironmans, the full had a changing tent that you had to go through with and a volunteer would get you your transition bag. You have two transition bags, swim to bike and bike to run. You also get a warm bag where you could put slippers, maybe a jacket if cold on your way to mirror lake for the swim portion.
The next day we did a shakeout bike ride. Immediately my quads burned on the bike but the pain got manageable in a bit and I didn’t worry too much. The run portion of the brick shakeout went okay. Next was dropping off our bags and bike at the Ironman village. A man explained the drop bag situation. Even though we were required to drop our bags now, we still had access to them tomorrow and could still make small adjustments. However, without a transition area you did not have a place to put your air pump. You had to give the pump to someone not racing if you wanted to fill up the day of the race or try to borrow from someone else racing. It’s definitely not an ideal situation. The rest of the day was just relaxing for us. We were staying in Keene and the others decided to go to a dinner in Lake Placid with some Trilife club. It was a lost of an hour, 30 minutes each way which I didn’t want to deal with. I made some dinner and just watched TV for a bit.
The morning of the race, Cathy and I left first. We wanted to get a spot in the closer parking lot and then take the shuttle. I ended up confusing parking lots and not getting the closest shuttle. Oaf, too early in the morning. Anyway got to the start, put wet suit off and dropped the running drop bag that was to be accessed after the first loop. The bike portion also had a drop bag for after the first loop but I decided I would carry everything with me. Critical to my nutrition strategy was the spring energy speednut gels. These gels had 250 calories to them so I didn’t need to carry as much food or worry about grabbing bananas at aid stations. For the swim I had an extra pair of goggles and a gel in the chest area of my wetsuit. I heard from the group that it is possible for someone to hit you and your goggles to break. The gel was to take after the completion of the first lap. After the first lap, you get out of the water and move a little to close the U shape. There is a water station in between. I took a gel before the race started and planned to take gel before the second lap. I was terrified of cramping during the swim, something that happened the last time I was here in the Ironman 70.3 that past fall. This time I had a good breakfast and two gels so hoped it was enough! Two QDR members who I wasn’t expecting at the race wished me good luck with help get some courage in me.
I started with the last wave of swimmers, around the 2 hour mark. It was a friendly group and we made a little bit of small talk before starting. The swim started off great. I quickly got over my fears and got into a groove. About halfway through the first lap, some of the people that started much earlier started passing. Not too much of a problem. 3/4s of the way however, swarms of people were pushing through. This caused to veer left off course for quite a bit. It was a brawl in there. First loop finished with some scratches on my neck but that’s lucky the worst of it. I took the gel as planned. The second loop was empty and quiet. I wondered if I was going to make the time cutoff. I stuck to the groove. This was the first time in open water that I didn’t have to breath after each stroke. I still could only breath off one side but could comfortably breath every 4 strokes. About halfway through I caught up to a few people. I then tried racing them and went back and forth with a few. The swim ended up going smoothly, no cramps and I made it through with some nice even splits.
Next was the run to transition which was pretty uneventful. I grabbed my own drop bag, changed and ended up grabbing my own bike. Think the volunteer missed a number of my bib and was looking at the wrong place. The bike ride started off okay. I was in good speed and it felt comfortable. However after about 30 miles I started struggling mentally and physically. The miles felt long and I could feel it in the quads. The last 10 miles, mostly uphill were a huge struggle and I got looped by many people. I ended up not making the 1:30 pm cutoff for the bike course by 13 minutes. To be honest I was relieved to have not made it. Another loop would have been hell and I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to make the final bike cutoff.
Afterwards I hung out with David and Jenny and cheered for the rest of the group. We had food and all. It was pretty relaxing. I had concerns about the recovery from the Ironman in relation to my UTMB race but guess that’s over. I definitely think Whiteface was the major reason for the quads burning out in the race. The finish line of the Ironman was fairly amazing. I could see why people are attracted to the race, you feel like a VIP for the day (unless you don’t make a time cutoff, then you’re just in the way). The strength of the even is their ability to draw out volunteers (probably more of a community thing - the area gets a lot of money from the outdoors).
The smart thing was to not train for both a hundred miler and an ironman but that's just how timing went. I wanted to race with friends and this was the year my friends were doing it. It doesn't seem like they would be doing it again and the cost of an ironman is crazy high. I'm not looking at it again, I had the experience and I could understand why it attracts some people but I could get a similar experience in ultra trail races for much cheaper and much more scenic and that's what attracts me more. I want to be in mountains, up high in them, not the roads that pass through the valleys around them. The race however was useful in getting me to figure out what I really want out of the endurance route I been pursing.
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