WEDNESDAY
The fun began for me on the Wednesday before the race. Since Ironman Texas is forced (by The Woodlands township) to be on Saturday unlike the typical IM model of Sunday racing, I had made arrangements to have my bike tuned up at Bicycle World and ready for pick-up on Wednesday. The mechanics did a superb job of tuning the gears, truing the wheels and cleaning all of the hardware. After my short 45 min run that afternoon, I set out all of the gear I needed for the race and tried to organize it into piles according to the stages it would be used in. I used plastic baggies to separate pre-race, T1, bike, T2 and run nutrition and wrote on them with magic marker so that it would be easy to throw them into the appropriate bags. The bottom half of our house was entirely covered...
THURSDAY
I planned to work half a day on Thursday so that I could get to packet pick-up before the 4pm deadline. After the hike from downtown to The Woodlands, I met Jamie at the "Ironman arch" that opened up the expo area and packet tents. After walking through the chutes like cattle on the way to a slaughter, we finally got all of our gear bags, signed the medical release and made our way into the brand area where you can purchase everything from nutrition bars to fully setup bikes. I ended up getting out of there having only purchased a t-shirt, some socks and a handful of bonk breaker bars. Since it was getting late in the day, I decided to skip the athlete dinner and the briefing so that I could make the hour trip home and begin packing. I knew it was going to be a long night and that I needed to be on the road at 7am the next morning with all of my stuff to make the 8am morning swim session in Lake Woodlands. Having everything organized certainly made a difference and I would later credit my preparedness on race day with the work I put into making sure everything was in a designated pile. By 11pm, I had successfully tagged and bagged everything and hit the sack feeling confident that no matter how difficult the race was going to be, I was not going to forget anything. Here is the organized version:
Morning Clothes Bag (aka, bag you will need before after the race)
- flip flops
- gym shorts
- dri-fit shirt
- aspirin
- Recoverite and water bottle
- wetsuit
- goggles (and extra set)*
- race day swim cap*
- timing chip/strap*
- chamois gel
- Body Glide anti-chafe*
Bike Gear Bag
- bike shoes
- bike helmet
- sunglasses
- Electrosalts (20)
- Race Legs (20)
- Endurolytes (20)
- Hammer Gel (4)
- Bonk Breaker (1)
- Garmin watch and heart rate monitor
Run Gear Bag
- Newton's
- socks (don't normally wear them, but thank God I had them...)
- towel
- Electrosalts (20)
- Race Legs (20)
- Endurolytes (20)
- Hammer Gel (4)
- Bonk Breaker (1)
I weighed the pros and cons of packing my "special needs" bags and decided to go ahead and plan on using them on race day. Here is a brief synopsis of what I put into each bag:
Bike Special Needs
- pb&j sandwich
- aspirin
Run Special Needs
- pickles
- tonic water
- extra socks
FRIDAY
Up at 7am, truck loaded and was on the road to Jamie's to meet before the swim practice.
*I have to make a plug for Larabar nutrition....rewind 3 months when Jamie and I did our first long bike ride. It was 40 degrees out, windy and miserable and our hands were frozen the entire ride. We made it 60+ miles and got back to the trucks to start our run. I pulled out a cherry pie flavored Larabar that I bought at Kroger the night before and took a bite, amazed out how good it tasted and more amazed out how much it brightened my spirits. Jamie didn't believe me when I told him how closely it tasted like cherry pie, so he took a bite and immediately had a smile on his face. From that moment on when times got tough during training, we always went back to the cherry pie Larabar story and were able to push through the day. Long story made longer, when I arrived at his house on Friday before IMTX, there was a box of Larabars on the bed. Jamie had contacted them to tell them this same story and they took the time to send us 2 boxes of bars and 2 t-shirts, for free, with a hand written note telling us good luck on our race. Talk about customer service...I will forever be a Larabar fan and will always include them in my nutrition plan!*
Jamie and I ended up at the swim practice around 9am to swim the 1,000m course that was put together for the athletes. We followed up the swim with a 20min run through The Woodlands and before heading back to Jamie and Nikki's, we stopped by HEB and bought a couple pounds of sockeye salmon for dinner along with as much Gatorade and coconut water that we could carry. By tradition, we always have a Maui Brewing Co. coconut porter beer on the night before a race, so thank God I finally found it among the plethora of beer choices. All was well. After we headed back to Jamie's, I took the opportunity to ride my bike around the neighborhood to test the gears and tires and then rummaged through my bags one last time. Another quick plug for the great job that the crew at Bicycle World- West U. did in getting my bike race ready. The entire drive train was taken apart, cleaned and reassembled with tweaks that I specifically asked for. I was very impressed with their work.
I spent what seemed an eternity going through my checklist and double-checking to make sure I had everything. I finally overcame the nervousness by remembering that worrying solves nothing and that I was leaving this whole thing up to God and my only job was to have a good time, a theme that I would have to come back to multiple times throughout the weekend. We loaded up the trucks with our bikes and bags, and headed back up to the transition area. I cannot stress how well organized Ironman events are in comparison to other races...you are again funneled through a maze and the volunteers made the check-in process systematic, taking away the stress of not knowing where to put everything. Bike is racked, bike and run bags are placed in numerical order on their respective pathways, and then you are done. Just as quick as you started, you are out of the transition area and back on the street. The temperature was just north of 90 and I was sweating...I remember thinking at this point that it was going to feel the same tomorrow, only I'd be grinding away at around mile 70 of the bike, not standing around talking. Damn.
This area of The Woodlands was constructed with pedestrians in mind. There was an HEB across the street from the transition area (that had air conditioning) so we stepped inside and bought some Gatorade and coconut water to cool off. Instead of heading home and biting our nails, we decided to catch a movie to take our minds off of the challenge ahead. The obvious choice was to see Ironman 3, so we loaded up on salty, carbohydrate rich popcorn and sat down to relax and watch the movie. When the movie ended we were both pretty tired so we headed home to get dinner going and put our feet up. Big thanks to Nikki for preparing what tasted like the best meal I had ever had, even though I kept thinking to myself that this is how death row inmates probably feel the night before their final hour. Whatever they choose to eat, I am sure it is the best meal they have ever had. My nutrition plan the week prior to Ironman consisted solely of coconut water, Gatorade, fish/shrimp and brown rice, and yogurt with an apple. Everyday. All week.
After putting on our Tri Tats race numbers, we toasted our beers and talked strategy, watched some Tosh.0 and then it was bedtime at 9pm. I knew I was not going to sleep more than a couple of hours, so I plugged in my iPod and listened to The Last of the Mohicans soundtrack on a loop. I received multiple texts and emails from family and friends, all of which I am thankful for, but the best came from my friends Chris and Kevin who sent along inspirational quotes and scriptures that helped me to remember that this thing was conquerable. This motivation put things back into perspective for me, aiding my sleep, and before I knew it my alarm was going off. It was 3am on race day.
RACE DAY/SATURDAY
Ironman takes a full day of your life; from the time you are settled down enough to sleep the night before, until your head hits the pillow after the race, you have expended 24 hours.I woke up at 3am and immediately began my hydration plan. I slammed a coconut water, a 20oz Gatorade with amino acid powder, and my pre-emptive does of anti-cramp (6 Endurolytes, 6 SportsLegs and 6 ElectroSalt tablets). I also forced down 2 cans of Ensure and a Perpetuem drink. Luckily this took about 5min to accomplish, so I was able to lay back down for an hour before waking up for good. When the alarm went off at 4am, I felt like I had been sleeping for days. I immediately went back to my nutrition and hydration plan by taking down a 20oz Gatorade, a pb&j sandwich and an apple. I grabbed my last coconut water and took another pre-emptive dose anti-cramp pills. I felt full which is what I was going for. Lathered up with chamois cream and thew on the tri-kit. Another plug for Epix Gear...their tri-kits are the best I have ever worn. Hands down.
Jamie and I met downstairs, which Nikki had turned into a mini pep rally for us both. It took off some of the nerves to see all of the signs she made and to read the note that she left each of us. Even better was her march into the kitchen singing The Final Countdown, a song that we have joked about for the last 6 months. It never gets out of your head (I bet it is in yours now...)! We loaded up the truck with our morning clothes bag and off we went, knowing nothing about what lie ahead waiting for us, but feeling good about the journey that we had taken to get here. It was time.
After making last minute adjustments (adding nutrition) to our bikes, we made the mile long trek to the swim start which was a carnival of people all standing in line for the port-o-johns. I felt the same emotion as the first time I visited Manhattan...I am surrounded by so many people buzzing in so many different directions, but all somehow attempting to accomplish the same goal. My head didn't stop spinning until I heard Emily's voice. Somehow she and Nikki had managed to find us in the crowd of 3000+ people:
Before we could say hello and give a few hugs, we were being summoned to the water via a loud speaker, giving us 15 min before the gun. I turned in my morning clothes bag, strapped on my goggles and swim cap and made my way into the water with 2,500 other people. Treading water for 10+ minutes was difficult enough, made even more stressful by the constant elbowing and kicking of fellow athletes all anxious to begin the 140.6 mile voyage to the finish line. Bang. The last thought that went through my head was how quickly the 3 months of training had culminated and how it was almost sad to be over. This was very, very quickly erased by the fight or flight response. You only have two choices at this moment, taking me back to my first blog post, "get busy livin' or get busy dyin'."
SWIM
"The churning inside me never ceases; days of suffering confront me." - Job 30:27
This was an extremely difficult swim, from both a navigation and a physical viewpoint. Every moment I began to feel comfortable was immediately overtaken by a kick to the head or someone grabbing my ankles. My normally long, controlled strokes were reduced to choppy shallow strokes that used more energy to stay afloat. Sighting each buoy was met with kicking water and bodies all around me, in a panic, to get to the transition area. After rounding the turn buoy, I could see the bridge in the distance so my goal was to remain calm and keep moving forward. At the 2 mile marker, I approached a female athlete and maneuvered to pass her in the canal, only to have her swim directly into my down stroke. My hand caught her goggles and ripped them right off of her face. I stopped and looked back with my apology, but had to keep moving so I truly hope she made it out of the water and finished the race! I finally saw the red carpet and stood up, never more glad to get out of the water in my entire life. Now the real work began.... swim time: a sobering 1:38, personal worst
T1/BIKE
"Rejoice in your sufferings for suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character and character produces hope." - Romans 5:4
I don't know exactly what it was that I expected in the transition tent, but it definitely was not close to reality. It wasn't until I began to write this section of the post that I was able to reflect upon the tent...I grabbed my bike gear bag and headed into the white circus tent to find just that, a circus. People were everywhere, some naked, some clothed, some moving slowly and some moving as though the tent were on fire. None worrying about what any of the others were doing. I don't remember much of anything else, aside from just trying to take down all of my nutrition and make sure I had my bike shoes, helmet and sunglasses. I got out of there as quickly as possible and headed to the bike racks (thankfully with my clothes on).
The first 20 miles of the bike went by at the speed of a dream. Before I knew it, I was coasting through Hwy 105 and heading up through the hills to Richards. Jamie and I had done the route so many times that it was routine. I knew exactly how far out I was, when I needed nutrition and when the next milestone on the ride was. The half-way point came without error and had me feeling very good for having ridden for ~60 miles. I stopped for 2min to grab my special needs bag and treated myself to a pb&j sandwich with a coconut water picnic. As I was taking off to resume the ride, I saw a guy trash his $10k+ bike by ramming into the back of another athlete who stopped to grab a special needs bag. The hub on his front wheel was bent and he was done for the day....There are so many things that can go wrong on the bike and you take calculated risks each time you get in the saddle. Traffic, flats, holes in a tire, chain breaks, gear slips, etc. etc. I thank God every time I finish a ride because you never know when the unexpected becomes your reality...
As we approached miles 70-75, we were deep into the chip sealed roads headed back down to Hwy 105 and were taking on substantial head winds. Staying aero helped mitigate the wind but took a toll on the lower back jostling down the rough roads. The relief you feel by hitting the clean pavement is mentally and physically astounding, and is one of the "wins" you get on the course to keep you moving ahead. I tore through Jackson road and found myself on 1488 headed to the mile 85-95 stretch, and decided to stop at the water station to refill my Speedfill and grab some ice to put in my jersey as it was approx. 91 degrees at this point in the race. One of the volunteers told me her Accuweather's "feels like" temperature was 98 degrees when she included the 90% humidity...I hopped back on my bike to finish out the 1488 stretch to Tamina road and turned to corner heading to 2928/Woodlands Pkwy. As I shifted down to pick up speed, I felt a small snap in my left knee cap and noticed a pop on every revolution of the pedals. This was mile ~88 with 24 more to go, plus a 26.2 mile hump on foot...
I tried to ignore all of the possibilities that were going through my head and just focused on getting off of the bike and into the run. I found that I had little power from my leg and the pain was getting worse and worse as I drudged along. By mile 95, my average speed had dwindled down from 19mph to 16, to 15 where it felt comfortable to pedal and I was able to push myself across the chip timer and into the bike racks where I hopped off and noticed the bit of swelling that was coming on. Handed off my bike, shoes and helmet to my volunteer and jogged into the transition tent to take a seat. Damn...
bike time: 6:36 aka terrible...
T2/RUN
“Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” - Matthew 11:28-30
In the transition tent, I noticed the type of folks I normally race with were not to be found, i.e., they were already running. I sat next to a guy who looked at me straight face and asked, "if I walk this whole f*ing thing, will I finish?" I looked down at my Garmin, did some elementary math, and politely said, "of course, just walk fast." Calculating my walking pace against the race deadline...a position I never thought I would be in...I slapped on my shoes, took down as much water as I could stomach and 500mg of salt, headed out of the tent and into the fiery abyss that was a May afternoon in Texas. I knew this was going to hurt, but I also knew there was nothing left to happen to me that was going to keep me from crossing that finish line, even if it was midnight.
My first mile felt OK, albeit wobbly, but I pulled out a 9min/mile pace and worked my way down the loop and into the swim start. As I rounded through North Shore park and onto The Woodlands trail, I noticed the pain was getting worse and I had no power coming off of my foot strike and into my stride. Rather than risking tearing something completely, I decided to run a mile and then walk for 60 seconds, then repeat. This plan worked for about 8 miles into the run, and got me through the first of three loops. Emily had posted up at the turn of the loops and I was amazed to see so many family members and friends in her group, along with Jamie's family/friends---again, it's the little "wins" that keep you going and seeing so many smiling faces all screaming words of encouragement was a refreshing break from the beating of a day it had become. My pace slowed to 12min/mile on loop two and by the time I made it back to the turn on the waterway, Emily was running in her flip flops along the route and yelling at me to keep going...she was running faster than I was! By the time I made it to the special needs area of the third loop, I was so very glad that I had made the decision to pack a run bag. I stopped, sat on the curb with 50 other people and enjoyed two pickles and a bottle of tonic water. It sounded good when I was packing and was even better when I was racing...again, the little "wins."
I saw a co-worker of mine on the turn through the woods at mile 20 which gave me enough steam to push the final stretch to the waterway. When I made my way down to the tunnel entering the waterway at mile 22 my body turned numb as I heard the cheering and yelling that was taking place along the route. Seeing Emily, Mom, Dad, Brother, Mother/Father-in-law as I paced up towards mile 23 was exhilarating and I wasn't thinking about my knee, my back, my quads, my calves or my feet, just finishing and a sense of accomplishment began to shoot adrenaline throughout my entire body. I turned the corner at mile 25 and began to sprint towards the finishing chute...
When you turn into the chute, you are greeted by hundreds upon hundreds of people you have never met, never will meet and will never share any other moment outside of this one. They are all yelling for you, screaming your name because it is printed on your race number. For that 60 seconds you are their hero, their inspiration, and the reason why they will train for months to compete in this event one day. It is very clear to me now why professional athletes find it so difficult to retire...the rush you get from people yelling your name and believing in you far surpasses the high from any other source and it is addicting. Hearing Mike Reilly scream your name into the microphone was worth the trip: "KELLY BELCHER FROM HOUSTON TEXAS, YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!" final time: 14:14
EPILOGUE
I was lucky to get into a great orthopedic surgeon on Monday after the race who confirmed the extent of my knee injury, made his diagnosis and then put me on a medication/stretching plan to heal the knee, no surgery needed. I have a trifecta of a small tendon tear, tendinitis and bursitis. Here is an image of my knee taken at 5am after the race:
The "knob" is the dead tissue just hanging out on top of my knee. The pain is from the tendinitis. All ligaments are perfectly fine and ready to run. Two weeks off from intense training...
What an incredible experience this was....when I signed up for that first sprint triathlon in August of 2011, Ironman wasn't even on my radar as something that I would think of doing, let alone actually completing. Now I am planning the next one. For me, Ironman was not simply an athletic event that I got a wild hair and signed up for, trained for and completed. It was much more complex than that. This was a spiritual journey for me, one in which I became a different (and better) person. Life is not as serious anymore and things that used to bring upon stress are little more than small bumps in the road. I know now that if I am given time, there are no problems that cannot be solved with determination, grit and hard work. I know now that the feeling spent in a dark place is minuscule when compared to the sense of accomplishment that you get when you fight your way out and back into the light.
I also know now why it is called Ironman...it's because you are recast into something indestructible after you go through the experience. You are physically, mentally and emotionally changed for the better. Iron is a very durable metal that is borne out of a perfect combination of extreme heat, carbon byproducts and oxygen. We as human beings are created with 2 of the 3 ingredients: carbon and oxygen. The extreme heat is all around us, whether it be a bad relationship, bad job, bad health or an overall bad disposition. Once you learn how to hone all of this heat into a fuel, you begin the slow and tedious process of recasting yourself with iron...
A list of things I could not do without in this experience (in order of importance to me):
- family, my training partner Jamie, and friends who came to support me
- coconut water
- Electrosalts
- socks
- Bonk Breaker pb&j
- pickles
- tonic water
- Larabar cherry pie
- chicken broth at the water stops
- ice at the water stops
Thank you for following me on this journey...I hope that you are inspired and that you will be turned into iron!
