Most of you do not know this, but on Saturday November 3, at 7:00 am I found myself among 2,277 triathletes at the starting line of the 2007 Florida Ironman. I wrote down a few thoughts about the event since then and somehow came up with a 6 page recap. You don’t have to read it if you don’t want to. I’m not selling anything or asking for anything. I just thought I would share my day with you. Sorry it’s long and filled with grammatical errors. Enjoy!

For those of you who do not know what the Ironman triathlon is:

2.4 mile swim

112 mile bike

26.2 mile run

More info and cool videos at ironman.com

The race I did was ironmanflorida.com, you can see the race results (in summary) there.

I signed up for the event a year in advance. Training was in full swing about 8 months prior to the event. For those who would like the details of the training program, just email me. The training was basically anywhere from 12-18 hours a week (one week was 22 hours). 2-a-days at least 4x a week. At full swing, weekends were long runs one day (22 miles at the most) and long bikes the other (7 hours at the most) or some combination of both. Basically there was not much room for anything else except work and sleep (and sometimes I did both of those last 2 at the same time).

I hope this explains why I have missed you phone calls and avoided happy hours lately? I know some of you had asked if I had any races or anything coming up and I said no. Sorry I fibbed a little, but I had my reasons. Some of you even asked if I would ever do an Ironman and I said “those people are crazy”, well now I can truly say they are crazy people.

Driving in to Panama City Beach Thursday before the race I begin to see the bikes on the roof racks and Ironman bumper stickers on all the cars. Ironman was taking over the town. When I finally arrive at the athlete village area I see the famous FORD advertising everywhere. That’s the same exact stuff you see on TV so I was intimidated right away. As I was standing in the long line to check in I notice that every single person walking around this place looks like a professional athlete. I suddenly wonder what am I doing in this crowd? Am I going to attempt to do this side-by-side with these people? Who am I kidding? Then as all the books I have been reading tell me, the work is done, I put in the training, I am ready for race day. I overhear other athletes testimonies of past races, their training plans, what they plan to eat race day, all of which conflicted with what I did and what I was planning on doing (or hadn’t even thought of planning on doing). I suddenly remembered the other thing the books say is spend as little time as you can in the athlete village; it’s only going to mess you up mentally, so I quickly got outta there as I can see how.

At the Thursday night awards dinner I’m sitting there eating my pasta and making small talk with these people from Philly. It was the guys first ironman and it was clear we had the same obsessive compulsive behavior (see below) so I figured he knew about the “gear bags”. Where, when, what do we do with them? A few moments later this old man asks if he and his wife could sit down next to me. Of course I say sure come to find out this guy is the oldest athlete to attempt the race Saturday. He is 78 years young! How is that for motivation?

Friday morning I pop up out of bed ready to do the last minute things and then take the rest of the day off to relax. Ok, 5 things to do: quick swim, quick run, pack the gear bags, eat lunch, drive the bike course. That turned out that it took all day and by the time that was done I had to eat dinner and get to bed. All I wanted to do was think about the entire race. I wanted to visualize the whole day and every time I sat down to think about it another thought would come to mind and I would get distracted and not be able to finish the thought. So I realized this late Friday night that I had not been able to think far enough into the race plan to mentally prepare for the run. I would think about the swim and the bike but never get to the run. The poor run segment got no thought. Oh well, plenty of time to think about it tomorrow on the bike.

Race day. Wake up 4:00 in the morning. Put a few calories down and try as hard as I can to not get nervous, yeah right. Three hours of more running around later I was at the starting line on the beach in the Gulf of Mexico next to 2,300 exceptional athletes getting ready for a long and unpredictable journey that would hopefully end victoriously just a few hundred yards up the beach behind us. We stood there and listened to the singing of the national anthem as the sun rose. Shortly after that was a countdown and the famous cannon start.

The swim:

The swim went really well. I was able to find my rhythm right away. The buoys seemed to be going by at a decent pace. I didn’t want it to end. All of my swim practices the past year were at 5:45 in the morning. After the swim practice I would have a hot shower and eat a huge breakfast. This time was going to be different. After this there would be no hot shower and no pancake breakfast. Only a bike with 2,000 calories worth of GU, powerbars, cliff bars, endurox, oh and some fig newtons. During the swim I only ran into, over, and under about half of the athletes that toed the line that morning, so that was good. I got to the half way point on the 2-lap swim course and looked at my watch and saw 30 minutes and something seconds. I thought great, pick it up and I would have my crazy goal of under 1 hour swim. The second loop I thought I picked up the pace but apparently someone must have moved the buoys or something because I came out of the water at 1:02:12 (average 1:38 per 100 meter). Still very happy about that.

T1 (Transition 1)

This is where you change out of your swim stuff and into your bike stuff. I came out of the water and ran a little dizzily up the beach. It was so loud, there were so many people cheering and yelling, it was great. I saw folks lying on the beach getting their wetsuits yanked off and I thought my arms were pretty tired and that would be a great service to have right about now. So I’m running along and these 2 guys flag me over throw me to the ground, yank off my wetsuit and prop me back up on my feet in one swift movement that took all of about a half a second. Continuing up the beach at a brisk trot I wonder if I would feel that good later in the day when I get off the bike to start running. No time to think about that now. I grab my bag that I finally figured out what to put in it the day before. Somehow I managed to put my swim stuff in it and put my bike stuff on. Run out, grab the bike and I was on my way. T1 0:5:37.

The bike:

Most of the time on the bike I was thinking about how after this I still had to run a marathon. The rest of the time I was thinking about eating and drinking. The plan on the bike was to go out easy the first 10 or 20 miles, and then pick it up into plan pace. That plan lasted about 5 minutes (2 miles). At that point I compromised and decided to go at a comfortable pace instead of an easy pace (big difference). At a comfortable pace I started passing people left and right. I was passing those professional looking people I saw in line 2 days earlier. Do they know something I don’t? Am I going too fast? No way, can’t be. I began passing really expensive bikes with really fancy wheels. Before I knew it I had come up to the first aid station. They were supposed to be every 11 miles. Had I already done 11 miles, yep. Wow, just 10 more of those and all I have left is a marathon. The 2 other marathons I ran in my life I had run with fresh legs and still found it incredibly painful to stand up for that long. I kept thinking how on earth am I going to run 26.2 miles after 2.4 in the water and 112 miles on the bike? Better keep eating. Mile 22 the course takes a turn onto route 20 and all of a sudden we are in the middle of nowhere. There was nothing to look at and nothing to distract the mind, just focus on pedaling and eating. By about mile 80 I began feeling more confident that my plan was solid. By that point I was expecting to feel quezy but that feeling was nowhere in sight so I kept on eating and riding. My bike computer said I was averaging somewhere around 21 mph and a quick calculation and I was happy to be under my goal time for the bike. Keep eating and keep up the pace. Mile 100, back into civilization, a breath of fresh air, the end is in sight, at least for the bike portion of the race. 12 miles to go, 11, 10, one last bit of solid food for the rest of the day, 9, 8, 7 and before I know it I’m passing the hotel, and I arrive at T2 in 5:24:46 (average 20.69 mph). Very happy.

T2 (transition 2)

This is where you hop off your bike and run, no wait, you slowly put your feet down and see if you can stand up. Then see if you can throw your leg over the bike. Then see if you can walk. So far I’m able to do that with minimal help from the volunteers who always seem to be there when you need them. They assure me they will take my bike from that point on and all I had to do was run and find my T2 bag that I packed the day before. So I ran over and found that no problem. Sat down put on my running stuff and ran out. For a half a second I stood at the T2 exit and did a self diagnostic. Everything hurt a little but all I had to worry about was one foot in front of the other from that point on. T2 0:4:33

The run:

In the weeks before the race I started to think about how I wanted to break the run down. The course was to be a 2 loop out and back run. Should I do 2x13.1 mile, 13x2 mile, or some people do 26x1 mile? I came up with 4x6 miles and then 1 mile of hang on, 1 mile of victory run and 0.2 gravy. That just seemed to sound the best and most appealing plan to me. Pulling out of T2 I felt better than I thought I would at that point. The plan was to go 2 miles and see how I feel. The first 2 miles turned out to be at 7:30 pace, whoops, I guess I feel good. But still at some point in this day I had to have a little control and hit the brakes and settled into a slower pace. Even as I settled I found myself passing people left and right. What is going on? What do they know that I don’t? This guy has an Ironman tattoo, he’s done this thing before, should I tuck in behind him and follow his pace for the race? Ok, I’ll do that, but then he stops at the aid station and I just don’t feel like stopping. So I grab everything I can get my hands on through the aid station (sip a little gatoraid, some water, grab the ice sponges, dump a few cups of water on my head as I did at every single aid station) and keep going and I get to the first turnaround at mile 6.5ish. I think wow, I just have to turn around and go back, do that again and then I’m on my way home. (In my mind it made sense to look at it that way somehow). Before the turnaround I hear this guy yell out “Rob from Orlando – Yeah” and I think nothing of it because people were yelling my name the whole way (our names were on our bib). So I get to the turnaround point and I’m heading back and now I can see the faces of the people behind me. They are in much more pain than me. I use that as fuel. I actually found this girl running a decent pace and I run with her for about 5 miles. This was a good distraction as I didn’t have to worry about pace, just keep moving and keep up. I pass the bunch of guys playing music and drinking beers again and I finally see who that guy was, it was Mike E who qualified for Kona here the year before. Gotta keep running now. I get to the turnaround at the half way point and I still have no desire to stop and walk. I’m feeling great. I pick up my special needs bag in which I packed a little endurox elixir. Mixed that up and sipped on that for about 3 miles. I think that turned out to be a bad idea as at mile 16 I started to feel al little sloshy in my stomach. Ok, better toss that, choke down some water and perhaps force one more GU and that would be it for nutrition for the day. I had reached the caloric limit. At mile 16 that was nothing to worry about. I was already 10 minutes under my goal. Plenty of time in the bank. But that turned out to be the worst it was going to feel. So at the half way turnaround the course starts to get a little more crowded as there are more people entering the course off the bike. There are lots of people running pretty slowly at this point so I was still passing a lot of people. By mile 17 I could not eat anymore GU. At this point I was just trying to take it all in knowing that the end was in site. By mile 19 I didn’t even attempt to drink anymore gatoraid, but I was able to put down a few sips of cola the last 6 miles. Cola, the last resort drink. Now somehow throughout the run I was able to miss a few mile markers here and there. But I do remember looking up and seeing a mile marker 21, yeah, 5 miles to go. Less than a Monday night run. I can’t walk now, Mike E is out there somewhere and I don’t want him to see me walking. Also found that girl I was following for 5 miles was now following me for 5 miles. Need to drink more cola, and keep moving. On the run that stuff is like rocket fuel, with 2 miles to go I was feeling so good that I picked up the pace, or at least I felt like I did and charged to the finish line on a mission. The sun was just about setting by this point, the cheers from the finish line were getting louder, I could hear the famous announcer saying “blah blah from wherever, you are an ironman”. I thought in just a few moments that will be me. Soon enough I rounded the final corner and saw the bright lights of the famous Ironman arch finish line ahead of me. A quick glance behind me to ensure I was not going to share this moment with anybody and I was cruising on cloud nine thinking about what to do for a victory dance. In that moment running through the tunnel, hundreds of people looking at you cheering, you want the moment to last forever. Then the announcer came on and said something along the lines of “From Orlando Florida in his first ironman, Rob Hambrecht YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!”

Run 3:47:27 (8:40 per mile average split)

Total for the day 10h:24m:35s. 277 place overall. 21 out of 132 in my age group. Very happy.

The finish line was a great place to be. The volunteers were there again to make sure I could walk, pick up my medal and t-shirt, get my picture taken and escort me to the all you can eat buffet. At this point who could eat anything? All I wanted to do was soak up the moment and reflect on everything that I did in the past year leading me up to this one moment. My thoughts were so wild I forgot all of them, but I know it was great. The scene at the athlete village was surreal. People looked like, well like you would expect them to after 140.6 miles. I do remember thinking (as I’m sure some of you are) why do we do this to ourselves? Why do we all push ourselves to the limit all day long? Then I realize we all do this for a reason that is unique to each one of us and that it does not require an explanation.

Now the big question, will I do it again? I started asking myself this at about mile 21 on the run. I remember thinking how much motivation it took to keep going. This was my first Ironman. That was all the motivation I needed. How could I ever muster up the motivation to keep going if I attempted to do this a second time? Perhaps I should look at my goals to answer that question.

Goals were

finish
finish under 12 hours
finish under 12 hours, without throwing up
finish under 11 hours
finish the marathon without walking (something I have had trouble with before)
qualify for Hawaii (hey if I got that far why not dream big?)

That was as far as my goals went and I’m happy to say I got up to #5. Is #6 enough to get me up the strength to do another one? Who knows? Right now I look forward to catching up on what I have been missing the past 6 months. I also look forward to getting back in the water, on the bike and running, it’s all going to be just a little different now.

In closing, in one day my heart rate was north of 150 for about 10 and a half hours, I managed to go 140.6 miles and end up where I started, I ate the equivalent of about 3 whoppers worth of calories, and I feel like I got hit by a bus. It was a memorable day.

If you are interested in doing an Ironman I recommend a few things:

get your head examined by a shrink. If he says you are nuts than you are ready for step 2
get your training plan
be prepared to spend a lot of money (not only the cost of the race and travel but your weekly grocery bill will double and you will find yourself buying more and more crap for your swim, run and especially the bike)
get ready to live an obsessive compulsive life of routine, routine, routine. Everything you do including what you eat has been planned out a week in advance.
say goodbuy to everyone except your training buddies for 6 months

Special thanks to:

Coach Ty at the pool for teaching me how to swim. Can we go to long course now?

Coach Pat at the Y (even though you are one of the ones who didn’t know why I was doing the marathon workouts).

Jeff T. for constantly giving me Ironman tips and motivation on all of our long training runs the past 6 months.

Mike M. for being such a good training buddy and always pushing the pace in every workout.

The City of Clermont for not paving Dirt Road.

Betty Crocker – I ate a lot of pancakes this year

Willy Wonka and R.D.S. who said something along the lines of how dreams can become reality if you just set goals.

Thanks for reading this. See ya’ll soon
Rob