Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
Options
IM Lanzarote 2017
The materials in this website are in no way intended to replace the professional medical care, advice, diagnosis or treatment of a doctor, qualified personal trainer, therapist, dietitian or nutritionist Runners's World, Part of the Hearst UK well-being network © Copyright 2017
Comments
Sorry for the delay in my report I've only just got back from Lanzarote.
My journey to "racing" as a Pirate has been a long one! I DNF'd Lanzarote in 2013 and 2015 getting off both times on the bike at the garage in Teguise. I met the Pirates in 2013 when they took over Club Oceano and thought "they look a fun bunch". I bought a Pirate Monaco top shortly after but never wore it and only lurked on the forums.
Roll forward to last week and crippling shyness meant I plucked up all my courage to knock on Phil's apartment door to introduce myself as I thought there was no point wearing a Pirate top if no-one knew who I was!!
The plan was just to finish the race. Training had gone well and I'd been out to Lanzarote to practice the bike and had ridden the first part of the course. The swim (my strength) was ok and I'm going to make my fortune as a swim coach by teaching people to swim in a straight line as it seems to me this is a rare quality. Had time to stop mid stroke and shout at a bloke who seemed intent on swimming over me as his race was obviously more important than mine.
Change of clothes out on the bike. The wind seemed ok but was blowing from a weird direction which would come back to haunt me later. Saw OC come charging past on his aero bars around El Golfo and rapidly lost interest with my nutrition plan of gels. Had a short conversation with Crooky (wearing splendid pink calf guards) and kept going. Met the cut off's at La Santa and Teguise with plenty to spar then up to Haria. The special needs station looked like a scene from MASH with people lying everywhere a helicopter hovering just off the side of the cliff. Crawled to top of Mirador thought "that wind sock is pointing in a weird direction" then got hit by awful crosswinds coming back down to sea level and the famed tailwind......never happened. This was the worse part for me, my back was killing me, my feet seemed to be on fire and mentally it was tough but spookily I never once thought about giving up. The rest of the bike was purgatory, the bloody unmade road at Nazaret never ending crosswind, trying to work out how long I had for the run based on my current average bike speed, etc, etc.
Finally came back to PDC saw the other half and onto the run my first thought being it's a bit hot not sure can do a marathon, these thoughts not helped by other athletes walking around in T2 with their finisher medals on! But on I went and the run was just.....slow. Saw Flat Footed on the course was overcome with emotion with the Pirate support outside Route 66 and just kept going until finally it was done.
16hrs 15mins, never again at Lanzarote and I made the official race video.
Thank you so much for all the support, I'm afraid I didn't have the confidence to thank you in person the next day at Route 66 but please know that being a Pirate made my race. I must learn that when you get support as a Pirate saying "thank you" isn't enough you need to say "arrgh" as I was reminded numerous times on the run course!!
You'll all be pleased to know that exactly a week later was perfect IM conditions with no wind and overcast, still we'd probably feel a bit cheated if they made it too easy!!
Thanks everyone, you were brilliant, Kay (Bungles)
I started mine but never finished it. I'll try and do now whilst on the flight out to Tenerife and post later!