IRONMAN SWITZERLAND RACE REPORT
10th July 2011
Chris Brennan
This is my race report for Ironman Switzerland. Hopefully it will be of use to someone training for their first Ironman.
I arrived Switzerland 3 days before the race; bike in box and gear arrived safely. I knew I wouldn’t fully relax until I had built my bike back up so this was on my mind for the first day. I had a couple of issues with the worn bearings in the hub of my front wheel but loosening it seemed to solve the problem.
Excellent. Bike built. Gear arrived, wife in tow and now ready to pump up the tyres for its first spin in Switzerland. Problem! Track Pump no longer working. For some reason, it had decided to spring a leak in flight and I couldn’t get any pressure. Still I wasn’t too worried as I was fairly confident I could borrow one and I also had an emergency mini pump.
I kept to a fairly strict diet in the week before avoiding red meat, alcohol (2 months) and anything spicy in the run up to the race. If one thing was running through my mind for the last few months it was the GI issues that seem to plague endurance athletes and I did the best I could to reduce this possibility. I don’t think pre-race nerves helped with this either.
The following morning, I tried my track pump again and in a fit of anger, managed to put more air in than it leaked out and got each tyre to 120psi. Great! One ride to the start line for registration and all was perfect. Humming a bit like Knightriders, KITT.
As soon as I got registration on the Friday, race mode started to kick in and for the first time after over 6 months of training, I was really looking forward to getting in to the water. The presence of the other triathletes was a real buzz and was a huge confidence booster. The Welcome party on Friday evening was OK and the food was surprisingly good, but not altogether necessary if you are not too bothered about taking in the atmosphere and you could save some cash. A lot of this is merchandising of IM goods at vastly inflated prices and so, I decided to buy a T-shirt…at a vastly inflated price!
One 10 min test swim later in Lake Zurich in the day before race day really helped confidence and I recommend doing this in the day/s before the race. I did one 30 minute early morning easy run the day before to blow out some cobwebs and remove some lethargy.
Didn’t sleep for any more than 3 hrs on Saturday night nor did I expect to. Woke up at 3:30 and had my porridge, coffee, water, stretched, checked gear for the umpteenth time and left at 5am to get the tram to the start line at 6am for a 7am start. My friend Ade, also taking part had the only race day drama. His trisuit zip broke but 60 quid later and he was ready to roll in a new 2XU.
I never fully zip up my wet suit until minutes before the start as I know I’ll need to nip to the gents! Bloody typical. Still my plan was to arrive at the start line with no GI issues and that is what happened. From then on I new I would have a good race.
Whilst I have swam in many open water races nothing can prepare you for getting battered in the head, kicked in the mouth, punched by lots of people who do not really mean to do it. Then best advice I can give is take it as a given and enjoy the electric atmosphere. It was a land start and I had the same problem as Chris DM - I wish I had started just a little closer to the front as it took a good 500m for everyone to spread out enough to make any progress in the swim. Also with the swim heading out to the first buoy, the sun was so low which basically meant you could not see in front of you so all I could do was follow the wave of bodies moving out in to the lake on the two lap course until I could just make out the orange buoys. It gets tight around the turn points so be prepared to get hit and your legs pulled further down. I was kicked under the nose but luckily no serious injury. There was a bit of a shallow and rocky bottle neck heading back in for the second lap where you have to get out, run across an island and dive back in but I felt fresh on the first lap and this gave time to readjust goggles and hat. I wear contact lenses so I could not afford to get water behind my goggles so I stopped a couple of times to readjust when needed.
My time for the 2.4mile swim was 1h17min. I expected a time of 1h15 so this was close enough. Up the ramp and run back in to transition, my wetsuit came off easy. I decided to bike with gloves to avoid blisters and get a bit of grip for the descents (which reached 42mph for me), socks (to avoid chafing at this distance) and my T1 time was still around 2 mins so not too much time wasted
The bike:
Smooth and fast. What more can I say? I had a game plan and stuck to it…for a while, at least. I averaged 23-24mph for the first couple of miles but then backed off to 21mph and then 19mph. It became rather difficult when you have loads of riders passing you but I held back for the first 40k quoting phrases from Joe Freils book to myself each time I made a decision to ease off the throttle. Nutter!
The main points for me from this course are its fast, the roads are well maintained and smooth unlike the ones I have been training on (pot hole, pot hole pot hole), wind was light but not enough to demotivate me. The two ascents were ‘The Beast’ and ‘Heartbreak Hill’. I put a 27 on the back and was pleased for it. I went pretty well up the Beast and put it down to tactics earlier on in the race. The Beast was probably 25 minutes in all but actually quite a pleasant ride in the sun with time to listen to other riders chatting away. I noticed that I was overtaking people who had passed me earlier on and this put a smile on my face. The rest of the course was straightforward. The aid stations were spot on, well organised, loads of volunteers, loads of bottles, gels, powerbars to the extent that you do not need to worry if there will be enough for all. I chose to bring my own gels and bars and I had already partially unwrapped the bars with a knife the day before so as to not worry about trying to tear them open with my teeth and lose concentration. I recommend doing this.
Heartbreak Hill was only 3-4 minutes but the crowds were great and this motivated me to push it that little bit extra up the hill.
As for the second lap, same as the first but a bit colder. Normally a six hour ride can be quite lonesome but this event was far from it. Cyclists everywhere and this helped spur me on. I stuck to my nutrition plan of 1 powerbar every hour for the first two hours topped up with powerbar energise and then one bar and 1 gel in hour three and finally one gel every 30 mins topped up with water until I cam off the bike. I took on more water to reduce any GI issues later in the race and I think this helped. I was 7 min faster on the second lap according to my watch so I felt I had played it well coming in after 5:50. In retrospect, I do not think I would have changed anything with my bike and nutrition strategy. I know I could have gone 15-20min faster but who knows the consequence of this in the run.
I had a slower T2 as I wanted to change socks, put on Garmin, put on cap and take off gloves. So what was my Big Mistake…same as Chris Demoulin – sunscreen. I applied some but not enough and after the run I was burnt pretty bad on my back so I strongly recommend that you take an extra few seconds to apply sunscreen. I used the one in the goody bag which I threw away after I applied it.
My run strategy for the 4 lap course was to take it easy in the first lap to avoid any GI distress. This was my slowest lap and I could feel it from the bike that my energy levels were dropping and my legs were tired. My nutrition strategy on the run was simple. I put in 8 isotonic Hi -5 gels into the bottles of my run belt and 1
water (Also packed with tissue, spare contact lenses and Immodium!) and had a mouthful every 10 mins starting 30 mins after exiting T2. I immediately noticed a pick up in speed and general good vibes after the first lap and assumed the gel had kicked in. I averaged something like 55min per lap with the last lap slightly faster than expected and was 5 min below my rather optimistic target time of 4hrs.
The weather in the run up to the day was typical, blue sky at 8am and 26C in the day and thunder and lightening with torrential rain downfall at night. Race day was no different and the heavens opened in lap 2 which was actually a real relief from the heat. After 1 hour, the rain stopped and blue skies appeared again. I was running fairly consistent and pleased that I suffered no GI issues on the run (felt really good actually) which was a big worry for me. After lap 3, I looked at my watch (for the first time in the whole race) - it was 10:00:00hrs on the dot and at that point, I thought, hang on, I could get under 11 here (My goal was under 12 and again, that was optimistic). That’s when I started to pick up the pace. Of course, I was feeling sick from the gels but forced down the last mouthful hoping I wouldn’t chuck it up. I then spent the next 5 miles wondering if should take some coke, hoping it would give me that boost to the finish. I opted just for water and continued to take this at each and every aid station to ensure I was well hydrated and of course, suffered no GI issues.
The last 3 miles were painful but a few good memories of friends and relatives and also what I would do after the race kept me focused. The last mile was a question of one foot in front of the other, drink water and just enjoy the experience. The last 400 metres were many hi-fives, smiles and loving every moment of it. My wife was there to see me through the finish line and so the story ends. I heard the legendary words and that was it. One medal later, a pint of alcohol free lager, leg massage and I was done.
What would I change here? Well…I felt I had a bit more left on the run and in hindsight, I may have increased my cadence earlier in the race and reduced my time per lap by 2 mins. The run went better than I had expected and having never done a standalone marathon was pretty pleased with a 3h40 marathon. I would worry less about liquid on the bike and use only two bottles not three. I would still take my own nutrition and perhaps in the next one I may experiment with a faster bike time. Obviously every course is different. Will I do another one? Sure thing, just a question of when, where and what I need to buy the wife.
Overall 10hrs 52min 17sec.
Splits
Swim: 1h17
Bike 5h48
Run: 3h41