IronTarsh - 'Weekend Warrior': The race that wasn't - Challenge Roth 14th July 2013

My head is spinning with so much emotion that I have no idea where to start. I want to keep this post short but also ensure I capture the experience so you can also take away learning from my experience for your own race. It is not my intent to blame anyone, or for it to read that way BUT to be honest about HOW I FEEL and FELT during the course of the day. I apologise in advance for how long this might end up, so here we go!

In my pre-race report, which I wrote, I mentioned that my teams original swimmer returned back to London due to one of her small kittens going missing. In response to her departure, my other team mate and I were presented with a dilemma. We tossed with the idea of one of us swimming the course, our runner was keen to do the swim, then I do the bike and then she would continue to do the run. In our heads this was an ok plan as our runner would get time to rest in between however a fellow Turbo member who wasn't racing at all had heard of our dilemma and offered to do our swim for us. He advised that he would be most pleased to help us and that he could do a 1:15, which was what our original swimmer had planned on doing as well. We discussed it and agreed as a team to accept the offer.

The night before we (biker and runner) were doing the times and said to each other, as long as our swimmer came in within 1:40 at the latest, I would be able to get within the cut off set by Challenge. The combined swim and bike cut off for relays is 8hrs 45 mins. Our runner was on form for a sub 5 hr marathon, so overall we were confident that the times could be met.

RACE DAY!

I had gotten a good nights sleep, I was pretty calm to be fair. In my mind to maintain calm I kept reminding myself that this was a training ride for Ironman Melbourne, I knew what was required from me and I simply just needed to get on the road stick to my race plan and give it everything I could. Secretly I was going to aim for a 6:30 overall time. I felt strong enough and I love to descend which is where I know I can make a lot of time up over other cyclists. I have afterall spent the last 3 months training in the hills and building my distance.

We had breakfast, picked up a couple of our mates and headed to the swim start. The drive over was fairly seamless. By the time we had arrived the Pros and fast age groupers were already in the water. We found our swimmer fairly easily in the crowd and started to get ready. As soon as we met up with our swimmer, we said bye to our runner, wished each other well and headed over to transition.

The relay teams were the two last waves for the day, 8:45am and 8:50am. Our team was in the last wave as was my mates from Team MaccaX. One of my highlights was being able to catch up with my Team MaccaX mates including Chris McCormack.

At 8:30am our swimmer headed to the swim start and stayed with my bike in T1. I anticipated my swimmer to arrive into T1 around 10am, 10:15am the latest. This would give me plenty of time to get the bike done within the cut off.

8:50am came round and I knew the swimmers were off, I was getting excited as I knew it would be my turn to get out there any enjoy the ride. We started to see swimmers come in and in true Tarsh style I cheered as many as I could on, well at least all the ones that were in my vicinity.

More and more swimmers came in and time was passing, when it went past 10am, I thought not long now and I will be off BUT then 10:30am passed........there were less and less bikes in the T1 and I did start to worry about my swimmer, so much so that another member in T1 who had finished the swim could see I was concerned that he told me to wait by my bike and he would go and see if anything had been alerted to the marshalls or emergency. 2 hours passed before my swimmer came into T1 and the first thing he did was apologise, bless. (I really did feel for him but I was also like FECK there goes my race plan, I now need to pedal my arse off!) I just said to him don't worry I just need to ride really really FAST!

Mate then I was off! I was the 4th last bike to leave T1 and all I could think off was right I need to pace the first lap and stick to my nutrition plan as it was bloody hot and it kept getting hotter as the day went on!

My first lap around the course was fast for me, I saw a few turbos out there. Whilst I was on my first lap they were on their way to finishing their second lap. It was could to get encouragement from Jason and Mel. A good reminder from Jason not to go too hard on the first lap and to enjoy Solarer Hill. I was feeling really, Solarer Hill was out of this world. Single file with loads of people on either side of you as you climb was another highlight for me.

My second lap was a little tougher, I was feeling the heat but I would not say that it was due to my nutrition. My nutrition was on point. I had enough of everything on me and I knew to grab stuff at each of the aid stations. My watch was set to alert me every 15 mins and when it did I ate and drank religiously. At the aid stations I picked up water and ISO tonic drink and ate the bananas for real food in addition to my gels.

I won't lie, I was hurting, I could feel the burn of the sun the whole ride just like everyone else but I did love the descents. My first lap was really fun as there were still plenty of people on the course but on the second lap it was lonely. My aim on the second lap was to give it everything and every time I saw someone on the course ahead of me, to overtake them. I ended up taking over about 12 other cyclists.

Around the 150km mark I needed to pee quickly and click my back in to place, so I go off my bike, clicked my back, pee'd on the side of the road (yup classy I know but I didn't give a shit, I just wanted to finish) ate a bar and drank the cola that was in my bottle that I had saved for the last 30kms. Got back on and I was off.

At 153kms the sweeper van came by and was full of people then I heard an alerting sound which was indicating to me to move to the side of the road. Basically they were stopping me and putting me in the van. My watch said 153.2 ams in 5:57, it would have been tight to make the 8:45 cut off but I still initially thought I would allowed to finish. Firstly because I was so close and secondly in the information booklet it states that the sweeper will mark your number but you could still finish. Well that was a load of shit, they simply put me and another 2 other people into the van. When I got in the van, there were 5 other people that had been collected. Many of the people that I had passed on the second lap had also been collected.

As soon as I got in the van, the shock of not finishing my leg of the race hit me like a ton of bricks and I simply began balling my eyes out. I cried for the entire journey back in T2. Our team runner was still allowed to run as we still could make the overall cutoff of 13:45. As soon as I got into T2, I saw our runner and I started balling again and I said to her they pulled me off and did she still want to run, her response whilst consoling me was 'I am going to and give it all I've got' and I knew she would. She had been training for this and had also completed the Paris marathon so she was in good shape. I had every faith.

I sat in T2 for a while crying and collecting my thoughts. After about 45 mins, I regained my composure and went looking for my bag so I could change. My god the buggers had lost my bag for 30 mins which just made me cry again. I couldn't believe what was happening. I headed to information within T2, to find a young girl who located it for me.

After getting changed I headed to the run finish so I could cheer everyone on and see my fellow MaccaX team mates and Thames Turbo club members finish. Along the way I bumped into a Turbo and then I found our swimmer taking photos.

I stayed all night with our swimmer cheering on everyone and waiting for our runner to come through the chute so we could join her and run and cross the finish line.

11pm arrived as did the fireworks, all the people I knew from both clubs had finished, we just had our runner to come through, both the swimmer and I were worried cause I knew our runner was in shape and had trained so we thought maybe the heat or something really bad had happened. We started to make our way down the run course to find her and cheer her in. A couple of other turbos had located her and were walking with her. Once we caught up we discovered she was suffering an injury and was unable to run.

We didn't make the official cut-off of 13:45 but we a long with many others were still allowed to walk the red carpet into the stadium filled with amazing people cheering us on whilst the fireworks were going off to cross the finish line and walk under the human arches to complete the race in 14hrs 21mins.

In short summary:

Good points
* I got to practice my nutrition and I felt it worked although in that heat I needed more salt
* I learnt how to eat a banana in aero position
* I was able to experience the aid stations for the first time on the bike, ie getting food and drink
* I gained confidence in my riding ability because even though I didn't finish I biked my fastest 153kms ever and my speed had significantly improved from last year to now

Not so good points:
* I will never do a relay again
* I went to hard in the first lap and I did feel it in the second lap
* No time to myself to get in the zone - no reflection on my team at all but I completely understand and have learnt for me that I need alone time leading into a race

My journey to Melbourne Ironman is on track, I learnt a lot from this experience. I have unfinished business at Challenge Roth, so I can officially say that I will be back next year to race the full distance with Team MaccaX!

Thank you everyone for all the kind texts, tweets, phone calls, vmails, follow up messages, facebook and simply being there to encourage me that not all was lost.

Thank you to my amazing supporters ISM Saddles, Huub, Bonk clothing and nuun uk. My saddle (Adamo Prologue) was amazing as usual, my Huub tri shorts most comfortable, Bonk race belt and nuun hydration in my initial bottles, THANK YOU!

Sorry for this being so long, till my next race - August 4th - Ride London 100 miles.
Smooches
xxx

Here are some more photos from my the weekend.