experiment of one: Ironman Lake Placid 2012

July 22, 2012 - Lake Placid, NY. It was 2 years ago I finished IM Louisville in the midsummer heat and now I am attempting 140.6 miles through the Adirondacks. Ironman Lake Placid has beautiful scenery and Lake Placid is great vacation spot in the summer.

The family trekked from Indiana to northern New York over a two day period and arrived on Friday of race week.

We stayed at the wonderful Whiteface Lodge with family since it was the same price for a week as two hotel rooms closer to the venue. When we arrived on Friday I had to pick up some rental wheels from Race Day Wheels, checked in at registration and went directly to the mandatory meeting. Luckily we chose to eat elsewhere.

As part of the adventure this time, I participated in a physiological heat stress study during the race. This require multiple pre-race tests and questionnaires as well as on race morning and post race. Researchers checked our weights, took saliva and urine, checked our mental status, and tracked our core temperature, speed, and distance throughout the day.

Sunday. Race day.

Woke up at 4am to eat breakfast and start moving. I thought that getting down the start shortly after 5 am would be enough time however the time flew by with everything to do at transition. I forget to get my body marked so I stopped by on the way out of transition after finishing my pre-race biometrics check for the study. The benefit - made it into the Ironman post race video below.

This was the first mass start for the swim that I have participated in as Louisville was a time trial start. There was 2800 people all starting at the same time. I got in the water with 5 minutes to the start and ended up at the halfway mark across the lake about 5 people deep. Thought that this would be fine to stay out of the way and keep right of the buoys where it would be crowded to stay on the underwater visible line. Boy was I wrong. Within 200 meters I was pushed, pulled by the ankles, forced under and swam over with little opportunity to catch a breath. I decided it best to swim directly perpendicular to the race direction and get out of the mess. That was a wise choice. See this video of the start. I eventually found a groove and swam into the turnaround to begin the second lap. Note that as you approach the transition/end portion of the swim everyone begins to bottle neck again on top of each other. The second lap was going well until one of the turn buoy's got loose and was floating away from the course. Many of us were sighting on it and swam off course. With all the extra effort and kicking to stay afloat during the action I did get a calf cramp during the turn around. That concerned me since I still had 138.5 miles to go for the day.

Swim: 2.4 mi

1:15:38

I finished the swim portion in 1:14 which was 10 minutes faster than Louisville. I thought that was a great start to the day. Exiting the swim you have to run a quarter mile to transition. Once in transition I took my time to change, get sun screen, take a pitstop and head out on the bike (8:43 min).

The bike course was very scenic and always changing. I like the bike course in general but it would be better without that screaming, white knuckling downhill at 40 mph+ with people passing and side wind gust messing with the front areo wheel. Even at the very bottom there is a curve in the road which takes of your ability to stay upright. Had to do it twice. I realized that by the 56 mile midpoint I was low on energy and need to fuel up so I stopped at one of the aid stations and filled up my gel bottles and fluids. Ate some gel squares and off it went. I ended up eating over 17 gel packs and 8 bottles of liquid on the bike alone.

I moved up from #218 in my age group to #137 and passed 447 people overall. I successfully made it to transition without crashing or bonking too badly. I did see others that were not so lucky but it was better than the carnage that occurred in Louisville 2010. At IMKY people were just laying under shade trees by their bikes and passing out/vomiting on the run. Not that it wasn't hot in LP as it was about 85 degrees on the run the daily toll seemed greater. With the energy exerted in the swim and climbing mountains all day I think I entered the run more depleted than expected. But I had been training in the flat lands of Indiana all summer so it could be expected.

Bike 112 mi

6:10:30

18.14 mi/hr

The bike to run transition was more of the same as earlier (6:10 min). I ran out of the tent and was happy to be on the marathon run. This picture with the Olympic ski jumps is the exact spot that my legs started cramping on the first lap, just 5 miles into the run. I was carrying water at the time since I had some gastro issues at IMKY but switched to electrolyte fluids for the remainder and slowed by pace. This helped substantially to get me to the finish line. At any point in the race the cramps and end your day as was seen along the run course all day. I even passed one of the pro men that looked to be in a daze and later saw him carted off laying on a mobile unit with an IV. It was hot in update NY that day.

I liked the run course overall as you were able to see more people and family members multiple times. By the end of the run I moved up from #137 to #106 in my age group and passed another 109 people overall. Best of all, I finished in daylight.

Run 26.2 mi

4:33:27

10:26/mi

Overall Time for 140.6 mile Ironman Lake Placid = 12:14:27
Full Results for #1911