This isn’t the post I thought I’d be writing, but I am. I am not feeling the way I should be feeling, but I am. Yes, I successfully completed IronMan Muskoka 70.3, and yes, it was a very challenging course, so in reality I should just be happy to have crossed the finish line—almost 40 people of the 1300 participants didn’t finish. I know that I improved significantly over my performance at IronMan Lake Placid last year, and I’m happy with that. Overall, I felt better prepared and in better shape. But the bottom line is that, for me, my performance on race day just wasn’t good enough. I trained my ass off for close to 6 months. Others that were competing with me (my wife and brother and sister-in-law in particular) all said that I would do way better than they would because they hadn’t trained. My…

I’ve decided that I love racing. Training is great and all, but I am really getting addicted to racing. If I said I was simply racing against the clock, you’d be well within your rights to call me a liar. Maybe other people do, but with my team sports background, I find I need other people to chase or fend off. I am racing against the clock, but I’m using everyone else I see as motivation to shave even seconds off my time. On Sunday, July 13, we headed to Carleton Place to race in the Graham Beasley Triathlon (Olympic distance for us). The weather threatened all of the previous night and in the morning but it managed to hold off for most of the race—just a few sprinkles here and there which really helped in keeping me cool. We hadn’t raced this one before, but I knew…

Very early on in our work with coach Dave Harju, he suggested that we do the half iron distance triathlon in Tupper Lake, NY. I thought he was nuts – we were training for the half IronMan Muskoka in September 2008, so there was no way we’d be ready for a half iron race known the Tinman in Tupper Lake, NY in June. As it turns out, he wasn’t exactly nuts. We did it, enjoyed some awesome time away from home (we rented a wonderful cottage in Tupper Lake and stayed there for a week of pre-race preparation and post-race solitude!), and feel really good about where we are. My wife hasn’t trained nearly as much as I have. And, as usual, I still only beat her by a little bit. h4. The Swim I’m fairly certain I pissed a few people off in the swim. I couldn’t swim straight…

I was practically begging my coach to let me race. Begging. When he said “it is a recovery week, so go for it. Go all out, don’t monitor your heart rate, just go for it” I was ecstatic. The Smiths Falls Classic is an event put on by Somersault (they organize/own most of the triathlons and running races around Ottawa and surrounding area). We had heard good things about it, but wanted to confirm for ourselves. The sprint distance was a bit shorter than what we’ve done before: * 500m swim * 26km bike * 5km run Kathryn and I quite literally had no idea what to expect. We hopped in the car early on Sunday morning, drove in the rain for an hour to the race site and arrived to find… nothing. We were told to go to the Comfort Inn hotel in town and expected to see lots…

I left my IronMan swim with a completely false sense of security. It had just finished the swim of my life, managed to get to the transition zone without slipping or pulling a muscle or tearing anything pushing off the sand. I found my bike clothes, got ready, and headed out feeling pretty good about the day so far. Going out of transition, I see everyone waiting for me at the side of the road. They cheer, I smile, I wave, and it is over. I’m past them in a flash, knowing I won’t see them for another 3 or more hours. All is well. I’m headed down the first hill out of town just about to head around the corner and go up another. And like almost all of my training rides, I hit the same damn pothole at the bottom of the hill and my drink flies…

As we settled into Mirror Lake at 6:50am on race morning, I started to feel a little nervous, wondering if the horror stories I had heard would come true. With 2200+ competitors, I’ve heard that the swim start is like a washing machine with flying feet, fists and elbows everywhere. I expected the worst – thinking I’d have to put my goggles back on after having them kicked off my head by a stray heel. I was starting to wonder if we’d placed ourselves too close to start line. Would the people from behind swim around or over us? Would we need the assistance of the underwater scuba divers that keep a watchful eye for swimmers that started to go under, or were knocked out by an inadvertant strike to the head? Was I going to need to grab on to a kayak at some point to rest? I simply…