Kansas IronMan 70.3 (DQ)

This was a 1.2-mile swim, 56-mile bike, and 13.1-mile run event held at Clinton Lake and vacinity just outside of Lawrence, KS--home of the KU Jayhawks.

As much as I would love to have a success story to tell, I don't. This weekend I came face-to-face with epic defeat--something I certainly am not used to. Being an acceptable runner and biker--and possessing what I thought were "fair" swimming skills (based on my very limited pool work), I went into my first triathlon experience planning to wing the swim and rock the bike and run. Halfway through the 1.2-mile swim, I came to realization after being passed by the last swimmer that I wasn't ready for this. This was a huge wake-up call for me: I am not an effective swimmer! It was naive of me to believe I could wing a swim of that distance within the time-allotment. About 400 yards from the swim finish, a kayak race official comes up to me and announces I have 10 minutes before the cutoff. I knew it was over at this point. The official said I could either finish the swim segment or jump in a boat for a ride to the end. To that I snickered and kept paddling along to the finish. They would not allow me to continue the official course because of the DQ. After beating myself up mentally in the car for about 20 minutes, I knew this behavior was counterproductive. I quickly threw on my running shoes and took off on a 13-mile run anyway.

Cardio was not the issue for me during the swim. It just became painfully obvious to me that I was putting forth quite a bit more effort than the average swimmer to make forward progress in the water. The best analogy I can come up with is: I tried to race Nascar when I had only been behind the wheel of a car one time in my life!

Despite skipping the bike portion of the race and not getting an official time, I hardly considered this event a "waste of time". I got to experience most of the triathlon experience and, more importantly, learned a lot about the swimming aspect of said event. Swimming (unlike biking or running) is not something the average person inherently knows how to do well (efficiently) without proper coaching and/or spending significant amounts of time in the pool. While fitness level is just as important in swimming as in biking/running, technique in swimming is paramount!

Water temperate was in the upper 70's--one degree below the "no wetsuits allowed" level. I opted to not wear one. In hindsight, I probably should have--not for thermal reasons obviously--but for extra buoyancy. I don't float. At all. The amount of energy I spent trying to keep my head above water was astounding!

The bike course (known as "The Iron Cross" to the locals) was mostly to the south of Clinton Lake and consisted of out-and-backs across an elevation profile ranging from ~850 feet and ~1050 feet (hardly very "hilly" by a Coloradan's definition).

The official run course was, frankly, simply retarded: out-and-backs along paved roads. My impromptu 13-mile course was much better in my opinion! ;)

Humidity was very high--but the temperature wasn't bad (for KS) on Sunday.

Outside of the triathlon itself, I had a simply fantastic weekend! Got to spend some quality time with friends/family, jump on the trampoline with my cousin's little kids, kick up some mud on the 4-wheelers, and visit a handful of Lawrence bars and restaurants! Did a fair amount of running around the KU campus as well.

I don't know if I am sold on triathlons yet--but I certainly don't have enough experience at this point to make a fair assessment. Nonetheless, I have a personal vendetta against the Kansas IronMan 70.3 and I have vowed to myself that I will go back and tackle it next year...after I learn how to swim! ;)

An experimental event I thought it would be--and an experiment it turned out to be. All-in-all, I chalk this one up to a "successful failure". I'll take a DQ over a DNF anyday!

It is a very humbling experience to be disqualified from a race--but ultimately this did me more good than anything else: it lit a fire that will motivate me over the next year!

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Putting that behind me, I have three weeks before the Seattle Marathon. I really want to run it sub-3:10. Back to speed work on Tuesday's and gotta get a few more 20-mile training runs in.