Thoughts: One Week Out
2 April 2000
1:00 p.m. Hong Kong Time
Well, next week (everything going well) I will be running right now. I thought that I would write a few thoughts through the week in the run up to race.
Not much in the way of nerves yet but I have noticed my mood swinging between extremes of "going to hammer and do great" and "feeling a bit sluggish today, I wonder what is going to happen".
I know that there is not much more that I could have done in preparing for this race. My training went well, was consistent and, other than one long weekend where I nearly buried myself, quite smart. However, strange things happen to my body when tapering. I also get hypersensitive to any physical issues. I have a fear of getting a cold or fever in the last few days and each time I go for a run I have to keep saying "flat feet, flat feet" to counter a nagging thought that I might sprain my ankle.
I have been using a fair amount of visualisation at night and when I have extra time. Most of my mental work has been for the swim and bike. Steady calm strokes with people all around me. Breathing in a relaxed manner and dealing with the crush. On the bike, I have continued to use my key words, "execute" and "power" while picturing good form and feeling the wind on my body. Compact, aero, comfortable and steady.
I burned myself a bit at IMC by making predictions but, hey, I can't help myself. In any event, this is my third race and I know a little more about the distance but ZIP about the course. So here goes.
I hear that the swim is fast. That suits me. I seeded myself deep in the entry form that they asked us to fill out. I figured that it was better to be doing the swimming over rather than being swum over. My swimming has really come along through the winter. Reference points. IMC was 1:12:20 and IMH was 1:10:18. Totally exploded at IMC. It was real ugly. Took it easy at the start at IMH and that seemed to pay off.
So what am I shooting for? Well, I would like to be on my bike at 1:05 and be feeling good. I figure that will take a quick T1 and about 1:38 per 100m. My PR for a long course 500m TT is 7:20 or about 1:28 per 100m. With a good draft 1:38 should be do-able. Maybe a little better but there is no need to push it on the swim. Going anaerobic has a HUGE penalty.
Next onto the bike. This is really the heart of the race. Too fast a pace and you run the risk of blowing up. Too slow and you could be wasting time. I don't feel that I have really had a great ride yet in an IM. Both my races had identical splits IMC a little under 5:55 and IMH a little over 5:55. However, in Hawaii I was comfortable and hydrated for the whole ride. The IMOz course is a lot flatter than both of these courses are.
The road surface has a reputation of being crap. I saw a note on the IMOz comments page that said that they would be trying to improve it prior to race day. Not much point in worrying about the surface, it is a non-controlable. I was very heartened to see that Peter Reid had a flat last year and still managed to win the race. That showed me that one could have a flat and still have a solid race. This is a mental boost and something that will come in handy if there are any problems on the bike.
My bike training has been the core of my preparations. Lots of weights, hills and pace work. In training, for rides up to 100 miles, I have been able to average 35-36 kph on a flatish 21.4K loop course. Not all are Centuries and most are around 120-130K. I always do a short run after these rides. Some days the running is effortless and others it is pretty tough. I have not been able to find any correlation. There doesn't seem to be a link to my HR or how hard I have gone on the bike.
So I figure, add a little for being tired from the swim, save a little for the run, deduct a little for race wheels, build in five minutes for a flat tire (hope it is a front one), add a little more for the small hills on the course. Going with intuition and gut feel - I want to be running at 6:30 race time. If I feel good then maybe I will be running earlier in the race if I am running later in the day then a good race is still possible.
My key goal for IMOz when I signed up back in August was to try to push it a little more in the bike. However, in training, I realised that my effort on the bike was about right from a perceived exertion point of view. The problem was that I weak! Weights and hills have improved this weakness. We will see by how much.
Now all that is left is the run. This is a total wildcard. My running training has been very good with lots of PRs over the last little while. I did a 8.4K TT last month and finished in 28:42. That pro rates (allowing for slippage) to a sub-35 10K, just. Using my marathon prediction tables I get 2:40-2:49. Then you need to add 30-45 minutes for an IM run split. This gives a range of 3:10-3:33. In good conditions, this seems about right to me. Hawaii was 3:28:28 (felt great) and Canada was 3:52:34 (felt great but legs were way dehydrated).
Take all this together and I have a predicted range of 9:40-10:04. Again this seems about right. Looking at how the IMOz qualifiers in my AG faired in Kona, they were on average 33 minutes slower on the IMH course (did I mention that I like to crunch data?). This data throws out one guy that had a tough day and was a little more than four hours slower. Take 33 minutes off my Kona time and you get 10:05. Anything better than that has to be improved fitness or better conditions.
The one thing that Canada taught me was that making predictions is fine and dandy but you never know what is going to happen on the day. So I need to have some back-up goals, just in case things don't go according to plan...
Non-Time Goals:
- Race to my potential given the conditions.
- Learn something useful about racing the distance.
- Have a solid bike split.
- Enjoy myself.
Expect a race report in mid-April. Should be an interesting read regardless of the outcome.
gordo