I am so grateful to be alive, well, walking, and happy to say that I've now completed a FULL IRONMAN! What a journey!!! Two years in the making and I can finally say I did it! :>)
An ironman is not something you just wake up one day and go do. I've spent countless hours away from my family for many weekends either riding my bike or doing a long run or both. I've put lots of money into a bike, several pair of running shoes, and training clothes. I'm nothing special. I'm just a nobody and I did it. So I want to say to all those that have been told you can't or maybe you think you can't, well you CAN. If you have a dream, go for it! I am just in awe of so many people that I saw racing. We had a double amputee, a lady with one arm, and a man with one leg that raced! Just wow!!! There was also a woman with Parkinson! It was an honor to become an Ironman along with them!! It doesn't matter if you are black, white, pink, or what country you came from, we all came together and supported each other all during the race. It was AMAZING!
Getting ready:
There is so much I could say about this race and I'm sure I'll never get it all into words. The volunteers were amazing! The neighborhood we ran in had amazing people sitting out in their yards cheering us on for hours! I'm so glad that it worked out for me to get my full Ironman in Florida! As my daughter said the morning after the race at breakfast, "The beach has always been our place, so it was perfect for you to get your ironman here mom". So very true! The beach has always been my happy place! I was extremely nervous before I got to Florida about the race. Probably mostly due to my DNF at Chatty. But by Friday the day before the race I had this peace about me. I can't explain it. I felt so at ease. I give GOD all the glory!! So glad I got in a little swim on Friday. BTW the temperature on Friday was like 32 when we woke up and the high was only in the 50s. The wind was very chilly! Thank goodness for the sun! Here's some pics my mom snagged of me on Friday when I did a practice swim:
My beautiful mom! She LOVES the beach as much as I do! You can tell it was very cool....note the long pants and jacket. :>)
Mom figured out a way to dry my wetsuit after my practice so I wouldn't have to put on a cold wet one on race morning! LOVE HER! and isn't our room view awesome!!! It was so peaceful sitting and looking out at that baby blue water!
Check this out! Someone racing did this and you could view it from the condos. So cool!
Here's my race recap: (long post... sorry...but I want to remember every detail!)
Swim -
Water was prefect! The water was smooth as glass and a perfect color of baby blue! It was COLD Saturday morning! They had told us on Friday that the water temp was 69 so the race would be wetsuit legal. Yippie because we all wore our suits to stay warm as we stood around in 43 degrees waiting to start. LOL I had never been so thankful for that dang wetsuit in my life! :>) My mom snagged this pic of me waiting to start.
The sun was just barely coming up when we started!
Water was prefect! The water was smooth as glass and a perfect color of baby blue! It was COLD Saturday morning! They had told us on Friday that the water temp was 69 so the race would be wetsuit legal. Yippie because we all wore our suits to stay warm as we stood around in 43 degrees waiting to start. LOL I had never been so thankful for that dang wetsuit in my life! :>) My mom snagged this pic of me waiting to start.
The sun was just barely coming up when we started!
The water felt so warm once we got it. The first lap was kind of crazy because all the fast swimmers were starting their 2nd lap and I got swam over a couple of times. I swallowed big gulps of salt water a couple of times even when I was trying not to. But I remained calm and told myself to just swim easy. No need rushing and getting into a panic mode. When I came out of my first loop and saw my time of 55 minutes, I will say I was a tad disappointed. I had wanted to be around 45 minutes on each loop. But I was till under the 1 hour 10 minutes so I felt good about that and ran down the beach to start my 2nd loop. I had thought my 2nd loop might be faster because the fast people that had kicked and swam over me should be gone. But this time I swam off course several times. The sun was up in full beam now and every time I tried to sight to find the buoy, I was way off. One time a guy in a canoe came towards me telling me to get back to the left. So my 2nd loop was longer than my first loop. My total time ended up being 2 hours 2 minutes. I'm normally around a 1:40 to 1:50 for a 2.4 mile swim. I reminded myself that I had still beat the 2 hour 20 minute time limit so keep moving forward. :>) I did get to swim 1 lap with a 74 year old lady that swam like a freaking mermaid!! I was in total awe of her! She was so graceful and just looked like she belonged in the water. I stayed within a couple of feet of her and watched her the whole loop. It was amazing! Oh and normally 2.4 miles is 4,224 yards and I swam 4,699 yards! So I swam an extra 475 yards! Yikes! So my pace really wasn't as bad as it looks on their results page. Hee Hee I took 3,409 strokes when swimming! That's a lot of arm work people. :>) My watch says I burned 665 calories. I had to be out of T1 (transition from swim to run) by 9:40 am. I was out on the run by 9:32 am... cut it a little close here! But they had said they would have everyone in the water no later than 7:10 am... well that didn't happen! I lined up with my pace group 1:40-1:50 and I didn't get in the water till 7:18 am! I don't think they expected the race to sell out and it was dark when the pros started and they started them a few minutes late. Here are a few pictures from the race on Saturday.
Can you tell I was happy to finish the swim within time!
Me after the wetsuit strippers going through the fresh water shower and making that long run to transition to get in my bike gear:
Either mom or Erin captured this one as I headed out of T1 on the Bike:
Bike
55 degrees to start the ride... that means it's much cooler on a BIKE! I hate it was this cool because I had to wear a jacket to keep the wind off my chest so I wouldn't get sick with my head being wet from the swim. I couldn't show off my TOA TRI top with my jacket on. :( But I kept warm. :>)
Notice the gloves and shoe covers I have on to keep my toes warm! It was chilly starting out!
Boy we had a headwind! I didn't think we would have much wind because the forecast had shown like 10-15 mph on the wind compared to Thursdays 20 mph wind! I felt the headwind for what seemed like forever! Someone announced at the breakfast on Sunday before the awards ceremony that the headwind was for 80 miles on the bike! I believe it! I only felt a tailwind for like 20 miles. I was so happy that I had no cramps and NO bike issues. Yeah me!
I did almost get hit by a woman in van that decided she wanted to turn right when I was coming up beside her. She never looked! I started screaming and the guy that was right behind me slapped the back of her vehicle screaming at her. She stopped and thankfully me and the guy were able to ride past before she turned. I'm so thankful the good Lord was watching over me!!! There was a racer hit by a vehicle and another racer hit a big pothole and wrecked. They were pretty banged up. I tried to just stay steady and not push too hard to fight the wind. I kept telling myself stay on pace and save your legs for the marathon. Lisa had prepared me a couple of options ranging from 14.8 mph to 16 mph showing how I could make the time cutoff in plenty of time if I stayed within that range so that was my goal. Now that pace includes stops. You don't realize how much time you lose when stopping to pee, etc. And I stop A lot! My bladder just won't hold it. Plus you have a half way stop where you can get a bag that you leave at the start of the race with food, etc. So if you want to average 20+ on pace, you better bike around a 22+ pace or faster if you plan to stop any. ha I could have pushed it hard and got a better pace, but I would have been toast for the run. I wasn't there to try to get an award. I was there for a finish! :>) Around the last 15 miles or so my thighs started getting real tight so I decided I would drink my pickle juice that I had been saving in my back pocket just in case. I didn't want any cramps. Well, that pickle juice was so tart that I got chocked and couldn't stop coughing and before long I throw up while riding all over my front handle bars. It just came up so fast I couldn't stop it. I was so embarrassed! We were right at a big red light where a cop was holding up traffic for us to pass through. I just hung my head down and kept peddling. Soon I came up on the last aid station. I yelled for water. See the volunteers are standing out there with water or Gatorade and you yell out what you want and they hand to you as you ride by them. I grabbed the water and started pouring it all over my handle bars to wash them and drank so to wash my mouth out. I would have never dreamt of that happening .... but it did. grrrrr
Soon I was home free! I looked at my watch and I was ahead of the cutoff time! yeah me! I had to be in by 5:40 pm to start the run and it was only 4:57 pm! I was so excited that I forgot to grab my Garmin off my bike before the bike catcher took my bike and told me to go get my run bag and head to the changing tent! As soon as I got in the changing tent I realized it and had to run back out and beg a volunteer to go get my watch because they wouldn't let me over the fence to the bikes. She was very nice and she actually ran trying to help me as fast as she could. I thanked and hugged her! All I could think was that I needed to hurry up because Lisa is watching my times. LOL I burned 4,272 calories according to the Garmin data. My moving time was 7:19 and my total time was 7:25 so this time I didn't lose too much time when I stopped at aid stations or at the half way point to refill my nutrition! Yippie! When I downloaded my bike stats I had 76 miles with a mph greater than 15 which averaged 16.78 and 36 miles that were 15 mph or less. I felt really good when I looked at my stats considering the headwind and me not over exerting myself. I knew I would lose time for bathroom breaks and the half way point to stop and get my bag to refill my nutrition. There was one racer yelling at the volunteers at the half way point telling them they had 30 seconds to get his bag. He was VERY RUDE! It was taking awhile for them to find our bags, but they were VOLUNTEERING!!! They were not getting paid to be out there all day helping us!
Here I am coming out of T2 heading out on the run. Thanks mom & Erin for capturing this picture. So happy to be ahead of schedule!
Run -
The first mile started off good. I did my jog/walk intervals and my pace was 11:07 ... I had been practicing this jog/walk for the race and planned to stay around a 12 min pace so I wouldn't die on the run after biking 112 miles. All was good until mile 5 and boy my stomach started feeling very sick. I reverted to walking more and only jogging a little to try to settle my stomach. I remembered I had my Nauzene tablets in my fuel belt so I quickly chewed 3 of them. I got no further than 1/2 mile and they all came up along with everything I had been sipping on at the 1 mile aid stations. Oh I was so sick! I wanted to cry! I kept thinking why now! I have felt good all day and now you want to make me sick! Everyone said oh your a runner so the run part will be easy. NOT!! I'm here to tell you that running after swimming then biking is NOT an easy task especially when you feel so bad. There was a sweet volunteer that walked over to me and put her hand on my back while I was bent over being sick and told me to get it all out and then keep moving forward. She told me she had been right were I was at and the key was to NOT stop. She told me to stop as many times as I needed to puke, but keep moving forward. She was a GOD sent! So I told myself you are not gonna stop! There is no room for you today Devil!! You can freaking walk the whole marathon if you have to and most likely still make your time limit. So I walked a LOT!! and I would jog from time to time when I could manage it without being sick. I have no idea why I was so sick. I've read where people said swallowing the salt water makes you sick so maybe that was it. Maybe I should have taken that dramamine early that I had bought. I was just scared it would make me sleepy so I never took it.
Then if being sick isn't enough my watched died at mile 10.8!!!! I couldn't believe it! I had forgot to turn off wifi and bluetooth! I was so mad at myself! Now I had no idea of my pace or total time. I did look real quick at my time when it beeped low battery so I was trying to calculate in my head what I had to do to finish within time. When I came in at the halfway point at mile 13.1 there was mom and Erin cheering me. GOD BLESS THEM!
It was getting cold now that is was dark. I grabbed my long
sleeve shirt and some nutrition even though I doubted I would be able to eat it from my special needs bag. I never saw any race photographers on the run course. Which I was glad because I was so sick. I'm so glad I carried my headlamp that clipped on my hat because so many parts of the run course were completely black!
I quickly asked Mom & Erin the time of day. Erin told me it was 8:08 pm. I was so happy because there was a 9 pm cutoff for the halfway point. I had beat it so I told myself I could still make this happen even walking the next 13.1 miles. I was so determined. I can honestly say that doing an Ironman is all about grit, determination, and literally mind over matter. I still wanted to cry because I had hoped for a 5 hour 15 min or so marathon with my jog/walk program, but that wasn't happening now. However, I kept telling myself something I heard a lady say while we were standing to start the swim. She said don't let yourself go to any dark places today. When you start going down that road, smile and think positive thoughts... quote scripture... do whatever you've got to do, but don't get down. So that's what I did. I looked around at the racers beside me. Some were sick just like I was, some were limping, some were cussing, some were actually running, and others were saying they might have to crawl, but they were not stopping. They amazed me! So I couldn't quit! Plus I knew my mom was waiting on me and she was going to be so excited to tell all her kin folks that I had actually accomplished the big one.
I was so happy when I came around and could hear the announcer at the finish line! I didn't have a clue what time it was, but I felt sure I had made it. I asked a guy walking what time it was and he said his watched had also died. I actually found the strength to jog in on the finish line. I don't know how I did it! They say when you get there no matter how bad you are hurting that you'll find your legs and fly. Well, that's just what happen. All the pain went away and I heard my name announced with the words... YOU ARE AN IRONMAN! It brings tears to my eyes thinking about it right now. If you would have asked me a couple years ago if I could or would want to do something like this, I would have told you that you were crazy. LOL I believe we all have this super strength deep inside us that we must tap into if we want to accomplish something like an Ironman. And most importantly we must draw our strength from GOD. :>)
LOVE HER!
Mom and Erin were waiting on me, but I should have held back because I got caught in a cluster of other racers coming in and a lady was right around me when they tried to take pictures of me. I really didn't even see the race photo guys or I would have tried to pose.. ha Honestly, all I could think about was that they were giving me a medal so I sure hoped I had made it in on time.
I'm happy to say the time in the photo says 16:41:34, but that's not my time. I finished in 16:03! Yippie
Then the guy stopped me after handing me my first medal and said I have another medal for you. I was pumped. I had read somewhere that if you did the half Ironman back in May and then also did the full Ironman in November that you would get a medal for doing both within the same year. Yippie!
Boy I'm so pale and tired looking... hee hee... my hat is crooked and I need some lipstick. Hee Hee... I don't even remember this being taken at the finish line. ha I guess 16 hours 3 minutes is a LONG day. :>) and check out this... they have a guy in the finish photo with my times!! I've contacted them and they said they'll respond within 24-48 hours.
Mom, Erin and I got in the bed around 3 am after collecting my bike, my bags and getting back to our condo! It was a LONG day to say the least! We'd all been up since like 3:45 am because the swim started at 6:40 am!
Love my sign Erin made for me! She also had the bottle of champagne that I told her to have, but when she mentioned it, I told her there was no way on God's green earth I could even take a sip of that! I didn't even eat after the race. I couldn't! After my long hot shower, I was able to drink 2 tailwind rebuild - recovery drinks. Thank goodness.
I had to get up early the next morning because finisher jackets went out at 7 am in the Ironman village store. I had heard you needed to be in line early if you wanted to get your size. Me and mom were up and in line EARLY. I think we got maybe 3 hours sleep! But I got my jacket! Erin took these pictures of me on the beach afterwards:
The extra medal I got for doing both Florida Ironman races. It says Florida Strong because last year they were hit by hurricane Micheal and had to move the race to Haines City Florida. Several people in Panama City Beach still have blue tarps on their roofs and are rebuilding from the hurricane.
Can you tell I was happy to finish the swim within time!
Me after the wetsuit strippers going through the fresh water shower and making that long run to transition to get in my bike gear:
Either mom or Erin captured this one as I headed out of T1 on the Bike:
Bike
55 degrees to start the ride... that means it's much cooler on a BIKE! I hate it was this cool because I had to wear a jacket to keep the wind off my chest so I wouldn't get sick with my head being wet from the swim. I couldn't show off my TOA TRI top with my jacket on. :( But I kept warm. :>)
Notice the gloves and shoe covers I have on to keep my toes warm! It was chilly starting out!
Notice I had ditched the warm gloves by this point.
Soon I was home free! I looked at my watch and I was ahead of the cutoff time! yeah me! I had to be in by 5:40 pm to start the run and it was only 4:57 pm! I was so excited that I forgot to grab my Garmin off my bike before the bike catcher took my bike and told me to go get my run bag and head to the changing tent! As soon as I got in the changing tent I realized it and had to run back out and beg a volunteer to go get my watch because they wouldn't let me over the fence to the bikes. She was very nice and she actually ran trying to help me as fast as she could. I thanked and hugged her! All I could think was that I needed to hurry up because Lisa is watching my times. LOL I burned 4,272 calories according to the Garmin data. My moving time was 7:19 and my total time was 7:25 so this time I didn't lose too much time when I stopped at aid stations or at the half way point to refill my nutrition! Yippie! When I downloaded my bike stats I had 76 miles with a mph greater than 15 which averaged 16.78 and 36 miles that were 15 mph or less. I felt really good when I looked at my stats considering the headwind and me not over exerting myself. I knew I would lose time for bathroom breaks and the half way point to stop and get my bag to refill my nutrition. There was one racer yelling at the volunteers at the half way point telling them they had 30 seconds to get his bag. He was VERY RUDE! It was taking awhile for them to find our bags, but they were VOLUNTEERING!!! They were not getting paid to be out there all day helping us!
Here I am coming out of T2 heading out on the run. Thanks mom & Erin for capturing this picture. So happy to be ahead of schedule!
Run -
The first mile started off good. I did my jog/walk intervals and my pace was 11:07 ... I had been practicing this jog/walk for the race and planned to stay around a 12 min pace so I wouldn't die on the run after biking 112 miles. All was good until mile 5 and boy my stomach started feeling very sick. I reverted to walking more and only jogging a little to try to settle my stomach. I remembered I had my Nauzene tablets in my fuel belt so I quickly chewed 3 of them. I got no further than 1/2 mile and they all came up along with everything I had been sipping on at the 1 mile aid stations. Oh I was so sick! I wanted to cry! I kept thinking why now! I have felt good all day and now you want to make me sick! Everyone said oh your a runner so the run part will be easy. NOT!! I'm here to tell you that running after swimming then biking is NOT an easy task especially when you feel so bad. There was a sweet volunteer that walked over to me and put her hand on my back while I was bent over being sick and told me to get it all out and then keep moving forward. She told me she had been right were I was at and the key was to NOT stop. She told me to stop as many times as I needed to puke, but keep moving forward. She was a GOD sent! So I told myself you are not gonna stop! There is no room for you today Devil!! You can freaking walk the whole marathon if you have to and most likely still make your time limit. So I walked a LOT!! and I would jog from time to time when I could manage it without being sick. I have no idea why I was so sick. I've read where people said swallowing the salt water makes you sick so maybe that was it. Maybe I should have taken that dramamine early that I had bought. I was just scared it would make me sleepy so I never took it.
Then if being sick isn't enough my watched died at mile 10.8!!!! I couldn't believe it! I had forgot to turn off wifi and bluetooth! I was so mad at myself! Now I had no idea of my pace or total time. I did look real quick at my time when it beeped low battery so I was trying to calculate in my head what I had to do to finish within time. When I came in at the halfway point at mile 13.1 there was mom and Erin cheering me. GOD BLESS THEM!
It was getting cold now that is was dark. I grabbed my long
sleeve shirt and some nutrition even though I doubted I would be able to eat it from my special needs bag. I never saw any race photographers on the run course. Which I was glad because I was so sick. I'm so glad I carried my headlamp that clipped on my hat because so many parts of the run course were completely black!
I was so happy when I came around and could hear the announcer at the finish line! I didn't have a clue what time it was, but I felt sure I had made it. I asked a guy walking what time it was and he said his watched had also died. I actually found the strength to jog in on the finish line. I don't know how I did it! They say when you get there no matter how bad you are hurting that you'll find your legs and fly. Well, that's just what happen. All the pain went away and I heard my name announced with the words... YOU ARE AN IRONMAN! It brings tears to my eyes thinking about it right now. If you would have asked me a couple years ago if I could or would want to do something like this, I would have told you that you were crazy. LOL I believe we all have this super strength deep inside us that we must tap into if we want to accomplish something like an Ironman. And most importantly we must draw our strength from GOD. :>)
Then the guy stopped me after handing me my first medal and said I have another medal for you. I was pumped. I had read somewhere that if you did the half Ironman back in May and then also did the full Ironman in November that you would get a medal for doing both within the same year. Yippie!
Boy I'm so pale and tired looking... hee hee... my hat is crooked and I need some lipstick. Hee Hee... I don't even remember this being taken at the finish line. ha I guess 16 hours 3 minutes is a LONG day. :>) and check out this... they have a guy in the finish photo with my times!! I've contacted them and they said they'll respond within 24-48 hours.
Got my PIC now!
Mom, Erin and I got in the bed around 3 am after collecting my bike, my bags and getting back to our condo! It was a LONG day to say the least! We'd all been up since like 3:45 am because the swim started at 6:40 am!
Love my sign Erin made for me! She also had the bottle of champagne that I told her to have, but when she mentioned it, I told her there was no way on God's green earth I could even take a sip of that! I didn't even eat after the race. I couldn't! After my long hot shower, I was able to drink 2 tailwind rebuild - recovery drinks. Thank goodness.
I had to get up early the next morning because finisher jackets went out at 7 am in the Ironman village store. I had heard you needed to be in line early if you wanted to get your size. Me and mom were up and in line EARLY. I think we got maybe 3 hours sleep! But I got my jacket! Erin took these pictures of me on the beach afterwards:
So what's next???? REST... well for a couple weeks. Got St. Jude coming up.... my 7th year!! and the Gulf Coast marathon the following weekend with my girlfriends for FUN!
I've already had people asking if I'm going to do another Ironman. Well, right now I'm not sure. I know it won't be next year. I plan to focus on my marathons next year and have a little FUN. So Erin's sign that says, "Been there .. done that"... fits! Bucket list - check!
Thank you to each and everyone of you that prayed for me, texted me, called me, and basically just SUPPORTED me during this journey!!! I am forever grateful!
Love, D
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