daffonce -

Dude, nice work!! Thats a really good time, even if you're unhappy with the running.

Well, i finished my first tri on saturday, a sprint in Loveland, CO. Not pleased at with my times, but having been somewhat obese since i was a child, and now I'm within reach of a healthy weight goal, i'm pretty stoked! This was the first organized competitive event i have ever participated in. I'm really glad that I did it, though I would have been so much better off had i trained in open water (I wasted a ton of time and energy swimming in circles!! Luckily the kayak brigade was super supportive).

This also inspired me to sign up for a half marathon for October. I'm all about setting PR's this year :)
Swim T1 bike t2 Run sex rank overall
00:28:51 04:22:00 00:48:57 01:41:00 00:41:41 133 02:05:34

NinjaMilitia - Awesome work! My first one took longer than that, so don't feel bad at all. Feel awesome! And the Half marathon will be fun.

Plus you have a great name for going into the combat of a race.

Congrats!! I haven't had an OWS yet for mine (few and far between in the Albuquerque area), but look forward to it some day.

Thanks! I am feeling better about it now.

The Ninja Militia is better suited i think for a team name.. how awesome would that feel, completing races with a bunch of friends wearing ninja outfits!! so much win.

well done you're hooked now.;)

scuse me for being thick but I can't make sense of your times ? could you tell me what the distances were and the time you did for each split please thanks


00:28:51 swim 04:22:00 transition ? 00:48:57 bike 01:41:00? huge transition ! 00:41:41 run 133 (rank) overall time 02:05:34

I think his T2 was 1:41 seconds. Overall heck of a race and nice job!

Guys,

I completed my first Sprint Tri at 268 lbs on Sunday in Naperville IL (Chicagoland). Total was 1:54. Swimming was OK, I killed the bike section and got to blow past a lot of folks. My weak link going in was the running and (as expected) ended up walking a lot of the run.

Everybody was friendly. I was not the biggest guy out there. If you're worried about being sneered or jeered at, don't be. Just go.

I can see how this Tri thing is addictive. Already planning how I'll train for next year, and where I can shave a few minutes.

Zoxe - Way to go!! I have a cousin and the family of one of my best friends who live in Naperville! You're totally right, people are supportive not derisive. The only problem ive ever had is when i made a mistake on the course, and an experienced person who was flying got pissed with me mid-race. knowing what youre doing solves that LOL

Zoxe, NICE GOING!!!:thumb: I hope to join the completed triathlon group in a little more then a week myself. :)

Hill-Pumper- Thats awesome! I WILL be joining the Half-Ironman completed group a week from tomorrow.

Ben,
I may try to join the half ironman thing next year. finishing up my training for the cranberry olympic tri (see you there), and also starting to ramp up my run training. If I am going to do a half iron man i need to run another half marathon, the first time was so awful I couldn't attempt a half ironman without it. I did 8 miles this past week, and am shooting for the united healthcare half marathon in newport this october (the site of said horrible half marathon). I am thinking about doing the patriot (the same day of the minuteman we did). Also thinking of getting some swimming lessons this off season make myself a better swimmer for the long swim.

Also wanted to wish you the best of luck next weekend. Get that rear wheel retensioned and give it hell.

Are you staying at a hotel the night before the cranberry?

daffonce - we dont have a reservation yet. I completely forgot until the wife and i were in the car today, so im doing that shortly. It's cool that youre doing cranberry, are you doing the sprint or the olympic?

Rach wants to do Minuteman Half next year too, but I want to see the schedule before I pick races. I think it'll be safe to not think about it until October when we need to start planning to pay for things, and I have enough to think about this week.

Ben,
I am doing the olympic at the cranberry. It should be inersesting, I have trained plenty for it but the thought of going at it for that length of time kinda freaks me out a bit. If you wanted you are welcome to crash at my place the night before the cranberry, I am in foxboro about 20 minutes away from lakeville. I won't think about the half ironman until after the half marathon, i want to finish it in under 2:30 with a real goal of 2:20, I think last year I came in around 2:38 but I am much faster now and the weather conditions will be much better or I won't run it this year. I am debating early season or late season for the half so the patriot or maybe the timberman we shall see, it all depends on what life deals me. it could all change if Mary and I have a baby, think that will significantly cut into training time.

2:38? Thats about 40 minutes faster than I did my last two halfs (3:19 and 3:20). I was walking both of those so that'll be interesting. Since I last talked to you, we booked a room, so we're all set, but thanks for the offer!

I put some more miles on the wheel so its off to the shop tomorrow for retensioning.

Thanks, I am just doing a sprint tri, nothing as grand as a Half-Ironman. I have a bruised heel and some pain in my hip, but I hope to be healed up with my taper week. I did my last run before the tri today, so no more impact on the legs for the rest week should help.:)

Nice work anyways!

I'm so ready for my race. I'm going to give my all and I'm going to finish inside the time limit.

hey all, first post.

on Jan 1, 2009 i was sitting by the pool with my wife. i told her i wanted to run a triathlon. she sighed. as we don't say much about what we want to do, as we just about always make a go at it. so this kinda thing only comes up once every few years. "Lets build a house." was her last one. took us 3 years of solid non-stop work. so it was my turn. "Lets run an ironman."

she paused a second. "Ironman."

"Yeah. how hard could it be?"

"The full-on motherscratcher Ironman?"

"Yeah hun."

we sipped our beers for a few minutes.

"Seriously?" she asked.

"As serious as a cat in a microwave." i replied.

she nodded. "Okay. i am in."

"Awesome." i said as i opened a fresh beer. i sat back contented. we were already pretty much done!

"Bummer you hate to run..." she mused from the chair next to me.

"Yeah, running sucks. but at least we like to bike!"

"I think its longer than we have ever gone before."

"How hard could it be?"

we were quiet a while.

"Bummer you can't swim honey." she hinted.

"Look, if all you are going to see are roadblocks, then... ah, swim eh?"

"Miles of swimming."

"Miles?" i sputtered.

"Miles. you cant swim a hundred meters."

"Well, we aren't doing the race next week sweetie, i can learn."

"How hard could it be?" she agreed.



so we picked a race. Canada Focking Iron Focking Man. August 29, 2010.

it was 600 days away. i am 6-1, i weighed 215 pounds. i could not swim one length of the pool. my bike was passable, i could ride 50 miles without destroying my weekend. but just about barely that. and i could run 4 miles. several of them without stopping.

a year and 8 months. what could we do? we decided to break the time into smaller sections, each ending with an event. the first section went from about Jan through May. this was our "just get things started" time. we ran a bit, biked a bit. swam ( drowned ) a bit. the swimming was staggeringly bad. i panicked and thrashed and gasped and.... got a video called Total Immersion. which solved the worst problems. i think i set a personal best distance of 100 meters sometime in this period.

we figured all things being equal we should loose weight through running. we plodded. we sweated. we shuffled and sometimes broke into a jog. we signed up for the columbus marathon held in the fall. we turned all of our attention to that. to finishing a full on marathon. marathon man! we ran our distance up to a half marathon. up to about 20 miles of sweaty cursing bruising hell. my weight came down to just over 200. my wife is big, not fat, but 6 feet tall and she also lost about the same amount of weight.

we ran the marathon. fairly slowly, but... not bad! and, it was ( obviously ) a personal best... ( and worst ) our first ever marathon done we hit the pool a bit more. i could now swim about 300 yards. doing the modified thrash and panic attack. we figured we were about half way with the getting in shape and continued to skip the biking. just ran for another 4 months to a second marathon in florida. the goofy challenge, you run a half one day and a full the next. again we did so-so. but! the training and not the destination was the point of the thing. this time we ran several runs in the 20 mile range. one week we did about 55 miles running. we were exhausted.

a few months before hand we went up to Canada to sign up for the race. we got to watch the race, hand out T-shirts at the end and pretended we were triathlon people.

March of this year comes and we have about 6 months left. we get a book called something like Triathlon training weekly schedule. we do this workout plan. which is the ONLY way i would suggest doing this kind of training with someone. its all the book's fault! you cant blame the other person when the alarm goes off at 4:30 and you have to get in a 2 hour run and a 90 minute swim.

we get the bikes out. 1993 35 pound monsters. this lasted about 3 months. then we went with the 17 pound carbon guys. gained about 3 mph from that. aerobars. then tight clothes - yuck! high tech running stuff. gels and vitamins and beta alanine and sweat sweat sweat. we were training. for a focking ironman.

also we decide to do some races to get ourselves up to speed on these things called transitions and... gear, and ... stuff.

we do our first ever sprint race. our first couple olympic distance races and a half ironman. we were very slow. but finished them all.

my weight goes from 215 to 188 today. our last hard workout was sunday the 15th. its now taper to the event in 10 days.

i am scared out of my mind and my heart is beating like its off the chain just thinking about it.

but i think we are ready. we have learned a ton of stuff, and if any of you would like some ( newbie ) tips... i can probably tell you what did and didnt work for us as newbs.

not sure why i wrote all this out. but... *nodding head* its been. without any doubt. the best 600 days of my life. if any of you are on the fence, are just reading and wondering. do it. do it. it is beyond my ability to put into words how staggeringly important it is to get your life if not fixed, then... turned to fun.


after all, how hard could it be?



wish us luck. :-)

Sparfy -

What a great story!! Where are you from? You mentioned the Columbus Marathon. Is that Columbus Ohio? I wish maybe my wife and I had trained for longer before the race, but we had almost a year and I think we're ready. I saw that you visited my site. I don't know if you clicked on the Team Tyler link, but there's a former NHLer doing Ironman Canada this year as well to raise funds to fight cancer. Good luck and have an awesome time. Get me your bib number, my wife and I have an Olympic next week, but I'll be following your race already so I'll track your progress too!

i didnt know the guy from the jackets was going to do it too. i am guessing he beats us like a rented goalie!

i will leave our numbers on your site - as soon as i get them! :-)

and let me know your info too - would be great to see how well you do after a year of getting ready - just from my experience the half was certainly very hard, but - doable!

good luck!

Sparfy, great story, best of luck on your Ironman. I was wondering how you liked the Total Immersion program. I had never heard of it until you posted about, but did a little checking in to it, and it looks like something I could use. Unfortunately, I won't be able to get the program before my sprint tri this weekend.

Tech: sorry about the last post - i am from ohio, i live about 100 miles northeast of columbus. in Canton - about 1 mile from where the football hall of fame is.

Hill: i only watched the one video. i think it was called happy laps. its not all that detailed on how to swim really well. i know they have those dvds and even classes you can go to. but this one takes you from beginning and gives you a bit of a push. it would be like when the pros get their tires swapped on the bike and then some dude pushes you for 10 feet.

the dvd starts pretty basic with just holding your head in the water and breathing in and blowing bubbles. then you go through about 10 stages of the freestyle swim stroke. sideways, then one hand forward and so on adding more to it until you are actually making the stroke. very good stuff.

but the two biggest things that changed my swimming are ...

1 - to breath out ALL the time. every moment you are not bringing air in, breath it out. bubbles all over the fockin place! eat my bubbles bish!!!

2 - have your return stroke be as relaxed as possible. i found i was swimming hard with the hand in the water and the other hand, the one above the water was also going very hard. just relax that hand and let you fingertips scrape the top of the water the slightest possible amount. this also gets you breathing better.

and i have about 10 tips for open water swimming - the biggest one, would be to get into the water at least 20 minutes before the start of the race and put your head under water. this will take a lot of the freak out of the swim.

good luck!


and, here is a write up of the first time i swam out in a pond. its a pretty panicky moment: http://ironsparfy.blogspot.com/2010/...king-pond.html

Sparfy best of luck in your race. I have just worked my way up to an olympic tri and may do a half ironman next year, what a great accomplishment to have worked up to going out for the full ironman.

the swim in a tri can be interesting. I had no trouble with the swim portion of training, could do 1200 yards in laps in the pool no problem. had done the open water thing before, no problem. i remember showing up to pick up my bib at the first triathlon (the swim was 0.25 miles), I almost shat myself when i saw the bouys for the swim course. i was a little freaked out. the next morning i saw them again and had the same omg wtf feeling. i got into the water and swam telling myself i would go to the first buoy and back, about a 200 yard swim. i didn't make it to the first buoy before getting a little pooped. i got out of the water pysched myself up got back into the water with my swim wave. i truly thought i was going to drown in the first 100 yards of the swim. my breathing was so screwed up i couldn't believe it. i kept thinking wow i am going to dnf in the first 100 yards of the swim. then i made it to the first buoy and turned and the breathing just become pretty normal again and i finished the swim pretty easily.

daff: yep! the swim is amazingly hard the first time. i saw more than one person DNF the swim in my first half iron. they just went to shore after about 100 yards. it is beyond words scary the first time. more tips if you guys want:

1 - get in the water before the start and get relaxed UNDER water.

2 - many ponds you cant see anything, its like swimming at midnight it is so dark. so you dont know where you are. this is pretty hard to get over, you just have to pretend you are lying in bed and turning from the side to face down in the pillow. this is a tough one to beat.

3 - if you are wearing a swim hat for the first time that day - like you didnt practice with it - things are different with it. your head will be more bouyant, which is a plus, and it will be tugging your hair which sucks and squeezing your head which also sucks... but! the worst thing is it will your hearing drastically if you put it over your ears. if this is your first time wearing it, DONT put it over your ears. the sound change is huge. from friendly bubbles that you heard in the pool you will now hear a huge echoing explosion of sound. very very unpleasant first time - just adds to the panic. so dont put it over your ears. :-)

4 - the bouys ARE far away. in a half iron they can be over half a mile away. which is insane. you can hardly see the dots bobbing out there. the thing is... and here is a good scene from the movie Hoosiers. they go to the big event stadium and look around - its like 20x bigger than their highschool gym. and everyone is nervous. the coach has the kids measure how high the rim of the basket is. they do this and say "ten feet". the coach then says "you might find that this number is the exact same number as the basket back home in Butfock indiana!" same with the distance. DONT even look at the bouys. the distance is just the same as in your pool. its half iron, olympic iron... whatever you know you were going to get. and! it will take as long to swim it. so dont try to get there in 30 seconds. just relax. the swim is the one place you dont want to go hyper. save that for the bike you freaks.

5 - trust the wetsuit - its awesome. plus you cant drown with one on. or you get your money back.

6 - swim one sided for the start at least, do at least 300 yards one sided. you dont need to know whats going on on your other side... its just more people splashing and going crazy.

7 - nobody is going to drown.

8 - start in the back if its your first 10 times in the pond. you cant win the event on the swim, and if you are new to pond swimming ( like me ) then you are probably good at running or biking. so know that you will be in the water a while and then pass all those ***** swimmers on the bike. tell them about it too as you go by. say "What now *** swimmer? Not so fast now that we are doing REAL sports are ya??" oddly good swimmers usually make good runners. so you will get to see these people again in a few hours for more discussions.

Well.... I finished my first sprint tri today. It was indeed ugly, but a finish none the less. The swimming killed me, but I knew going in that was my weak point. I think that I noticed something like 22 minutes in the pool as I got out from my 500 meters. The first transition seemed a little slow since I had trouble getting on my jersey. The 20k bike portion went well enough. I did get passed by a guy and a mountain bike which was sort of embarrassing. Second transition was faster since it was just a change of shoes.The run started off with my right calf being so tight that I needed to stop to stretch it out. It loosened up, but my hip started to act up with with about 2k to go. I ended up doing a limp/jog for the last 1k. Never the less, I did pass quite a few runners in the 5k course, so I was happy with that. I don't have an official time yet, but it looks like I did the whole thing in 1 hour, 39 minutes. My goal was to do it in 1:45, so again a bit of happiness. Hopefully, I can find out my splits and post them up later. The event was a first for those who were putting it on, therefore it was a little unorganized. Still, I had some fun and know what to work on for the next time.:)