Wildflower

I feel like a complete novice triathlete as the ironman approaches. Aero bars, deepwater starts, Co2 air, special needs bags, draft zones -- these are all brand new to me.

As much of a newbie as I am, I am not completely unfamiliar with triathlons -- in May 2002 I completed the Wildlflower Half-Ironman in central California.

My results at Wildflower --

Swim - 47:29
T1 - 5:00
Bike - 3:24:00
T2 - 3:22
Run - 1:54:57

Total - 6:14:48

This time from Wildflower would seemingly convert into roughly a 14:00 full ironman.

Back in 2002 I was living in Burlingame California near San Francisco where it is much easier to train for a triathlon than in Tokyo. However back then I was definitely a novice triathlete and my primary triathlon objective could be summed up simply as -- "not drowning".

I did not have a blog for Wildflower, and I cannot precisely recall the training work I did in preparation. I remember though that my bicycle training for Wildflower was insufficient. Because of this, much of my energy for New Zealand these past two months has been centered around increasing my cycling training. My Wildflower bicycle time of 3:24 is not so terrible itself. Rather it is the fact that the bicycle ride left me so drained that I ran a 1:54:57 half-marathon (versus the 1:20 half-marathon I might have managed in a half-marathon alone).

When I say I was "so drained" during the run I am not exaggerating. Like in every triathlon, my legs felt heavy and sluggish after I first got off the bike. But rather than loosen up after a few kilometers I found myself feeling worse and worse. Soon every step was misery and my run form could best be described as a "survival shuffle".

Wildflower is famous for its running aid station staffed by naked college girls. But I was in so much pain that I didn't really even care about admiring the naked college girls. I was just happy to be handed some sports drink. Usually I find some energy at the end of a race when I see the finish banner, but at Wildflower I just shuffled across the finish line and collapsed in the first aid station.

I am a bit more confident going into New Zealand than Wildflower. Since Wildflower and since moving to Japan I have done four Olympic distance triathlons.

My weight today is still 60kg, but I am eating more, and feel OK after getting 10 hours of sleep last night. I recovered suprisingly quickly from the 33k run I did in Ome on Sunday.