Race Report – Ironman Zurich Switzerland 2014 I did not have the best final pre-race days. A week before the race, I was hit by a tourist bus at Mount Faber. Then I had a crack in the stem (again) but managed to get the bike repaired before departure. Once on at the airport, I had to pay excess weight; quite a hefty sum in fact. Once in Switzerland, the weather was rainy and unusually cold (17 deg C) for summer. After bike assembly, my Di2 wasnt working. I dismantled & reassembled the bike a few times & managed to have the electronic shifters working for next days training ride. But it came differently: they werent working again. To find a bike shop with electronic shifters expertise wasnt an easy task. I finally found a shop of a former Swiss cycling pro. They had to re-wire the entire bike with new cables. My baby was returned to me on the day I headed to Zurich (D minus 2 days). I registered on Friday, paid for a 1 day triathlon license to be allowed to race & headed for a swim. The water was super cold and I had difficulty keeping my heart rate low & breathing. Saturday (D minus 1). It was still raining and cold. I did another swim at the race site that turned out quite well, which gave me the confidence back. Subsequently, I headed out for a final ride to check my baby. She was fine. However, riding in 17 deg C and rain is pain to me! Bike check in late in the evening (according to my allotted schedule) in the rain wasn’t fun. The organisers had run out of bike covers and quite a significant number of athletes weren’t happy. After a long (cold and wet) wait, we received an additional supply. All set, transition bags hung, chip received, it was time to head back to the hotel for dinner and bed. I decided to eat at the hotel to avoid exposing myself further to the cold weather. Yes, I was already suffering. My dinner was good but it took an eternity to be served. I was in bed 2 hours later than planned. Race Day: I woke up before the alarm clock rang. I was relaxed. Went for breakfast, hopped into my gear and made my way to the transition area. It wasn’t raining. At transition, I set up the bike, wore my wet suit, hung the street cloths bag and was off for warm-up. I was feeling relaxed. 3, 2, 1 … and the horn went off: I walked into the water and started swimming. The water suddenly felt freezing. My heart rate shot up and my breathing was a mess. After 200 m I stopped. I could not breathe and I felt dizzy. I treaded water, swam breast stroke but could not calm down. I panicked. I looked back and was the last one. So I decided to call for help but all the support paddlers were with the swimming athletes, which meant I had to swim back ashore. Then I thought about someone special and I asked God for guidance. I turned around and told myself to finish the swim even if it was in breast stroke style. I started swimming and immediately switched to free style. This time everything was OK. The water seemed warmer, the heart rate was lower and the breathing normal. I soon caught up with the last swimmers and as I was overtaking them. On and off, I was getting cramps. I was also whacked a few times into pretty much everywhere. Even my goggles went flying but I managed to hold onto them before they sank. Only after the race I saw my left outer thigh bruised. Out of the water, I picked up the transition bag, put the nutrition into my back pockets and stuffed the wet suit into the bag, which was handed to a volunteer. As I reached my bike, my Oakley glasses were gone. I normally put the helmet onto the aero bar and the glasses into the helmet, but they weren’t around. I spent some time looking for them around my transition slot but they were really gone. Enough time wasted, I grabbed my bike and off we went. The weather felt especially cold. It was 16 deg C, rainy and there were winds coming from the lake. As I reached KM 35, the zipper of my tri top gave way and I was bare-chested. I tried to tie it somewhat together to no avail. So I decided to take my rain coat and wear it. At least this way it kept my nutrition from dropping off my back pockets. The climbs at IM Zurich Switzerland are tough. There are approximately 1500 m of climbing (approximately 4900 feet). As I was descending one of those climbs at KM 50, I was overtaking 3 bikes and moved onto the left lane of the road to realise too late that there was a check point. I had to reverse up the slope and clear the check point if I wanted to stay in the race. One Hispanic speaking athlete I had just overtaken yelled at me: Turn around, turn around. On the second loop, on a downhill section, the marshals made a mistake by allowing a camper van to enter the road as I was approaching. Unfortunately, there was an oncoming car at the same time and I could not break on time at such speed. I narrowly managed to squeeze between the camper van and the oncoming vehicle. Strangely, I was still calm after that incident. The rest of the bike was cranking it up the hills, followed by descending; while constantly shivering. My legs were trembling from the cold. The final 8 KM of the bike, I pushed as hard as I could and managed to clock an average speed of 42 km/h. Now onto the run – my favourite discipline: I started conservatively and decided to switch my nutrition to pure liquid from the aid stations: Water, coke, Isostar (Swiss isotonic drink), salty soup (because I was cold) and my own staltstick tabs. I recalled a tri coach saying: hydrate and fill up in the first 14 KM. I did just that. In fact, I took time to fill up at every aid station. Throughout the run, I was feeling better and better and on my last loop, I even spotted my brother Rene running next to me for a few 100 meters. That gave me the final boost. My last 4 KM were done at a 5:05 pace (including stopping at aid stations). I ended the race on a high, with a marathon PB, a bike PB and a course PB. I was ecstatic with my feel in the run and very happy to have achieved some of the objectives set. A big THANK YOU to all those that contributed to my achieving this, supported me in doing this, believed in me more than I did and were there in spirit when I faced the darkest moment in the race during the swim start! Key impressions from the race: Swim – The pros were very considerate when overtaking the backmarkers like me. They did not swim over us; at least not over me. Bike – The Korean female athlete, whose tri shorts were so thin, that one could see her butt crack… It cracked me up! The British female athlete who was wearing a lacy thong. It was visible through her tri shorts. The bike course. 180 KM ride with approximately 70 KM of climbing; the beast and heartbreak hill. The latter being compared to Alp d’Huez’ with 15% inclination. Run – Seeing Pete Jacobs on the run. I had to do a double take as he should not have been on the run course at the same time as me. I learned later that he just needed an IM finish to qualify for Kona. The ladies from a British tri club that ran the marathon in a tutu. Seeing my brother Rene running next to me.
Posted on: Fri, 01 Aug 2014 13:56:53 +0000
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