Final countdown

Wow, it's almost here. Hard to believe it, but after all the pain and suffering of early mornings, constant tiredness, too many bottles of sports drink, it's almost here. After getting into the Okanagan valley, getting over jet lag, seeing family I settled into race headquarters on Wednesday morning.

I'm staying in a house with 2 other Ironmen, and some of their family. Katrina, a very good friend of wife Colleen and myself and she is competing in her first IM tomorrow, and what better way than for both of us to be back on home soil doing one of the best IM races in the world. You're going to rock it Kat! Coming along with her is her coach Chris, or Z as he's called. For Z this is his 3rd IM as well. He's a great guy and I can now see why Kat has done so well in her prep leading up. Well done mate.

We also have our in house staff ;-) Katrina's mom has joined us from Ontario, her aunt from the UK is here and her daughter as well. Now put on top of this, my mom and dad (who by the way will be celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary on race day, congratulations you two, love you) my sister Jen, her husband Vic, my nephew Daniel, my wife's folks, and of course mancub. I reckon there will be a good cheering squad for us tomorrow.

We've done some good swims, rides and runs since Wednesday and did the check in, hit the merchandise tent for IM propaganda, been to the welcoming dinner, and now it's time for one last little training set of 15 minutes of each. Then take the bikes in and put the feet up.

The weather here has been great and they're calling for 32 come race day. A bit hot, but it's all about hydration. At the dinner, I learned about a few things, IMC is one of only a few IM's that is a single lap configuration. The man who created this event wanted to choose a location in Canada which in his mind, simulated Kona the most. Hot, scenic and challenging. Well sir, I think you've hit the mark on all 3.

The official count for IMC this year is 2900 people, of which there will be over 1100 first timers, WOW! There's a competitor who is doing their 125th IM tomorrow and there's a group of 3 guys who will be doing their 27th consecutive IMC, wow.

So you're probably wondering what this place is like. Well here's a few pictures for those of you who have never been.

Taper

Taper.... According to dictionary.com it means a variety of things.

• gradual decrease of force, capacity, etc.


• to grow gradually lean.


• to reduce gradually.

Yup those all work. But even though the harder yards are behind me, there is so much work to do yet. Still need to train hard, but less over the coming two weeks. Starting in the next day or two, the "list" comes out. Yes, for all those OCD's out there, the list of lists, the holy grail of lists. Produced by non other than the self proclaimed king of the OCD's, TimO.

I've bartered for a bike box and it'll cost me dearly, but worth it. To be honest, the trip will be the toughest part as it's a 13 hour flight to LA, a 3 hour layover, a 3 hour flight to Vancouver, then top it off with just over a 4 hour drive to Kelowna. Ouch. All with a very energetic 4 year old. With the aid of alcohol and drugs I'm sure we'll both make it in one piece.

Once I get there, I'm going to put the bike together, go for a few rides, head out for some swims and get the mind ready. I've done some training, and yes the mind still wonders if it's enough? Hell it better be.. I've done so much over the past year, a 20 week IMA campaign, then 5 weeks of light training, then a 12 week program for IMC. That doesn't take into account the marathon, the half ironman I did and the like before IMA training. Shit! I do need a break.

So with my new trusty steed now here, and fully pimped out, I'm looking forward to putting things together and just see what happens.

Not much now, other than sleep well, keep the bugs at bay, train smart and focus... well that and have a few Tim Hortons donuts when I arrive in Canadiana.

almost there

Another tough week done, one more hard week then 2 weeks of taper that just happens to have close to 13,000kms of travel involved.

I really can't judge where I'm at, but things seem to be right, but hey the day will be what it will be and I can't do anything about it. I do FINALLY get one of those nagging things off my back tomorrow, my bike goes in and I get my new DA Felt.... mmmmm bike porn.

This week was tough at work which didn't help too much, but come this Tuesday, things will be better and I can concentrate on the task at hand. I had some good workouts in the mix which was nice.

Yesterday, I managed to head out for a 26km run. My plan was to head out, run steady and well within my limits. This is exactly what I managed to do. The first half was perfect, I kept my pace steady and comfortable. When I hit my 15 minutes (was running 15, walking 1) my quick breaks, I was getting impatient, so this was a good feeling. Once I got going again, it was feeling quite quick between breaks. At the turn around, I topped off my water bottles and got into again. Same thing, easy pace, keep within my means, and before I knew it, I was done my last break and was heading into home.

Today was a four hour stint on the wind trainer. I was hoping to get out with the boys on my new bike, but the distributor screwed up so I didn't go this week, rather pushed the big ride to next week. The family was busy so, I hopped on the wind trainer and went to town. 4 hours on the wind trainer is as close to capital punishment as you can get. I killed an hour of it on skype with my sister which was great. We chatted about our upcoming trip to the mother land and what amounts of alcohol we're going to consume. Then I watched a very bad movie (the mechanic) and then finished off by watching the Brisbane Lions choke in the final minutes of the game. Sigh......

For the ride on the wind trainer, I did my best to try and simulate the mountains I'll have to tackle, so I broke the session into 4 equal segments. Easy spinning to simulate the down hill start, then into a hard grind to simulate the first mountain pass, back into an easier spin and then finish off with another hard grind to simulate the second mountain pass. I was quite tired after this session which is good I guess, but it was only 4 hours, not 6. I know I have the base to draw upon, I know I have the stubbornness to push on through, so I'm not going to sweat it and really get into the spirit of the race when I arrive and truly enjoy the full experience.

All up I hit 300kms for the week which has me just shy of 2,500kms in the 9 weeks thus far, not to bad if you ask me.

So tomorrow is a double brick session by riding to the bike store, then running into work, the reverse it for the afternoon. All up will be about 50kms of cycling and 13kms of running. Then a run/swim combo Tuesday, I reckon I'll have a cracker of a last week before taper.

The end is in sight, so onwards and upwards.

Cheers
Rich