Preparation
After an off season with almost 0 movement I started picking up training again about 21 weeks out. As always I had my share of injuries during my training. 17 weeks out I took a week off from running as some old shin splint was playing up, week 16 and 15 I was out with the flu. To counter the shin splint when starting to run again I used some old orthopedic soles I had from a few years back that I barely used and made sure to wear my calve pressure socks. (both suggestions I found surfing the web) This seemed to resolve the shin splint issue but now I started to feel pain on the top of my left foot. Seems I got some tendinitis of my left foot toe flexers. After about 2,5 weeks of not running at all that got resolved as well. Just to be on the safe side I removed to soles though, as I suspect it was the root cause of the issue. To avoid any further issues I tried to stay of concreet and paved roads, so running on grass and athletic tracks as much as I could.
I re-used the training plan of my Oct 2017 race, just started a few weeks earlier and cycled through the trainings given in the plan. Longest training weeks were between 14 and 15 hours long, taper started 2 weeks from race day.
From an equipment point of view only one thing changed, I had the Flo 90 wheelset on my bike this time. As always I read some race reports to get an idea about the race in past years, they basically all said the same: super flat and fast on the bike with possibly some strong winds and a really hot flat run. I headed into the race determined to break my PR, or at least to be sub 5 hours.
Location
I selected the Eagleman race as it was on the east coast, fitted in my work schedule and was still within driving distance. And basically preferred to do a different race vs. the ones I already did close-by.
Everything is conveniently located at the Great Marsh park in Cambridge: Ironman village, swim start, swim exit, T1, T2 and the finish line. So from a logistics point of view this race is very easy. All 3 disciplines are a one loop setup. The swim is in the brackish water of the Choptank river, bike course is in the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge - image above from the US Fish and Wildlife Service webpage.
Stay
As the hotels near the race venue were to expensive for us we looked for a hotel in Easton, which is about 30 minutes away. We ended up in the Holiday Inn Express Easton and were more than pleased with our stay. On Saturday they had bottles of water and Gatorade and fruits available. On race morning they even opened up the breakfast service at around 4 am I think, I didn't used it though as I preferred to stick with my normal breakfast. We arrived on Thursday late after a very long ride so we could head into the weekend without any rush. On Friday before picking up the race package at Great Marsh park we looked for a local restaurant to get some pizza, we found the best place! A place called "Out of the Fire" which had one of the best pizzas I ever had.
Package pickup was easy and well organized, as always went to the store to pickup a hat, shirt etc and joined the athlete briefing. Would recommend to put some insect spray on though, mosquitoes were all over the place. Headed to Walmart on our way back to the hotel to be all set for race morning and to leave as little as possible for Saturday. On Saturday we dropped the bike of via a shuttle service at the Mace's Lane Middle School, had pasta at Olive Garden near the hotel and tried to relax a bit. Sunday morning woke up around 3:15 am to get some breakfast in (bagels, banana, Gatorade and a GU) before heading over to the race.
Swim 0:30:03 AG-18/146
- Swim course was very well indicated, and it is a pretty simple setup, one counterclockwise huge square basically. They told me it was brackish water and race morning water temperature was 75.3°F if I recall correctly, so a wetsuit legal race. Not a AG wave start but a rolling start, so seat yourself in the estimated swim finish time to get into the water with athletes that have comparable swim times.
- I didn't really had a warm up as I always spend more time in the lines to the restrooms right before the race than anything else. Right before getting into the water, race director Gerry Boyle greeted each athlete individually, something that I greatly appreciated. The first maybe 100 meters the water was so shallow that it was faster to wade through the water vs. trying to swim. As always my heart rate was way to high at the race start, really struggled to catch my breath in the beginning and it took me quite a while to be able to get into any rhythm. Halfway into the swim I already started to feel really warm in my arms, guess the water was a little warm for my full sleeved wetsuit. The longer the swim lasted the warmer I was getting, in the end over my whole body. I could keep my pace but it felt more like jogging vs. hard running. I couldn't really step the pace up because I felt so darn warm! I didn't had major issues with other swimmers, touched some feet, got tickled myself a few times, but nothing out of the ordinary. Also didn't really felt like the current was having a major impact on my swim, tried to sight often and rarely had to make big adjustments. After the last turn I was hoping to step it up a little but I started to feel pain in my liver area, never had felt that before. Barely could swim at that point and was so happy when my feet felt the ground and I could walk up that boat ramp! My face in below picture is a testimony to that liver pain :)
- I got into the water with the 35-39min swim wave if I recall correct, as I didn't really had a target time. If I would swim 35min I would have been happy. So happy with the 30min swim, but seems I can do better as I couldn't step it up during the heat of the suit and the pain at the end of the swim, so next time I will get into the water with the 30min wave. Expressed in % in my AG I got out of the water with the first 12%, where my best so far was 11%, so that was satisfying as well.
T1 0:04:09
- Last race I decided to bypass the stripper section and pull the wet suit of myself near my bike. As its always a hassle / struggle I opted for the strippers this time. Man they were fast, impossible to do it that fast myself I think. First time I used body glide on my arms and legs so that probably helped as well in getting the suit of quick. Felt so relieved having that suit stripped from my body and the pain in my liver went away in seconds, so still think it was just because of getting overheated. Smooth transition although I kicked a bottle out of my bottle case when getting on my bike, but stayed calm, picked it up and got on with it.
Bike 2:24:55 AG-24/146
- Race reports I read all said about the same: definition of flat and wind might be a factor as its very open. And it was flat indeed! No bridge, no incline or decline worth mentioning whatsoever. I didn't feel like there was to much wind neither. Part of the course was not closed of to the public, but I ever felt unsafe.
- Within 1 mile I already cursed myself, my bike computer wasn't working so I had no idea about my pace or how far I would be in the race. After the race I noticed that I somehow managed to put my front wheel on my bike in the wrong direction so the bike computer was never receiving a signal. So the whole bike course I did basically based on how I felt. I knew I could go faster but preferred to stay calm and don't go full throttle as well kept high cadence over heavy gear. Seems it worked out fine as I was able to take back various athletes, that passed me in the beginning, near the second half of the course. During the first half of the course my legs never felt great, they started to feel a little better towards the second part of the race. I improved my bike PR with about 1min30s so happy about the bike part, although I believe that if I would have had my speed available I probably would have been faster. Based on AG% this was actually only my 4th best bike leg! 16% vs. 11% best.
- For nutrition I added an additional bottle compared to my past race, again in an attempt not to cramp up during the run. So I had 4 bottles, all filled with Gatorade Endurance, one Hammer Amino Acid and one pouch of Gatorlytes each. Besides that I took as well 4 GU gels: right out of T1, after 45min, after 1h30min and the last one around 2h10min. In addition near the end I started to lick Base salt to even get more salt in.
T2 0:03:45
- Relative long run with the bike, seems they added this compared to last year IM70.3 races to have all athletes run about the same distance with their bike. Right calf felt like it would start to cramp up while I was running along with my bike, but that didn't happen in the end. All by all a smooth transition.
Run 1:48:20 AG-29/146
- From the race reports I read this is the most feared component of Eagleman as it can be really hot and there is barely any shade on the course. We were lucky this year though as it wasn't to bad at all.
- Felt pretty good running out of T2, didn't feel like I could cramp up any second as during my past races. Was a bit scared to push it though, wasn't sure if I would be able to hold it till the end. Thought I had settled in a decent pace, but looking at the splits afterwards they were all above 8min/mile and increasing towards the end so need to keep that under/close to 8min next time. Last 2 miles people were starting to pass me as I was unable to make a last push to the finish line. All by all improved my run PR with 8 minutes, didn't cramp up and didn't had to walk at all, so cant be anything but happy, still room for improvement though!
- Nutrition: running out of T2 I had a bottle of Gatorade with Gatorlytes to be able to get some drink in before getting to the first aid station. About every 4 minutes licked Base salt, took 3 GUs spread out over the run and drank Gatorade at each aid station.
Overall 4:51:12 AG-22/146
- I knew my swim and bike time, but at the finish line I didn't knew my total run time, as I was focusing more on the split times per mile, as those were below 9 minutes per mile I knew that my run was faster than my last race. So I estimated that my total time would be close to my PR. When my wife told me my finish time I couldn't think clear enough to remember if it was faster than my PR or not. But it was 5 minutes faster so mission accomplished!
- Swim: happy with my time and AG%, especially because I got overheated and had the liver pain near the end
- Bike: could have gone faster if I had an idea of my pace, but that might have had a negative impact on my run, AG% not as good as I want it to be
- Run: happy as it was a PR and didn't had cramping issues, just need to push it harder to bring my splits down
Some lessons learned
- Nutrition plan worked:
- Bike: 4 bottles (Gatorade / Amino Acid / Gatorlytes) + 4 GU + Base Salt near the end
- Run: 3 GU + Gatorade at each station + Base Salt each 4 min
- Double check the direction of the front wheel on race morning to have bike computer readings!
- Great race if you want to break your PR because of the flat and fast bike and run
Result
- Swim 0:30:03 AG-18/146
- T1 0:04:09
- Bike 2:24:55 AG-24/146
- T2 0:03:45
- Run 1:48:20 AG-29/146
- Total 4:51:12 AG-22/146
Tags: HIM Eagleman race report, race report HIM Eagleman, 70.3 Eagleman race report, race report 70.3 Eagleman, Ironman 70.3 Eagleman race report, race report Ironman 70.3 Eagleman
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