Wednesday 6 January 2010

Legs like Eddy


Great day today, great, great day. Even though I woke up feeling pretty beat up (come to think of it, my legs have been buggered since Sunday night) within the first 20km of the ride I felt strong. I rode with another Brit AG'er, Russell Cox. Russ has been pretty much full time for the last year or so and his times have tumbled at Ironman with a pb of 9.19 and a 9.49 at Kona this year, he is a great athlete.

To cut a long (180km) story short, Russ and I two up TT'd the entire bike ride in 6hrs 4min over rolling undulating terrain. I avg'd 204 watts, easily my highest since the start of camp and my legs felt great all day - I even attacked the main group at one point as soon as we were caught at 40km. Russ bridged up to me and we were away again - the roads were a bit smoother so the arse took less of a battering than usual.

Again, todays scenery was spectacular taking us from Matamata to the bottom edge of Lake Taupo, home to Ironman New Zealand. The terrain took in a multitude of flora, fauna and feel - I swear I saw 5 or 6 different countries in one ride: Belgium, Canada, Spain, France, UK etc. At any point in the ride I would put my head up and remark "this looks just like blah"
What a beautiful part of the world.

With the ride done by 2pm we had some time to regroup before heading to Lake Taupo for a 3km swim. Obviously there are no buoys to mark the course so the comittee decided (on the spot) to take 3km as your Ironman swim PB minus 5 minutes - so for me a 54min swim to get my mandatory distance in. I can't say it was my best swim ever, my arms were moving but thats about it. The water was very choppy but crystal clear - what I would do for an OW venue like this in England!

Most people (including me) chose to run the 5km back to the hotel - the run was very tough, legs felt like stumps and I struggled along at 6min km pace. One of the top AG'ers did 25km......

People are getting tired and cracks are starting to show in peoples patience. An admin cock up left the camp split into two separate accomodations, 3km apart. Not what you want to hear when you have just ridden 180km!

We were told that tiredness and crankiness would set in at about day 5 - it has happened on cue - I expect a big blow up within the next 48hrs - stay tuned.

Tomorrow - 3km lake swim, 185km bike ride, 10km run - just another 8hr day on Epic Camp. Hopefully my legs feel as good as they did today :-)


POTD is me following Russ through todays beautiful scenery

3 comments:

  1. That looks like the side view of Box Hill! Great work mate, keep it up & hold the cracks together.

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  2. run silent run deep through tough times. Good riding. J.

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  3. Still rivetted, amazing stamina. When do we get the lunch-stop post?

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