2016 Ironman Oceanside 70.3 Report

Posted on April 6, 2016 by markreith

Pre-Race:

Leading up to Oceanside, I didn’t really know how well I was going to do. I didn’t have a good sense if I had improved in overall fitness over last year at this time. Looking at my numbers and training metrics, it almost seemed like I was less fit this year than the previous year. I had some good training days, but my overall volume was still much lower than some of my friends training for the same race. I also had some health challenges (allergies and infections) and other commitments (new baby) over the winter which didn’t help my overall confidence leading into the spring. Overall, I was feeling good and happy and didn’t feel like I needed to put pressure on myself to perform. I feel that just enjoying the journey and the process can be greatly rewarding in itself.

This race was going to have a different dynamic for me because I was going to be making the trip to Oceanside solo, without any family. Good or bad, I was still looking forward to an enjoyable trip, with plenty of stops along the drive down in SLO and Santa Barbara for family and good food. Even without family around, I still felt pretty busy the Friday before the race, checking in to the hotel, doing the athlete pickup, walking the expo, checking in my bike to transition and going on a short 30 min run to get my legs moving.

Race Morning:

Race morning I was up at 4:50am. I actually got decent sleep, going to bed around 8:45 and sleeping pretty good. I love hotels where you can turn down the thermostat enough to make the room really cool at night. I had taken a big risk by not grocery shopping the day before for my race morning breakfast. The hotel said they were going to do an early “breakfast” for athletes at 5am, but no one seemed to be able to tell me what they would have ahead of time. One person told me “just coffee” and someone else said “only coffee and oatmeal”. I feel that recently, I’ve been less concerned and picky about my pre-workout fuel. A lot of my workouts are even fasted if they are done early enough in the morning. That, and I was too lazy to go to the store the night before. So I just hoped they had something decent. Since it sounded like there would be 100% chance of coffee at the least, I figured I’d be fine. I could go for 4.5 hours on coffee alone. The breakfast ended up being really decent (for a hotel). Lots of fruit, bagels, pastries, oatmeal, etc. I pretty much tried a little of everything until I was full. Normally, I’m pretty picky with ingredients and food quality, but I was just happy they had options.

After breakfast, I went back up to the room, got dressed and then made the 1.2 mile walk from the hotel to the harbor. Setting up transition was pretty uneventful. Since my bike was already there, I just had to lay everything out. I didn’t even add air to my tires. I figure, the less things I had to do and the more I could just relax the better. I feel I always do better when I’m relaxed and the typical tension in the air in transition usually just makes me anxious. I was able to catch up with some friends and take my time getting into my wetsuit. I finally made it to the start shoot and we made our way to the boat ramp, waiting for our wave start.

Swim:

I was surprised how warm the water was, as we made our way from the boat ramp to the in-water start line. I had heard some people complaining about how cold the water was going to be (62F). I guess, with the only ocean swimming I usually do being in the cold Monterey Bay, everything else feels warm. I took a spot on the far side of the buoy line, hoping to avoid some congestion and risk having to take a longer line.

When the horn went off, I put in a solid effort to sprint ahead of the main group. I ended up with about a handful of people from my wave after the first couple hundred yards and then settled into a more sustainable pace. I tried to pace the swim more on the aggressive side. I felt like I was swimming at an effort between “solid” and “kinda hard”. I just kept telling myself, “don’t swallow any water”. Who knows what’s in harbor water. I just didn’t want it in my stomach.

About half way to the turn, the few people I was swimming with started hitting the back end of the wave in front of us. I tried my best to avoid running into the back of someone, but it required me to do a lot more sighting, which just wastes energy. Around the turn around point, the chop started getting pretty rough and I was getting tossed around a lot. As we turned to head back in to the harbor, the sun was directly in my eyes and I lost sight of everything. I couldn’t see a thing with the sun. The best I could do was keep swimming and hope I was going to right way. I just got glimpses of people around me to somewhat guide where I was going. The way back in to the harbor also got pretty crowded. There was a good mix of lots of waves by then, and it was much harder avoiding people.

I finally made it back to the boat ramp and started the LONG run around transition and back to my bike.

Swim Time: 29:24

Bike:

The beginning of the bike leg is always a bit awkward. There are just lots of people doing lots of things. It’s kind of just a mess. It took a few miles to really start settling into things. I tried to keep a strong pace right off the start. My goal was to hit about 240 watts Normalized Power for the ride. I did this a couple weeks before and still felt good at that power for 2.5 hours, so I knew it was very doable with some effort and sweat.

I like the Oceanside bike course because it seems like there is always something different to look at and that keeps your mind busy and away from thinking about the burning in yours legs. This year, I felt like there was less congestion on the course, especially during the first half. There was some initial congestion, but once I got on the base, I didn’t feel like I was around the same people very long. Some races, it feels like you play leapfrog with the same handful of people the whole time, and I didn’t get that this race.

There are some good climbs on the course that forced me to stand in the granny gear, but I actually really like that about Oceanside. Mixing it up and changing positions and muscles is always welcome. What’s also good about a bit of climbing is the downhills. The Dimond bike just kills it on the downhills. I can easily coast in an aero position on the downhills and pass a few people who are still pedaling hard. I love it.

I feel like the bike leg wasn’t eventful, but in a good way. I didn’t get frustrated at people leapfrogging the whole race, I didn’t see packs of people forming, overall it was great. The pace was just at that point where I had to concentrate on pushing hard and couldn’t just let my mind wonder. I think I was pretty consistent at 240 watts most of the ride.

For nutrition, I tried to do 200 calories an hour from UCAN. This is actually more than I usually take on any training ride less than 4 hours. So I knew I was going to have to force it down a bit. I ended the ride with still a fifth of the bottle left, so I ended up with just about 170 calories an hour. A bit light, but it didn’t affect me at all. I figured I could always just prop myself up on coke during the run if needed.

For hydration, I think I could do a little bit better next time. I started with a BTA bottle of Skratch Hyper Hydration just to immediately load with sodium. Then I tried to drink somewhat to thirst, or a bit ahead of thirst. I didn’t really count the bottles, but I filled up every aid station, so I probably did about 96 fl oz of water over the 2.5 hours on the bike.

Bike Time: 2:29:07
NP/AP: 242/235 watts

Run:

I got off the bike and still felt like I had good energy. I know a lot can change when you run. Running is just so hard on the body that a lot can happen in a short time. I had originally planned on starting off with a 7 min/mile pace and holding that. My real goal was to run 6:50 pace because I knew this was doable off the bike. I mentally envisioned this as a short run (just because it’s not the full marathon like in an Ironman). I figure, even worse case and I really fall apart, I can fake it for almost 13 miles. I could, at least, fake it for 10 miles and then just do what it takes to do the last 3 miles.

What I like to do off the bike, is just run at a conservative pace for the first few minutes before checking my pace. Then, after a few minutes, check my pace and see what I’m doing. That usually is a good indicator of how I’m feeling and how the race is going to play out. After a few minutes of running, what I thought to be strong but conservative pace, I looked and saw I was running 6:45 pace. I was pretty happy with that and decided to slow down just a hair to be safe.

The run at Oceanside is just so much fun. Because it’s two out and back loops, it really breaks up the run into very small and manageable chunks. Plus, the run along The Strand is just awesome. Can’t beat running along the ocean with a huge crowd. I stuck with my cooling and hydration strategy from Kona where at every aid station I dumped water on my head and back and drank a cup of coke (actually, they used generic “cola” which sucked. I usually don’t drink coke, but if I do, I want the real thing).

What was truly amazing about the first lap, is that it was really really empty. I mean, there was no one on the course. I got to see all the pros go by, which was incredible. They run so fast, it’s just insane.

I kept drinking “coke” every aid station, knowing I didn’t fuel too well on the bike, so I thought the simple sugar would keep me going. On the second lap, I was still going strong but getting a bit tired. The course started to get pretty crowded and I had to dodge people the entire second lap. I finally hit mile 10, just before the last turn around. I knew I could run 3 miles in my sleep. There have been so many hard training runs where I have ran the last 3 miles just destroyed. So I know I can run 3 miles on fumes. But I was still feeling pretty good. I picked it up a hair the last couple miles. Well, my pace probably didn’t pick up too much, but my heart rate sure did.

Oceanside finish is one of the best finishes outside of Kona I have done. Just an amazing crowd and a great view.

Time: 1:28:34
Pace: 6:45/mile

Thoughts:

There was no rest after the race. I didn’t even stop to get food, but actually ran (yes ran) to my hotel so that I could get my bags out of the room before my late checkout time. That was pretty painful. At least a got a quick shower in before finally going back to the finish and to the athlete food area. I was the only athlete in the post-race food area already showered and dressed.

I feel like Oceanside was perfectly executed. I was able to pace slightly better than my aggressive goals. This was really the first race where I didn’t do a lot of pre-race planning for pacing, hydration or nutrition. I kind of just let things go and hoped for the best and that seemed to pay off. I’m not sure I can get away with that for a full Ironman though, so I may have to go back to better planning for an IM race later in the year. I think I can fake my way through a 4.5 hour workout, but not through a full day in an Ironman.

One bad thing about having a well-executed race, is not knowing where to go from here. I don’t see much low hanging fruit for future improvement. Sure, I can keep working on aerobic fitness, but I’m not sure I’ll ever be as good as the top guys in a 70.3 race. There are a few lifestyle tweaks I can make and hope for some gain there, but I’m not sure there is too much to be had on that front. At some point you hit a point of diminishing returns for the effort and sacrifice needed for marginal gains in fitness. I guess one area where I can gain some big time in a race is transitions. At Oceanside, my T1 time was almost 5 minutes. I feel like I some mornings I have breakfast and coffee faster than that. I feel like I’m going fast in transition, but obviously there can be a lot of improvement there. Maybe a few minutes can be had between both transitions.

I would really like to do Oceanside again next year, so we’ll see what happens with scheduling. It’s a great race and the energy is one of the best of any races I have done. There is a reason all the fast people show up for this race, it’s just an amazing experience.

Ironman World Championships Race Report

Posted on October 14, 2015 by markreith

Pre-Race:

Race day started a lot earlier than usual at 3:50am. I usually like to sleep in as much as I can and only wake up to get food in with enough time to let it digest. The bus from our hotel to the start left at 4:30 am so I needed to be up and ready extra early this time. I drank a couple cups of coffee and got dressed, then started eating breakfast as I waited for the morning bus.

Breakfast was a French roll peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a cup of yogurt with granola. I brought some extra bars with me for the morning just in case I got hungry later.

I got to transition and got the tattoo body marking. This is the first Ironman I’ve done where they weigh the athletes in the morning. That made me a bit worried about the hot day ahead. I weighed in at 172 lbs!! That’s 12 pounds more than I weighed when I left for Kona. I’m either carrying a lot of water or I’ve had one too many iced mochas. At least I’d kill it on the downhills.

I finally made it to my bike. The volunteers were awesome. They brought me over a pump and held my bike, while I pumped up my tires. I loaded my nutrition on the bike and synced up my Garmin bike computer. After getting my bike all checked, I still had almost an hour and a half of downtime before the start. I ended up leaving transition and hung out with my family, once they had made their way down to the swim start.

After the pro start, I started getting dressed and slowly got in line to make my way into the water. I ate a UCAN bar and drank a Skratch HyperHydration to finish off my salt pre-loading plan. I ended up hanging out on the beach for about 5 minutes until Mike Riley started telling everyone they needed to be in the water. The last thing I wanted to do before an Ironman was tread water for 20 minutes.

I didn’t really have a strategy for where to place myself at the start. I couldn’t really tell what position offered the fastest line. So I just found a spot and put myself about 4 rows of people back from the line. I figured this would be a good place for my swim skills, not in the front with the real swimmers, but not in the back of the line either. I just treaded water, watched the clock on the pier and tried to enjoy the whole experience of the sunrise, helicopters and drones overhead.

Swim:

When the cannon went off, I surged forward and started off with a strong pace. I figured, this would be the coolest (temperature) part of the whole race so might as well put in a little more effort before the heat slowed me down. Right away there was a ton of contact with all the other swimmers around me. I was used to a little contact, but it would usually die down. But here, it was relentless. I was getting kicked and smacked all over. Every time I tried to look around to see how to avoid the masses of people, I didn’t see an escape. I even tried backing off a bit just to let some swimmers around me go ahead to avoid getting beat up, but then I would just get swum over from behind. By far, this was the hardest swim I have done in a race due to the violence. After about 15 minutes, things got a bit better as I found my pace with the swimmers around me. I was then able to relax a bit and watch the sea floor and pay attention to sighting ahead.

At the turn-around, things became a bit more congested and violent, even though I made a pretty wide turn to avoid the congestion. I looked at my watch and saw I was under 30 minutes, which was a good sign. I know a lot of people had told me the swim back to shore would be slower, so I was still expecting a slower overall swim time.

The swim back to the pier was a bit more uneventful, which I was grateful for. I picked a strong, but not too aggressive pace. I could feel my swimskin cutting into my side, and I just hoped it felt worse than it was. I really didn’t want to deal with an open wound the rest of the day.

As I got closer to the swim exit, I checked my watch again and saw I had already passed the 1 hour mark. I knew it was going to be a slower swim, but mentally, it’s hard to see numbers which are slower than you want. Overall, I put in a decent effort and was happy I survived a very tough and physical swim.

Swim Time: 1:04:24

T1:

The run through transition was pretty long. They make you run from the swim exit, all the way around the entire pier before getting your bag and running into the changing tent. All I had in my transition bag were socks and glasses. I had rolled down my tri-suit under my swim skin with the hopes of being able to put in on while running through transition. That didn’t work out at all. I couldn’t get my tri-suit on with my wet skin. I needed a volunteer to help pull my sleeves up on my tri-suit. After I got dressed, I got to my bike, put on my helmet, and ran to the exit with my bike.

T1 Time: 5:06

Bike:

As usual, the first few miles of the bike were just about getting situated and doing a self-check. I felt decently good, and didn’t have any issues putting out power. We made our way south on Kuakini Hwy before quickly hitting the turn around and making our way back north. I was happy to not only see my family cheering for me out of transition, but also only a few miles later as we worked our way up to the Queen K.

Once I started heading north on the Queen K, everything got a lot more quiet and serious. The crowds of people went away, and for the first time I could start feeling the heat of the morning. I became a bit worried as I could feel my face getting warmer already. I started to just focus on power and thinking about my nutrition plan.

This is the first race where I didn’t have a really good idea of what my pace should be. I ended up deciding to just go more by feel. I knew what I could do, but wanted to be cautious about the heat and the run to come. I really wanted to be more conservative and maybe learn about how I handle heat, than over-do it and end up in a bad situation. If anything, I thought I could probably go harder earlier when it wasn’t yet as hot.

My nutrition plan was to start with 300 calories from UCAN the first hour of the bike and then back off to 200 calories per hour for the rest of the bike. I had a single bottle of UCAN behind the saddle for the first half of the ride, and then a BTA bottle for water only which I refilled every aid station. My goal was to drink at least 70% of the BTA bottle between each aid station, which would put me at about 1.5L/hr of water. Each aid station had 2 water pickups, at the front and at the end. The first pickup, I would refill my own bottle, and the second pickup I would dump on myself to stay cool.

Ironman Hawaii Hydration and Sodium Planning

Posted on October 14, 2015 by markreith

With a high sweat rate comes challenges with athletic activity an athletic performance that I am all too familiar with. When it’s a hot day out and I have a workout, I usually fall apart. All of my worst training days have been when it’s hot out. I can easily lose 10+ pounds of weight during a long run or bike ride if I don’t pay attention and plan my hydration needs.

This has become more of a front and center issue in the last couple years after choosing to start Ironman racing and training. For shorter distances, sweat loss can be managed without too much thought. With the long distances, I really needed to make sure I understood how to manage water loss and dehydration for both training and racing. I have been lucky up till now that all of my Ironman events have been in relatively cooler weather. Training in Monterey County also tends itself to mostly cooler weather, especially in the early morning or later afternoon, when I tend to do the majority of my training. When I qualified for Kona, I knew I would have to take a serious approach to understanding my sweating “problem” and my overall hydration needs for hot weather racing. I knew I couldn’t just cross my fingers and hope for a cool day in Kona… it wasn’t going to happen.

My first step was to quantify my sweat rate. This is very easy to do. I simply weighed myself before and after workouts, and also weighed all the fluids I consumed during my workouts. I could calculate total weight loss over the length of my run and bike ride and account that for sweat lost during the activity. I started doing this in August, leading up to Ironman Kona for key workouts (typically on hotter days). I also recorded the average temperature during the workout and also my average pace or power for the workout. My hope was to correlate a sweat rate to a temperature and to an effort level. With this, I could approximate my sweat rate for a given effort level and air temperature.

Here is a sample of the data I collected for my bike rides:

From the above, you can see that 1.5 L/hr was a rough idea of my sweat rate on the bike. The last entry is actually my Ironman Kona Race Rehearsal, so the power would be close to race day. You can see I lost over 16 lbs of sweat on that ride, and it was under 70 degrees out. That’s a lot of sweat! I nailed the hydration though, because I lost no weight at all on the ride.

Of course, I really didn’t hit any temperatures which would accurately represent the heat I would get in Kona. I was lucky to see some unusually high temps for Monterey, but that still wasn’t enough. I wonder if there is a maximum sweat rate at which you really can’t sweat any more. I imagine, at some point I would hit my maximum sweat rate and temperatures above a certain point wouldn’t matter as I wouldn’t sweat any more.

Here is a sample of the data I collected for my runs:

From the above, you can see I can easily hit 3 L/hr sweat rate when it began to heat up above 80 degrees. To me, this was most disturbing part of my findings. 3 L/hr is a ton of sweat. There is no way I can drink anywhere close to 3 L/hr while running.

During this time of testing, I was also doing sauna heat acclimatization where I would sit in a dry sauna for 15-45 minutes 3-4 days a week to prepare for the Kona heat. Heat acclimatization increases blood plasma and also increases ones sweat rate and affects how quickly they begin to sweat. I could see the affects of this in the data as my sweat rate did seem to increase per temperature/pace over time. I’m still not sure if this is a great strategy for me. Given that I already sweat more than most, I’m not sure I want to make my body sweat even more. I’m not sure that extra sweat means more cooling or if it just means I can dehydrate that much easier. I’m still not sure heat acclimatization works for me and my situation, where I already have a very high sweat rate at baseline. I need to do some more research on this to see what is best for me next time.

I also did the same testing for swimming, but I noticed I didn’t really lose any weight swimming. The only weight I lost swimming was actually due to going pee (yes I get out of the pool or wait till after the workout) and not due to any sweating that I could measure. My fluid loss for swimming was under 0.1 L/hr.

So I now had my expected and approximate sweat rates for swimming, biking and running. Next, I wanted to learn more about sodium and electrolyte loss and replacement. The easiest and most cost effective option was to do a Levelen sweat sodium test. For $75, Levelen will send you a piece of gauze to tape on your forearm during a short run to collect sweat and sodium. They also provide you tweezers and a tube to pull out the gauze after the workout and ship them back the sweat soaked gauze for analysis. I did this simple test during a 45 minute run in 75 degree weather. Here were the results:

Sweat Rate 2.42 L/hr

Sweat Na+ 61 mmol/L 3395 mg/hr

Sweat K+ 7.0 mmol/hr

Sweat Cl- 60 mmol/L 5140 mg/hr

NaCl loss 8.5 g/hr

levelen results

Just as I expected… I was on the extreme end of the scale for sweat rate and also sodium loss. The above equates to 1403 mg of sodium lost per liter of sweat. That’s a crazy amount of sodium! The FDA RDA for sodium is 2300 mg per day for an adult. That means, in 1 hour of running (3L of sweat), I lose almost 2 full days intake of salt…. In 1 hour!

So now, I had a good idea of my sweat loss rate and also a data point for my sodium loss rate. Now the question is, how much do I need to replace during a race. All of it? Some of it? None of it? Certainly, I knew I needed to replace most of my fluid loss. I know that when I get below 155 lbs of body weight I feel pretty crummy and fall apart on the bike or run. So I know I can’t lose more weight to get below 155 (or I cramp up and can barely move). But what about sodium? I’ve never really taken salt pills or any sodium supplement outside of what was in my sports drink and food.

The new school of thought, specifically from people like Tim Noakes and Phil Maffetone is, you just need to drink to thirst and do not need to supplement with electrolytes like sodium. I have been following Tim Noakes and his ideas for a while. I have read his book Waterlogged, and listed to countless podcasts and read countless articles from him. His concept is very appealing because it relies on listening to the body and only drinking when thirsty. This is really appealing because it takes all the work out of trying to stay hydrated… just drink when you’re thirsty and you’ll be fine. Noakes also doesn’t recommend sodium supplementation when exercising because, he says, our bodies have enough internally stored sodium to sustain us and that sodium loss (as measured per the test above) has more to due to your daily salt intake from diet than your sodium needs during exercise.

The problem for me is I have used this theory and have had very limited success with it. I tended to train and usually race using thirst as a guide for water intake, and also not supplemented with any sodium. The problem for me, as mentioned above, is I always fall apart on hot days or long workouts. All my race rehearsal training days, where I worked out for 5-8 hours, have always been huge failures due to dehydration (as measured via body weight loss). I always cramped up so bad I could barely move and barely made it home. I feel like I’m pretty in touch with my body and how I’m feeling, but maybe I have no idea when I’m thirsty and I don’t drink when I should. Whatever it is, the drinking to thirst theory doesn’t seem to work well for me right now.

I decided for Kona, to not follow that school of thought and go back to a more prescribed approach to fluid intake and sodium intake, at least as a starting point.

So next I needed to figure out how much fluid and sodium I should take at Kona. On the bike, I knew I could manage the 1.5 L/hr of water I would be losing as I had practiced taking in this much water quite a few times. The run as another story. There is no way I could drink anywhere near 3 L/hr to replace all my fluid loss. I’ve heard some say that about 800 mL/hr is about all you can absorb. I was hoping that wasn’t true.

I next contacted Skratch Labs to get some help. They seemed to be really on top of helping endurance athletes with their hydration needs and I liked their products for all of my training. Skratch was a great help, and after a couple back-and-fourths over email, I got a great understanding of how they approached hydration and fluid replacement. From this I began to build out my baseline formulas for my Kona hydration planning.

The starting point is your baseline body weight and then a maximum acceptable dehydration level. Skratch said that they have seen 4% dehydration as an acceptable level before performance loss. I would agree with this based on my data, as my baseline body weight is 162 lbs, so 4% dehydration would be about 155 lbs (right where I notice I begin to fall apart). From there, they key is really pre-loading with fluid before starting the race. Using something like Skratch Hyper Hydration Mix, you can use the extra sodium it has to help with water retention to preload your body with sodium and fluid.

If I am able to pre-load my body with fluid, and taking into account an acceptable level of dehydration throughout the race, I can come up a level of fluid replacement needed in the race which will be a certain level less than the fluid lost due to sweat.

Here is my data I put together in preparation for Kona:

I start by entering my body weight and level of acceptable dehydration after the race. I also enter anticipated race times (don’t need this too much as you can plan on a per-hour basis if needed). I then enter all my expected sweat rates for swim, bike and run.

The output on the right, shows my acceptable fluid deficit per hour in mL (293.9). This means, for a 10 hour race, I do not need to replace 293.9 mL per hour of my sweat loss. So if I sweat at 1 L/hr, I would only need to take in (1L – 293.9mL) 706.1 mL/hr of fluid in order to be fine and still be at only 4% dehydration after the race.

From there, I estimated I can pre-load fluid the days leading up to the race and race morning up to a total of 1.5 L. This would mean my body would be heavier when I started the race by that extra 1.5L of fluid I would be holding (with the help of sodium). This would then put my acceptable fluid deficit even higher at 443.9 mL/hr.

In the totals you can see I expected to lose 18.8L of fluid during the race but only needed to replace 14.4L during the whole race.

Next is to figure out how to replace that 14.4L of fluid throughout the race. I obviously cannot replace it during the swim (unless I end up drinking ocean water).

I played with different replacement rates for swim, bike and run. I put in 0% for swim, since I would not be drinking any during the swim. I tried to hit over 100% replacement on the bike, just because I knew it was easier to handle drinking water on the bike than while running. If I hit 102% replacement of fluid on the bike and only 57% replacement on the run, then I still could hit that 14.4 L of total fluid needed. I thought this would be the best strategy for me in Kona.

This level of fluid replacement ended up being about 70% of my BTA bottle per aid station on the bike and about 10 fl oz of fluid per aid station on the run. Pretty doable.

One other very important thing to note (that Skratch brought to my attention) that plays into this is managing body temperature. If I could use external cooling to lower my sweat rate, I would be in a much better position and not need quite as much fluid replacement, and more wiggle room with these numbers. Keeping the body cool by dumping water on your body during the bike and run, and using ice could really bring down my total fluid needs by reducing my sweat rate. I didn’t know how to really quantify this, but I knew I chose moderate sweat rates based on Monterey temperatures so, I figure I could just use as much cold water and ice as possible as an experiment in Kona. If anything, I would just be less dehydrated at the end of the day if all worked out.

Now that I knew how I planned to replace fluid in the swim, bike and run, I just took my sodium loss rate and figured out about how much sodium I needed to hour and per bottle of water I took in. This would not be all the sodium I lost in sweat, but just like water, I would replace most, but not all, sodium loss for the day. I then thought about when I could take in Skratch Hyper Hydration (pre-swim, bike special needs) and added up how much sodium what was. I took my total sodium needs, subtracted what I would take in from Hyper Hydration (and what is in my food I take in during the race) and then calculated about how many SaltStick pills I would need per hour or per bottle of water.

All of this is a bit overkill, I think. I really just wanted to use this as a starting point to figure out how to manage sodium and fluid intake for Kona. I think sometimes, you can overanalyze things which ends up hurting more than helping. But I guess that’s all part of the fun of triathlon. Triathlon is one big problem (or maybe lots of little ones) that is fun and interesting to figure out.

In the future, I really want to do another sweat-sodium test for another data point to further validate my own data. I think I have a much better idea of my fluid needs, but am only really scratching the surface on sodium needs. Plus what about all the other electrolytes! I think I would really need to spend a lot of time training and racing in the heat to really dial this in, which probably isn’t going to happen any time soon.

Ironman Canada Race Report

Posted on August 1, 2015 by markreith

Pre-Race

This was my first visit to Canada so the trip to Whistler was highly anticipated for me. I will say, that the drive from Vancouver to Whistler is just amazing. Lots of thick green forest mixed with steep rock faces and aqua-blue water. The scenery did not disappoint. We got in to Whistler the afternoon of Thursday before the race and settled in to our hotel before walking though Whistler Village. The village reminded me a lot of other mountain ski towns in the summer such as Tahoe. The venue seemed a bit different from other Ironman events I have been to. Normally, Ironman seems to be the center of all activities, but in Whistler, Ironman seemed like a small event amongst a lot of other visitors and activates around the area. The downhill mountain bike scene seemed to really be front and center in terms of what people where there for. What’s great about the village is all the food choices and even a nice grocery store for anything you could ever want in addition to lots of options for coffee and dessert.

I made my way down to the Ironman village, and picked up my race wheels from RaceDayWheels. What was nice about this trip is I didn’t bring any wheels with me. I brought only my bike, which saved me an extra checked bag. I used my Ruster Sports Hen House with their new carat case to pack up my Dimond bike (super easy by the way) and just put my rented wheels on when I got to Whistler.

On Friday morning, after coffee with the family, I decided to take my bike out on the road for a quick ride and make sure everything was in working order. The weather report called for scattered showers throughout the day and I wanted to get out before more rain came in. DSCN0759 On my ride, the roads were pretty wet, but at least it wasn’t raining (I hate riding in the rain). I rode 15 minutes on the highway toward Pemberton and then back. The roads, aside from the puddles, were in great condition, and I was looking forward to having the whole lane for the race instead of just the shoulder. I spent the rest of the day, relaxing with the family and enjoying the area by doing the Peak2Peak gondola ride.

Saturday morning was bike check-in day. They had early bike check in at 9:30 for AWA athletes, so I packed up my bike and run bags and rode the 2 miles to Alta Lake and T1. There weren’t many people there yet as the shuttle busses hadn’t started yet. I racked my bike and covered the aero bars and seat with some plastic bags I had. I really didn’t like the idea of leaving my nice Dimond in the rain all night. Right after I checked in my bike, I got my wetsuit on and swam an easy lap in the lake. The water temp was great. Basically, it felt like swimming in a pool, not too hot and not too cold. There was a bit of chop from the wind which made going out a bit harder than coming back. Overall, it seemed like a great swim venue.

The rest of Saturday was just relaxing with the family (and checking the weather every 3 minutes). The weather report for race day showed a lot more rain than both Friday and Saturday. I was a bit worried because I really never ride in the rain, so I wasn’t excited about spending all the time wet on the bike. I figured rain was still better than being hot.

Race Morning

Sunday morning my alarm went off at 4:30am. I actually got a decent nights sleep, falling asleep a little after 9pm and only waking up a couple times at night. My goal was to eat breakfast before 5am to give me a couple hours before the cannon went off. Breakfast was a couple bowls of granola and milk with raspberries and a sliced apple with lots of nut butter on top. After breakfast and getting dressed I made my way down to T2 to get on the bus to T1. I was happy it wasn’t raining yet, but the ground was soaked and the sky didn’t look too promising.

T1 had its typical nervous energy as everyone went about their morning routine. I didn’t have much to do as I decided not to even pump up my tires due to the wet road I knew was ahead. I spent most of that hour talking with friends and trying to enjoy the experience. I finally put on my wetsuit and headed toward the water to watch the pro start. I tried to wait till the last minute to get in the water as I didn’t want to waste any energy treading water before the start, and I’m not one to warmup before an Ironman.

DSCN0758

Swim

I really like mass starts. They are much more energizing for me. When the cannon went off, I started my swim fairly strong and settled in with the masses of others, trying to find feet to follow. There wasn’t too much contact as I didn’t start right along the buoy line, but a little offset, towards the shore to try to find a cleaner (but longer) line to the first turn buoy.

On the way to the first turn, I could tell it had started to really rain…hard. I felt bad for all the spectators out in the rain watching. Then I started to think how wet I was going to be on the bike. The first and second turn got a bit tight, but I slowed down and took my time around the buoys.

Overall, the swim was pretty uneventful. I really only have a couple speeds when I swim, so I don’t really think about pace, but just try to swim strong without too many hard efforts. Towards the end of the second lap, we started coming up on swimmers finishing their first lap. Things got a little more chaotic as the group I was with tried to get around and find a clean line. After the last turn buoy, it felt like there was a lot more chop in the water, and that last segment really seemed to take forever.

I walked out of the water and over to the wetsuit strippers who helped me get my wetsuit off, then I was off to the changing tents.

Swim Time: 00:59:29

The first thing I noticed in the tent was how hot and muggy it was in there. It was also really busy. I had to find a chair toward the far back because most of the chairs were already taken. I guessed it was due to the bad weather and everyone taking a little longer to put everything on. I struggled for a bit getting my arm warmers on and rolled up… not too easy when you’re wet. I put on my shoes, helmet and gloves and headed toward my bike. I did have a wind breaker in my bag, but chose not to put it on since at that time, I wasn’t cold at all. Probably a big mistake.

T1 Time: 05:33

Bike

It was raining pretty hard when I got on my bike and started settling in. Just a few minutes into the ride, and I was already soaked through and starting to get cold. Within a few more minutes I could feel my jaw shattering and my whole body started to shiver and shake. I was getting really really cold, and I couldn’t stop shaking. I wasn’t hungry at all, but I tried to get in some nutrition by drinking some of my UCAN and eating a gel. My goal was 300 calories and hour on the bike from mostly UCAN and a few gels (just to mix it up). It was really hard to even drink from my bottle as my jaw was tight from shivering so much. By the time I got to the base of the Callahan climb, I was in full convulsive shivers.

I was really looking forward to the long climb up Callahan by then, hoping I could up my power and warm up a bit. No such luck. Sitting up out of aero, I got hit with more wind on my body and it made me even colder. I was starting to become really miserable. More miserable, than I have ever been on my bike and definitely the longest I had ever been that cold. All the way up Callahan, I kept thinking about how was I ever going to run off this bike feeling like this. My whole body was shivering and my lower back was even shivering and aching. I was really worried about all the wasted energy my body was using shivering: I needed that energy for the run.

Going down Callahan was really bad. I was ice cold. I tried to take it really slow, but I didn’t have much braking power at the time. My wet brakes on carbon wheels weren’t really doing much to slow me down. On top of that, I could barely squeeze the brakes, my hands were so cold and my bike was shaking like I had speed wobbles from my shivering as I went down. After making it down Callahan, I made my way back to Whistler village and then out toward Pemberton. The whole time, I was just doing what I could to stay warm. I was freezing and shivering all the way to Pemberton. IMG_1709_cropped

Once I made it down to Pemberton and started the long flat section, the rain started to ease a bit and I started warming up. I began to feel a little better and even stopped shivering. It wasn’t till then I was really able to look around and enjoy the beautiful scenery. I still felt pretty strong along the flat and was able to hold power and get back to focusing on my nutrition.

The long climb back to Whistler seemed to go on forever. Most of the climb back wasn’t too steep, but there were sections that had a good grade and really slowed me down. From Pemberton, I had about 20 miles up climbing to make it back to Whistler. The first 10 miles had some good climbs broken up by some short downhills. The second 10 miles was a lot better and was just a slight uphill grade, but I could at least stay aero. This last section really got me tired, and I was seeing my power harder to hold where I wanted it. I was just ready to get off the bike.

I finally made it back to the village and tried to stretch a little while coasting through all the chutes until T2. I was still very stiff and my lower back was more tight and sore. I finally was able to get off my bike and make it into the T2 tent.

Bike Time:5:40:42

I was really slow moving in T2. I left my arm warmers on, just in case the run was cold, but took off my gloves and even changed out my socks for dry socks. I was really moving slow. I had to hit the washroom on the way out in order to get everything out of my bladder, and that added another couple minutes to my already slow pace getting to the run.

T2 Time:3:34

Run

Right away on the run, I could tell it was going to be a tough day. I usually have good energy from the crowd and seeing family coming out of T2 DSCN0765 , but this time, my energy was low and my body was already achy. I had to really slow down my pace and I was really worried I’d be walking later in the run based on how I was feeling. Right out of T2, there is a nice climb which really hurts. So right away my heart rate felt like it shot up and my pace dropped back to what felt like a crawl. On the gravel and dirt trails, I wasn’t feeling too great. My stomach started to bother me and I had to walk a small hill because I didn’t have the energy to run it. Due to my stomach being upset, I really wanted to stop and rest to see if I could reset myself, but I kept moving past aid stations without stopping.

Around 4 or 5k, I saw a bee land on my chest, and then felt the sharp pain of its stinger. I cursed out loud. I figured this was a sign I needed to stop. I found the next aid station and stepping into a porta-potty and sat down. I looked for the stinger in my chest, but there wasn’t one there, just a small red mark. I ended up sitting there for about 4 minutes. I knew now, my run time was going to be way off my goal, but at least that took some pressure off me to go too hard. I eventually made it back on course and started running again. My average pace had dropped to 8:30 already with the stop, not good compared to my goal and what I knew I could do.

I slowly started to feel a bit better in my stomach. Just stopping somehow reset everything and I began to feel normal again (normal for the marathon part of an Ironman). I was able to get my pace back to 7:50 or so, which is still slow for me, but much better than walking. I ditched my arm warmers as the sun started coming out from the breaking clouds.

I mentally, just thought about completing the first lap. After 13 miles, I gave myself permission to take Pepsi at the aid stations (I was only doing on-course Gatorade till then). Also, mentally, after the first 13.1 miles, it feels like the home stretch. I made it through the first lap and started the second lap. I then told myself just to keep it up till mile 18. Mile 18 seems notorious for when the wheels really start coming off for most people. At mile 18, I was still going, slowly, but still chugging along.

What was nice, was I never really got to that deep dark place at mile 18 or 20 like I knew could happen. I think maybe the slower run helped not burry myself too deep after that brutal bike.

I finally made it to the turn off, where you go left to make another lap, and right to the finish. I was almost there…. Or so I thought. That last section seemed to go on forever. There was a little more uphill, some windy paths, and a long loop up through the village path before making it down to the finish shoot. DSCN0778

I was able to ear my name being called as I crossed the line.

Run Time: 3:35:26

Race Time: 10:24:44, 8th in AG

Closing

It was truly an epic day. Hearing the stories from others who went through similar challenges on the bike, made me feel a lot better. Through a lot of the bike and run, I thought I may be walking to the finish, so I’m really happy I was able to keep going.

I’ve never been a bath person, but I have never wanted to get in a hot bath so much in my life as when I finished. After getting my stuff and hobbling back to the hotel, I sat in the hot bath until I finally got some feeling back in my limbs.

I’m really happy I chose Canada as the venue for my first Ironman of this year. It’s a great location for this great race. Even though, the weather wasn’t ideal leading up to and on race day, it’s still a great place for family and athletes. I also learned a lot about myself from this extra-hard experience. It was even sunny and warm the next few days while we finished out our vacation in Whistler and Vancouver.

Oceanside 70.3 Race Report

Posted on April 3, 2015 by markreith

Taper

I’ve heard that some people feel really energized during their taper weeks, leading to a race, with extra energy they can barely control. I’m the opposite. When I start to taper, my body takes the opportunity to completely fall apart. Good thing I am beginning to see this as a trend in all my races, or I’d be worried. In my two week taper I really felt horrible. I felt tired and fatigued all the time and I barely wanted to even do the easy workouts for the day. I tried my best to get good sleep every night and continue to eat pretty clean. I tried not to limit my diet too much and even ramped up the food the couple days before the race with some extra carbs thrown in for good measure. No giving up anything the week of the race like I’ve heard others do with coffee or alcohol. In fact, it’s become somewhat of a tradition to still have my red wine the night before racing.

The Morning

I slept surprisingly well the night before the race. I never have slept horrible before a race, but this night was exceptionally good. Went to bed around 9pm and woke up at 4:50am, which is very close to my normal sleep any other day. Breakfast was a couple cups of coffee, and a huge bowl of greek yogurt with berries, granola and honey and a packet of Justins almond butter. My goal was to eat about 2 hours before my race start at 7:05. After breakfast I slowly got dressed and grabbed my nutrition bottles from the freezer and got on my bike to ride the mile to transition.

Setting up transition was pretty low key. It didn’t take me long to do, so I had a lot of time to just hang out and watch other athletes as well as try to ignore all the nervous energy in the air. I’m notorious for not being able to find my bike coming in to transition, so I made sure to walk the transition and find the best way to spot my bike.

As they got closer to my wave start, but put on my Roka wetsuit and made my way to find my group.

Swimming

I find wave starts pretty anti-climactic. I really like the mass starts because of the energy. The wave start just feels small and unimportant. The start was an in water, swim start. The water was really warm (especially coming from Monterey), so getting in and wading for the start wasn’t an issue. I don’t really even remember the sound of the start (was it a gun, or a cannon, or a beep). I just started swimming when everyone else did. I knew I could sustain a pretty strong pace for 30 minutes and not worry about tiring myself out.

The swim was fairly uneventful. I didn’t find anyone’s feet to draft off after the first few hundred yards, so I was on my own. There were people at my feet, which I usually don’t mind as long as they’re not annoyingly swatting my feet. Pretty much all I thought about the whole swim was, don’t swallow any of the nasty harbor water.

There were a couple points in the swim where it was hard for me to make out the next buoy to sight. That and every now and then I’d come across a pack of swimmers from a previous wave and have to either go around or fight my way through.

As I existed the water on the boat ramp, I looked at my watch and saw 30 minutes. I was really expecting to be a couple minutes faster than that. 30 minutes should be very doable at an even moderate pace. That was somewhat disappointing for me right away.

Swim Time: 30:27

Biking

I was pretty happy there was some fog and it was cool out. As I got on the road, I got situated in aero and did a quick body and leg check to see how I felt. My quads seemed a bit fatigued which was odd. After getting away from all the people leaving transition I just tried to hold form and focus on keeping my power where I wanted it. My goal was to hold 230 watts, which is a pretty good effort for me over 2.5 hours. I knew it was very doable as I had my race rehearsal at that power for 3 hours without issue.

As we headed up the coast, I did notice my heart rate was much higher than I expected. At 230 watts, I would expect my heart rate in the 140s and I was seeing it in the 150s. I was a bit concerned, but I usually try not to pay too much attention to heart rate during races as all the race excitement and transition usually gets it going higher. I just focused on looking at power, focusing on my breath and trying to enjoy the ride.

I really think that having a positive attitude while racing is so valuable. I always remind myself to look around and enjoy the moments during each part of the course. I even try to smile at people or say encouraging words as I pass them or get passed.

The course was a really great bike ride. We weren’t in traffic like some other races I have been in. Lots of rolling hills and a few good climbs and lots of pretty scenery. The fog started lifting and the sun came out about a third of the way through the ride.

I will say the Dimond is a fast bike. I just flew by people on the flat sections and downhill’s without too much effort. I will say, I don’t think I passed anyone on the up hills. I try to flatten the course by not going to high above my target power on the climbs. And this means, it feels like I am going very slow and easy on the climbs. People would blow by me like I was standing still every climb. I guess we all have our different strategies.

For nutrition, my goal was to take in 300 calories an hour. I knew the bike would take me about 2.5 hours to complete. I had 2 HoneyStinger honey gels, 1 HoneyStringer gummy packet, and they rest of the calories came from a UCAN bottle I had behind the seat. Because it was pretty cool, I only drank 2 bottles of water from my BTA bottle (refilling it only once). I did bring salt with me, but dropped that on accident right away, so I never was able to take any.

The last handful of miles on the bike, as I made my way back to the coast, were really nice. It was flat and I had the whole road to myself. I could only see one person way in front of me, and couldn’t easily see anyone behind me. It was kind of nice to just be alone on the road.

As I made my way back into transition, I wanted to try something new to speed up my transition times. I wanted to dismount the bike and leave my shoes on the pedals. In all other races, I run back to transition in my shoes, which is uncomfortable and slow. I really mis-timed this and ended up taking off shoes about a mile before transition, so I had to pedal the last mile with my feet on top of my shoes and not in my shoes.

Bike Time: 2:33:26

Running

As usual, as I started to run, I did a quick leg check. It seemed everything was normal. I had that weird feeling I always get running off the bike. My “on paper” goal was 7:15 pace to start with and then pick it up half way through if I felt strong. I decided to try for a 7 min pace right away since I was feeling good and then I could always back off a bit if needed.

The run is pretty flat except for a few quick steep sections where you’re going up or down to the Strand. Those sections really take some effort to get through.

What always happens to me during races, is my feet fall asleep and I get that needle feeling in both feet. I cannot figure it out. But that happened after a couple miles of running and I really lose a lot of feeling in my feet. Luckily it went away after about 8-9 miles. I really need to figure that out. run

I never really have a great nutrition plan on my runs. I just took in sports drink from every aid station and then dumped a cup of water on my head. I figure the run is only 1.5 hours, so it’s not long enough to really put a lot of effort into nutrition.

I was able to keep a good 7 min pace the whole run. I even had to hold back a few times because I noticed I was picking up the pace. I kept telling myself to wait till mile 10, then pick up the pace all you want. Once mile 10 came, I was starting to get somewhat tired, and I ended up really not picking up the pace at all.

finish I will say, the crowd support coming in for the finish is amazing. That was the best experience of the whole race.

Run Time: 1:30:37

Thoughts

I really enjoyed this race a lot. I think the course is great. It also helps to have family that has a condo right at the finish. Logistically, the only pain was having to go back to transition after the race to pick up my bike. That mile walk was hard, especially since we were in a rush to get in the car to make it to Santa Barbara for dinner reservations.

Looking back on my times, I have a lot of room for improvement. I was happy that I hit all my pace goals, but my transition times were downright horrible. Everyone else in my age group around my splits are doing 3 and 2 min transition times and I’m doing over 4 min in each transition. I could easily gain 4 minutes just by being competitive in transition times. That’s something I really need to work on.

I’ll definitely be back next year!

Mark Reith

swim bike run

Tag Archives: ironman

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