Funny Triathlon T-Shirts have invaded the often oh-so-serious world of Multisports! Welcome to the official blog of GymSkinz Corp. - the home of hillarious Triathlon T-Shirts relating to triathlon, multisports and LIFE! In our Blog and GymSkinZ Podcast - "You Don't Have To Win, You Just Have To TRI!", you'll find all sorts of information and news (some useful, some not so useful ;) regarding multisports, the triathlon lifestyle, funny stories, our crazy gag t-shirts and of course stuff about me - Tavis - the guy that started GymSkinZ!
What is GymSkinZ? Our mandate is to simply put some fun (back) into the typically monotonous and often gruelling act of training for triathlons, marathons, or whatever it is you do to get you off your ass and outside to play!
We'll also use this as a way to update people on the PLETHORA of new designs we'll be releasing, featured designs, exciting corporate developments and everything else under the sun.
Get it? Have fun out there folks and look forward to catching up with you soon!
Tav
Ironman Canada 2006
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Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Sunday, September 10, 2006
GymSkinZ Ironman Canada Race Report
GymSkinZ.com Ironman Podcast - You Dont Have To Win, You Just Have To TRI
Tavis Yeung, You... Are...An... Ironman!
There are two types of endurance athletes.... those who have bonked, and those who are going to.
Ok folks, with slight apprehension and almost a feeling of embarassment, I present to you my OFFICIAL Ironman Canada blog entry, one week after the horrific event otherwise known as my first Ironman.
I was hoping to include a pic of me staggering across the finish line, but of course they haven't posted the pics yet so just imagine a real dejected, sweaty, and tired asian dude crossing a finish line in the dark, with barely enough strength to break the tape held up by a couple of 12 year olds....
So for those who have alread listened to my Ironman podcast, this won't be much different. For those who haven't, and are looking for a good laugh and a way to kill 40 minutes, check it out here.
So Saturday August 26th, 2006 - The night before the "big day". You could almost feel the nervousness in the air, the anxiety, the panic, the je ne sais quoi that permeated the atmosphere throughout the city. However the pre-race jitters weren't that apparent amongst our camp, consisting of Harry "The Princess" Woo, Tara "There's no Crying in Ironman" Gill, Mike "This is my 7th Ironman and I just did Ironman Germany 5 weeks before" Shaw, and myself - "can't think of an appropriate tag-line right now". We had a nice casual dinner with the entire IRONFAN support crew, over 20 strong with all family members, groupies, children, etc etc. My parents made the trek to watch us race which was awesome, considering the last time they saw me undertake any athletic endeavor was probably over 20 years ago when I played my last tennis match as a junior for Canada Games qualifying - I told them and my coaches that if I didn't win Gold that day, I was going to quit tennis... So I won Silver, and quit....planned? maybe...
Anyway, we all said our "good lucks, get a good rest, and don't forget to freeze your Carbo-pro" well wishes and off to our respective hotels we went. Thankfully, I was staying at the Ramada in downtown Penticton which was about 5 minutes from the chaos of the race start, and where we had dinner. If there is one thing I can suggest to anyone doing Ironman Canada, BOOK YOUR HOTEL EARLY, I'm talking a YEAR in advance. The first thing you should do after you get your registration form, is wander to the nearest hotel in sight and book a room - no joke (hear me Stella? Jen? Dara?)
Up in my room, it literally looked like war-torn Iraq. Transition bags, wet-suits, bikes, wheels, paperwork, water-bottles, everything you can imagine strewn all over the place. If you can imagine Wal-Mart being hit by a scud missile, this was it. It was about 7:30pm and I still had to prepare all my "race-fuel" for the next days event. From the moment I cracked that first water-bottle, I think my fate was sealed right then and there....
So I dunno about all of you long-course triathletes out there, but you should ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS race using the fuel / drink mixture / gels / food that you train with - simple right? Having said that, I started my home-made chemistry experiment and started preparing my usual concoction of grape Cytomax, Carbo-Pro and emptied e-Load capsules into 6 water bottles. Typical of what I'd consume for any of my long 5 hour plus rides. Basically one bottle an hour, carefully measured, just under 500 calories per bottle and about 200grams of carbs - perfect for my body composition and tweaked to perfection based on my summer of training. Everybody has different requirements, so please keep that in mind if you are reading this and saying "what the f?!". Anyway, by the end of ordeal, I had all my bike fuel, and run fuel prepared and loaded into the freezer... almost 12 bottles of custom prepared stuff in varying sizes and configurations plus a half a dozen Boosts which would be loaded onto my bike, into my special needs bags, and consumed while standing around in the morning.... all good, and I was set for a good night sleep..... yah right.
Sunday, August 27th - 4:00am - Thanx to the Husqvarna chain-saw that was sawing logs in my room throughout the night - also known as Harry "the Princess" Woo. I had one of my crappier sleeps that I can recall. I actually have another hillarious story about the Royal Victoria Marathon last year where Hoz and I were also unfortunate enough to share the same room but I'll save that for another day. Anyway, so the alarm goes off at 4am, I fall out of bed certain that I've slept in and somehow convinced that my bike was stolen. It was apparently a beautiful morning, well as beautiful as it can get when you're up at 4am and its pitch black, but according to the TV, there wasn't a cloud in the sky and it was going to be in the mid 30's Celsius, or 90's F - toasty... First order of business, application of as much Body-Glide to the nether-regions as humanly possible. I swear I slathered on enough in my tri-shorts that if I wasn't careful coming out of the water heading into T1, I'd fly right out of my shorts and give the wet-suit strippers the scare of their lives. Speaking of Body-Glide: Tav's tri-tip - roll your socks inside out, and liberally apply Body-Glide to the insides of your socks (or even your tri-shorts if you're changing). Once you've done that, flip them back the right way, and then roll them up like a condom and leave them in your runners so when you gotta stick your wet feet into them, it's basically like... well, rolling on a condom and you'll also be sufficiently lubricated... ahem.... haven't had a blister on any marathons / races since.
4:30am - Ok, so I'm all lubed up, and ready to eat something - anything, bark-mulch, the nearest plant, whatever was in sight. Thankfully, didn't have to resort to being a neanderthal and I prepared a gourmet pre-race breakfast - scrambled eggs, an ice cold Boost and a bagel with peanut butter. All of which I would normally eat before a long training day or race. Go with what you know and your queasy stomach shouldn't be anymore queasy than necessary. I felt really good at this point... psyched and ready to tackle the task at hand - of course I really had no idea what I was in for, but I wsa psyched nonetheless. Having done various olympic tri's and marathons, how much different could it be? (queue ominous music)
5:30am - After about a 5 minute drive and walk, we were approaching the buzz of the race start-area. Hundreds of volunteers setting up bleachers, music was already playing, the announcer was on the PA directing athletes, the sun was just starting to peak over the horizon - a beautiful sight really. Not to mention a couple thousand bright-eyed athletes ready to rock - for the most part. En route to bodymarking, ran into tons of other friends competing and was nice to bid our final farewells before the race start. After getting inked up with the ole Jiffy Marker by two volunteers (one of them even hand-wrote my number in a really cool digital like font), #888 was off to transition.
6:00am - As I walked down the rows of thousands upon thousands of bikes, I noticed in the first couple rows were the pros' bikes - folks like Lisa Bentley, Belinda Grainger, Jasper Blake, all the really FAST folks. Just awesome. Of course, walking to where MY bike was, on the far END of transition was a little humbling, but then I had to remind myself that I WAS afterall #888 and there were a LOT of athletes - just cuz I was waaaaaay back in the corner by the porta-potties didn't necessarily mean anything... ;)
6:15am - Already?!?!.... An hour had gone by in the blink of an eye, you could sense people starting to get a little tense as they frantically looked to borrow bike pumps and find water because they forgot to fill their aero-bottles (Tav's tip #2, remember to bring water to put in your aero-bottle!)
I met a nice fella who came all the way from Ireland who was racked beside me, his first Ironman as well, and of course he needed water. I gave him half of mine and wished him luck - told him not to pants me during the run if he recognized me on the way in. Was good for a chuckle. I passed him about 5 hours into the ride and never saw him again... but at least he had a smile on his face.
6:30am - time to get into our wetsuits and gather near the start. All I could remember was almost a years worth of counting down was now down to a mere 30 minutes. Wow...
6:45am - Neoprene clad and gathered with Harry, Mike and Tara, we stood amongst the crowd, got a final pic taken, and headed towards the swim start. The grass along the way was FREEEEEZING. We crossed the timing mats to register our chip and confirm we were in fact going to start the race, and the high-pitched squelching rang through the morning air. By the time I got to the sand at the water's edge, my feet were completely numb - but I didn't care, so was the rest of my body. It was truly amazing standing there looking in every direction and seeing nothing but THOUSANDS of athletes, and THOUSANDS of spectators. It was just AWESOME. Just standing there and taking it all in gave me that tingly feeling down my neck and it was really something I wish I could describe. After watching the last 4 Ironman Canada races, it was TOTALLY different being a participant vs. being a spectator. As a spectator, you have that feeling of nervousness and awe for the friends that you're supporting, and even for the other athletes when you see them shedding tears as they hug their loved ones before the race start - it was SO emotional seeing that the last 4 years and now I was on the other side of the fence.
6:50 - the bagpipes started playing and we were just 10 minutes away from GO-time.....We waded into the water, a bunch of us that trained together managed to find each other amongst the chaos. There was Harry, Tara, John, Dominique, Lisa, Corey, Haley, myself, all first-timers and it was great spending those last few minutes together before the race start. We also searched around for our IronFan supporters. Took us a while to spot them since there were thousands upon thousands of people up along the shore but we saw Ron who took off his red IronFan shirt that I made up for the crew and held it up so we could see the print "IronFan - Spectating isn't as Easy As it Looks!" He was waving it around like a madman. When we started waving in that direction, he started waving more frantically to acknowledge the crew saw us. That's when I really started getting emotional - it was so awesome having some of my closest friends and parents up in Penticton that day. Tara, Harry and I gave our last group hug and wished each other the best race day of our lives - we did the training, did the suffering, and this was just the icing on the cake. Luckily I had my goggles on cuz I was getting weepy.
7:00am - BOOOOOM, the starting canon known as "Maranatha" goes off. Holy shiznit, we've started... About 2,400 athletes dive into the lake, and I go with them. Although we were almost on the faaaar left side of the pack, we were forward enough in the crowd so it was in a nut-shell - ViOLENT. Sheeez, I was really hoping to swim alongside Tara and Harry for a bit but within 10 strokes, I had climbed over a couple people, kicked at least two more and got elbowed a half-dozen times. If you've never experienced a mass-start swim with a couple thousand people, it is something else! Now it know what my laundry feels like! I have no idea how long it took before I had my own space to actually *swim* in, but it seemed like an eternity. In all of the olympic races I've done, there was nobody around within a couple minutes (mainly attributed to the fact I waited to go in near the back and everyone was faster than me anyway), but it was a loooooooooooong time before I actually had some space to get into any sort of a rhythm. I spent a LOT of time kicking weirdly just for the sake of self-defense when people kept hitting my legs or trying to climb over me - GO AROUND people... sheeez. Anyway, the swim felt really good and despite the gong-show, I was surprisingly relaxed and didn't let the chaos rattle me at all. That was KEY. I just took it easy the whole way - especially until the first turn - 1,700 meters away and kinda zoned out, the race isn't won in the swim folks, use it as a warm-up. I probably swam an extra 500 meters that day as I was allll over the course like a sewing machine, along with all the other idiots I was following / drafting off of. I went to sight a couple times and I swear we were headed 45 degrees in the opposite direction of where we needed to go. (Tav's Tri tip #3 - practice swimming straight and sighting, DO NOT depend on others to sight for you). In most of my training swims, I swam with Tara and the gang, and they swim nice and straight so it was great cuz I would just swim alongside them. Definitely didn't work during the race since there was just SOOOO many people all going in slightly different directions... chaos really - but from where I was a year ago in terms of my swimming ability (where I could barely make it 100 meters), it was a great day for a leisurely swim with 2,400 friends ;)
8:35am - Well whaddya know?, I made it! 1 hour 35 mins when I hit the timing mat. Not too bad, but I wanted to be on my bike MOVING by 1 hour 30. No big deal, I felt good, didn't expend a lot of energy on the swim at all and was ready to get on my bike and hammer... or so I thought. (queue ominous music yet again)
8:40am - I fly outta transition after a quick T1 (the volunteer even said - "great transition" since he was the one that handed me my bag). Luckily all that body glide didn't allow my shorts to fly off when the wet-suit strippers yanked my wet-suit off! As I mounted my bike, I was amongst the HORDES of other racers and crazy cheering of the crowds that lined Main street - was definitely pumped! Downed an Enervit Gel and a Boost, and I was flying down Main. Pulled out my voice recorder and got a little snippet in - luckily didn't crash in the process! ;)
So my bike is typically my "weapon", I've done that course almost 5 times this summer and had a couple excursions in the 5hour 45minute mark. However, the plan started to unravel REALLY early on when my left hammy started cramping unexpectedly within 20 minutes of the ride. WHAT THE FFFFF??!?!?! I was PISSED! All sorts of things started going through my mind, all negative and it wasn't good. These are the times you have to compose yourself, deal with what's going on and react accordingly. Unfortunately, my first reaction was to think of how to get more sodium into my body in order to battle the cramps early. When I got to the first aid station about 10 miles into the race, I dumped ALL my carbo-pro / cytomax and replaced all my bottles with Gatorade... Why? Cuz I'm a total moron that's why. I sucked down that bottle of Gatorade like nobody's business and prayed that my cramping would subside - miraculously, it actually DID. So, I naturally thought - Gatorade is good, more Gatorade! That was basically the beginning of the end of my race. STICK TO YOUR RACE PLAN, adjust in SMALL amounts if need be, don't do a wholesale change like I did.
About an hour into the ride, I finally caught up to Tara who exited the water about 8 minutes before me. I patted her on the ass in honour of Hozumi as I passed her cuz I'm sure he wouldn't mind, and wished her a good race. The cramps were manageable now, I would get that occasional "twinge" every now and then if I tried to push it, so if anything, it kept me from blowing up early in the race. My heart rate was averaging about 145 bpm which is 20 beats lower then my race pace - so that was REALLY frustrating. Doing 18mp/h instead of 23mp/h was totally unnerving for me as I wanted to hammer off the ride of my life, but what can ya do - it simply wasn't my day.
All along the way, I made a point of saying hello to as many friends as I could, as well as people from the LA Tri Club (recorded that a couple times too). To note, although I exited the water roughly 2,150th out of 2,400 people. I managed to pass almost 800 people during the bike leg and I wasn't having a very good ride - and managed to pass a mere 97 during the run and I WALKED most of it. Moral of the story is, save yourself during the swim, and reel them in during the bike ride because people will suffer to shave 5 or 10 minutes off their swim, only to pay a dear price later on in the race - EVERYBODY walks during Ironman.
So at the end of the ride, I was 6:09 for the 112 miles with both transitions... crappy as far as I'm concerned, but still mid pack in terms of ranking so not that bad I guess. The crowd support along the course was phenomenal, I saw Team IronFan numerous times and it always gave me that little boost to see a familiar crowd / or face. Crappy time, but amazing experience.
As I was riding in, I saw Mike on his way out on the run course, he's a kickass swimmer and was done the swim in an hour - almost 35 minutes faster than me... sheeeez.... Anyway, gave him the hang-loose as I flew by and was about to hang-on for dear life when I started the run. I think I mentioned during the podcast I was going to be in for an 8 hour marathon, but I didn't think I was being serious when I said it.... (more ominous music)
At this point, I was 7 hours and 44mins into the race, about half an hour off my projection but that's ok. I figured I was good for a 12 hour 15 minute finish time if I could somehow pull off a 4:30 marathon. I'm a 3:30 marathoner so I figured an hour extra would have been plenty! That would equate to a pace that was almost 1 minute 30 seconds per mile slower and that was my zone1 EASY training pace where I felt I could run for days. Well, things went TOTALLY SIDEWAYS during my marathon. Since I had completely screwed myself in terms of nutrition during the bike and threw my nutrition plan out the window, the consequences were VERY apparent during the initial stages of the run. I was SO bloated on Gatorade that by the time I hit the run course (I took in almost 9 bottles of Gatorade during the ride and didn't pee once - basically 1.5 bottles an hour), my eyeballs were SWIMMING. I started out the run doing a 10 minute mile for the first 2 miles to get my legs moving and had no cramping which was good. I recorded a little bit when I first exited the transition but I was so delirious and/or drunk on Gatorade I didn't say too much. I saw a bunch of friends heading out in the same group which was great so I offered my best wishes and carried on (all of them kicked my ass on the swim). Just as I was heading out of downtown, I ran into my good buddy Dave Heel and his girlfriend Sandi which was just awesome. He ran with me for a bit and told me how proud he was - thanx Dave. Things like that really make the pain and suffering worth while when you see your buds out there cheering you on - that was a memorable moment and we did a couple high-fives before I carried on. After that point, the light started to gradually dim... slowly at first and then it was like the Sandman jumped out from behind the grassy knoll and mugged, no.. bludgeoned me with an sledgehammer. I got to mile 6 feeling like I had been run over by an 18 wheeler.. the same one that drove into the ditch and took along half of Ron's car with it during the weekend's "incident" during Ron and Hoz's training ride (listen to podcast)... sheeesh. I was bonking, and bonking HARD. 9:30 miles diminished to 10.. then 11... then a walk. I heard Steve King announcing as I was dragging along and managed to muster enough strength to run through that aid station to put on a good show, but that ended pretty quick. I started getting dizzy, and then the cold-sweats started. My fingers started cramping and tingling and it felt like a cloak of death was being wrapped around me. I limped to mile 8 completely demolished, totally nauseous and had to find a nice quiet place behind the medical tent to sit down and proceeded to wretch my guts out for almost half an hour. NOT FUN. Like my preliminary race report mentioned, I came within a hair of pulling out of the race right there because I was F*CKED - it probably looked like I had cerebral palsey considering some of the crazy body and facial contortions I was doing while at that aid station. I couldn't take in anything without yakking, I was totally cross eyed and every muscle in my body was in a state of seizure. I had to basically sit absolutely still for almost half an hour and all I could do was suck on ice-cubes to pass the time. Looking at my watch, I was just getting more and more angry as the seconds ticked away. Just when I was about to pack it in and hitch a ride back to town in the next ambulance that drove by - cuz there was a LOT of them picking up the carnage off the course, John Duffield from the North Shore Tri Club shuffled by. He was literally my saviour as I told him what was happening and he offered up some TUMS. I knocked a few of those back and it settled my stomach enough to at least stand up and walk on. That was about the gist of my marathon, a walk, jog for 5 minutes, walk for 10 more. Everybody was walk/jogging at this point. My stomach wasn't doing backflips anymore, but I sure felt like hell. I had no power at all and it was taking all my concentration to just put one foot in front of the other. After what seemed like an eternity - 3 hours as a matter of fact, I got to mile 13.1 - the half-way turnaround.. Yes, after THREE FREAKING HOURS. I went through my special needs bag, and all I took out was a wet-face cloth, and a fruit-to-go bar. I thought I could at least stomach that, but nope.... went to the washroom facility at the half-way, stuck my head in the stainless steel sink and yakked up what was left in my gut. lovely I tell ya. So now, I had just done the last 13 miles on barely any fuel, and had to do another 13 more without the ability to take in any food... it was going to be a long day back... dammit.... as I dragged my ass up the first incline after the turnaround, there was Ron, Matthew, Hoz, Shannon and a bunch of other IronFans. I stopped and yapped with them for about 5 minutes to share my horrible day thus far. Ron even recorded it without me knowing since I was so delirious. After what I thought was going to be my last farewell before I died on that course, I told them to have a nice life and divide my worldly posessions as they wished. I came upon another friend, Bill Weymark who was shuffling along. Stuck with him and another great guy from Miami - Mark. We said we'd make it together and it would be death before DNF. Mark gave me a couple pepto-bismol tablets after I told him about my yakking episode and I figured it couldn't hurt. Besides, if I hurled those, it would only be two little pills anyway so why the hell not. I sucked those down with the cup of water I had been carrying for the last God knows how long and started to think - I might actually make it, just 12 more miles to go.
We started rounding up more and more people as we crawled along Skaha Lake - it looked like a death march from some bad horror movie where the entire town has risen from the dead. I mean literally EVERYONE was walking. People that were coming OUT were even walking and they were still 5 miles to get to where I was standing. I saw Tara coming out with her Dad riding beside her. I gave her a hug and told her she was looking great and I'd see her at the finish line. I also saw Lisa Hall, Larry Billings, Lucy Ryan, I hugged all of them - we all laughed, and said how shitty we felt but I was so proud of all of them - we were ALL doing it and they were well within the cutoff if they just kept moving. DON'T EVER STOP - KEEP YOUR ASS MOVING. I made the mistake of sitting down (granted I had to puke) and it was nearly the end of me. We passed Anthony Epp, another friend who was part of Team Cops for Cancer , he was walking with another gal from Oregon. All along the way, we made new friends and shared stories of our day - if only for a few minutes before one of us started going again - or at least tried.
Mark and I started picking up the pace by mile 17, we started picking targets to run to - the next telephone pole, the next concrete median, that tree....see that crack in the road? how bout where those fans are sitting.... I feel good, let's keep going.... let's pick off that person, catch up to them... keep moving buddy... we're gonna make it....it was awesome and I thank Mark for that stretch of "brotherly suffering" as we headed back into town. I lost him at about mile 19 as something came over me where I could actually start RUNNNG again. I thanked him and said I'll be there at the finish when he comes across... I downed a sip of Coke and ice-water at each aid station that I came to, just a mouthful, but it was enough to keep me going. Mile 20, it's getting dark, but I'm feeling human again... come on Tav, pick up those feet. There's Mike!! Chased him down and told him to get goin' with me - nothing left so I'd see him at the finish...
The crowds at this point were starting to thicken again as we approached downtown Penticton. Likely all these people were waiting for their friends and family still out on the course as the majority of others were already down the home stretch lining the finish line - including the IronFan crew. Mile 22, I'm gonna make it! I really started to pick up the pace... I glanced at my watch and I was doing 8:30 miles... some quick mathematizing and I figured I could salvage 13hours 30 mins if I could hold this pace - although a full 1.5 hours longer than what I wanted to do.. you never know what Ironman is going to hand you on race day.
Mile 24... 2 miles to go and I feel like a rockstar.... people are screaming, you can just FEEL the energy draw you closer to the finish - it was just UNBELIEVABLE. At this point, EVERYTHING was numb.. my body, my mind, my lips, my eyeballs, my family jewels... oh wait a sec, those were numb 5 hours ago........ It was like running on air, nothing really "hurt" - well, in hindsight EVERY PART of me hurt but I didn't want those thousands of people to see the pain.... Mile 25, my Dad ran out out of the crowd in that oh-so-familiar red IronFan shirt - that was probably the biggest highlight of the day for me and I'll remember that for the rest of my life. Me and my Dad running along as he patted me on the back and congratulated me - "Congratulations Tavis, you did it!" He also mentioned Harry was just around the corner so I thanked him, and I dropped the hammer - it might have been a Tonka Toy plastic hammer - but I dropped it. If you ever have the misfortune of training with us, we use the term "drop the hammer" more often than I'd like to admit... sometimes you have nothing left in the "colloquial toolbelt" except a pencil and maybe a screwdriver when you're really spent, but I'm certain these were hammers I was dropping. As I turned onto Lakeshore Blvd, and headed out to the final turnaround at the SS Sicamous, Hozumi ran out and cruised along with me for a bit - he yelled a few words of encouragement over the crowd-noise which I can't even remember now, and all I could say was "I'm chasing Harry down". I saw Harry coming back on the out-and back, he was with Terence, his eldest son and a crowd of supporters walking along with him. I don't think he noticed when I ran by, but I was giving it everything I had - and I mean EVERYTHING. I made that turnaround and knew I was less than 500 meters from the finish.... people screaming, music blaring, metal halide lights turning the night into day... just go to the light Tav.. go to the light! I blew by Harry with about 400 meters to go and yelled at him to come with me..."Let's go buddy, we're right there!!". Now, he had Timothy his youngest son alongside as well as Terence. I wanted to drag them ALL in, but he was done - and I knew that if he wouldn't even try running the remaining 400 meters, he was REALLY done. There was the IronFan Crew.... all of them.. screaming as I high-fived them all as I passed by. There was my Mom...my aunt... hanging over the fence as they tried to take pics while I sprinted by.... 50 meters to go... I'm on the carpet... holy shit it's bright along here.. and LOUD...... just a little more... hold up that fnishers tape dammit cuz here I come...
13 hours, 27 minutes, 47 secs.
"Tavis Yeung, you... are... an Ironman!"
Tavis Yeung, You... Are...An... Ironman!
There are two types of endurance athletes.... those who have bonked, and those who are going to.
Ok folks, with slight apprehension and almost a feeling of embarassment, I present to you my OFFICIAL Ironman Canada blog entry, one week after the horrific event otherwise known as my first Ironman.
I was hoping to include a pic of me staggering across the finish line, but of course they haven't posted the pics yet so just imagine a real dejected, sweaty, and tired asian dude crossing a finish line in the dark, with barely enough strength to break the tape held up by a couple of 12 year olds....
So for those who have alread listened to my Ironman podcast, this won't be much different. For those who haven't, and are looking for a good laugh and a way to kill 40 minutes, check it out here.
So Saturday August 26th, 2006 - The night before the "big day". You could almost feel the nervousness in the air, the anxiety, the panic, the je ne sais quoi that permeated the atmosphere throughout the city. However the pre-race jitters weren't that apparent amongst our camp, consisting of Harry "The Princess" Woo, Tara "There's no Crying in Ironman" Gill, Mike "This is my 7th Ironman and I just did Ironman Germany 5 weeks before" Shaw, and myself - "can't think of an appropriate tag-line right now". We had a nice casual dinner with the entire IRONFAN support crew, over 20 strong with all family members, groupies, children, etc etc. My parents made the trek to watch us race which was awesome, considering the last time they saw me undertake any athletic endeavor was probably over 20 years ago when I played my last tennis match as a junior for Canada Games qualifying - I told them and my coaches that if I didn't win Gold that day, I was going to quit tennis... So I won Silver, and quit....planned? maybe...
Anyway, we all said our "good lucks, get a good rest, and don't forget to freeze your Carbo-pro" well wishes and off to our respective hotels we went. Thankfully, I was staying at the Ramada in downtown Penticton which was about 5 minutes from the chaos of the race start, and where we had dinner. If there is one thing I can suggest to anyone doing Ironman Canada, BOOK YOUR HOTEL EARLY, I'm talking a YEAR in advance. The first thing you should do after you get your registration form, is wander to the nearest hotel in sight and book a room - no joke (hear me Stella? Jen? Dara?)
Up in my room, it literally looked like war-torn Iraq. Transition bags, wet-suits, bikes, wheels, paperwork, water-bottles, everything you can imagine strewn all over the place. If you can imagine Wal-Mart being hit by a scud missile, this was it. It was about 7:30pm and I still had to prepare all my "race-fuel" for the next days event. From the moment I cracked that first water-bottle, I think my fate was sealed right then and there....
So I dunno about all of you long-course triathletes out there, but you should ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS race using the fuel / drink mixture / gels / food that you train with - simple right? Having said that, I started my home-made chemistry experiment and started preparing my usual concoction of grape Cytomax, Carbo-Pro and emptied e-Load capsules into 6 water bottles. Typical of what I'd consume for any of my long 5 hour plus rides. Basically one bottle an hour, carefully measured, just under 500 calories per bottle and about 200grams of carbs - perfect for my body composition and tweaked to perfection based on my summer of training. Everybody has different requirements, so please keep that in mind if you are reading this and saying "what the f?!". Anyway, by the end of ordeal, I had all my bike fuel, and run fuel prepared and loaded into the freezer... almost 12 bottles of custom prepared stuff in varying sizes and configurations plus a half a dozen Boosts which would be loaded onto my bike, into my special needs bags, and consumed while standing around in the morning.... all good, and I was set for a good night sleep..... yah right.
Sunday, August 27th - 4:00am - Thanx to the Husqvarna chain-saw that was sawing logs in my room throughout the night - also known as Harry "the Princess" Woo. I had one of my crappier sleeps that I can recall. I actually have another hillarious story about the Royal Victoria Marathon last year where Hoz and I were also unfortunate enough to share the same room but I'll save that for another day. Anyway, so the alarm goes off at 4am, I fall out of bed certain that I've slept in and somehow convinced that my bike was stolen. It was apparently a beautiful morning, well as beautiful as it can get when you're up at 4am and its pitch black, but according to the TV, there wasn't a cloud in the sky and it was going to be in the mid 30's Celsius, or 90's F - toasty... First order of business, application of as much Body-Glide to the nether-regions as humanly possible. I swear I slathered on enough in my tri-shorts that if I wasn't careful coming out of the water heading into T1, I'd fly right out of my shorts and give the wet-suit strippers the scare of their lives. Speaking of Body-Glide: Tav's tri-tip - roll your socks inside out, and liberally apply Body-Glide to the insides of your socks (or even your tri-shorts if you're changing). Once you've done that, flip them back the right way, and then roll them up like a condom and leave them in your runners so when you gotta stick your wet feet into them, it's basically like... well, rolling on a condom and you'll also be sufficiently lubricated... ahem.... haven't had a blister on any marathons / races since.
4:30am - Ok, so I'm all lubed up, and ready to eat something - anything, bark-mulch, the nearest plant, whatever was in sight. Thankfully, didn't have to resort to being a neanderthal and I prepared a gourmet pre-race breakfast - scrambled eggs, an ice cold Boost and a bagel with peanut butter. All of which I would normally eat before a long training day or race. Go with what you know and your queasy stomach shouldn't be anymore queasy than necessary. I felt really good at this point... psyched and ready to tackle the task at hand - of course I really had no idea what I was in for, but I wsa psyched nonetheless. Having done various olympic tri's and marathons, how much different could it be? (queue ominous music)
5:30am - After about a 5 minute drive and walk, we were approaching the buzz of the race start-area. Hundreds of volunteers setting up bleachers, music was already playing, the announcer was on the PA directing athletes, the sun was just starting to peak over the horizon - a beautiful sight really. Not to mention a couple thousand bright-eyed athletes ready to rock - for the most part. En route to bodymarking, ran into tons of other friends competing and was nice to bid our final farewells before the race start. After getting inked up with the ole Jiffy Marker by two volunteers (one of them even hand-wrote my number in a really cool digital like font), #888 was off to transition.
6:00am - As I walked down the rows of thousands upon thousands of bikes, I noticed in the first couple rows were the pros' bikes - folks like Lisa Bentley, Belinda Grainger, Jasper Blake, all the really FAST folks. Just awesome. Of course, walking to where MY bike was, on the far END of transition was a little humbling, but then I had to remind myself that I WAS afterall #888 and there were a LOT of athletes - just cuz I was waaaaaay back in the corner by the porta-potties didn't necessarily mean anything... ;)
6:15am - Already?!?!.... An hour had gone by in the blink of an eye, you could sense people starting to get a little tense as they frantically looked to borrow bike pumps and find water because they forgot to fill their aero-bottles (Tav's tip #2, remember to bring water to put in your aero-bottle!)
I met a nice fella who came all the way from Ireland who was racked beside me, his first Ironman as well, and of course he needed water. I gave him half of mine and wished him luck - told him not to pants me during the run if he recognized me on the way in. Was good for a chuckle. I passed him about 5 hours into the ride and never saw him again... but at least he had a smile on his face.
6:30am - time to get into our wetsuits and gather near the start. All I could remember was almost a years worth of counting down was now down to a mere 30 minutes. Wow...
6:45am - Neoprene clad and gathered with Harry, Mike and Tara, we stood amongst the crowd, got a final pic taken, and headed towards the swim start. The grass along the way was FREEEEEZING. We crossed the timing mats to register our chip and confirm we were in fact going to start the race, and the high-pitched squelching rang through the morning air. By the time I got to the sand at the water's edge, my feet were completely numb - but I didn't care, so was the rest of my body. It was truly amazing standing there looking in every direction and seeing nothing but THOUSANDS of athletes, and THOUSANDS of spectators. It was just AWESOME. Just standing there and taking it all in gave me that tingly feeling down my neck and it was really something I wish I could describe. After watching the last 4 Ironman Canada races, it was TOTALLY different being a participant vs. being a spectator. As a spectator, you have that feeling of nervousness and awe for the friends that you're supporting, and even for the other athletes when you see them shedding tears as they hug their loved ones before the race start - it was SO emotional seeing that the last 4 years and now I was on the other side of the fence.
6:50 - the bagpipes started playing and we were just 10 minutes away from GO-time.....We waded into the water, a bunch of us that trained together managed to find each other amongst the chaos. There was Harry, Tara, John, Dominique, Lisa, Corey, Haley, myself, all first-timers and it was great spending those last few minutes together before the race start. We also searched around for our IronFan supporters. Took us a while to spot them since there were thousands upon thousands of people up along the shore but we saw Ron who took off his red IronFan shirt that I made up for the crew and held it up so we could see the print "IronFan - Spectating isn't as Easy As it Looks!" He was waving it around like a madman. When we started waving in that direction, he started waving more frantically to acknowledge the crew saw us. That's when I really started getting emotional - it was so awesome having some of my closest friends and parents up in Penticton that day. Tara, Harry and I gave our last group hug and wished each other the best race day of our lives - we did the training, did the suffering, and this was just the icing on the cake. Luckily I had my goggles on cuz I was getting weepy.
7:00am - BOOOOOM, the starting canon known as "Maranatha" goes off. Holy shiznit, we've started... About 2,400 athletes dive into the lake, and I go with them. Although we were almost on the faaaar left side of the pack, we were forward enough in the crowd so it was in a nut-shell - ViOLENT. Sheeez, I was really hoping to swim alongside Tara and Harry for a bit but within 10 strokes, I had climbed over a couple people, kicked at least two more and got elbowed a half-dozen times. If you've never experienced a mass-start swim with a couple thousand people, it is something else! Now it know what my laundry feels like! I have no idea how long it took before I had my own space to actually *swim* in, but it seemed like an eternity. In all of the olympic races I've done, there was nobody around within a couple minutes (mainly attributed to the fact I waited to go in near the back and everyone was faster than me anyway), but it was a loooooooooooong time before I actually had some space to get into any sort of a rhythm. I spent a LOT of time kicking weirdly just for the sake of self-defense when people kept hitting my legs or trying to climb over me - GO AROUND people... sheeez. Anyway, the swim felt really good and despite the gong-show, I was surprisingly relaxed and didn't let the chaos rattle me at all. That was KEY. I just took it easy the whole way - especially until the first turn - 1,700 meters away and kinda zoned out, the race isn't won in the swim folks, use it as a warm-up. I probably swam an extra 500 meters that day as I was allll over the course like a sewing machine, along with all the other idiots I was following / drafting off of. I went to sight a couple times and I swear we were headed 45 degrees in the opposite direction of where we needed to go. (Tav's Tri tip #3 - practice swimming straight and sighting, DO NOT depend on others to sight for you). In most of my training swims, I swam with Tara and the gang, and they swim nice and straight so it was great cuz I would just swim alongside them. Definitely didn't work during the race since there was just SOOOO many people all going in slightly different directions... chaos really - but from where I was a year ago in terms of my swimming ability (where I could barely make it 100 meters), it was a great day for a leisurely swim with 2,400 friends ;)
8:35am - Well whaddya know?, I made it! 1 hour 35 mins when I hit the timing mat. Not too bad, but I wanted to be on my bike MOVING by 1 hour 30. No big deal, I felt good, didn't expend a lot of energy on the swim at all and was ready to get on my bike and hammer... or so I thought. (queue ominous music yet again)
8:40am - I fly outta transition after a quick T1 (the volunteer even said - "great transition" since he was the one that handed me my bag). Luckily all that body glide didn't allow my shorts to fly off when the wet-suit strippers yanked my wet-suit off! As I mounted my bike, I was amongst the HORDES of other racers and crazy cheering of the crowds that lined Main street - was definitely pumped! Downed an Enervit Gel and a Boost, and I was flying down Main. Pulled out my voice recorder and got a little snippet in - luckily didn't crash in the process! ;)
So my bike is typically my "weapon", I've done that course almost 5 times this summer and had a couple excursions in the 5hour 45minute mark. However, the plan started to unravel REALLY early on when my left hammy started cramping unexpectedly within 20 minutes of the ride. WHAT THE FFFFF??!?!?! I was PISSED! All sorts of things started going through my mind, all negative and it wasn't good. These are the times you have to compose yourself, deal with what's going on and react accordingly. Unfortunately, my first reaction was to think of how to get more sodium into my body in order to battle the cramps early. When I got to the first aid station about 10 miles into the race, I dumped ALL my carbo-pro / cytomax and replaced all my bottles with Gatorade... Why? Cuz I'm a total moron that's why. I sucked down that bottle of Gatorade like nobody's business and prayed that my cramping would subside - miraculously, it actually DID. So, I naturally thought - Gatorade is good, more Gatorade! That was basically the beginning of the end of my race. STICK TO YOUR RACE PLAN, adjust in SMALL amounts if need be, don't do a wholesale change like I did.
About an hour into the ride, I finally caught up to Tara who exited the water about 8 minutes before me. I patted her on the ass in honour of Hozumi as I passed her cuz I'm sure he wouldn't mind, and wished her a good race. The cramps were manageable now, I would get that occasional "twinge" every now and then if I tried to push it, so if anything, it kept me from blowing up early in the race. My heart rate was averaging about 145 bpm which is 20 beats lower then my race pace - so that was REALLY frustrating. Doing 18mp/h instead of 23mp/h was totally unnerving for me as I wanted to hammer off the ride of my life, but what can ya do - it simply wasn't my day.
All along the way, I made a point of saying hello to as many friends as I could, as well as people from the LA Tri Club (recorded that a couple times too). To note, although I exited the water roughly 2,150th out of 2,400 people. I managed to pass almost 800 people during the bike leg and I wasn't having a very good ride - and managed to pass a mere 97 during the run and I WALKED most of it. Moral of the story is, save yourself during the swim, and reel them in during the bike ride because people will suffer to shave 5 or 10 minutes off their swim, only to pay a dear price later on in the race - EVERYBODY walks during Ironman.
So at the end of the ride, I was 6:09 for the 112 miles with both transitions... crappy as far as I'm concerned, but still mid pack in terms of ranking so not that bad I guess. The crowd support along the course was phenomenal, I saw Team IronFan numerous times and it always gave me that little boost to see a familiar crowd / or face. Crappy time, but amazing experience.
As I was riding in, I saw Mike on his way out on the run course, he's a kickass swimmer and was done the swim in an hour - almost 35 minutes faster than me... sheeeez.... Anyway, gave him the hang-loose as I flew by and was about to hang-on for dear life when I started the run. I think I mentioned during the podcast I was going to be in for an 8 hour marathon, but I didn't think I was being serious when I said it.... (more ominous music)
At this point, I was 7 hours and 44mins into the race, about half an hour off my projection but that's ok. I figured I was good for a 12 hour 15 minute finish time if I could somehow pull off a 4:30 marathon. I'm a 3:30 marathoner so I figured an hour extra would have been plenty! That would equate to a pace that was almost 1 minute 30 seconds per mile slower and that was my zone1 EASY training pace where I felt I could run for days. Well, things went TOTALLY SIDEWAYS during my marathon. Since I had completely screwed myself in terms of nutrition during the bike and threw my nutrition plan out the window, the consequences were VERY apparent during the initial stages of the run. I was SO bloated on Gatorade that by the time I hit the run course (I took in almost 9 bottles of Gatorade during the ride and didn't pee once - basically 1.5 bottles an hour), my eyeballs were SWIMMING. I started out the run doing a 10 minute mile for the first 2 miles to get my legs moving and had no cramping which was good. I recorded a little bit when I first exited the transition but I was so delirious and/or drunk on Gatorade I didn't say too much. I saw a bunch of friends heading out in the same group which was great so I offered my best wishes and carried on (all of them kicked my ass on the swim). Just as I was heading out of downtown, I ran into my good buddy Dave Heel and his girlfriend Sandi which was just awesome. He ran with me for a bit and told me how proud he was - thanx Dave. Things like that really make the pain and suffering worth while when you see your buds out there cheering you on - that was a memorable moment and we did a couple high-fives before I carried on. After that point, the light started to gradually dim... slowly at first and then it was like the Sandman jumped out from behind the grassy knoll and mugged, no.. bludgeoned me with an sledgehammer. I got to mile 6 feeling like I had been run over by an 18 wheeler.. the same one that drove into the ditch and took along half of Ron's car with it during the weekend's "incident" during Ron and Hoz's training ride (listen to podcast)... sheeesh. I was bonking, and bonking HARD. 9:30 miles diminished to 10.. then 11... then a walk. I heard Steve King announcing as I was dragging along and managed to muster enough strength to run through that aid station to put on a good show, but that ended pretty quick. I started getting dizzy, and then the cold-sweats started. My fingers started cramping and tingling and it felt like a cloak of death was being wrapped around me. I limped to mile 8 completely demolished, totally nauseous and had to find a nice quiet place behind the medical tent to sit down and proceeded to wretch my guts out for almost half an hour. NOT FUN. Like my preliminary race report mentioned, I came within a hair of pulling out of the race right there because I was F*CKED - it probably looked like I had cerebral palsey considering some of the crazy body and facial contortions I was doing while at that aid station. I couldn't take in anything without yakking, I was totally cross eyed and every muscle in my body was in a state of seizure. I had to basically sit absolutely still for almost half an hour and all I could do was suck on ice-cubes to pass the time. Looking at my watch, I was just getting more and more angry as the seconds ticked away. Just when I was about to pack it in and hitch a ride back to town in the next ambulance that drove by - cuz there was a LOT of them picking up the carnage off the course, John Duffield from the North Shore Tri Club shuffled by. He was literally my saviour as I told him what was happening and he offered up some TUMS. I knocked a few of those back and it settled my stomach enough to at least stand up and walk on. That was about the gist of my marathon, a walk, jog for 5 minutes, walk for 10 more. Everybody was walk/jogging at this point. My stomach wasn't doing backflips anymore, but I sure felt like hell. I had no power at all and it was taking all my concentration to just put one foot in front of the other. After what seemed like an eternity - 3 hours as a matter of fact, I got to mile 13.1 - the half-way turnaround.. Yes, after THREE FREAKING HOURS. I went through my special needs bag, and all I took out was a wet-face cloth, and a fruit-to-go bar. I thought I could at least stomach that, but nope.... went to the washroom facility at the half-way, stuck my head in the stainless steel sink and yakked up what was left in my gut. lovely I tell ya. So now, I had just done the last 13 miles on barely any fuel, and had to do another 13 more without the ability to take in any food... it was going to be a long day back... dammit.... as I dragged my ass up the first incline after the turnaround, there was Ron, Matthew, Hoz, Shannon and a bunch of other IronFans. I stopped and yapped with them for about 5 minutes to share my horrible day thus far. Ron even recorded it without me knowing since I was so delirious. After what I thought was going to be my last farewell before I died on that course, I told them to have a nice life and divide my worldly posessions as they wished. I came upon another friend, Bill Weymark who was shuffling along. Stuck with him and another great guy from Miami - Mark. We said we'd make it together and it would be death before DNF. Mark gave me a couple pepto-bismol tablets after I told him about my yakking episode and I figured it couldn't hurt. Besides, if I hurled those, it would only be two little pills anyway so why the hell not. I sucked those down with the cup of water I had been carrying for the last God knows how long and started to think - I might actually make it, just 12 more miles to go.
We started rounding up more and more people as we crawled along Skaha Lake - it looked like a death march from some bad horror movie where the entire town has risen from the dead. I mean literally EVERYONE was walking. People that were coming OUT were even walking and they were still 5 miles to get to where I was standing. I saw Tara coming out with her Dad riding beside her. I gave her a hug and told her she was looking great and I'd see her at the finish line. I also saw Lisa Hall, Larry Billings, Lucy Ryan, I hugged all of them - we all laughed, and said how shitty we felt but I was so proud of all of them - we were ALL doing it and they were well within the cutoff if they just kept moving. DON'T EVER STOP - KEEP YOUR ASS MOVING. I made the mistake of sitting down (granted I had to puke) and it was nearly the end of me. We passed Anthony Epp, another friend who was part of Team Cops for Cancer , he was walking with another gal from Oregon. All along the way, we made new friends and shared stories of our day - if only for a few minutes before one of us started going again - or at least tried.
Mark and I started picking up the pace by mile 17, we started picking targets to run to - the next telephone pole, the next concrete median, that tree....see that crack in the road? how bout where those fans are sitting.... I feel good, let's keep going.... let's pick off that person, catch up to them... keep moving buddy... we're gonna make it....it was awesome and I thank Mark for that stretch of "brotherly suffering" as we headed back into town. I lost him at about mile 19 as something came over me where I could actually start RUNNNG again. I thanked him and said I'll be there at the finish when he comes across... I downed a sip of Coke and ice-water at each aid station that I came to, just a mouthful, but it was enough to keep me going. Mile 20, it's getting dark, but I'm feeling human again... come on Tav, pick up those feet. There's Mike!! Chased him down and told him to get goin' with me - nothing left so I'd see him at the finish...
The crowds at this point were starting to thicken again as we approached downtown Penticton. Likely all these people were waiting for their friends and family still out on the course as the majority of others were already down the home stretch lining the finish line - including the IronFan crew. Mile 22, I'm gonna make it! I really started to pick up the pace... I glanced at my watch and I was doing 8:30 miles... some quick mathematizing and I figured I could salvage 13hours 30 mins if I could hold this pace - although a full 1.5 hours longer than what I wanted to do.. you never know what Ironman is going to hand you on race day.
Mile 24... 2 miles to go and I feel like a rockstar.... people are screaming, you can just FEEL the energy draw you closer to the finish - it was just UNBELIEVABLE. At this point, EVERYTHING was numb.. my body, my mind, my lips, my eyeballs, my family jewels... oh wait a sec, those were numb 5 hours ago........ It was like running on air, nothing really "hurt" - well, in hindsight EVERY PART of me hurt but I didn't want those thousands of people to see the pain.... Mile 25, my Dad ran out out of the crowd in that oh-so-familiar red IronFan shirt - that was probably the biggest highlight of the day for me and I'll remember that for the rest of my life. Me and my Dad running along as he patted me on the back and congratulated me - "Congratulations Tavis, you did it!" He also mentioned Harry was just around the corner so I thanked him, and I dropped the hammer - it might have been a Tonka Toy plastic hammer - but I dropped it. If you ever have the misfortune of training with us, we use the term "drop the hammer" more often than I'd like to admit... sometimes you have nothing left in the "colloquial toolbelt" except a pencil and maybe a screwdriver when you're really spent, but I'm certain these were hammers I was dropping. As I turned onto Lakeshore Blvd, and headed out to the final turnaround at the SS Sicamous, Hozumi ran out and cruised along with me for a bit - he yelled a few words of encouragement over the crowd-noise which I can't even remember now, and all I could say was "I'm chasing Harry down". I saw Harry coming back on the out-and back, he was with Terence, his eldest son and a crowd of supporters walking along with him. I don't think he noticed when I ran by, but I was giving it everything I had - and I mean EVERYTHING. I made that turnaround and knew I was less than 500 meters from the finish.... people screaming, music blaring, metal halide lights turning the night into day... just go to the light Tav.. go to the light! I blew by Harry with about 400 meters to go and yelled at him to come with me..."Let's go buddy, we're right there!!". Now, he had Timothy his youngest son alongside as well as Terence. I wanted to drag them ALL in, but he was done - and I knew that if he wouldn't even try running the remaining 400 meters, he was REALLY done. There was the IronFan Crew.... all of them.. screaming as I high-fived them all as I passed by. There was my Mom...my aunt... hanging over the fence as they tried to take pics while I sprinted by.... 50 meters to go... I'm on the carpet... holy shit it's bright along here.. and LOUD...... just a little more... hold up that fnishers tape dammit cuz here I come...
13 hours, 27 minutes, 47 secs.
"Tavis Yeung, you... are... an Ironman!"
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