Worst. Day. Ever.

I've been putting this off, hoping that if I waited long enough it would turn out to be a bad dream. Guess not, so here is a race report from Muskoka 70.3, my first ever attempt at the half iron distance.

The title of this post nicely sums up the race for me. In the short amount of time I've been doing this, it was certainly the worst, most brutal day of racing I have ever experienced. It left my spirit broken and my body battered and bruised. There were three specific times I wanted to quit, and if there happened to be a support vehicle in my area at those moments, I likely would have. I ended up making it to the finish line under my own power, and that's about the best thing that can be said.

The 5:00 wake-up call came and it revealed cold and rainy conditions. This wasn't exactly a shock, since it had been raining for a few days and it was expected to last through the weekend. It didn't ever end up raining really hard... just mostly steady drizzle that would make me feel colder than I could remember feeling while in the middle of a race.

The swim (2km): This turned out to be the best part of the day for me... not exactly what I expected. I knew from the pre-race newsletter that it would be a tough day mentally - I was the third wave off, which was also the first of the age-groupers. This basically meant that I would be passing very few people during the race, because it's not as though I was about to catch any of the pro men or women in wave 1 or 2. It also meant that hundreds of men and women, both younger and older, would be riding and running past me all day long. So, yeah... I had that going for me. Bad times.

There were 214 people in my wave... that was just M35-39... some of the races I have done didn't have that many total people in them. So it was a little more crowded than I was used to, but I knew it would be like that, so no big deal. I purposely stuck to the outside, because I knew that there would be faster swimmers coming soon, and I wanted to stay out of their way. I likely ended up swimming a little farther than the 2km, but I wasn't too worried -- it would have only added a couple of minutes to my overall time. I dealt with the congestion and rough-housing pretty well, not to mention the dude that insisted on slapping my head for about the first 300m. It was like getting cuffed in the back of the head by a bullying sibling. So for while it was stroke, stroke, breathe, CUFF, stroke, stroke, breathe, CUFF, and so on.

With less than 100m to go, I experienced something new... leg cramps during the swim! Yaay! I don't kick very much when I swim, and in the past I've been told by numerous People Who Know Things that with 50-100m to go in a long swim, start kicking a little more to get some blood flow down there and help prepare yourself for going vertical after being horizontal for a while. Well, on my 3rd or 4th kick, my right calf went into a massive spasm... it put me in pain and pissed me off - I mean, who gets a calf cramp when they're swimming?? It actually turned out to be a very good indicator of what was waiting just a few hours down the road for me (cue the Darth Vader evil theme music). I finally got to the stairs and a volunteer helped me out of the water. They had timing mats set up right there and my swim was cut off at 44:28... a little slower than I had hoped, but only by a few minutes - I'm a relatively slow swimmer. Besides, it's not like I was fighting for a spot on the podium or going after the prize money, or anything like that.

T1: This race has a long run from the water to transition, mostly up a giant hill. The eventual winner, Craig Alexander (yes, the former 70.3 World Champ and 2nd place dude in Kona last year... that Craig Alexander), had a transition time of 2:29, so that should give you some indication of what we were dealing with. As for me, I took my sweet-ass time and ended up just under 6 minutes. It's almost like I was delaying having to go out on the bike course. I didn't feel the leg cramp at all while I was running to my bike... in fact I forgot all about it (for the moment). T1 was also a good reminder that it was raining... I had kind of forgotten about that, too, while I was swimming, as weird as that sounds.

The bike (94km): Yes! 94! In order to avoid any out-and-back portions and "maintain the integrity" of the bike course, it had to be a little long, according to those who designed the course (including 11-time Ironman champion Lisa Bentley). Just what the novice first-timer wants... more distance! Yaay! This course also has the biggest hills I have ever seen. In fact, I know that opinions went both ways, but some people (who had experienced both) would go on to say that the hills were just as tough, if not tougher, than on the IM Lake Placid bike course.

I'm not going to spend too much time talking about this, because it just brings back bad memories. Early on in the bike, I could feel very faint pain in my quads as I climbed some of the hills... even for a non-pro like myself, it was waaay too early for that. It went beyond the feeling of muscles working hard. Something was wrong, and I didn't know what. My legs just didn't feel right. Much like the cramps during the swim, it was a new experience and I didn't really know what to do about it. The two bottle exchanges went well, I guess. It was my first time doing that, so I slowed right down... I mean slow... like, almost walking pace. I made sure I wasn't screwing up anyone behind me, and just took my time getting what I needed. The real fun came at about the 85k mark -- 3/4 of the way up a massive hill and both my quads just locked. I was almost at a complete stop, pushing down on the pedals when it happened... on my next revolution, my front tire went about 3 inches off the asphalt onto the sand, and I wiped out. Yes! WHO FALLS OFF THEIR BIKE GOING UPHILL?? Me. That's who. So there I am, lying on the pavement, feet still clipped into my pedals, and my water bottle goes rolling down the hill. Like, a kilometre down the hill. Yeah... not getting that. Meanwhile, people are asking me if I'm alright, and I'm saying yes, just keep going, don't stop your race for me, etc, etc (reason #256 why I love triathlon: people will sacrifice themselves to help out a fellow competitor... even a doofus who falls off his bike while going up a hill). So now I'm standing there beside my bike, only I can't move. Both my legs - quads and calves - are totally seized, and I am in immense pain. I can't even take a step. Not one single step. It's as though my muscles were replaced by rocks... and not the "rock-hard muscle" thing that people would want to have... no, this is just hard pieces of something under my skin that hurt when I touch them... a lot. I didn't think my calves could stick out that far. It looked kind of funny... if I wasn't almost crying from the pain, I'd would have almost been crying from laughing so hard. Bad times.

A couple minutes went by and my legs calmed down enough to continue. I eventually made it back to transition... more than half an hour after I thought I would. My support team -- my future wife & in-laws -- were apparently getting a little worried... especially after they saw a couple athletes getting carted back via ambulance and heard some horror stories from earlier athletes. Speaking of support teams, mine deserved a medal, I have to tell you. It rained non-stop and was cold. Not cool, not chilly, but cold. Yet there they were, waiting by transition to cheer me on. When I saw & heard them, it suddenly got a little dusty there in the Kuota saddle, despite all the rain.

T2: When I dismounted my bike, I realized how tough the run was going to be. I had a hard time getting unfolded from the aero position, I was so cold. Then there were my legs, which were busy singing me a few unhappy tunes. I got back to my racking spot and put on my shoes & socks, which were completely soaked despite being in a plastic bag. I'm talking wring-them-out type of water-logged here. That made my feet even more unhappy than they already were. My T2 time was not fast, but I was already a little off of world record pace, so I wasn't too worried. Plus I had to visit the porto-john to take care of some business. I finally found a place where there was no rain. Only huge amounts of stink.

The run (21k): And he's off! Slowly! I was in full running shuffle mode... you know, the one where you're making the running motion with your arms but your speed is more like a walking pace? Bad times. The run course was about as hilly as the bike course. And running down the hills sent more pain through my body than running up the hills. Another first for me. Other than the raining and shuffling, it was pretty uneventful until about the 13k mark, when both my calves cramped and seized again. I was in the middle of a wooded area on a pathway going up a hill, and I couldn't make my legs work. At all. In order to prevent myself from screaming out loud from the pain, I knew I had to sit down... but I couldn't bend my knees to get down there, so I just let myself fall back onto the paved path, landing on my ass. Since I was on a hill, it wasn't as far down as if I was on a flat section. That was the moment I most seriously contemplated quitting. I was sure that if I wasn't in the middle of nowhere I would have just hung up the shoes right there and climbed in a nice, warm support truck. But I just really wanted to finish the damn thing, even if I was the last one across the line and they were tearing down transition and packing everything up. I didn't want the months of training to be for nothing... even though it felt as though I'd never been on a bike or in running shoes before. On the run course, you have to go past transition and the finish line for a few more km before you're done... this gave my support crew a chance to see me a couple more times before the end. Hearing them certainly was a boost, and believe me, I needed it. I finally made it across the line... about 90 minutes later than I thought I'd be.

So, what went wrong? I really don't know. I can honestly say that I don't believe it was a lack of training. I put the miles in, and I think I deserved better. I thought I had a good nutrition plan and I was able to stick to it fairly well. It was tough sometimes to be right on schedule with eating & drinking, especially with all the hills. I know I was having trouble judging how much I was sweating because of the rain... I didn't know if I was drinking enough or not. The cold really seemed to affect me -- that plus not enough fluids, maybe... I really have no idea, and I doubt I ever will. So overall I don't really know what to think. It would be an understatement to say that I am discouraged. I had dreams of doing a full Ironman in 2010... but I think that's on hold now, after what went down in Muskoka.

It's a shitty way to end the triathlon season, no doubt. But I'll bounce back. My plan for next year is to stick to some shorter races, maybe a couple of Olympic distance tris, and really try to nail them. I'd also like to attempt my first marathon in the spring. The IM dream is obviously on hold, for now. But somewhere deep inside, it still lives on.