Trip Down Memory Lane - Half Iron Style

I’m about 2.5 weeks out from the Chattanooga 70.3 and I’m feeling good about my training. I’ve been consistent with my swimming which is feeling great right now, I’ve been outdoor riding all winter and the run seems to be coming around. Now let’s take a short trip into the brief history of Bri’s half iron distance races.

#1: 2004 – Duke Liver Center Half (doesn’t exist anymore). Did you know that Marty and I blogged before it was called blogging? Some of the stuff got lost in cyberspace but here’s my race report from this race! We got married that year, I was working at Lockheed Martin, and finishing my MBA (we were living in Orlando). We had 3 hurricanes roll through during the summer (on the weekends) and I was also a very weak biker and swimmer. I was still running fast not so far removed from college, but not in this long event. I finished thinking, nope, not doing that again. I don’t know if the results are anywhere, but I think I did something like 36min, just under 3hrs, a little under 2hrs. 5:33 total time is what my race report says.

#2: 2005 – Duke Liver Center Half (why oh why did we go all the way up to NC AGAIN for this darn race?) This race report also exists!  Not a whole lot faster than the prior year. I just frankly didn’t train that much :) Race report says I was 8min faster so I guess I did a 5:25 this time around.

#3: 2007 – White Lake Half. I was in great shape this year – having traveled the world the prior year and getting to ride my bike a lot. We moved to NC late in 2006 but I didn’t get a ‘real’ job until March of 2007 so the in between time I had lots of time to train. There is a race report floating around somewhere for this one but I can’t find it. I can look at my splits since these are still around - RESULTS  That run split makes me laugh. I literally couldn’t do that if I was shot out of a cannon downhill now :) Of note at this race (that apparently I’m still steamed about) is I got my first (and so far only) penalty. I will never forget the talk I had with the official after the race. Apparently, someone passed me and I dropped back. He said, “oh yeah, I could see you were clearly dropping back, but you didn’t get XX bike lengths back within 15 seconds. Sorry.” So yes, I guess I technically did deserve the penalty (?) except I do believe that the official might have made a judgment call and saw that I wasn’t intentionally drafting and did completely get out of the zone so maybe a 4min penalty wasn’t really warranted? Incidentally, they were throwing out penalties left and right at this race and at the sprint the next day. I’ve never seen another local race like that in terms of penalties. Final time was 4:40:36 (4:44:36 with penalty). 

#4: 2013 - Raleigh 70.3. I really was done with long stuff after White Lake. I felt like I nailed that race and probably would never get into that shape again. And still, I just didn’t love the long stuff. Sprints and Olympics it was! And then I had Logan! Then more sprints! Then we hear that Ironman is bringing a 70.3 to town and everyone and their brother is doing. Oh all right, I’ll sign up. Then I got to around March and had tremendous mom guilt and decided not to do it. I trained how I liked (short) and didn’t worry about it. THEN in early May we did The Raven Rock Ramble (60mile bike ride) and an 11 mile long with the OSB crew. I realized I could just do it for fun and not really race. So that’s what I did, and it was fun, until the last 4 miles of the run. I was undertrained, it was hot AF, the course was awful and I had major stomach issues. I finished in 5:15, 4^th in my age group and got a Worlds’ spot which I declined. Not my thing. Here’s my race report.

So this will be #5*. I’m in much better shape than #1, #2 and #4 but not like #3. Still, I’m excited for the race and am hoping to feel good all the way to the finish!

*I technically did another half iron distance last year as part of the American Triple T, but that race is so different I wasn't sure I could count it. So maybe this is really #6.