Ironman South Africa 2012

185 participants didn’t finish the 2012 South Africa Ironman. I so easily could have been one of those people. You have 2 hours and 30 minutes to finish the swim or you are disqualified. I finished the first half in 45 minutes, then the winds and currents really picked up. At less than half way into the 2^nd lap of the swim, I realized I was already at the 1 hour 30 minute mark and that I wasn’t making much progress swimming against the current. I started pushing harder and turned the corner to be able to at least swim cross-current and made it back to finish the swim in 1 hour 50 minutes. One of the professional’s described the swim as “cruel,” saying it made her feel like she hadn't even trained.

Getting into the bike was actually pretty encouraging as I took it relatively easy and finished the 1^st third averaging over 16 mph which would have put me at 7 hours total bike time. My goal had been 6 to 6.5 and I figured I could make up time on the next laps. Starting up the hill at the beginning of the 2^nd lap, I realized I had been seriously deluded and that I would be lucky to finish the bike in the total time allotted. Pros ended up taking an hour longer than previous years on the bike because of the wind. We would literally be riding uphill into the wind, then make the turn and start a long downhill only have to pedal against the win to actually pick up speed on the downhill…not to mention the 45 kilometer per hour (kph) sideways gusts that knocked a few riders over while going downhill. My second lap was 15 minutes slower than my first and my third was 15 minutes slower than my second. A couple flat tires and a little slower ride and I wouldn’t have made the bike disqualification cut-off time either.

I laughed after talking to my friends in Kigali who had completed an Ironman when they told me that the best part of the race was after the bike when you realized that all you had left to do was a marathon. But having finished the bike and started the run, realizing that I could still be considered a finisher even if I ran/walked 16 minute miles, I appreciated what they said.

It doesn’t sound very spiritual, but the true driving motivation throughout the different legs of the race was that I wanted to just get that particular leg finished. On the swim, I felt OK physically throughout, but I had drank so much salt water and was so sick of being tossed around by the waves for almost 2 hours that I just wanted out of the ocean. On the bike, similar to the swim, my legs and lungs actually felt OK, but my morale had been beaten down by the wind and rain and I was so saddle sore that I never wanted to look at my bike again. Finally on the run, with the rain and the dark and a slightly pulled Achilles and swollen knee, I just wanted to be done pounding the pavement which motivated me to push for 12 minute miles instead of the 16 that I could have finished with. I had about three miles to go before I was done and my only thought was that I wanted this thing to be over with so I picked up the speed from there through to the finish line. And miraculously for those three miles, my Achilles and my knee didn't bother me at all.

There’s no doubt that the Ironman is mostly a mental game. I knew that if I started walking on the run, I would end up walking most of the run so I didn’t even start. But I did drag super slowly on the first lap (of three) going uphill. It was there that I literally felt like people must have been praying for me because I just flipped the switch and decided not to mope about how I felt and instead get back on a good pace so I picked it up and held that same pace for the rest of the run.

The fact that I trained at much higher altitude in Kigali, that I never had the extra buoyancy from a wetsuit or from saltwater during my training and that I was generally training in less-than-ideal conditions (lots of hills, lack of nutrients and water, lots of traffic, etc) really helped me do OK with the difficult conditions of the race.

I didn’t spend a lot of time analyzing the “why” of doing this before I did it and I don’t want to spend a lot of time doing so now. All I know is that I wanted to and had wanted to for a while and the desire to do it hadn’t gone away. Ultimately it felt like a "natural" thing for me to do, as opposed to something forced or contrived for some ulterior motive.

I think what this race reconfirmed for me is that life is about being who I am. And that it’s really not by might nor by power but by His Spirit. And that it’s when I’m being who I am that I have the chance to realize that it’s not by might nor by power.

So…genuine Glory to God and thank you to my friends and family who supported me throughout this last 9 months and particularly for all the prayers that carried me through a really long day in South Africa on the 22^nd of April 2012!