I raced the Ironman
70.3 Miami yesterday and after putting together a great day I managed to hold
off and win the race.
I made sure I checked the weather forecast before leaving
Los Angeles on Thursday as Hurricane Sandy was sneaking by and I knew they had
canceled a race in the Bahamas. Miami was due to feel the side of Sandy on
Thursday and Friday and clear up by Saturday. That is the one thing I love
about Florida, they seem to get the weather forecast right 99% of the time.
Sandy has moved up the east coast and gained enough power to be called a super
storm as it hits the states up north.
By race day the sun was out but we were still receiving some
of the strong winds. Fortunately the harbor where we swam was somewhat calm and
besides of a few of my competitors presuming it was going to be a non-wetsuit
swim and leaving their wetties at home it was fast swim. 
The bike was an out and back. Out into the wind, back with
the wind. Riding into the wind it seemed people where getting mighty close to
the draft zone and the stronger cyclists could not make any impact on the
group. This all changed dramatically after we hit the turn around. Jan Van
Berkel who beat me in a sprint finish at 70.3 Ireland a couple months back
launched an attack, while I sat in 5th place waiting for the two
Germans in front to hang in there. They didn’t and I didn’t react quick enough
and soon I was sitting on the front of the group trying to chase down or at
least limit the deficit we would have on Jan. we went from 23 mph heading out
to 33 mph on the way home and the large group soon was not there. I had 2 guys
sitting behind me but I was doing all the lifting which was fine.
Through the technical section into Transition we managed to
almost close out the deficit and we ran out of Transition just behind the
leader. Frommhold, one of the guys who were behind me took off like a man on a
mission and we ran our first mile under 5minutes. It was a 2 lap run course
with a bridge you crossed 4 times in total. The gradient on this slowly pinched
away at your legs and by the time I hit it for the forth time I was glad I had
open up a good lead and I could enjoy the last few miles to the finish.
Frommhold ended up paying big time for his early pace and
lost several positions while Jan and Horst Reichel held on for 2nd
and 3rd. Another high would
be getting to share the #1 position on the podium with woman’s race winner and
current Ironman and Ironman 70.3 world Champion Leanda Cave. Leanda – have a
holiday chick, It would be well deserved!
I have been putting in a lot of hard work and it is great to
see it paying off albeit very late in the season, 1:11 for the Half Marathon 2
weeks ago, 1:12 for this week and after a long season I still have a lot of
energy going into my next two races.
I fly to LA for a couple days before starting the trip back
to NZ where I will be going via Taiwan for the Ironman 70.3 next weekend. I
have never been to Taiwan and am looking forward to experiencing the culture
and racing at a new venue.
Until next week
