Thursday, July 1, 2010

All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go....

Yes, soon I'll be leaving on an airplane....

So looking pretty certain like a very hot one on race day--most forecasts putting it up over 90 degrees. Monday and Tuesday look to be in the 60s so it looks like I'm just missing a nice weather window.

The water temp is right at cut-off now and with the heat of the next couple of days my guess is we will go no wetsuit--going to be an uncomfortably warm swim in any event.

Here is how i plan to adjust. On the swim, I'll back my HR down to 148-150 from 152-155. Doesn't sound like much but it is a noticeably easier effort. I don't want to overheat on the swim. time wise, instead of 64-66 minutes, I'll probably be looking at 73-77 minutes.

On the bike I was planning on a watt range of 200-215 watts--hoping to average around 210 watts (I did 215 at IM Florida in 2007). I'll probably back that down by 10 watts or so (5 % less effort) and try to average around 200 watts. this is about 10-15 minutes slower so instead of a 5:25 (remember it's 185km, not the normal 180km) I'll look for more like a 5:35-5:40.

So this puts me at 7 hours or so out of T2 and with the heat, I'll be moving from aid station to aid station on the run and trying to stop and hydrate andf douse myself with ice and icewater. Under 12 hours might be the more sensible plan...

Don't get me wrong, I'm going to try to go as fast as I can. I'm excited to give it a try. I just need to be mindful of the environmental conditions. I've never raced an IM in this kind of heat before--several halfs and those were extremely difficult--lots of walking....In any event, this should be a good dress rehearsal for Kona!

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