Yesterday we said our farewells and left PE to travel back home – it’s nice to be back home and sleeping in one’s own bed. The trip back was pretty uneventful outside another chip on the windscreen – I’m so pleased I decided not to replace the cracked windscreen in PE.

I woke up normal time this morning and thought I might lie in, but as soon as Louise and Kobi were up and getting ready to go for their early morning forest walk I realised that I couldn’t just lie in so I put my running shoes on and went to test the legs. I was really surprised how good I felt – a little stiffness but nothing serious. Ran for 30 minutes at a gentle pace and felt great.

As after all big events which you spend months preparing for, there is always the post race blues and analysis of what went right/wrong. I downloaded the race info off my Polar and added up the time I spent sorting out my technical issues – almost 75 minutes! If I take that time off my finishing time I still wouldn’t have achieved a sub-11 hour IRONMAN. I really felt I was in good condition going into the race but I’m now even more convinced that I have to run a sub-4 hour marathon if I want to break the 11 hour barrier. My run time of 4:21:09 just doesn’t crack it! Yes, I realise that I went too hard on the bike for the last 35km to pick up time, but still, I need to improve on my running off the bike.

I spent the whole day catching up on admin after being out of the “office” for a week. This evening I collected my bike from Paul and Kelly and took it directly to John O’Connor Cycles to remove the race wheels and check the tubes and give it a good clean – it was seriously greasy after all the wheel changes. I’m not sure when it’s going to get out again, but I’d rather have it in race shape than needing attention when it come to be used again. I think it might be time to pull out my mountain bike again. After dropping off my bike we had a wonderful stroll on the Mouille Point promonade and had a great coffee at Prima – the van next to the lighthouse – fantastic coffee – well worth the stop.

So what’s next? Really not sure. I did bump into Eddy Casar at the IRONMAN finish and he is running the Challenger Triathlon in Cape Town in November and I’m going to have coffee with him and find out more about this race. I guess after my performance on Sunday I feel there is room to improve and given that I have this fitness I’m keen to test it with another race – maybe – not sure? It will however have to fit in with my new focus of setting up my consultancy business as it is clear that I cannot rely on making a living out of tri-athlon!

On the donations front we are nearing the halfway mark with monies received and commitments made. So still quite some way to go. I need some of those larger corporates who were so generous last year to come to the party. From a physical point of view I’ve done my bit, but I’ll still be pushing hard to get in more donations so we can send those kids on leadership skills training. We all know that this is what this country needs to become even greater – educated leaders. Come on all – dig in and dig deep and let’s close the gap on the magical R80,000.

You might think that I have lost the plot after IRONMAN with a blog title like that. Well, my astrologer wife tells me that the planet Mercury is not in good shape which can result in technical issues. How right she was!

We were up at 4am and off to transition to do the final checks and have an interview with Mel prior to the race start – all good and ready for a big day. I had an OK swim given that it’s one of the areas of my training which has been lacking. A lot of the field (including myself) swam to far out when rounding the back bouy on the first lap resulting in a longer/slower swim. After what was quite a quick transition for me, it was onto the bike. At this stage all still going to plan. I was pretty conservative on the first lap and the marshalls were out in force penalising drafting, passing on the wrong side, blocking, crossing the white line etc etc which made it really difficult to get into a rhythm, especially early on in the bike when the field was still so congested. My first lap was around 2 hours, a little slower than I’d wanted but still feeling good so I picked things up on the second lap only to have a front wheel puncture after 110km. Now, bike maintenance is really not my thing which is why I always take my bike to the bike shop to have anything done. I know how to fix a puncture, but it’s not the speediest nor prettiest process with me. Anyway, I fixed the puncture and cursed that I had not put the new tube in which I’d bought the day before, rather opting to use my spare which had been in my tool tube for quite some time. On the second lap when going up past Action Cycles I collected 2 new bombs (CO2 cannister which inflates your tyre) just in case. Well I wasn’t 10km up the road when my back wheel flatted. Fixing a back wheel flat is more time consuming and messy than a front wheel flat as you have a greasy chain to deal with. I sorted it out and by now I was pretty peeved – I can only think that the tubes were old as I did not feel that I had hit anything to justify a puncture. Now I’m riding with no spare tubes and am still 50km from the finish, but surely I should be OK – who has 3 punctures in one race? Me! Just before the turnaround point (140km) – the furthest point from the finish, my rear tyre goes. There’s nothing I can do as I have no spares left so I begin the long walk/run and hope the mechanics roaming the route will eventually get to me. The other competitors offer sympathy as they know it is not possible to get all the way back to the finish pushing your bike. Time is ticking by and there are no mechanics in sight. By now I’ve blistered my feeting from run/walking in my cycling shoes and my cleats are worn to the metal. It’s looking like a DNF (did not finish) for me. All I could think of at that time was what am I going to do about all the donations which have come in already – will I have to go back and re-imburse them? Then, by complete chance a fellow competitor comes past and asks if he can help but looking at the wheels he was riding I said it was unlikely as I needed a tube with a valve extension to fit my deep section rear wheel and he was not riding deep section wheels. He then digs into his bag and pulls out a tube fitted with a valve extension – exactly what I needed. I could have kissed him – although I’m sure he wouldn’t have wanted that. I’m sorry I did not get his number to thank him afterwards but if by any chance he is reading this – massive thanks!

By now my day was pretty much blown, but I thought I’d still give it my all and just finish. I pushed way too hard over the last 35km of the bike and ended up with a bike time of 6:56, almost 2 hours too slow for me to achieve the magical sub-11 hour mark. And my legs were toast after running with the bike and pushing too hard over the last part of the bike course. All it meant was that the run was going to be a super slog. I ran the first 8km solid and then moved into my walk the aid stations and run in between strategy which kept me going through the run – but some of the running was at 6 min/km which was all I had in my legs. I did however finish strongly and ran some 5 minute km’s to finish which I was pleased with. Overall, a very long and tough day. Total time 12 hours 44 minutes and 19 seconds, a good 1 hour and 45 minutes longer than I’d hoped for. Am I disappointed? Yes and no – I’m disappointed as I went into this race feeling really good/confident and would dearly liked to have cracked the 11 hour barrier, but on the other hand I’m really pleased that I struck it out and finished and gave it my all – I left nothing out there on the course. Sometimes it’s in these sorts of races that you learn the most. I thought that last year I had to dig deep to finish and ensure that all the hard work we put into raising the funds did not go to waste – that was nothing compared to this year.

To all of you who have donated so far a massive thanks – you can sleep easy knowing that I’ve given it my best shot. To those who still plan to donate, think about doubling what you had in mind, as this effort of mine was a lot bigger than last year and took a lot more out of me.

A huge thanks to Mel who drove up from Cape Town to come and represent SCORE here in PE and provide the coverage on the IRONBRIAN website – you really embody all the best characteristics of what true charity work involves. A big thank you also to my family, Louise and Kobi, who have supported me through thick and thin on this journey going back many months – putting up with a tired and often grumpy husband/father is not easy. I promise now that we can have those dinners and take those walks which have been put off to squeeze in extra training time.

Lastly, to all those IRONMAN finishers – well done – YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!

Posted by SCORE:

Live from PE, watch IRONBRIAN in action – PART ONE:

Swim
3.8km completed in 1h 15m

Cycle
Lap 1: 60km completed in 2h 01m 19s
Lap 2: 120km completed in 4h 08m 39s
Lap 3: 180km completed in 7h 03m 45s

Live from the track:

Run
Lap 1: 12km completed in 1h 10m 56s
Lap 2: 26km completed in 2h 41m 07s
Lap 3: 40km completed in 4h 14m 15s

Live from the track:

FINAL LAP

Live from the track:

Go IRONBRIAN go!

THE FINISH LINE: 12h 44m 49s

SCORE Facebook fans continue to cheer on Brian
www.facebook.com/SCOREnews

Live from PE, watch IRONBRIAN in action – PART TWO:

There are less than 15 hours to the start of the 2011 IRONMAN SA – still plenty of time to go online and donate.

I started the day watching the Bulls loose to the Crusaders before getting out and taking Kobi for a walk. Midday I went down to the garage to put my bike in the car to go to race briefing at 13:00 to find that I had a flat tyre – same as in 2008! There was needless-to-say some last minute running around as bike shops close at lunchtime on Saturday. Lucky for me I could call on Focus.on.the.finishline.com and Kelly arranged for their mechanic to sort out a spare tube – the problem is when you are running Zipp deep section wheels, regular tubes valves are too short and need extensions. Well, rather have to repair a flat today than tomorrow!

Race briefing was a bit intimidating with Paul taking everyone through some of the new ITC rules – increase in the drafting rule to 10m – seems daft for us middle and back of the field riders. That and some new automatic disqualification rules, one of which is littering on the course leads to an automatic DQ which I agree 100% with. There’s nothing worse than seeing all the litter left after races – this should be incorporated into all races.

Bike racking was a breeze and I managed to get through quite quickly. I’m not sure what the weather is going to be doing but there is quite a strong westerly blowing now – if there has to be any wind tomorrow rather a westerly than an easterly. I’m prepared for it all with arm warmers and rain jacket in my transition bags – let’s hope that they stay in the bags like in all past years I’ve raced.

Time to now put the feet up and watch the Stomers win.

It’s all happening in PE this week – Smokie and Neil Diamond concerts, SA Swimming Champs, EP Kings are playing at Grey High School, and then of course IRONMAN and all the associated events (IRONGIRL today, IRONKIDS and Corporate Challenge tomorrow). I’m actually sitting here at my parents-in-law’s place writing this blog and listening to Neil Diamond in the background – that’s because the wind is howling so strongly we can hear the concert in Greenacres which is a good few km’s from the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium where he is performing.

This mornings swim was a disaster to put it mildly – a massive chop and hectic Easterly – definately not what we want on race day! I still joined a bunch of hardy soles who braved the conditions and swam out to the back bouy to try and sight the other bouys, but it was far to choppy to see anything so swam back. It’s really weird swimming over a swell and then catching air as opposed to water in your stroke as you plunge into the trough of the wave. I then took my bike out for an easy 21km ride out towards Schoenies on the IM route and felt good. Man and machine are ready!

It was then back home to begin the IRONMAN admin – stickering up the transition bags, packing them, stickers on bike and helmet, and laying out all I need for race day so that I can be sure I have everything and if not there is still time to sort it out tomorrow. After the admin was done Louise and I popped in at an old adidas customer of mine and then went for coffee with an ex-adidas colleague and IRONMAN participant – good luck on Sunday, Lee – I’m confident you will achieve your goals – you always do!

Carbo-loading has started in earnest tonight so I’m feeling quite full and ready for an early night as I’m sure tomorrow night’s sleep will not be quality sleep. No plans for tomorrow morning as yet and then it’s off to race briefing at 13:00, followed by bike racking at 3:00, and feet up for the rest of the day.

Donations are now rolling in which is great to see – thanks to all of you. Puma is currently winning the sporting goods challenge pipping Hi-Tec with their R5,001 donation – thanks Ron and Brett.