Saturday, October 16, 2004
IRONMAN DAY!
It feels SOOO good to wake up at 5:30 on an Ironman Day, and NOT eat
oatmeal at 4:00 AM, NOT prep for the race, not hassle my gear to the
shore, not worry about my tires, and my water, and my drinks and food
and the weather and all the other athletes milling around, waiting for
porta potties .... today, I just get to watch.
I get to wear this blue medical scrub shirt, emblazoned with a giant
white cross on the back, and a little palm tree logo with “Ironman Kona
2004” on the front pocket. This, plus the red, white and blue “Kona
All-Access” band on my wrist (the athletes get to wear neon
orange - real obvious who they are), along with the blue “MEDICAL” band
next to it, get me into transition, and able to wander around anywhere
I want. I ogle the pro’s bikes, and don’t learn much from them, except
to note that Natascha’s on her Cheetah again. This is without a doubt
the coolest bike in the world. Of course, the fact that this model has
won the women’s race every year for the last six gives it even greater
cachet. It’s made out of carbon fiber, shaped like a lazy “X”, sort of
tilted forward, with the more horizontal arm being quite fat, and the
shorter, more upright arm being narrower. No top tube, no seat stays,
and the thing is HOLLOW, so Natascha fills it with water, with a short
camelback-like tube coming out from the front, where she drinks. I
notice that racer #214 also has this bike. The numbers in this race
are: 1-160, basically pros; 160-200, challenged athletes, then starting
with the oldest first, men then women by age within age group. So this
guy is a 69 y/o from France. He looks kind of fat. What is HE doing
with this bike - maybe he owns the company that made it?
Anyway, I head for the challenged athlete tent, where I need to quarter
myself to do the five minutes worth of work to qualify for the cool
access I get. The tent is directly in front of the dangling hoses which
serve as showers at the swim exit. In other words, from our little
gazebo, we have front row seats to see who’s coming out of the water. I
meet up with Randy, the wheelchair athlete I’m helping, and Gordon, my
partner for the day. Randy lives in Kona. He’s maybe late 30s, blond,
long hair, and has done this race about 7 times, as well as “30” other
races. He’s got a lady with him who hovers around, providing valet
services.
There are three other wheelchair guys. One is Marc Herrmans. He placed
6th as a (non-challenged) pro at Kona in 2001, 20 minutes behind Tim
DeBoom. He was young, Belgian, and looked ready to take over from Luc
Van Lierde as that country’s top triathlete. Then, several months
later, he got mowed down by a truck while biking. Paralyzed from the
waist down, he started training in the spring of 2002 for that fall’s
wheelchair division at Kona. He didn’t finish (the hand cycle did him
in), but he came back last year and finished.
Another is Carlos Moleda. In 1989, he led a team of Navy Seals in the
Panama excursion which nabbed that country’s drug lord/president,
Manuel Noriega. They got ambushed. Four men died, and Moleda ended up
with a bullet in his back. Eventually, he found triathlon, and set the
wheelchair record at Kona in 10 hours 55 minutes (about an hour better
than me, but then, he gets to roll along for the marathon). Wow, a
couple of amazing stories.
Randy’s story is more prosaic and thus, actually more inspiring. In
1987, as a teenager, he went down on his motorcycle while biking under
the influence. Most young men in this situation stay on the same path,
but now with the added burden of wheels instead of legs, and all of the
medical and mental dilemmas that go with it. Carlos and Marc were
obviously highly motivated, highly fit when they were taken down. Randy
was just a regular guy. Over the next ten years, he built himself into
a marathoning machine, setting course records for both the Maui and
Kona marathons. In 1999, at the first Ironman USA in Lake Placid, he
entered, and hyped the wheelchair concept for the race, even pushing
for prize money in the wheel chair division, saying that many
wheelchair marathoners would enter if there was a reward. Anyway, he
has persisted in his efforts, and now speaks regularly to high school
and other groups, warning by example of the dangers of drinking and
driving.
He’s finished a number of these things and so today hopes to win his
division.
Gordon and I get his gear together, and go over the transition process.
Randy’s triathlon life is even more complicated than the rest of ours.
At Hawaii, no one gets to wear a wetsuit, although some folks do wear
those knee-length swim suits you see at the Olympics over their
tri-suit. And, a few older folks wear sleeveless suits, but don’t get
to qualify for age group awards. Randy has plastic leg molds, cradling
from thigh to ankle, to keep his lower limbs straight. Over those he
wears a “mermaid” wetsuit, surrounding both legs from ankles to hips,
zipping up the middle. He puts these items on while sitting on the
Kailua Pier, with little help from us, except to do the final zipping.
Goggles and cap complete his attire, along with the full sleeve white
skin shirt he already has on. He flops into the bay, and immediately
(of course) starts swimming away. He’s got an exaggerated longitudinal
rotational roll, but very long and strong strokes. He swiftly moves
away from us towards the Body Glove boat, where he will await the
cannon.
We stay right there, to watch first the pro start, then, fifteen
minutes later and about 20 meters closer to shore, the 7 AM age group
start. A fair number of people hang off of the pier, one behind the
other, while the rest either wait on shore, swim out towards the line,
or wait behind kayakers for the gun to blast. There is no countdown, no
“1 minute, 30 seconds, 15 seconds” like there is at all other big tris
I’ve done. As a matter of fact, probably 1/3 of the field is still
either on shore or swimming to the line when we see first the smoke,
then hear the cannon.
Randy has said he wants to finish in 1 hour 15 minutes, which would be
10 minutes slower than previous years, so he can “save” his arms for
the bike. I amble back to the PC tent, and await the pro’s exit. They
should start coming out about 30 minutes after the AG start. During
that wait, the tent starts to fill with oglers and would be
photographers. But NBC has an exclusive contract, so they get to set up
their tripod in the middle of our tent. This is a camera guy, his
assistant girl friday (with a list of the “stars” and their race
numbers), and a sound man. Security arrives, and shoos all
non-essential personnel away. I set up camp right next to the NBC cam,
figuring this will guarantee me an unobstructed view of the exit. Soon
enough, Jan Silberstom, the perennial swim leader, runs up the ramp,
grabs a quick hose shower, and zooms a u-turn right in front of us. I
explain to Girl Friday who he is, and for the next ten minutes, we try
to identify the leaders as they come out in little packs - Simon
Lessing all by himself; a few minutes later, Peter Reid, Chris
McCormack, Tim DeBoom a little later - we get to see them all. Monica
Caplan as usual leads the ladies and gets remarks from inside the tent,
“She doesn’t look like a triathlete!” (she’s kinda chubby - helps in
the swim, but hinders elsewhere). Next is Nina Kraft - could this be
her day? Then, several minutes later, Lori, Heather, Natascha, Lisa -
they all come running thru, fit, ready and warmed up to start the day.
About an hour into the age groupers, Gordon and I make contact, and
agree the time is right to get down in the water, and look for Randy.
It might be a long wait, but within a minute of our arrival, someone
shouts, “There’s a Gold Cap”, and we spot Randy’s white shirt. As we
race into the water, we get some hassle from the catchers, but brush
them aside with our insistence that we are here to drag a challenged
athlete out of the water.
Randy motors in, and rolls over on his back as we rush down the ramp.
He appears not to see us, and starts to sink. We throw our arms out,
and drag him up onto our shoulders. We’re all shouting instructions to
each other, but somehow get the three of us moving in unison up the ramp
“Wow, Randy, 1:05, man [ed. actual time 1:03 +] Way to go. Amazing!”
“Just get my arms on your shoulders!”
“Drop your leg for the chip, man!”
“Do you want a shower?”
“Yeah, just hold me under”
We plop him onto his standard chair while somehow he unzips himself,
Gordon strips the leg molds off, and we roll over to the hand cycle.
Steve Black, the PA in charge of the PC athlete support team, has
joined us. We roll the cycle up to the sharp right turn in front the
the pro’s bike (all gone now), and haul him into the seat.
“Pull my leggings down like a sock!’ Randy shouts as we fumble his
cycle booties onto his feet. Gordon and Steve strap his legs in as I
steady the cycle. Within three minutes total time, he’s out like a
NASCAR driver after a quick tire change. The whole transition area sees
him go by, and cheers and applause spring up. Mike Reilly gets the cue,
and hypes the crowd for his exit onto Palani Road. Wow, intense, but
fun. Now what do I do for the next seven hours?
For the next hour, the age groupers barrel through, at any one time up
to ten taking quick showers. Everyone has a special method: some just
run under, others get hair and face, others drink, and some make sure
they spray the sand out of their suits, dropping the hose into their
shorts, bra top, whatever. Finally, they peter out, and I spend the
last half hour or so watching the bike racks of the over 55s, who seem
to have an inordinate number still waiting. I lean over the fence, and
ponder mountain biking on the Big Island with coach Cal. He’s tried
going up up and away to the cloud forest past Palani road - pavement,
but steep. I counter with the four treks I took on grass, rocks, beach
lava, and mountain mist.
I told him how, a few days earlier, I had gone up north of the airport
a bit on the Queen K, and found the road to Kekaha Kei State Park. This
part of the shore is actually pure, unadulterated lava. There is a road
carved over the black flows, but I wanted some bouncing simulation of
the Xterra course, so I parked just off the highway. The air
temperature in the shade may have been 87F, but the searing sun and its
evil twin, the reflection beaming back from the black corrugated lava
flows made it like being in a sauna, with heat lamps turned on. Once I
got going on my bike, the wind flow lifted the worst of the blast
furnace off my skin, and helped evaporate my sweat enough so I could
pay attention to my riding, and not to the heat.
The road down to the actual shore was not bad, although parts of it I
would not want to take a passenger car on - only a high clearance truck
or SUV. But once I turned left, south, towards the airport, the surface
became basically lava gravel over the flow. Lots of little ups and
downs, rocks sized between pea gravel and baby heads, and no compromise
on the smoothness (or lack thereof) of the surface. I turned down a few
“trails” towards the ocean. These were marked with white coral rocks
denoting a suggested route of travel, but in no way was this an
improved surface. It was just the lava, as it had cooled. A lot like
riding on slickrock, but a little less smooth, and certainly with no
large playgrounds. And a lot darker than the rock around Moab.
The first one led to a black sand beach. This black sand was clearly
not the result of stream deposition, like many beaches, but rather came
from constant wave action cutting up ever finer chunks of lava into
granular dust, and, eventually, taking it out to sea. Someone had
driven a late model white Ford pickup nearly to the water’s edge,
turned it around, and got stuck on a hillock of the stuff. The vehicle
had been stripped, and seemed to serve now mainly as shade for surf
fishermen, who’d left their lines and beer bottles as evidence.
Probably a rental who had not gotten the extra insurance, and couldn’t
pay for a tow?
The second led to a more conventional beach, with a lot of little coves
hiding mini-clumps of sand, backed by a few scraggly trees which had
taken hold in a patch of grass snared by a minature sand dune. Someone
had set up camp there, with a tent and snorkeling gear. No vehicles
were evident, nor people. I gave them a wide berth nonetheless, as they
looked like they were there for the long haul; there was laundry on a
line strung between the two trees, and a little kitchen made from lava
rocks and driftwood.
Every five minutes or so, a plane would swoop down behind me, heading
for the runway a half mile north. I reached the chain link fence
protecting the tarmac from me or any other terrorist who might want to
gain access across this desert. I wonder how they guarded the ingress
from the sea? At night, it would be pitch black here (after the sliver
of the moon had set), and anyone who wanted could snake over into the
forbidden zone, and hang out to wreak mischief. Instead of trying to
breach this outer defense, I headed back, hoping for a little relief
from the sun once I got to my mini-van.
“Well, that sounds pretty cool,” Coach Cal said. He gave no indication
he actually wanted to try such a ride, though, even when I told him it
would bounce him around almost as much as the cattle road on Haleakala
next week.
“You want to hear about a COOL ride, let me tell you about Mana Road.”
I meant this literally, of course. It was in almost every way the
opposite of my lava beach adventure.
Mana Road circles around the north and east side of Mauna Kea, the now
dormant crown of the Big Island. It connects the Belt Road and the
Saddle road, via 45 miles of Off Road. I came at it from the north,
just past Waimea. The first 6-7 miles were tolerable gravel with only a
bit of washboard, so I kept driving. I had to open/close one ranch
fence to enter at about the 4,000 foot level, a green and overcast
section of the Parker Ranch.
John Parker, an early visitor to the Big Island, apparently befriended
one of the King Kamehamehas in the early-mid 19th century, who gave him
a bit of land as a reward. John liked it so much, he married the King’s
daughter, and fell into another 640 acres as a dowry. One thing led to
another I guess, and by the time he was through, there were nearly
200,000 acres in the Parker Ranch spread over three sections. His heirs
variously built up and squandered, then remade the ranch, which is
basically a grass factory for feeding cows. In the old days, the
paniolos would just drive the cows down off the mountain and into the
sea, where they’d surround them with log booms and float them to a
waiting ship. Now, I suppose the cows just go inside a container.
The final heir (the last scion?) died leaving money to his kin, but the
land to a non-profit trust. Maybe it will all become a giant park
someday, but for now, cattle still is king.
Soon past that first gate, the road got a lot choppier, and started to
take some serious rises, so I pulled over to the side, and loaded up
for what I hoped would be a 19 mile trek, to replicate the distance, if
not the terrain and difficulty, of the Xterra. Clouds were starting to
scud down from Kea’s shoulder; the air temp was 73F. I had no long
pants, but I did have a windbreaker/bikejacket which I could fold up
and wear as a fanny pack. Into that went my camera, phone, and some
gel. The road did a lot of ups and downs, gaining a net total of 1000’.
About half way in, I either rose up to meet the clouds, or they rose up
to meet me. In any event, I got socked in and misted over, so much so
that I had to take off my sunglasses to see - they kept getting so wet,
it was like peering at the world mypoically without my glasses. (I had
contacts in for the ride.) Just when things seemed the worst, I broke
through to the sun somewhere due south of Hilo, but 5,000 feet above
it. I could not see the ocean or the town below. I was one hour and
twenty minutes, and nine miles plus into the ride, so I decided to turn
back. How bad could it be? The temp in the cloud had been 66F, and was
now again 75 in the sun. I forgot I had been going up most of the way -
there were a lot of rollers at the end, with no net gain in elevation,
but a lot of work nonetheless. Once I got thru those on the way back,
it was a six mile plunge at speed with the temp dropping and the mist
turning to outright rain - very small drops, just like at home, but
rain nonetheless. I was definately ready to warm up by the time I got
to the car. I congratulated myself for my foresight at bringing a
long-sleeved polypro shirt, and cursed myself for having left it in the
car to begin with.
“Now, that was weird - a combination of weather like the northwest, but
terrain from Hawaii. There’s really nothing that can prepare you for
the hellacious conditions of the Xterrra course - the heat, the dust,
the constant up and down, the rocks, the gullies, the thorns, the sun -
it’s unique, and can only be experienced one day each year. The rest of
the time, THAT cattle ranch (Ulupalakua) is closed to bikers.”
By this time, Cal’s last client in the race, a hard biker, but sea sick
60 year old, wobbled up the ramp sometime after the 2 hour mark. He
seemed oblivious to his coach’s encouragement, as he could barely
stand, much less focus on instruction. Apparently, he easily got
veritgo from the swells of an open water ocean swim.
With the bike racks now nearly empty, and the time standing at 9:20, I
prepared to organize my afternoon until 3:30, when we expected Randy
back at the ranch, to transfer from his hand cycle into his chair for
the marathon. These are definitely two different machines. You’d
wonder, well, he can’t use his legs, he’s got to be in a wheel chair,
why not just use the same vehicle for both cycling and the marathon?
Well, a triathlon is SWIM, BIKE, and RUN. Wheel chair marathoners have
a relatively long history, regularly finishing the twenty-six miles in
under two hours, much better than those of us who have to use our legs.
They sit in specially designed racing chairs, sort of like the
high-speed motorcycles you see out on the highway. The physically
challenged wheel chair marathoner is in a severe forward lean over the
front
of his machine, unlike the laid-back, hands-high posture adopted by a
leather junkie on his chopper. It looks like a tricycle created by a
low-rider. The wheel chair marathoner folds his legs in two, sharply
flexing at both knee and hip, and rests the front of his ankles on
little stands low near the ground. He’s got half-gloves on, of course,
and gains motion by pushing forward on his racing wheels (actually, on
the hand rims attached to the outside of the tires), which are canted
inwards, each being angled towards the midline. If you’ve ever seen one
of these guys race, it’s quite inpressive - their turnover rate
(forward pushes per minute) is faster than a runner’s leg speed,
because the arms are shorter, so they scoot along at speeds we can’t
reach by running except for very short distances. This is why, in a
marathon, they start a few minutes BEFORE everyone else, to avoid
crushing a lot of toes. In an Ironman, of course, they have to maneuver
their way past the masses doing the “Ironman Shuffle” which passes for
running in the marathon for mid-packers. Their speed and energy level,
to say nothing of their mere presence, invariably energizes the crowd,
as well as the runners they inevitably pass.
For the bike, they use a hand-cycle, set close to the ground, with a
single
small wheel up front, which has a little side-to-side play for turns.
The driver sits on a sling seat, much like a recumbent bicyclist, and
operates “pedals” set in front of him, at about chin level. These
rotate chainring gears which look a lot like those in the front of a
standard bike. These drive, through further gearing, the rear wheels,
which seem to be conventional “27 inch” bicyle wheels. Instead of
alternate circles for each foot, as on a conventional bike, the
hand-pedals are set up together, so both arms cycle at the same time.
Because the arm and shoulder muscles together still don’t equal the
mass of the legs and buttocks, hand-cyclists end up being slower than
leg cyclists. So depsite Randy’s outstanding swim time, he would not
finish his bike leg in less than seven and 1/2 hours, which is at the
slow end of the Ironman bell-shaped curve for 112 miles at Kona.
The main action for a spectator at an Ironman is: watch the swim start,
maybe hang around for the transition into the bike, then kill time for
a few hours (4-7 depending on who you’re wanting to look at) until the
bike-to-run transition, and then watch the pros finish. If you’ve got
great stamina, you can hang out at the finish from 10 PM to midnight,
and cheer in the REALLY slow people, those who are doing this on a
personal dare, or who are too old, or too out of shape to actually bike
with any speed, or run a marathon. Some Ironman courses are set up with
mulitple loops and curlicues in both the bike and run, bringing the
racers back to the same area multiple times. These are called
“spectator friendly”, because you can stay in one spot, and catch a lot
of action all day. Kona is old-school, with the bike ride being
basically a single out and back “loop”, but they do have a few
curlicues and a short out and back at the start, “downtown”. Between 10
and noon, there’s nothing to see, except the big screen TV where
tri-geek announcers and old pros comment on the field reports from the
front of the race, speculating on what it all means. They’ve added a
bit of Tour de France technology, and now have some live shots coming
in on the Jumbotron, but it’s only one camera on a motorcycle, and no
swooping helicopter shots (those birds are EXPENSIVE, so they use them
for the start, and the finish, and keep them grounded in between.) I
got an update on the the race this way at about 80-90 miles. The
Germans Normann Stadler and Nina Kraft looked likely to snatch the race
by their courageously aggressive bike rides. Without going into the
nuances of drafting rules and race tactics, suffice it to say that
Stadler and Kraft both had what appeared to be insurmountable leads at
this point.
I found a spot on Ali’i Drive, about a mile into the marathon, which
seemed ideal for spectating. A low-slung lava rock (what
else?) retaining wall curved under a large shady tree, almost at the
edge of the surf, with a strong sea breeze funneled into this spot by
the nearby buildings. My thermometer read 82F, which is about as good
as it’s going to get in Kona. I leaned my bike against the wall, took
out my camera and cow-bell, and waited for Normann.
The day was warm, of course, but not overpowering here on the coast.
Word had filtered back that out on the Queen K, however, the weather
had played more than its usual havoc. Normann had by far the fastest
bike split, at 4:37, nearly 15 minutes slower than the fastest ever.
Back in the pack, where most of the favorites had spent the morning,
the times were quite a bit slower. Peter Reid, three time and defending
champion, for instance, came in nearly 20 minutes behind the leader.
This would put his bike split slower that several of the women’s
fastest times from years past, including Natascha’s from 2001, when
winds and heat were so strong that several age groupers (mostly little,
old folks) were literally blown offf their bikes.
The Big Island is formed by five volcanoes, four of which lie at
various distances and heights to the East of the bike course up the
northwest coast of Hawai’i. These create various wind and cloud
currrents, depending the general air flow over the Pacific that day.
Usually trade winds come in from the northeast and hit the massive
slopes of Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea. The air rises with the land, trying
to squeeze up and through the Saddle between the two peaks, at over
5,000 feet. There, mist and clouds form, and often showers on the
windward side (Hilo). What happens next is even more interesting. Down
at sea level, the black lava fields are absorbing the sun, heating the
air just above to triple digit levels. The temperature differential
draws air in from the ocean, where it is “cooler”. This starts a
“makai” wind during the mid-morning hours. This wind, however, is
eventually beaten down by the air streaming in from above. As air moves
down the saddle towards the ocean, it gets compressed, and compressed
air gets hotter. With THIS heat, there is now a “mauka” wind, from the
mountain. So as the ride goes first north to Hawi, and then back south
along the coast to Kailua-Kona, the riders get baked and blown, both
coming and going - the hot air from above, combining with the radiant
oven like heat from the lava below. Each year, the wind pattern and
heat levels are different, but each year without fail, the riders will
get affected by the sauna-hell. This year, apparently was particularly
bad not only in the 90+F temperatures, but also the quixotic winds,
sometimes with, mostly across or against the riders. So everyone, save
Normann Stadler, Torbjorn SIndballe from Denmark, and Faris Al-Sultan
(who is German through and through) suffered, and lost ground to those
leaders. Waiting for the first runners to come through was an exercise
in patience and sympathtic humility.
On the women’s side, Nina Kraft seemed to understgand the situation
much better than either Natascha Badmann or Lori Bowden, the other two
pre-race favorites. Natascha usually murders everyone on the bike. In
years past, she has seemed to fly effortlessly through the mauka
monster, saying she just imagined herself a bird winging on the zephyr.
That mental image must have lost its feathers this year, as her bike
split was over 1/2 an hour slower than her best on the Kona course. She
did manage to finish second, showing her mettle much better than Lori,
who wallowed back in the pack, unable to run with her charactaristic
speed; her marathon was one minute slower than Natascha.
So the pros, except for the winners, seemed to find the day
devastating, the age groupers likewise. Nonetheless, I perched on my
little sea wall for an hour, and tried to envisage just what it must be
like to run at that speed, in that heat, after those bike conditions,
for that distance. It’s imaginable, but I was very glad I wasn’t doing
it.
After seeing the top men and women come by twice from out vantage
point, I wandered back to hang out and wait for Randy (remember Randy?)
We saw Carlos come screaming in around 4:15. Marc and Randy were still
not in, presumably somewhere out on the course. Marc had an entire
entourage with him, headed by his brother. They seemed to have a good
guage on where Marc was at any one time, and were expecting him at just
about the bike cut-off time, 5:30 PM. Rumors surfaced than Randy had
abandoned the race; but checking at the desk which tracks such things
proved fruitless.
While we waited, I spied on the penalty tent for a while. Computers
have transformed this mundane little task. Marshalls on the course
would identify a penalty, put a slash across the racer’s number, and
phone in the information to the tent. There, someone would enter the
name and number of the infractee. A chip sensing mat was placed below
the computer, connected to it. When the poor soul with the penalty
would come to the tent, they were urged to enter quickly, but told they
could not go to the bathroom in the tent (they started adding this
instruction after someone, noting the lack of a porty potty in the tent
with 10 just outside the door, went over the corner and did a little
puddle protest). Once across the mat, the computer would sense who it
was, identify the minutes required in the “sin bin”, and start the
count down. A spreadsheet would then tick off the minutes and seconds
of those in the tent. This was monitored by a race marshall, who would
give each person a countdown, and send them off after the requisite
interval. No paper involved, although they did have a white board as
back-up. Each penalty was identified by racer number; as they entered
the tent, the number was erased from the board. One final touch: T2
bags were moved from the rack to the penalty tent, so that racers could
pick them up at the end of their stay, and go directly to the change
tent.
So that was loads of fun to watch that little backwater, with its own
culture and the various responses of the sinners. Some were remorseful,
some defiant, some confused, and some just plain spaced out. But the
head marshall treated them all the same - like friends who just dropped
by for a little rest.
After 4 PM, I switched my locale to the closest spot I could find to
the T2 entrance. This was right next to the “dry clothes bag” tent,
where people would pick up the bag with clothes to change into after
the race. Crossing right in front of us was the exit from the finish
line. Those done with the race were escorted across by two catchers,
and re-united with the real world, moved towards food, or medical, or
dry bag. We got to watch everyone come in, from Peter Reid on
down (Stadler didn’t come by here - I think he was having trouble with
producing a sample for drug testing.) Again, everyone had a uniquely
personal approach towards this post-race comedown. Some (like Peter)
were elated, all smiles; others were completely, totally drained; still
others seemed disconnected from themselves and reality.
Our reality was to wait until 5:30, to see if Randy made it back, and
help him transfer to his racing chair. Marc’s team got a phone report
about 5:25 that he was this side of “Hana Alua Dr”, and wondered how
long he would take - this was six miles out, but mostly down hill. He
arrived at 5:31, and rushed into the chair, hoping the race officials
would not notice the slight tardiness of his arrival. He came in 10
seconds after the cutoff, but apparently the rule applied to the end of
the minute, not the beginning. So he snuck in by 50 seconds, and he
went to finish third in the hand-cycle division, at 13:48. Carlos won
at 11:18, and second was Pat Doal, a first-timer from Georgia.
When Randy hadn’t showed by 5:45, we assumed he had just gone on home,
so we did too. I ate a quick dinner, then came back out to Ali’i drive
about 6:45 PM, to cheer on home an hour’s worth of finishers. I decided
I would cheer for “my people”, the ones who were finishing in the time
I would hope to get, were I out there - 12-13 hours. In a little over
an hour, 400 people came by. This was the last hour of the middle of
the curve - 1100 people came in between 5 PM and 8. There were 100
before that and 400 after.
I stood just where the sea wall meets the road, the spot where the
seaward sidewalk is often splashed by waves. At this point, the runners
have been winding along Ali’i for about 4 minutes, and are just
beginning to enter the zone of light and noise created by the finishing
stands. Here, some would start to break into a smile, some would look
grim, a few would resolutely walk, but most were still wasted,
unwilling to realise that they were done. I told each and every one of
them how good they looked, how well they’d done. Those 50 and over, I
would give a special boost; people whose shirts were open I would
remind to zip up for the photo. I knew full well as I was ringing my
bell, and offering my support, that I was actually trying to convince
myself that I, too, had raced along with them, in some small way,
through the training I’d been doing for the past five years, the seven
Ironman races I’d entered (and five I’d finished), the ones I’d walked,
the ones I’d run. Yes, these were my people, here at the end of the
middle of the pack on a hot night in Kona, third Saturday in October.
At 8 PM, I turned back up Ali’i, the noise fading, the lights dimming,
the feeling already becoming a memory.