Ironman Calgary 70.3

Beer gardens and Finish Line Stands!

Did Ironman Calgary 70.3 4 weeks ago (#imyyc).  It was pretty fun, well organized with great volunteers.

Race Review

They did a lot of stuff right and it was a great race overall.  The swim was beautiful, the bike was excellent, and the run was gorgeous.

Swim - in Auburn Bay Lake, very nice clear water, lots of people watching all over the lake, but not enough bathrooms at the start and some buoys were smaller and tougher to see - 4/5

Bike - route was rolling hills for the first half then largely downhill on the way back, very fun, very nice.  There were only two support stations though, and they didn't have any

Run - Pretty fantastic, friendly people at all of the aid stations and very scenic and nice.  Great run.

Post Race - also fantastic, great food trucks with chicken and waffles and there was beer there.  Next year, I am definitely going to buy a beer....

Race Report

I waited way too long to write this, so it cannot be very detailed, alas.  Swim went well, I got a little lost but still had an excellent (for me) time.  Bike was a lot of fun, I liked the route a lot.  There were a lot of see through bike shorts which was a little disturbing.  I'm not sure people realize that worn out bike shorts are see through in the sun?  The run went pretty well, I ran a higher percentage of the race then ever before for this distance.  Went out too fast and kind of burned out but when I settled down it was a lot of fun.

Great White North Olympic Triathlon

Last Sunday I did the Great White North Olympic Triathlon.  This was the first year GWN added an Olympic distance to their classic 1/2 Iron distance race and I thought it would be a good preparation for Calgary 70.3 later this month.  It was fairly fun, our race started 1.5 hours after the 1/2 IM and we raced on the same course, so you could pass tired longer distance racers who had twice as long to go as you, which was pretty fun, I guess?

Swim - they pulled the far buoy in to make 1500 M, the water in Hubbles Lake was quite warm and very clear, I could see the weeds on the bottom.  Good support too with lots of divers and kayaks, etc.

Bike - this was 50 KM (slightly more than classic Olympic of 40 KM) and basically it was the same course as the 1/2 IM, they just do two loops while we do one.  Harsh wind going the one way and some pretty good hills but pretty nice coming back.

Run - a 10 km out and back loop through Stony Plain, 1/2 IM racers did this twice.  I ran the whole time at an OK pace and passed lots of tired 1/2 IM racers who still had another lap to do.

Race was pretty fun, a little expensive (but they all are I guess) but good overall.  Official site here.

Goals for 2014

Here are my goals for 2014

• Run 1000 miles
• Run a half marathon in under 1:50
• Finish Ironman Calgary in under 6 hours
• Do 100 pushups in one sitting
• Beat Fast Alex!

Other than beating Fast Alex, doing 100 push ups may be the toughest task.  Definitely have to pick up my game?