One more time

I will be returning to Penticton in late August for another go at Ironman Canada.

I secured my ticket in the rolldown after the Oliver half ironman yesterday. As I type this early on Monday morning, I'm aware that I put in a solid effort. That said, I'm in good stead.

My race went largely as I expected. I had a fair degree of confidence in my fitness heading towards the start line though I was far more nervous than I can recall before any recent race - though since Ironman Canada last August, the one race I have done was a 5k running one in Seattle in late November.

So I was rusty.

I swam 34 and change. I was in the third and final wave - everyone over 45 years of age. I got a great start and swam hard for the first several hundred metres and for the first time in a long time, I found some very helpful feet and with a few surges was able to benefit from them til they pulled away at about the half way mark. I was 10th in my age group.

At Oliver it's a long transition from the beach to T1. I clocked 3.21 and I ran relatively hard, passing a lot of people.

Onto the bike and this for me was going to be the challenge. I wasn't fully confident of what my conditioning was because I haven't been outside on my bike much this season. But I felt good. And I rode 2.35 for 93km, avg speed of 35.9 km/hr. I was very happy with my spin. I had the 10th fastest bike.

The run proved the challenge on this day. To be honest, I was a bit disappointed with my final time of 1.39, though the consolation was it was 6th fastest split in the age group. I started slowly and it appears perhaps I started just a tad too slow.

I was confident of a top 10 finish - and felt I could be competitive for a top five too. I was 9th overall. As it turned out I got the second of three spots allocated to my age group.

I'm looking forward to building on the fitness I have now.