Florida Ironman Day 3...T – 12 hours and counting

I am nervous, very nervous. This morning after waking up I did a quick X Stretch and felt wonderful. Then it was time to try my luck in the water. I stepped outside and took a look at the ocean. Holy S%#@%!!!! The water looked like something you’d see in a horror show. The good news is that the sun was shining, but the wind was blowing causing to the ocean to have white caps for as far as the eyes could see.

OH well, let’s give it a try. I slipped on my wet suit and dove in, or should I say I had to walk out 100 yards through the breakers to be able to start swimming so I would get killed by the waves. There was one other guy out there and it looked like he was struggling too. Then there was another problem, my goggles were leaking…NOOOOO!!! But I did plan for such a problem and brought a second new pair. Anyway I continued swimming for about 15 minutes and gave up. It was just to ruff. I headed in and sat on the beach for a couple of minutes trying to figure out what I was going to do if this weather continues tomorrow. I came up with NOTHING!!!

Time to head back to the room and make one of my now famous protein shakes with my not so secret recipe. After that I just hung out for a couple of hours and tinkered with my bike. That’s when I realized that I was not able to get my pump to work with the front 808 wheel. Off to Ironman Wheels I went with my pump and bike. They had the same issue and made some adjustments to the wheel and I was now good to go.

Well then let’s go for a ride. So I put on one of my aero suits and stopped dead when I stuck my head out the door. It was still about 45 degrees out sided. Back in I went and got a set of arm warmers. Heck I’m from NE and we’re tough. I went out and got a good 10 miles in at a fair pace.

Back at the hotel I grabbed some lunch, a Graham PB&J Special with some grapes and a Gatorade. Yum.

Now it was time to start organizing all the transition bags and special needs bags. Thank god I created lists for each thanks to Randy Uram’s starter list he sent me a couple of weeks ago. I also did all the final tweaks to my bike and applied all the numbers to all my equipment. This whole production took several hours. I checked and re-checked everything. Leave nothing to chance I always say.

By 2 PM it was time to put my bike over in T1 and hand off my 2 transition bags. First thing I needed to do is make sure that I would have access to the bags tomorrow morning because I still have to add some PB&J sandwiches to each (fuel of the gods.



After racking the bike it was time to take one more look at the ocean. S@%$@ it’s worst then this morning. After talking to a couple people they assured me that it will calm down by the morning. I sure hope so because I don’t want to DNF in the swim.

OK time to get some grub. I walked back down to the little place I was at the other night and got some more chicken and veggies. My favorite pre-race fuel. As I walked along the beach on the way back from the restaurant I received a call from 2 friends, David Katz and Matt Carroll. They were commuting together from work. They busted my chops for a couple of minutes and wished me luck.

Now it’s time to chill out. I created another list of all the things I need to do tomorrow morning. Which includes making sure I bring my water bottles out to the bike, and adding stuff to my Transition, and special needs bags.

I’m as ready as I can be. I most likely will not send out another report until Sunday. All systems are go, I’m locked and loaded. NEVER GIVE UP!!!!


Forecast for tomorrow...Pain Heavy At times!!