Completed my First Half Ironman (HIM) Event

It is more than 24 hours after the HIM race but my mind still drifted back to memory segments of yesterday’s 2 Km Swim, 90Km of Bike and the 21Km of Walk+Run as frequent as the clock ticked…and wondering how I managed to endure the extreme hot temperature and the pain on my legs, back & butt from the physical demands of the 3 disciplines.

This was my first attempt at Half Ironman event and it happened to be on my 17th Wedding Anniversary with Margaret (Mag). So the completion of this race is dedicated to Mag for sticking with me thru “Thick & Thin” and for creating and sharing all the Happiness and Joy with me over the last 17th years.

THE SWIM

For the SWIM leg, I though of the10K Charity Swim (Jun-12) experience… Telling myself that “If I could swim 10K non-stop… what is 2K to me?” and making sure that I don’t over exert myself. During the swim, there were always a few freestyle swimmers beside me so I know that my pace wasn’t too bad. I finished the swim in 49 mins (23 + 26) and that is 11 mins ahead of my targeted swim time.

THE BIKE

My pre-race strategy for the Bike leg would be: Take the first loop easy, keeping the second loop at the same pace as the first loop and endure the last loop to conclude the Bike leg point.

There were at least 8-10 hill climbs over the 30K bike loop but the 2 most torturing hill climbs are at 6K mark (very steep and approx 600m) and 22K mark (moderate but long approx 1.2K).

As expected, muscles started to feel the ache and soreness at the 52K mark…. And I just let the mind focused on reaching the end point of 2nd loop.

For the 3rd loop, I set a few objective/Obstacle points that I would overcome. The 6K steep hill, stop at the 15K water point, 22K long hill and “Home” that I have to cross. I told myself “OK, whatever you do for the Bike you just have to do it for ONE LAST TIME. Go for It!!!”

THE RUN

Although upon completion of the 90K Bike leg, I know it is just a matter of how long it will take me to finish the 21K Run leg and finish the Race… the thought of the remaining 21K distance is still quite daunting and scary.

OK, OK, enough of negative thoughts, let’s move on. “Let’s aim for just first 10K and see how it goes”. I had a pee break behind the bush at the 500m mark and then Edkor caught up to join me. We walked and chatted, jogged occasionally. Passed the 3K mark where Mag took some pictures of us. At 5K mark, I noted our timing of 39mins and was quite satisfied with the pace as comparing it with my normal 5K run time of 32mins… Now I could estimate roughly when we would be able to reach the 1st Loop of 11K.

We reached the end of 1st Loop in 47 mins as planned… with a total time of 1:26.

NOW, we have left with just 11K to clear. I said to Edkor “Hey can you smell the finishing line already??? Hang on for just a little more. We are going to achieve something which we all worried about for the last 3 weeks i.e. Whether can complete the race or not!!!!”

After passing the 5K mark in 44 mins, both Edkor and I shared the same thought that we maybe able to finish the race is sub 7:30 time so we decided to jog more often and whenever we reached a down slope we will set a target in front and said “see that lamp post there….let’s jog until there”. After the U-turn at around 6K mark, both our spirit were getting high already…we started to cheer on people on the opposite side. A few cars passed by and cheered us on too. One of car driver was TheLonelyRunner (TLR) http://thelonelyrunner.blogspot.com/ from SGRunners which I manage to spot and acknowledge him for the first time… He is one of the Runner thou I am yet to meet face-to-face but already have full respect and admiration for him for his running achievement. .. (I think his record is running 150K non-stop!!! Holy Cow!!!).

It is 7 hrs 20 mins since the start time and now we were 200m away from the FINISH Line…. Edkor and I started to dash slowly and steadily to the finishing line together. To be honest, besides Mag, I can’t really remember who (from TriFAM) were there to cheer us.. My mind was completely blown off by the joy of crossing the finishing line that I dreamt of since signing up of this HIM in early August.

My HALF IRONMAN TIMING

Swim 49:45
Bike 3:24:54
Run 2:57:30
Total Half-Ironman Timing 7:23:30