The Recap Begins - Friday & Saturday

It is Wednesday morning and I am still hurting.  Rather than try to cram the past few days into one post I am going to split it up into digestible amounts of information.  In this first post I am going to recap Friday and Saturday and then over the next few days talk about each segment of the race in separate posts.  There is just too much that went on and I am just now starting to remember everything.  I am probably going to write way too much, but in this case I just need to write it all down.

Friday

The Elbow – I went to the ART (Active Release Techniques) tent in Ironman Village and had them look over my sore and swollen elbow. The “doc” worked on it for about 15 minutes, threw some “Rock Tape” on it and I was good to go. While I was doing that, my family was in the Ironman Store checking out all of the goodies they had available.  (the picture on the right is of an empty Ironman Village....it would get busier).

After spending way too much time and money at the village, we (me, my wife and daughters, Mom and Dad) headed to Saguaro Lake in the Tonto National Forest to go on a river boat tour. It was really beautiful, floating in an enormous lake in the middle of the desert. The scenery was breathtaking and we even managed to see a bald eagle soaring through the sky, trying to find some lunch. I was hoping to get a better picture but it just didn’t happen.

Friday Dinner – Ironman Welcome Dinner

My wife and kids joined me for the Welcome Dinner (that's mee and my oldest on the right) that was held outside right on the shores of Tempe Town Lake. The food was fair at best (herb crusted chicken, salad and pasta) and neither of my girls was really all that happy with the options (they did like the cookies though). The highlight of the dinner was meeting so many people who I had communicated with on the iamtri.com site. My wife sat next to Skip, awesome guy, so nice and funny. I also had a chance to talk to Rich, Marie, Alexis and Stephanie. We had a really good time and learned a lot from the mandatory athletes meeting….so much that I was convinced to the pre-race swim on Saturday morning.

Oh, here is a picture of Mike Reilly, Mr. Ironman Announcer....I couldn't wait to hear him say my name on Sunday night....hopefully not too late.

Saturday
Like usual I was up at 5:15AM or so, just laying there in bed. I was trying to figure out how I should attack the day. I wanted to keep off of my feet for the most part, but I still wanted to do “stuff” with my family. First things first though, I needed to get down to Ironman.

After the swim I got dressed (of course I forgot a towel) and headed back to the car to get my bike and transition bags, which I had to turn in at 10:00AM. The whole process went extremely smoothly, they really do have it all nailed down. I think I was done and on my way back to my parents house by 11:00AM. On the way back to their house I decided to drive the Beeline Highway, where the bike portion of the race takes place. It was pretty much what I expected, flat with what I think folks in Arizona call “hills”. I wasn’t worried at all for Sunday.

Once home I ate lunch and waited for my family to get back from the pool. The rest of the afternoon was mellow; basically we went to the park with the kids and just chilled out. I just wanted to stay off my feet for the entire day because I knew Sunday was going to be a very long day.

The last thing on the agenda was to eat dinner and that was at my Aunt’s house, Super Aunt Dot. My Mom cooked up a great pasta dinner and my Aunt hosted the event. Everyone was there, my wife and kids, my Mom & Dad, my sister, her husband, my nephew & two nieces, my Aunt Dot & Uncle Rod, and then eventually my Uncle Mike, Aunt Bonnie and Cousin Cody arrived from California. We had quite the pre-race dinner party; it was awesome to have so many of my closest family there for this occasion. Actually, I don’t think it is all really hitting me until right now as I write this. I guess I was so focused on the job I had to do on Sunday that I really didn’t comprehend the sacrifices everyone had made to be there for me.  I am very lucky!

Around 8:00PM I was feeling exhausted and needed to get home and in bed….of course after I took care of the last minutes things, e.g. Special Needs bags packed, water bottles filled with Gatorade, race clothes laid out, timing chip and watch ready, etc. I think I was finally closed my eyes at 9:30PM….seven hours before I would be up and getting ready for Ironman Arizona.