Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Ironman at Last

I did it! Over the past year I went from being an out of shape, lazy, sit on the couch, out of control diabetic all the way to Ironman. I will be posting some pictures sometime in the near future. Until then let me just tell you. It was a brutal pain fest. My 2.4 turned more like 3 mile swim was great. I got a little low and a little off course and still made it out of the water in an hour and a half. Right at 2 hours I was on my bike and made the 112 miles in 7 hours. That was a pretty fast pace for me. The course wasn't near as bad as I had expected, but apparently it wore me out because when I started the run I had a way too familiar feeling in my knee. That IT Band was acting up again and within a few miles of the marathon course I was walking faster than I could run. I was devastated and praying to God to help me finish. About that time I found Ems, my wife, and she let me know real fast that if I kept up a brisk walking pace I would have plenty of time to finish. Well I walked for miles pretty fast, but by mile 19 my feet were severely blistered and I was just creeping along. Dude it was so lonely those last few miles. Every step was excruciating. But at 16 hours and 15 minutes I crossed the finish line. I am an Ironman.