24 hours in the life of an Ironman.

Right up there with my wedding and the birth of each of our two kids, July 25^th 2010 is clearly around the top so far.

3 AM: Rise and shine, time to eat like there no tomorrow. 1500 calories is the goal amount to consume in the first hour. Why is it still so dark outside?

4 AM: Bags are packed, I am ready to go and getting very excited. So cool to see others in the hotel lobby already up and at it.

5 AM: arrive early and get numbers put on body, Glad to have kimberly with me as i get the numbers wrong, check bike and run bags, fill nutrition on bike and check tires.

6 AM Hang out water side with Kimberly as the sun starts to come up. Can I do this? Will I make the swim? How am I gonna run a marathon at the end of this? Lots of questions and lots of self talk, Wow I need my ipod turned up loud to drain the voices.

7AM Just saw my family right before getting in the water, that was some good energy blast and now KaBam goes the cannon and off I go, swimming with 3000 other people is like a human demolition derby.

8:15 AM out of the water, quick get the wetsuit off, now run ¼ mile or so down to the expo tents. Could they make it farther? Bike shoes on, helmet on, sunglasses on, race belt on, gloves on lets get on that bike.

9 AM: Hills out of town were no so bad, energy levels are high and I feel great. Now its time to fly down the hills towards keene at near 50 MPH, holy crap is that fast in the rain.

10 AM: 30 miles in on the bike and I feel great with an awesome first bike split around 23mph. Crap how come I have to pee again????

11 AM: Climb, Climb, Climb and then Climb some more. Headed to the top and am I only doing 7.5 MPH? at what slow speed do you just fall over?

11:30 am : Got to see my family after the first bike loop and stopped to give kisses to them, that always refuels my energy tank. They have now been here for 5-6 hours and this is the second time they saw me, they are awesome for sure. Team Kris rocks.

12: Downhill the second time is bitter sweet, its fun doing near 50 MPH for a few miles, but my legs know what it’s going to take to get back up and they are not happy. Eating lots of food on the bike is good.

1 pm: Flats feel good and I ma keeping good time. Hey wait there goes my friend Mark from Mooseman. I wanted to chat for a bit but it bathroom time again, wow this is getting on my nerves.

2 PM: Just before heading up the hills again I feel like I want to just get off my bike and sell it, first mental obstical of the day really gets the self talk going n a bad direction. I took a 5 minute break, chow some serious food and am now ready to climb and get this 112 mile ride done.

3 PM: Bike done and in T2 my legs are working still, holy crap I can still move around. Time for running shoes, hat and sunglasses. It was raining before and now its sunny, massive changes in weather up here in the hills. As I exit T2 I see the family and everyone looks so amazingly happy and awake, have I said how much Team Kris ROCKS?

4 PM: It took 3 miles to get my legs to slow down and now I have a comfortable pace that I am confident will last me the whole race without bonking and having to walk it off.

5 PM: Mile 11, who put this huge hill into town? It’s not killing me right now, but all I can think of is how hard it will be when I have to do it again at mile 24. Yuck, just walk and smile and say thank you to the people who came to cheer us on.. I get to see my family twice on the turn around and am feeling strong again.

6 PM: Running 9:30’-10:30 in between aid stations and walking all the hills and stations for rest, just keep moving and keep smiling is the thoughts in my head.

7 PM: feels better to run, but walking the hills has become necessary to get the job done, stick to the plan and make this happen.

7:30 PM Here comes that hill at mile 24 again and it just a nice walk to the top of the second of three peaks . Just after I started to run I see my family and this gives me all I need to run to the top. Just two more miles to go, out and back along the lake and this is all over.

7:45 lost track of time but I am sure I am not breaking 13 hours so I just settle in toa slow jog so I can finish.

7:53 As I turn into the stadium, I see my family first and am feeling like 100% again, then I see the clock at 12:54 and am going to finish in under 13 hours. Over the loudspeaker I hear, Kris Kaplan of Lexington Mass, YOU ARE AN IRONMAN.

8 PM: Found my family quick and got to get some serious love, I am an emotional mess of joy and just loose it with the sweat loving hug from my wife. This was awesome. Two weeks ago, I would have said never again, now I can’t wait to do it again.

Dreams do come true

In the weeks 8 weeks that led up to Lake Placid Ironman, if you had pulled me aside and asked me face to face how ready I was, you may have gotten a bit of hesitation from me. Going into that final stretch of build was a difficult one for sure. Right after Mooseman, a trainer that I was training hard with and set to run the race with decided she had had enough of long distance stuff. The last 4-6 weeks prior to the taper were 20+ hour workout weeks with 6-7 hour long rides on Saturdays followed by an hour long run and 12-20 mile runs on Sunday that took another 2-3 hours. There is no complaining at all, just hard to do by yourself after having someone right there with you. You race alone, so train alone is what a few people said. You race without music, so train without music. Wow some of these people are really hard core.

I made it to race day with no issues, I had great family around me, I was staying a great place and I had great wordsof encouragement from my coach about all the hard work coming together. Race day was simple, follow the plan.

For me if I have a plan, then amazing things can get done, short of a well written plan and I am all over the place. I woke at 3 am and felt great. I had called it a night sometime around 8pm the night before. At 3 am I started eating pre race food and the goal was to get about 2000 calories in me to fill up the tanks. I drink perpetum, eat hammer bars and a bagel or two with some orange juice.

Bags for the race are all packed, bike was dropped off along with bike gear bag and run gear bag the day before. No transition bag needed for Ironman races as each T has its own plastic bag with all of your needs in it hanging there in transition. I did have to bring my race number and stick it in the bag on race day morning.

I put on my tri shorts and shirt and then some warm dry clothes to hang out in until race time, after a cup of coffee, Kimberly and I head down to town in the hotel shuttle. We got there way to early so we headed back to the hotel, grabbed the truck and drove ourselves down so they would have a car to keep stuff at near the course. We got the second to last space and just in time.
Numbering was quick and easy, good thing I had Kimberly with me as when I was asked my number, I gave the wrong one and quickly got corrected. Now its time to just sit and relax and let the crowds start to form. Maybe next time we wont go so early.

At 630 ish I head to the water entry, luckily I see the rest of my family and get to say hello and give the kids kisses before I start. I am in a zone at this point and trying to stay focused on one theing and one thingone,

the first big buoy in the water. That is where I

amswimming to and nothing else matters. Iwas going to let the race start and hold back for a minute or two to let the 3000 plus swimmers clear out a bit, but the adrenelin kicked into full speed and off I went about 50 yards back from the start line.

Swimming for that first buoy that was ½ mile out was like getting in line for the train at penn station, only there was a lot more water. I got kicked in the eye, punched in the side, kicked in the side and had my feet grabbed. The worst is when I was coming up for a breath at the

end of a stroke and someone right next to me is starting his stroke with his arm hooked on my head and shoving it back under the water. Goodtimes for sure. I did not panic, ya can’t stop or you get run over and I decided I was just going to swim my race, stroke at my pace and go where I needed to go. The first 1,2 mile lap was faster than I expected, coming out of the water to run the beach at about 35 minutes. I felt confident and was very confortable with what was going on around me. Now back into the water and do it one more time. Second lap was a bit slower than the first, but I came out of the water around 1:15, got my wetsuit pulled off and was off and running to transition. I saw Rob pointing to where everyone was and I waved in that direction. I did not see anyone however and was just hoping they saw me. They all traveled a long way and I wanted to give them a good show.

T1 was not rushed at all, I relaxed and made sure I had everything I needed for the long 112 mile ride ahead of me. I was told they get your bike for you, but I came out of the water and T1 with a big pack and had to get it myself. Loaded with nutrition, gloves on, helmet on, shoes on and bike ready to go. Off we went to the familiar bike course and everything felt awesome. I had a plan to ride to a power number for each lap of the race. 190 for the fist 56 miles and 200 watts for the second and I am quite sure I came very close to those numbers. Maybe when I get a new power cord and usb devise fro my garmin, I will know just how well I did. My fors

t bike split was fast, felt great, but I knew I had to back it off a bit to save some leggs for the marathon. The 9 mile climb back into placid was comfortable and not too taxing for the first loop and i was starting to realize that I was realy going to get this done today. Just under three hours for the forst loop and I pulled into town, I stopped quickly to give kisses to my family as that always gives me an extra boost and off I went into the second loop.

The most common question in the past week or so has been what is was the toughest part and it realy came around hour 4.5 ish on the bike, you pass a sign that says mile 90 and quickly do the math that there are only 22 miles left, but most of them are up hill. It was all I could do to just keep peddeling, know ing that when I got back to the corner of (N and 86 to make that right hand turn there was nothing but climbing infront of me and the reward for each climb is another. I stopped, used the bathroom, ate some food and re-filled all my bottles and was quickly off and ready to get it done.

Climbing the last 11 miles back into town was more just a long slow ride than hard work, I didn’t want to stand and grind it out, I wanted to save my leggs for whatever they could give me on the run. It took me 6 hours and 20 minutes to finish the ride and I came off the bike with some solid leggs that seemed to be much better than I expected them to be.
The run started out faster than I was comfortable with, after getting past the downhill out of town, my legs were firing fast and it was all I could do to get them to slow, sadly I could not get them to fire fast again after I slowed them. The plan was to run 10:30 and I was not sure that I was going to be able to run the whole thing. I had convinced myself that I would run as long as I could and if 13 miles were covered it would not ne the worst thing to walk the rest.

My coach had given me a solid plan and it had done me well so far, so I just stuck to it and gave it a go. I settled into a 10:30 pace and decided I would walk all the steep hills and all the aid stations. In between each aid station was a mile marker so it seemed that every ½ mile I was getting a reward and that kept me going.

I got passed by these uber athletic types and or young hot and very fast girls who in turn created an opportunity to pick up the pace to enjoy the show a bit longer. I kept my legs moving in a run the entire time aside from the stations and hills and felt strong the entire way as I looked every volunteer in the eyes and thanked them for all their great work today, high fived every little kid that had his hand held out and smiled at everyone. The energy of the crowd was inspiring and great fuel, those cowbells really keep you going.

At mile 24 is the nasty hill climb back into town, heartbreak hill in Boston has nothing on this climb and I for sure walked every inch of the steepness, as soon as I started running again I saw my family for the last turn before the out and back, I was going to finish this race and I was going to do it right at the numbers I thought. The smile on my face was reduced to some tears, the legs were just doing their job of firing right, left, right left and it was less than one mile to go and it was so amazing hearing the crowd cheer. Coming down the last hill and turning into the finish areana was over the top and awe inspiring, I caught sight of my family and then turned to see the finish line, holy crap the clock say less than 13 hours and in 20 yards, 10 yards, 10 feet right now, Kris Kaplan form Lexington, Mass……… You are an Ironman.

When is the next one?????