Chris Werner

I will post my Ironman Lake Placid review tonight, and I will expand on my trip to Guru's new facility in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Photo Gallery here.

Again, back in Lake Placid, NY...the energy is at a fever's pitch.  It's tangible, like the humidity in the air.  You can see it in everyone's eyes, whether competing or here to watch a friend or loved one...tomorrow this place is going to rock n' roll!

In the midst of all this, I laid down for a couple of hours, my hotel is on the lake, I swam off the hotel beach out to the swim course, it's beautiful.  I got in an hour of sleep, and I woke up to a welcome friend, the pre-race anxiety of an athlete looking to execute a plan.

 Having a coach (Chris Hauth, Advanced Ironman Training Program article on Chris here), and being part of an a team of advanced Iron-distance competitors (30 of us total, and we're all at the top of our game or looking to get there) has given me an edge I could never have imagined.  I have a plan, and I have support (not the kind from family and friends, but from experts, from professional athletes who know what they're doing).

Tomorrow's race is not about time, it's about executing a plan, which includes pacing myself in the swim, into the bike, and through the bike, to have an awesome run.  If I can take enough off the bike, or execute my plan, to have enough to run a solid run...then I have accomplished my goal for Ironman Lake Placid 2008.

My coach gave me a very detailed breakdown of where I need to be, pacing on the swim, moving through heart rate zones througout the bike...and pacing out a solid run...and how to race for myself, let people pass me (people who will be making the same mistake as I did in the past...hammering out the bike, or surging and backing off) and then hit the run hard.  That takes some will power, and a real sense of who you are as an athlete, to race for yourself. 

If I can accomplish that tomorrow, I've made a huge step as an Iron-distance competitor. 

“There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth...not going all the way, and not starting.” Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism (563-483 B.C.)

Ironman Lake Placid on Sunday, a new coach, new people, new friends, change and challenges surround me, and I find myself open to everything I'm encountering.

It's been a while since my last post.  I had finished Ironman Arizona, I was immersed in finalizing my USA Triathlon Coaching certification, sharpening and broadening my client base and experience in Bike fitting, getting my name out there in the multisport industry...and taking up any opportunity to train with new people, more expeorenced people...and better athletes.  

In doing so I began training with a few athletes, a crazy bunch of serious endurance athletes, the personalities each as unique and complete crazy as the next.  It's an amazing communty!  A group populated by athletes who regulalry pull off the Western States 100 (100 mile race made famous by Dean Karnazes, the Ultramarathon man), and then a week or two later, doing an Ironman (one did this with 12 staples in his head from a bike crash the week before)...a couple Kona Ironman World Championship qualifiers, a Western States 100 winner...and of course, plenty of guys like me...just plain, 100% passionate about ultra-endurance and pushing it to the limit, whether it be swim, bike run, or...whatever!  I can hang, I love meeting new and interesting people, fascinating personality types who have been places and seen things...like old sailors! 

One such athlete referred me to a new coach, he takes on 30 athletes, generally in the bay area.  Chris Hauth, winner of the 2006 Ironman Coeur D'Alene, swam in the Olympics for Germany in 1992 and 1996, and graduated from my alma mater...the University of Michigan...

I was in a rut, done with Ironman Arizona, and looking to Ironman Lake Placid, my 2nd of 3 Ironmans this year, and looking at the same basic training routine...something needed to change.  I was fortunate enough to qualify for Chris Hauth as coach, and to train with his team of athletes.  It represents a paradigm shift in my training and development as an athlete, and a new beginning for me.

He uses a scientific approach, sending me out to Tiburon (North of San Francisco, across the Golden Gate from the city) to a lab (really the basement of his coach, Craig Upton, who conducts blood lactate testing.  Every few weeks I ride on a bike trainer at increasingly more difficult wattages...and he pricks my finger and plots the curve as lactate begins to build up in my blood

...from here my coach is sent the data, and my training program is developed.

It's incredible, Chris Hauth's Advanced Ironman Training Program (AIMP) utilizes long, long periods of timne in very, very low heart rates.  It's only until months have passed, and I've built a massive aerobic base that I will have true high intensity workouts built in...he reminds me, Chris reminds me....Mark Allen, 6x Ironman World Championship winner...would walk the hills if need be during his runs to keep his Heart Rate in a low zone...and I am doing just the same. 

 The results will not show themselves this Ironman.  I am using this as a B-priority race to dial in for Ironman Arizona II in November, when all this low intensity base training should really show results.  It's amazing, the science...and the abilty to get hands on training from a 2x Olympian and Ironman Winner, and to train with his team, some of the best in the game.

...and then to go into work and bike fit, coach, and work with athletes all day...it's the dream (just today, I did a bike fit with an ahtlete who lost his leg in Afghanistan...such an impressive character, we've fitted him for a wetsuit, he's into triathlon, cycling, just an amazing guy...THIS WAS MY DAY AT WORK!).

It's a new beginning...new beginnings.  Coming out of a rut, a slump if you will, it's not thateveryday is cheery and full of sunshine (training through last week's 110+ degree heat, 100+ miles on the bike and 15+ miles on the run...and working, etc.) it can be tiring and tough to keep with it...but I find  myself ready to take these new beginnings and just run with them...and see where the journey takes me next! 

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”  Theodore Roosevelt

 ...I must re-post this quote, the same quote I posted after IM Florida, and the same quote I will re-post in various formats, blog, email, small note in my back pocket, or just in a whisper inside my head somewhere telling me to carry on.

100 miles on the bike today...climbed all of Mount Diablo's 3,800 vertical feet on the bike in the aero position, never getting out of my saddle, nor removing my arms from armrests or hands from the aerobars.  It was intense...but necessary.  Why?  Because when I started the ride, I wasn't sure if I could do it, or if it was possible.  I approached the South Gate, and decided, "I'm going to do it, and I'm going to hit it hard!" 

And I did just that, hitting the summit in under 80 minutes (as fast as I could climb coming out of the saddle and riding more of a traditional, climbing-friendly, road position!!!).  I quickly cruised back down and continued my ride, which included more climbing up through Morgan Territory Pass, and out into Livermore...but I accomplished something that I doubted I could do, proving I had:

...the mental ability to say, just do it,

...and the physical ability to make it happen. 

Today was my first real tough day of training on my program for Lake Placid, and I wanted to continue in the spirit of the Roosevelt quote above, having no doubt that at the end of the day, I had given everything I had of myself. 

My lifestyle compared to where it was a couple years ago, is hard to even conceive of.  Today was a typical Monday...a MONDAY!  This day, maybe two, three years ago...in the Chicago, in a cubicle, with so many other people moderately content, and never going for what they were really passionate about...and knowing deep inside, the regret of never doing "what they always dreamed of doing."  I can't say it was easy, I can remember writing a journal entry just after moving out here saying, "do what you love and success and happiness will follow...that's a load of crap."  I was wrong, it does happen, it takes time, sacrifice, toil, hard work, and the ability to fight and fight and fight, despite detractors, or thoughts of what others might perceive of what your doing.

 The story is still unfolding.  I begin another cycle, another triathlon season, my second Ironman of the year, my second year in the endurance sports business, my second round with customers, my first season as a coach, my first season as a professional bike fitter...it's not easy, it has its unique twists and turns, and ups and downs, but today was a perfect example of not even letting the dust settle from Ironman Arizona, and just getting back into the fight and continuing on the journey...even if it's climbing Mount Diablo in the aero position!!!

I've never done an early season Ironman, and I think my mind was -fully- focused on everything work related, and in my hear-of-hearts, I new I was not in "Iron-distance race-mode." Needless to say, when I have come comfortably in the 10 hour range, it's mid-to-late summer, and I'm fully ready to go...this race was a totally different story...

...the past month or so I've been so focused on work, I've either (1) missed workouts, or (2) not put the focus into a workout, and the analysis afterwards.

Excuses aside, my fitness was not there and I knew it. In fact, it was obvious enough my own mother was worried for me going in. She has become aware of my training volume and can sort of read where I'm at physically and mentally (regardless of my age, she has that "instinct" with me) ...apparently she commented to my sister on the phone "he's nowhere near ready for this one!"

Having said that, with minimal swim training, I was able to pull off a 1:07, and that was pretty much effortless, I had a good stroke going, clean and efficient, and I did not even try to push the pace. I knew I wasn't physically ready for a PR swim split or anything, and I didn't want to waste a drop of energy!

The bike was brutal. Full on headwind, turn around, and an equally powerful tailwind. So it made for a hellacious 3-lap bike course. My analysis: again my overall fitness. By the 3rd lap I was having trouble maintaining my cadence, I was getting a bit dehydrated, and my quads started cramping. The cramping was as much do to pushing myself beyond my limits of where I trained myself, than my hydration/nutrition strategy...again, no excuses, in top physical shape, I could have had a solid bike with no cramping.

The run was perplexing, punishing, and finally...humbling. After 3 miles, I started to pick up pace, 8:30 miles, 8:00 miles, even a couple 7:45, and a 7:30...I was truly shocked...compared to IM Florida, where I came off a (1) an awesome swim (2) PR bike...and I just couldn't push my body to run...this run was all over the place.

I did settle into a comfortable 8:45 pace, which would have brought me in the 10 hour range...then my left hamstring decided other wise, and a rebellion broke out amongst the muscles of my upper and lower legs! A domino effect of cramping from left hamstring to right calf, to right quad, to right calf…

At mile 14, my left hamstring cramped up, more or less to the point of constricting blood flow out of my leg. My HR dropped from 145 down to 80 in a matter of seconds, and I felt faint...I held it out for a couple seconds...minutes...then it eased up...but I was left standing, swaying side-to-side, not sure what to do…

…then the thoughts of all the people who had wished me good luck…along with the long chain of people who were struggling just to finish, some just on their first lap, with hours and hours ahead of them…and a wheel-chair athlete came by…112 miles on a hand-cycle, and pushing himself in the chair for a full-marathon, without the use of his legs…

I could have dropped out, in fact, now that I’m coaching, selling, and marketing within the industry…my EGO was telling me to save face…a DNF rather than a poor race time, that’s not what I’m in the sport for, to have somehow inflate my ego.

…I would never tell an athlete I would coach to take that course of action (unless injured), and watching people pull just to reach the finish, including someone roll by in a wheelchair, truly embodying every last bit of what this distance, what “Ironman” means…

…while I contemplate what people might think of a poor race time…no way…I decided then, it was a walk-run between aid stations…

I was humbled. People ask why I race this distance over-and-over…because no other distance seems to force me to ask myself important questions, and no other race seems to hold the proverbial “mirror before my face” and reveal character flaws…like IRONMAN!

So I began a walk and broke into a slow jog, downing chicken broth and coke, slowly making my way through the third and final lap…

Again, better fitness along with flexibility and a better nutrition strategy, and I think the cramping my not have been so severe, or not occurred at all. In training, I had a single run of 18 miles 2 weeks prior, that was the extent of the running I had put in. Plain and simple, my legs were not ready for a marathon, and certainly not up to the task of the blistering, sun-burning, fluid and mineral-depleting conditions I was faced with on Sunday.

I finished, just under 12 hours…and I that was that.

…I’m coming back in November (November 23^rd) to race the same race, same course, all over again. Between now and then, I’ve got a lot of racing on the schedule, including:

Ironman USA in Lake Placid (July 20^th)

A few half-Iron-distance races, including the Pacific Crest half, in Oregon, a qualifier for long-course worlds, and a tough course with a tremendous field.

A few Olympic-distance races, including the Chicago Triathlon, where I’m racing as an age-grouper, but in a separate wave of “amateur elite” athletes, comprised of the top amateur finishers from last year.

And of course, some short local races…

…and I’ve got a ton of training to do.

Humbled under the hand of Ironman, once again, I take away lessons about myself as an athlete and a person, and somehow this allows me to accept what happened out there as just:

    “Part of the journey”