Race Report

Last weekend I raced at Ironman Frankfurt — my 7th race over the full distance of 3.8km swimming, 180km cycling, and 42.2km running. It turned out to be my best race in terms of time, but one of my worst in terms of execution. How did it come to that? In early October 2011 I started the direct build for the race, with the focus on running and cycling. For running, my primary goal was to run every single day. I kept that up for nearly 40 days — at least 15 minutes every day, with one longer session per week. After that I scaled back to 3–5 times a week. On the bike I worked fairly intensively in the early phase to push my threshold power up. That was relatively successful and I’d already made good progress in both running and cycling. ...

… or slow start, strong finish?!?!? Both pretty much characterize the key points of my race, but more on that later. After the workload of the previous days I was anything but rested at the start line — quite the opposite of last year when the race came at the end of a rest week and I was fresh. My priorities were therefore mostly on nutrition and equipment, with a faster time than last year being a bonus. ...

Who would have thought that after this year’s Ironman Germany in Frankfurt there could be a step up in terms of conditions?! I was prepared for a lot: rain, wind, and rough roads, waves in the swim and a rolling marathon… my expectations were exceeded by far, and not in a good way. Given everything, I can say (and so can many of my fellow competitors) that we finished and survived what is currently the toughest Ironman on the calendar. Every single person had to work extremely hard for their finisher shirt and should — no, must — wear it with pride!!! ...

A full race report will follow in the next few days — for now I just want to hit the highlights in bullet point form. “Monster conditions” is, by the way, a direct quote from men’s winner Faris Al-Sultan. We headed to the lake at 4:45am Shuttle buses were running late, so we were only in transition 45 minutes before the start Last-minute bike prep in a hurry, wetsuit on, and shortly after — swim start Swim went well, much more relaxed and no survival battle like last year Swim time 1:00:23 — I wanted to go just under 1h, just barely missed that goal First transition was okay, put on an extra jersey and arm warmers → turned out to be nowhere near enough in hindsight It rained for 4.5 out of 5 hours on the bike, strong and fierce wind made it even worse After just 1 hour completely frozen, goosebumps all over, legs with a solid blue tint I’ve never experienced bike conditions like that before — it was very, very, very hard Roth 2008 was similarly wet and cold, but without the wind Cramps meant I could only pedal seated — standing up or stretching my legs wasn’t possible At that point I genuinely had no idea how you run a marathon in that state At times I was seriously struggling to stay on the bike, the wind was that brutal The cobblestone section in Maintal also left its mark: the lid of my tool box flew off, my spare tube came loose (it was taped on multiple times), and my bottle cage was just dangling from the handlebar (has anyone ever seen a zip tie snap before???) The bike conditions cost me roughly 10–15 minutes — fortunately the same was true for almost everyone Bike time 5:04:19 — similar to last year, except last year’s course was 5km longer T2 was okay, though they handed me someone else’s bag first After that I ate and drank everything I could get my hands on, especially lots of salt to get rid of the cramps By two kilometers in I’d found my rhythm From then on it was full-on risk. I knew I was 18th in my age group (there are 12 slots in my AG) Set off at 4:30/km pace toward the finish Rain showers and fierce wind on the run too — I was actually freezing out there at times In the first two laps I kept getting passed; from around km 17 I turned the tables and started picking people off The marathon went without any major issues — I ran very evenly throughout From lap three on the course got crowded, making aid stations and passing trickier Run time 3:09:20 — the best running performance I’ve ever put together I knew it was theoretically possible — but actually doing it … especially after that bike leg. I’m very, very proud of that Finish time 9:18:55, 50th overall and 14th in my age group 13 seconds too slow for a guaranteed slot — the sweating continues. Should be fine in the end though Takeaway: new personal best, the hardest race of my career so far in the worst possible conditions — all in all I’m very happy, and a Hawaii slot would be the icing on the cake.

Yesterday was the second middle-distance (half-iron) race within a week — the Triathlon in Maxdorf: 2km swim, 85km bike, 20km run. Raced straight out of training, no taper, so a performance as strong as the previous week at Kraichgau wasn’t exactly expected. I somehow got up on the wrong side of the bed — spilled milk at breakfast, changed clothes after brushing my teeth. A bad omen, and more mishaps were to follow… ...

… or me and the race marshals… It already started on Saturday at bike check-in, when my TT helmet failed inspection — more on that in the post about the bad omen. Today was the sequel: I picked up my very first time penalty in my triathlon career. More on that below. Conditions today were significantly tougher than last year — fairly windy (last year was calm). This showed up in the swim as choppiness, and later on the bike with wind from every conceivable direction. ...

Sunday is one of my favorite races: Challenge Kraichgau. The distance is 1.9km swimming in the Hardtsee lake in Ubstadt-Weiher, 90km cycling on challenging and scenic routes through the Kraichgau, and 21.1km running on a 7km loop in Bad Schönborn. I was only a spectator at the first edition of the Kraichgau Triathlon, but I’ve raced every edition since — across different distances and with mixed results. Everything from new PRs to DNFs has been in there. ...