Race Report by Greyson Daughtry Part1
Triple Iron With Single Iron 2 Weeks Later
In January it was difficult for me to run 5K. In October I was an Ironman.
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Race Journal: Ultra October
Thursday, October 4, 2007:
I arrived in Spotsylvania, Virginia, after a drive of over 650 miles. I drove another 25 miles to the race site for bicycle inspection, registration, and a meet-n-greet pasta dinner. My longest race to date was a half-Ironman. This was a triple—7.2 miles in the water, 336 miles on the bike, and 78.6 miles on foot, all on a continuous clock, with a time limit of 60 hours. Everyone else was more experienced than I. At 20 years old, I was also the baby of the group; if I finished, I would be the youngest American ever to run a triple Iron.
Thursday night:
I did not sleep much—only 1.5 hours total. I finished off the 1-pound bag of Skittles that I had started in the early morning hours.
Friday, October 5, 2007:
I arrived at the race site just after 5 AM. I had a six-foot-long table assigned to me, and I covered it completely with supplies—towels, wet suit, Hammer gel, whey protein, Red Bull, trail mix, Pringles, and many other things. I was in the right mindset; I was ready to roll.
We started the swim at 7 AM. I made a short stop every 1.2 miles for some kind of refreshment. After 3.6 miles I had the best peanut-butter sandwich of my life. After about 5 miles my upper body started getting lactic. I cleared the water in about 5.5 hours.
I started the bike ride in the early afternoon. I was faster than almost anyone else for the first few hours, but the bicycle seat started to hurt significantly. I made short stops about once every 15 miles, with a few exceptions where I pressed to 30.
I started having problems with my right foot. My leg was always rotated a little bit, and this caused an odd pressure between the base knuckle of my little toe and my bike shoe. After 50 miles or so, this became painful, and that pain became more intense with time. In training, I had managed to tolerate this for 100 miles, but this time I was riding much more than that. I tried stuffing Kleenexes into various parts of the shoe, but they soon flattened out too much to be useful. The pain became severe, and I ended up using a sharp knife to cut a hole in the shoe to relieve direct pressure.
Around the 12-hour mark (total race time), I started to feel very sick to my stomach. When I got sleepy during a break, I drank 2 Red Bulls and mixed another one into my Heed. This apparently compounded the problem. An ambulance arrived for someone, and, pedaling behind it, I thought to myself that it would be coming back for me next. I kept going for a few more hours. When I was around 100 miles into the bike, I decided that I had to rest, if only to give my stomach some time to settle. I spent 30 minutes in the sleep tent. Afterwards I felt much better, but by no means good. The race director saw me towards the end of this episode, and he seemed to think I’d had it. I said, “I’m not dead yet!”
Saturday, October 6, 2007:
Dawn broke after a long night.
I spent a lot of time on my outer handlebars, upright against the wind. The reason was because I was still in my first year of triathlon, and I’d only had a tri-bike for about 2 months. I was not accustomed to the balance of the lower elbow position. After about 200 miles, despite my periodic rests and my efforts to shake my hands out while riding, the compression of my ulnar nerve started to take its toll. I could not spread my fingers or straighten them fully.
I pedaled all day, and into the night. I finished the bike leg after about 31 hours.
I began the run. For the most part, I walked uphill and ran downhill. The exceptions involved running uphill. My right knee was stiff and painful to bend, apparently because the slight turn in my leg during the bike had caused swelling of the iliotibial (IT) band, the tendon running through the knee. Some of the time I did a funny limp-run where I bent my right knee as little as possible.
After 14 miles, I talked to the race doctor. He told me that I would not snap any important connectors in my knee, but stressing it too hard might cause a chronic condition.
Sunday, October 7, 2007:
I ended up walking out a single-marathon distance, earning me credit for an “Iron-plus.” Since I had completed an Iron race, I still got to cross the finish line carrying an American flag. During my last lap I decided that I had to finish strong. For the last half mile or so I ran, ignoring the pain, because nothing else mattered beyond those few minutes. I crossed the finish line with both feet off the ground.
Post-race:
My hands were in bad shape. I could maintain a tight grip, but I had great difficulty holding a writing utensil for a few days. It took about two weeks for me to straighten all my fingers. It took a little longer for the numbness along the sides of my hands to go away. I could not snap my fingers for about a month.
I was working as a part-time foundry technician. I did a lot of hard manual labor. I did not take time off for my race-related ailments. I limped for several days on account of my IT band problem, but the pain went away in a week.
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