Half Iron Preview

It's that time! This upcoming Saturday is the Patriot's Half Ironman in Williamsburg, VA. This is my second half iron after the Beach 2 Battleship last November. Now I'm not as nervous about being able to complete the distance, but I want to be able to set and meet some time goals. This is all still a part of Ironman Prep Year 2010, and I'll probably do another spring or early fall half next year in prep for Ironman Florida.

This half should be really fun. The weather is supposed to be mostly sunny with a high of 81 on Saturday. The half is the only game in town that day; I hate running a half anything when there is a full going on. So this time everybody's hitting the same race.

The 1.2 mile swim is in the "brackish" James river, whatever "brackish" is supposed to mean. I have no idea if it's wetsuit legal or not, but I bet the water temp is going to be around 80. The start and finish points change with the tide, so it's a guessing game until right before race day. But that means we will swim with the current, so that's good. I've been feeling good in the water lately, so I'm predicting a 30 - 40 minute swim time.

The big goal is in the bike leg. Break 3 hours. If I can break 3 hours on the 56 mile bike everything else should fall into place. On the event web site it claims to be mostly flat with some rolling and false flats, but you can leave your bike in the big chainring the whole time. I've never seen an event description actually claim that. And I've been killing the bike lately, so I am very hopeful for a good bike split. Reading other people's race reports from last year's race they all seem to agree that the bike was faster than anticipated. I'm just going to roll my 20 mph minimum and push as much as I can. The B2B bike split was 3:11, so it's just a small amount of time that I really have to make up here. and that course had bridges and tons of false flats, plus I feel much stronger now.

The run should be around 2:20. I know the B2B half marathon was 2:40. I really think I can make up some time here. The running has been going really well the last few months. And the run course in this race is supposed to be the best part! I'm just going to try knocking down 10 minute miles, maybe some 9:30's if I'm feeling good.

So the goals:

1. Don't die.

2. Sub 3 hour bike split

3. Sub 6 hour total time. If I roll sub 3 then sub 6 is totally within reach.

4. Have fun! It's my first time in Williamsburg and it's supposed to be a great town.

I hope this is as much fun as it was last time in Wilmington. I'm really looking forward to a good weekend away and running a nice hard race. Cheers!

P.S., in family news Evil Genius started kindergarten today! It's a 3 year old program at the church nearby. I'm so proud of my baby girl for embracing school like this! See how happy:

I think that backpack is going to swallow her whole.