Race Report: Ironman World Championship - French Propaganda
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Decision To Race:
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The first thing I did after I got the Ironman World Championship qualification slot last year was to go directly to the race's website to check on the water temperature. Only a fool would fork over a large amount of French Francs to race a non-wesuit Ironman. Those of us who are members of the super secret Vertical Swimming Society .... LLC, have sacred oaths to uphold. The website said average water temp was 72 degrees in Nice, France in September. I said, sure, that might be a little bit chilly for my girlish figure, but 72 is very far from 76.1. Zero chance it goes non-wetsuit.
Well, as you read further into this race report, you will find out that just like 'Nam, the French lied. French bread, as it turns out, is just Vietnamese banh mi with the word "French" on the label, sans meat. What are they going to do next? Throw an avocado in there and call it Mexican bread?
To all of my public school educated friends out there, be forewarn. They don't serve French fries on Air France. On their national airline, the French don't even serve what they are best known for. Another lie I had to deal with during this adventure. Unbelievable!
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PRE-RACE
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There were two things that I was concerned with coming into this race; climbing hills in the Alps and descending hills in the Alps. The two things that I'm not good with on the bike are climbing hills and descending hills. I'm money on the flats, as long as it's not windy. That was why I signed up for this race. The scouting report said that there was a section up in the Alps where it was flat and not windy, so I said, "I'm there!." I mean, the French said, wetsuit legal with a flat non-windy bike course. Who knew that it was all propaganda to separate me from my money? Oh wait, I don't want to ruin the surprise of telling you that the freaken race was non-wetsuit. I'm not bitter. I'm just still pissed off.
I came to the French Riviera one week early for this race. The main reason was, in the propaganda brochure, they said that the beaches there were lined with topless women. Well, when I got there, the only topless people were topless fat men. I inquired about that at the Ironman village info desk. They first looked at me funny, but then said that there hadn't been topless women on the beaches since after the fall of Saigon.... the lies continues.
Once there, I went out on a shake out ride. I found a random French athlete on the road, so I proceeded to do what I do best. I sucked on his wheels. Eventually, we ended up having a conversation. He said that he was there to try to earn his pro card. He had recently won his age group at the Ironam European Championship. Not to be outdone, I told him that I had just recently won my age group at the PeasantMan World Championship. I asked him where he was going. He said that he was going out to the first climb to check things out. I asked if I could suck on his wheels along the way. He said, "sure, I'll pull you up to the top."
My French must be rusty or something because the mofo dropped me once the climb elevation passed the 20 feet mark. Don't get me wrong, I was on his wheels for the first 20 feet of climbing. At the 21 foot mark, shit got real and I got dropped. Man, the lying never stops in this magical land where they don't even speak English. Here is video proof.
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RACE MORNING
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I woke up at 4:00 AM to go through my pre-race zen and nutrition routine. At 5:00 AM, my sister wakes up and says, "I think the race is not wetsuit legal." I'll tolerate the French lying to me, but my own blood lying to me, knowing full well that I can't swim!? I looked at her and said,"huh!? what do you mean? Where did you get such propaganda?" She said the Ironman app says that the race was not wetsuit legal. "No, no, no, no," I said. It must be a French app and something must have gotten lost in translation. Perhaps their app got hacked by a swimmer. It says right there on the Ironman website that the average water temp was 72 degrees and I had spent a billion dollars to get here. No way can my race day end early in the ocean. Well, it can, but that's why we wear wetsuits ... to minimize such possibilities.
Refusing to believe in such propaganda, I walked to the transition area from my Vietnamese airBnB mansion with my wetsuit in tow. Apparently, not only do the French not believe in ice, they don't believe in air condition either. $25/night and they couldn't even bother to put an air conditioner in there ... sons of bitches. That got my whinning even more riled up. I was hot. I was ready to jump into the 72 degrees ocean with my wetsuit to cool off.
Anyway, as I got closer and closer to transition, I noticed that no one was carrying their wetsuits. My first impression was, they must have great sherpas camping out overnight and waiting for them in transition with their wetsuits. Then, I chuckled to myself and said, "these guys are fools for not racing with a wetsuit. Race snobs, just tripping,"
Well, then the offical annoucnement came over the speakers. "The water temperature is currently 76.3. It will be a non-wetsuit swim today." What kind of fuckers kid like that before a World Championship race? I mean, 76.3? You round down, you son of a bitch! 76.3 rounding down is 76. Even a non-Asian understands that math.
Don't they realize that the fine line between life and death is 0.2 degrees Farenheit? Really, did they really want to go there and risk an inscrease to their race insurance premiums like that? What a stupid business decision. When they convenverted between Celsius and Farenheit, did they carry the one? Did they measure it with a Farenheit thermometer or Celsius? I've read studies where the Farenheit thermometers were proven to be more accurate and more likely to round down. All kinds of crazy things were going through my head, like, what if I wore my wetsuit underneith my tri suit, would anyone notice?
This was my Facbook status race morning. It was a terrifying feeling to know that you were about to drown.
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SWIM
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It took awhile, but I became at peace with death at the hands of the French. The French did do me a favor by putting my age group 2nd to last in the wave start. It meant that only 200 people would be swimming over me instead of 2,000. A small consolation prize, but I'll take what I can get before death.
The race was an in-water start, meaning you had to swim 25 meters out to sea, tread water, wait for the gun, and then get molested by people in your age group trying to muscle their way to the front. It's a world champtionship race, so the hack-a-Tuan game was at an elite level. Without the protection of the padded wetsuit, I was expecting it to get nasty ... but I am a suvivor
As my age group was walking toward the water to swim to the start buoys, the announcer said, get in the water quickly. We will start in 60 seconds. No sooner did my sexy toes touch the water, the gun went off. Did they do the countdown with a Vietnamese Rolex? That must have been the fastest 60 seconds countdown on record. Great, not only was it a non-wetsuit swim, now I've got to swim 25 meters more than anyone else. Nothing like adding 5 extra minutes to your swim time ... but it was ok. My good looks was going to pull me through all of this adversity.
I tried everything in the book to get through this non-wetsuit swim. I tried sucking on feet, but they kept trying to evade me. I tried swimming out of the molesters' way, but they always seem to find their way to head. I tried playing dead, but no one came to rescue me. I mean, I tried everything in the book. I even tried waving down kayakers but the mofos would waive back and say, "bonjour, ca va?" ... sons of bitches! How can I ca va back at you while going through a drowning episoid? They must have wanted me to die badly to meet their quota.
A few memorable things happened during the swim
1. I saw Llyod swim past me in his distinctive OnPoint kit at about the 1/2 way mark. I tried waving him down for a chat and a gel, but he kept on swimming
2. I saw a scuba diver filming underneith me while I was swimming and waved to the camera. He must have ran out of film waiting for me to arrive since I got no reaction from him. I would have arrived sooner but, you know .... well, you know. In case you don't know ... non-wetsuit, in a foreign country with lots of ca va.
3. I swam with a guy for one loop, probably the French version of a Vertical Swimmer, since he couldn't drop me. We just went back and forth in the water until I just gave up and sucked on his feet. In T-1 as I was leaving, he grabbed my by the shoulder and smiled. I smiled back and said, "hey friend, we didn't die out there," and left for the bike
4. As you swam back to shore, they put a kayaker near the last buoy to prevent you from exiting. The bastard made you go back out to sea for another loop. It's like matching your Powerball winning lottery number to today's drawing, but your ticket says, "Mega Million" ... sons of bitches
At this point, I must give the French some credit. Not sure if it was the kick in the head during the swim or getting spooned at every freaken turn buoy, but I thought the swim was pretty awesome. Very buoyant water. Nice calm, no waves, and clean. Clear enough water so that you can witness your own drowning, except for the fact that I close eyes every time my face hits the water (it's a verical swimming thing that most of you probablly don't understand).
I would rank this swim course as my 2nd favorite, next to Chattanooga, out of the 15 or so Ironmans that I've done. You didn't see swimmers disperse over a wide area like other Ironmans. The swim peloton stayed in a pretty tight line from buoy to buoy. It was asif everyone at this race had done an Ironman before. It made worrying about swimming off course a non-issue. You just sight the swimmer in front of you and that pretty much guaranteed that you were in a tight line and won't wander off course. In other Ironmans, you sight off the wrong swimmer, you end up in Cambodia, especially when you are at the back of the swim peloton.
Of all of the 2,139 people that started the swim, I was the 1,900 fastest. If I was any slower, the Italian mafia would be pulling me out of the water to check my pulse because they aren't used to seeing bodies float that slow. What can I say? I can't freaken swim. A vertical swimmer in the water is like Gilligan on a 3 hour tour with a 2:20 cutoff. Nothing good can come out of it.
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T-1
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I got to T-1 and looked for some Vaseline to lubricate my girlish figure. They didn't have any. As it turned out, Vaseline is considered a medicine in France. I would have reached into my T-1 bag, but didn't want to be accused of doping.
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BIKE
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Bike Course Preview
The bike course can be described as 5 miles of flat, followed by 75 miles of climbing, follow by 20 miles of descent, and then followed by 10 miles of flat back to T-1. Not sure how one can climb for 75 miles, descend by 20, and end up at the same elevation, but this was France. Maybe they measured the bike course with a Celsius thermometer. Yes, I'm still bitter at shelling out a billion dollars for a non-wetsuit swim. I had to pee on the bike just to try to get even with the French for doing me like that. And, no, I don't want to voulez-vous swimming avec toi!
The bike course itself wasn't as tough as I had envisioned. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't easy. I just had a vision of crying a lot during the bike ride, but I barely cried at all. The first climb was tough, tough enough to get me out of the saddle on the small ring on a few stretches. The rest of the climbs weren't tough. They were just grind it out long. The first climb was about 5 miles. The 2nd one, which was the longest, was 10+ miles, followed by a bunch false flats and rollers. You just sit down, grind it, and enjoy the views. And, oh boy, were the views spectacular, escpecially on the descents. You're presented with the quamire of enjoying the view or paying attention to the fast winding descents. Do you go aero and risk a fracture nut or do you go aero and pretend that you don't have a nut? I heard the sound of the sirens of ambulances throughout the descent. That was enough for me to wish that I had worn a cup.
64 athletes didn't make it off the mountains. With the caliber of athletes at this race, I would say that most of them were due to crashes vs not making the time cutoff or mechanical issues. At one point during the descent, I saw a guy with his feet up on the wall of the mountain and his bike next to him. I was descending too fast to stop and help, espcially with a bunch of guys coming hot right behind me. At the bottom of the descent, when I saw a volunteer, I pulled over and told him what I saw and asked him to send someone up there to check it out. Scary shit to see a body lying there as you are descending at speeds around corners with deep cliffs. I read about a few crashes where people were taken by helicopters and bikes being broken literally in half.
That bike course can be describe as the product of a marriage between the Grand Canyon and Skyline Dr. You have beautiful scenery and sharp drastic dropoffs like the Grand Canyon. And, you have nice winding descents like Skyline. Very scenic. The switchback on the descents also took some use to. You'd go really fast and then have to give the bike the grip of death to make sure you don't go off of a cliff as you're trying to make the switchback turn. It would be heavenly if I live near there and do those climbs/descents on a weekly basis.
For those with Facebook accounts, this was what one of my favorite section of the descents look like from a cyclist's point of view (turn on the volume).
https://www.facebook.com/IRONMANWorldChampionship/videos/821022799509544
A few memorable things happened during the bike
1. Before getting to the last 10 miles of flats leading to T2, I was descending a good 30 minutes. My legs weren't doing much other than chilling. By the time I got to the flats section, my legs felt like it hadn't bee doing anything all day. It was fresh as a daisy. I remember just rocking it the last 10 miles at a pretty good click without feeling any kind of pain or tiredness. It was a great feeling leading to the run
2. One of the last fast descents out of the mountains resembled the last descent out of Skyline Drive. There was a guy in front of me, maybe 25 yards. It reminded me of the last ride that I did on Skyline Dr with Richard when he was trying to drop me. Just like then, I was like ... "no, not today. That mofo isn't getting away from me. Today, I have testicles to spare." I just tucked in an hammered it like a Tour De France rider. We were just descending on winding scenic mountainous roads with steep cliffs and without a care in the world, just like a TDF broadcast of a break away attack. That was one of the most fun and beautiful moment of the bike ride for me. It is something I remembered most about the bike course.
3. During the middle of the longest climb, I came to the realization that the French wasn't trying to be nice to me by putting me in the 2nd to last swim wave. They wanted me to climb the longest hill during the middle of the day when the sun was brightest and the heat strongest, just so that I can yearn for the ice that they don't put in their drinks. They wanted me to suffer. That climb was the first time in my Ironman career that I had to take my helmet visor off to cool off and get some circulation going. It had reached the middle 80s during the big chunks of all of my climbing. I couldn't even pee on the bike during that strech because all of the fluids in my body left via sweat. Believe me I tried. This was probably what they meant on the scouting report when they said, "flat, no wind."
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RUN
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When I left T-2 I was met a guy who was hitting the same pace as I was. We started talking a bit. I asked him what loop he was on. He said 4. People! He was on his last lap while I was just starting my first. And, he was running at the same pace as me ... sons of bitches.
All was not bad. I was able to spot an old DCTri friend, Tobias F, and get a high five shortly after I got out on the run course. It's always good to see familiar faces in the crowd. He was enjoying French liquor on the sideline while I was enjoying French pain. It's a small world out there when you can connect like that on the other side of the world.
The run was pretty neat for the first two laps when it was full of racers and spectators. Then, it got empty and empty quickly. All of the fast guys had finished. The only people remaining on two feet were vertical swimmers trying to crawl back the 2 hours they left on the swim course. Probably the first time in my Ironman career where it felt a little bit lonely out there on the run course. Did I mention it was non-wetsuit? Well, it was.
The bright spot on the run was that I got to see my mom, sister, niece, nephew, and brother in-law a bunch of times. They took a bunch of pictures, but sent me none. I was expecting them to bring me some French pastries. Instead, they brought, "hey, it's getting dark out here. The kids are getting cold. When are you going to be done?" ... 12 more miles, family, that's when.
The beautiful thing about finishing as the sun sets was that you couldn't see your pain, You could only feel it. On the final turn to the finish line, I could see the bright lights of the finish line 3+ miles away. I just told myself, 3 more aid stations and we are done. I then did something that I've never done in any prior Ironmans. I took a Red Bull at each of final 3 aid stations that I encountered prior to the finish line. I wanted some boosts to get me to the finish line because it was lonely out there.
A. It did gave me a great boosts
B. My body said, wrong kind of boost, stud. I spent the 20 minutes after crossing the finish line trying to decide if I wanted to vomit or not vomit. Never felt so bad after an Ironman in all my life. I'll just chucked it up as a byproduct of the Celsius thermometer that they use to deny me a wetsuit legal swim.
C. I told my family that I was going to retire after this race and end it on a high note. I had confirmed that decision at around mile 10 of the run. Now that the run is over and I've had a chance to indulge in a few donuts, perhaps I'm just too damn sexy for retirement. I can't rock the girlish figure if there is no race at the end of the rainbow, so well see what happens when the Popeyes interacts with the Dunkin.
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FINISH
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I came to this race with 2 things in mind, not crashing during the descents and enjoying the experience of Nice. Mission accomplished. If you know what it's like to do this race, here is the official propaganda video. You can catch a brief glimps of me at the 4:23 mark. See if you can spot my girlish figure.
To all of the numbers crunchers out there, below are the stats of the race. I got off of the ocean at the bottom of the standings and picked off about 1/3 of the overall field and almost 40% of the people in my age group during the bike and run. Not too shabby since I was just chillaxing and trying not to crash on the bike. I was about 35 minutes faster on the run than the average run time of my age group, which I thought was cool considering the caliber of some of the people at the race.
Overall, I finished in the middle of the bell curve, a lot better than I expected, but still 2+ hours than my qualifying time. I was expecting to fight it out with the 75-79 year old age groupers throughout the day, not just in the water. I say 75-79 and not 70-74 becuase the winnner of the 70-74 year old age group beat me to the finish line. There were a lot of fast old people out there. One day, some of you youngins will be bitching about getting beat by some 70+ year old age grouper. I want that 70 year old age grouper to be me one day ;)
An interesting note: The guy that won my age group used to be a professional UCI cyclist. Apparently, he's a French icon in the cycling world. He was also, once upon a time, sanctioned for doping. To his defense, I'd dope too had I known it was a non-wetsuit swim.
Enter the MySQL table name: `2023_IRONMAN_World_Championship_-_Men`
Total Athletes: 2269
Finished: 1998 people (88.06%)
Did Not Finish: 151 people (6.65%)
Did Not Finish Swim: 4 people
Did Not Finish Bike: 64 people
Did Not Finish Run: 82 people
Did Not Finish (Short Course): 1 people
DNS (Did Not Start): 102 people (4.50%)
DQ (Disqualified): 4 people
NC (Not Classified) - Missed Leg Cutoff: 14 people
Age Group Statistics:
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| AgeGroup | Count | Fastest | Slowest | Median |
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| HC | 1 | 09:43:21 | 09:43:21 | 09:43:21 |
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| M18-24 | 67 | 09:22:15 | 14:46:33 | 11:31:24 |
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| M25-29 | 124 | 09:02:17 | 16:18:27 | 11:06:42 |
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| M30-34 | 222 | 09:11:35 | 15:54:27 | 11:19:05 |
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| M35-39 | 268 | 08:55:26 | 16:33:53 | 11:25:50 |
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| M40-44 | 320 | 09:25:46 | 16:53:27 | 11:43:57 |
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| M45-49 | 287 | 09:25:39 | 16:59:01 | 12:25:51 |
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| M50-54 | 298 | 09:35:00 | 16:36:04 | 12:47:38 |
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| M55-59 | 215 | 10:02:56 | 16:59:48 | 13:29:55 |
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| M60-64 | 113 | 10:46:45 | 16:57:01 | 13:59:43 |
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| M65-69 | 40 | 12:01:00 | 16:46:09 | 14:48:00 |
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| M70-74 | 7 | 12:00:17 | 16:56:10 | 15:48:04 |
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| M75-79 | 1 | 14:57:40 | 14:57:40 | 14:57:40 |
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| MPRO | 32 | 08:06:22 | 11:21:14 | 08:39:30 |
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| PC/ID | 2 | 12:01:49 | 16:51:23 | 14:26:36 |
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| Unknown | 1 | 16:51:23 | 16:51:23 | 16:51:23 |
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Average Time per Age Group:
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| AgeGroup | Avg Swim | Avg Bike | Avg Run |
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| HC | 01:01:07 | 06:25:38 | 02:06:12 |
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| M18-24 | 01:06:22 | 06:14:06 | 04:03:52 |
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| M25-29 | 01:05:42 | 06:06:16 | 03:54:13 |
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| M30-34 | 01:08:50 | 06:13:58 | 03:58:50 |
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| M35-39 | 01:10:43 | 06:17:43 | 04:01:46 |
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| M40-44 | 01:12:49 | 06:30:33 | 04:11:18 |
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| M45-49 | 01:14:41 | 06:46:03 | 04:20:01 |
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| M50-54 | 01:16:47 | 06:52:49 | 04:31:24 |
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| M55-59 | 01:18:54 | 07:04:59 | 04:50:01 |
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| M60-64 | 01:21:21 | 07:19:42 | 04:59:12 |
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| M65-69 | 01:26:53 | 07:38:19 | 05:13:08 |
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| M70-74 | 01:32:14 | 07:58:36 | 05:28:48 |
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| M75-79 | 01:19:36 | 08:11:28 | 05:09:42 |
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| MPRO | 00:49:51 | 04:50:14 | 03:00:56 |
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| PC/ID | 01:27:35 | 07:05:53 | 05:26:36 |
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| Unknown | 01:30:21 | 08:29:36 | 06:13:04 |
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Hope you enjoy the race report. See you out on the roads
--Royalty
Great job Tuan! I’m glad you haven’t decided to quit yet: ) We have many more rides to come!
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