by Tom Glynn

As someone said, things never really go as planned or quite as you imagined.

 It's incredibly hard to believe that I was in a hospital 10 months ago recovering from a destroyed hip socket after a bad bike accident.

Who qualifies for Kona with a 1:39 swim, a leisurely bike ride of 0.67 IF and running 9:30+ minute miles? Me! I'm still expecting a call telling me they got the paperwork wrong and I didn't really qualify. I came out of the water and looked at the clock. Could I really be that bad - again? Yup! 1750th place, nowhere to go but up.  Got on the bike and started passing everyone. I was hollering "on your left" all day long. 5:01 bike split riding a 0.67 IF; that's one fast course. The run course was a flat 3 loop course and very fun to run. But, relatively hot and humid. Lots of walking all around me. They need to fix the finish line too. I came around the final corner with about 20 yards to go. I looked at the clock. 10:59:50. I finished in 11:00:11. Had that final corner been 50 yards longer I surely would have broken 11 hours. 12 or 13 seconds faster would have sounded so much better :).



I'm still laughing at all the newbie things I did on my 7th Ironman.

First, the swim. It was actually a great venue, just too warm for wetsuits. (Who wears a speed suit and swims a 1:39 - me!) Looking at the map it looked like just over a mile up and then back in a man made lake and then a short distance in a canal to the transition area. Well the canal went on forever and I just gave up mentally and physically. I was just really tired of swimming. I should have walked the canal distance on Friday. Should have swam more in training too.
 Next time!

Second was nutrition. For the past 5 or so IMs I've used Cytomax and gels on the bike, 2 bottles to start and then 2 in special needs. I then fill in the extra calories with on the course materials. Well this year Gatorade is gone and Powerbar is in. The stuff tastes like crap to me and I just couldn't tolerate the bars, gels or drink. I can handle most things, but this was quite unbelievably bad. Who eats power bars when it’s a 100 percent humidity?  On the run course I carried one Cyto bottle to start and a couple of gels. When they ran out I tried the course stuff again. No go. I tried coke, but it was still carbonated. One swallow and out that went. I ended up running from mile 15 to the end on water in the stomach and ice in the hat.

Third was my watch. Before the race I did as I always do, power up the Garmin to connect to the satellites to make the connection faster in T2 and then power it down and throw it in the transition bag. Well this time I somehow forgot to power it down, so as I strapped on the watch in T2 and turned it on it said battery gone and powers off. I ended up running the entire marathon without a watch. Still chuckling at that one. Of course I ran the marathon completely against all of my training principles, running way too fast to start and holding on for dear life at the end.



Well, I'm thinking about Hawaii and as they say, "don't get fat!". Hopefully a couple of good glasses of beer are still OK.



Got to thank my Iron Sherpas who sat in the Texas humidity all day long catching short glimpses of me here and there. My daughter Kira was there with her boyfriend Oscar as well as our Houston host, Patrick. Neither Oscar nor Patrick had ever seen a triathlon before, let alone an ironman. Quite the subculture shock for both of them! They were all awesome picking up all my gear at the end, getting my bike to TriBike Transport to be driven home, and mostly putting up with me.

As to my wife who graciously allows me to train for one ironman a year, I'm going home to see how many family credits I have left in the bank. :)

Also had a friend email me some statistics about my day:

"A bit of data from IM TX last weekend where Tom Glynn went from 1750 overall out of the water to the end of his day where he got a Kona slot . . . During his 5:01:49 ride, Tom passed, on average, a person every 14 seconds. . . . . Here are the number of positions he gained in each section: 141 in T1, 1315 on the Bike, 10 in T2 and 97 on the run." WOW! Can anyone say Patience and Discipline?"

Also, for all of you horrible swimmers, there is good news!  A couple of days after getting home, I pulled up the race results.  I scanned down to my name in 180th spot or so, went across to my swim time and then starting looking up; all the way up.  I was the worst swimmer in the top 180.  I then scanned down (actually way down!) until I came across the next guy who finished slower than me in the swim.  He was somewhere around 325th.  I scanned left to see who it was, and the coolest thing was he was a 60 year old guy who came first in his age group overall.  There is hope for all of us!

For those of you thinking of Ironman Texas in your future, I think it’s a great course.  The swim will probably always be a non wetsuit because of the warm water, so expect somewhat slower times. The bike course is relatively flat, much of it shaded through a forest area.  It's fast too.  I pushed with more power in IM LP a couple of years ago and ended with a 5:25ish bike split there.  Cars on the road, so you had to be careful.  The run is a three loop course through the Woodlands area.  A good run course in my opinion.  The potential drawbacks will be heat, humidity and wind, which we didn’t see a lot of.  Most locals said we were lucky.  The swim and run course are very spectator friendly.  Lots of shops and nearby hotels.  Many people sat along the canal at one of the bars and drank beer as we looped around.  The one loop bike course is not intended for spectators.


Also I would be remiss without thanking the many, many people in this club that helped with my recovery in the past year.  Lots and lots of wonderful emails, words of encouragement, dinners delivered to my door, driving me around, PT help, learning to pool run and then Wednesday rides pushing me harder than I really planned to go.  Thank you everyone!

See you in Kona!

Tom