Monday, August 3, 2009

Barb's Race - a total disaster

My first half Ironman back since my injury didn't go as planned, mostly because of outside influences. Here is my sad race report.

I got sick during Barb's race and couldn't finish. I couldn't even
breathe on the run and felt so insanely nauseous my stomach felt like there were needles inside. which has never ever happened to me
before. This past week was so unbearably emotional for me that I think I cried myself to a state of dehydration. After that emotional week, for reasons I will leave out for the time being, Brian and I left in the car for LA to pick up Hannah, my dog, who flew to LA
on Pet Airways, on the way to the race in Santa Rosa. I was excited to get my dog back since my parents had been watching her in Chicago for the past two months and excited to race since I've been out for so long, but shortly was stressed out again when I found out the person who was supposed to watch Hannah during the race was no longer coming to Santa Rosa. We didn't know anyone else who was going to be at the race who could watch her, so I had to stress out again and try to find a
random dog sitter to watch Hannah during the race. Of course our hotel didn't have internet, so my mom googled pet sitters in Santa Rosa and texted me their phone numbers. Eventually I found Fetch Pet Care, and a sitter picked Hannah up from the hotel Friday night and watched her at her house
while we did the race! I was so nervous the whole time because she was
with a stranger. I didn't eat my normal foods. Adam forgot his wetsuit
for the full Vineman so I let him use mine, and then had to stress out
about getting it out of transition before my swim started. I was not
in the right mindset to race at all, I didn't even want to start the
race. My goggles broke during the swim, my elbow pad broke on the
bike, my neck and back hurt so bad the whole bike because of my new aero
helmet I'm not quite used to yet. Actually the whole time on the bike
I was thinking I didn't want to be on the bike at all, and when I got
on the run I felt like I was going to die. I got through the first 9
mile loop and had to keep stopping because I couldn't breathe and my
stomach was so nauseous. The second loop started by running through
transition and there was nothing that could make me go back out there
and finish that 4.4 mile second loop. I felt so bad. In my mind I was done. I took my chip off
and handed it in, went straight to the shuttle and sat in the back
seat of the school bus curled up in a ball feeling so sick and shivering cold. I went and got the car which
was back at the start and drove straight to get Hannah back from the sitter. I took
her back to the race to watch Brian and Adam do the marathon and sat
there feeling like total crap.

I've never had a bad race yet, but I guess it happens to everyone once
in a while. As a positive, I am more motivated to crush the next race
I do and be more emotionally stable and.... dog-less of course! This
was all just a situation from hell.

So no I didn't finish in 8:15 or whatever the time says on the
website, I actually didn't finish at all. But after all this family
stuff blows over and everything is ok, I will be ok.

Cori