My husband Dennis joined me on Friday night a week before
the race, my sister the following Tues., my sister-in-law and brother-in-law on
Wed. and my friend and best training buddy Cecile, the day before the race. So
my cheering section was set.
With the course shrouded in fog, I couldn’t see from one
buoy to the next and never saw the course from shore. I felt amazed that I was
able to execute my plan of swimming to the inside of the sighting buoys and
turning tightly around the turn buoys. I felt like I was just surviving on the
first lap and couldn’t really concentrate on swimming well.
On the second lap I was able to stretch out a bit and focus
on my stroke. At this point, every time
I drew a breath, I could appreciate the view of snow capped mountains in the
distance with trees in the foreground dusted with snow. This alternated with
the crystal clear view to the bottom of the lake, which was sometimes
obliterated by bubbles from hard kicking around me. I came out of the water
thinking it was a pretty slow swim. I couldn’t tell by the clock because we had
a rolling start and I didn’t know what time it was when I crossed over the
starting mat. I learned after the race that my swim time was 1:20 – I was
expecting 1:15 or a little quicker.
On the first loop, the first two Bonk Breaker Bars were
almost frozen and it took me a half hour toget through each one. At this rate,
I thought I’d be eating constantly during the entire bike ride. Also my bottles
were so cold that they were almost impossible to squeeze. All in all, I ate three
bonk breaker bars, two gels, and one package of Power Bar Energy Blasts. Plus I
had 100 cals of Roctane Energy Formula in one bottle. In total this adds up to
approximately 1290 cals on the bike. The bike took 7:08, so this is 187 cals
per hour ingested. My target was 200 cals per hour; not perfect but not
terrible. Where I fell short was in drinking. I had three bottles on the first
loop, all with one Nuun tab in them and one with the addition of the 100 cals
of Roctane. I stopped at special needs and picked up an additional bottle with one
Nuun tab in it. I took 2 water bottles from aid stations after that and thought
that there was another aid station between Carnelian Woods and the turn into
Squaw Valley, but there was not. That made the total number of bottles only six,
well short of my target of seven to 10. Since I finished my last bottle at the bottom of the Dollar Hill climb, I
entered T2 on the thirsty side but I also needed to pee.
Although I didn’t know it at the time because my computer
had malfunctioned, my bike time was 7:08 – just eight minutes over my goal
time of seven hours. My average HR was 134 (zone 3) max 155, and my average
watts 139 (zone 2).
When I headed back into the parking lot after the first loop
of the run I stopped in the porta potty again! I felt much better after that,
although I was disappointed that I was losing time with three porta potty
visits.
My legs felt achy after about 14 miles and I took two Advil.
It was dark by the time I turned the corner to head up to the Resort at Squaw
Creek for the second time. Again, I allowed myself to walk up the hill behind
the resort. When I turned off of Squaw
Creek Road onto the bike path, all I could see was an unending line of racers’ headlamps
coming toward me in the darkness. About a mile later, the course took us down a short dirt hill between Hwy 89 and the bike path which
I walked down on this second loop.
Although it was well lit, I felt like my quads couldn’t take the steep
downhill running. It was only a short distance from there to the second turn around
and my spirits lifted once I made that turn. Sortly after the turnaround I had to walk/stagger back up the
dirt hill. My legs were feeling pretty uncoordinated for that short
climb. At the top of that hill when I started running both the volunteer at the
top and the guy running behind me voiced concern that I would stray out into
the street, so I must have looked pretty wobbly at that point. From there it
was only about 5K to the finish and it felt like I was able to pick up my pace.
I was even able to run/shuffle up the hill by the soccer field behind the fire
station.
My
chiropractor – Dr. Marshall Luck (Rincon Chiropractic)
My nutritionist – Dr. Rich Stagliano (Live Fit Medicine)
I did my last workout on Friday: A one-hour bike during
which I tested Zipp 404 race wheels rented from Tri Bike Transport. This last
minute decision was fueled by a look at the USAT rankings of my competitors
versus mine. Of those with a ranking, I was ranked 6th; podium spots
go to 5th place, so I asked myself, “What was there to lose?” My
bike felt a little different with the wheels, but it only took about 15 minutes
to get used to the feel. On Saturday, it poured rain, the temps dropped, and snow
fell above 7000 ft. Good thing I
finished my last scheduled workout on Friday!
IMAGE FROM SQUAW WEB CAN ON DAY BEFORE THE RACE
Race Morning: At 4:30 am, I drove to Cecile’s place
located less than a mile from the swim start and left my car there until the
next day. Cecile drove me to the start, took my morning clothes and saw me off
before she headed to Squaw to volunteer in the medical tent.
Even before the start I knew that Ironman Lake Tahoe was
going to be a different kind of race. My bike, protected from the rain by plastic
bags, was now covered in ice. Even the little puddles of rain water in the
dimples of the plastic bags had formed ice cubes and, where the bike wasn’t
protected, it needed defrosting in order to tape on my electrolytes. One of the
best things I did was put “Hot Hands” inside my gloves before hanging them on
my shifters so that they would be warm when I started the ride. As there was
not a bike pump to be found, I stood in line in freezing temperatures at the
air compressor for my tires to be pumped. After re-racking my bike I headed
over to the transition bag area and put toe warmers between my bike shoes and
neoprene toe covers.
Swim: By the time I got to the beach most of the
competitors were already lined up. I wove through the tight crowd to line up for
the swim at the back of the 1 to 1:10 group, thinking I could do the swim in an
hour and 15 mins. The sun had just come up and fog was rising off of the warm
lake into the 32 degree air. I couldn’t see any of the buoys as we entered the
water and started to swim, so I just started following people. With all my
effort to not let it happen, my heart rate soared and I actually felt a little
panicked as I got pummeled, elbowed in the mouth, and especially when one guy
actually put his arm around my waist and pulled himself over me pushing me
under to get to the other side of me. My heart was racing until the number five
sighting buoy, where I finally managed to get my breathing under control. 
With the course shrouded in fog, I couldn’t see from one
buoy to the next and never saw the course from shore. I felt amazed that I was
able to execute my plan of swimming to the inside of the sighting buoys and
turning tightly around the turn buoys. I felt like I was just surviving on the
first lap and couldn’t really concentrate on swimming well.
T1: I took advantage of the wetsuit strippers,
retrieved my transition bag pretty quickly and went into the inadequate changing
tent which was packed with women struggling to put on dry clothes. With no
chairs available, I dropped my stuff on the ground and put my helmet on right
away so it wouldn’t get kicked or stepped on. It was pure chaos as women stepped
all over my stuff and I struggled to put my jacket on, so I grabbed everything
and went outside. Although it was significantly colder, I had some room which I
used to sit down on the ground to get my socks and shoes on. I put on a stretchy tight jacket, tight
fleece vest, knee warmers, socks, a neck gator, shoes, sunglasses, and a
headband that covered my ears; plus I stuffed a few Bonk Breaker Bars in my tri
jersey pockets. I had worn arm warmers,
a dry fit tee, tri jersey and tri shorts under my wetsuit and kept them on even
though they were now wet. My transition time was 12 minutes and 16 seconds. It
seemed ridiculously long but was very much in line with many other competitive
participants and probably less than the average for this race.
Bike: I felt cold for the first lap of the bike but thanks
to the chemical warmers, didn’t have frozen or numb hands or toes. It took a
long time for my legs to feel warmed up and on the first two climbs (Martis and
Brockway) I wasn’t able to produce Z4 watts or Z4 heart rate very often. At the time I was thinking that I
probably went too hard on my three hour Wed. ride earlier in the week. I also thought about what my
coach said about just getting over the hills, so I tried not to get mentally hung
up on the seeming lack of power. I felt like I took the entire first lap
fairly easy. On the second lap, my Garmin turned off in the Comstock area; I
turned it back on and saw that the battery was fine and hoped it would stay on.
I kept my eye on power and heart rate, realizing about nine miles later
that I hadn’t pressed start! I’m missing data from Truckee to somewhere in the
Martis area. On the second loop the Martis climb didn’t feel difficult but the
top half of the Brockway climb felt extremely difficult. I enjoyed the final fast descent back to Kings
Beach hitting a top speed of 47 mph. Then came the start of the home stretch, I wished I knew from my computer how much time had
lapsed on the bike ride so I would have some idea about how I was doing
compared to my pre-race expectations. At the start of the last Dollar Hill
climb I noticed two guys squatting off of their bikes; Just as I was wondering
what they were doing, my right inner thigh got a major cramp. Ah ha, they were
stretching out cramps! I downed the rest of my water bottle, took two salt tabs
and tried to emphasize a different part of my pedal stroke and the cramp went
away pretty quickly. Which leads me to what I ate and drank on the bike:
On the first loop, the first two Bonk Breaker Bars were
almost frozen and it took me a half hour toget through each one. At this rate,
I thought I’d be eating constantly during the entire bike ride. Also my bottles
were so cold that they were almost impossible to squeeze. All in all, I ate three
bonk breaker bars, two gels, and one package of Power Bar Energy Blasts. Plus I
had 100 cals of Roctane Energy Formula in one bottle. In total this adds up to
approximately 1290 cals on the bike. The bike took 7:08, so this is 187 cals
per hour ingested. My target was 200 cals per hour; not perfect but not
terrible. Where I fell short was in drinking. I had three bottles on the first
loop, all with one Nuun tab in them and one with the addition of the 100 cals
of Roctane. I stopped at special needs and picked up an additional bottle with one
Nuun tab in it. I took 2 water bottles from aid stations after that and thought
that there was another aid station between Carnelian Woods and the turn into
Squaw Valley, but there was not. That made the total number of bottles only six,
well short of my target of seven to 10. Since I finished my last bottle at the bottom of the Dollar Hill climb, I
entered T2 on the thirsty side but I also needed to pee.
T2: It was pretty uneventful. I did have to duck into
a porta potty before I left T2. My transition time was five minutes and 35
seconds.
Run: A lot of
the run is pretty much a blur to me. There are moments that stand out but
mostly I was focused on two recurring mantras: “You don’t get on the podium by
walking” and “Don’t let all that training go to waste.” Soon after T2 at the
end of the parking lot, just before heading onto the Squaw Valley Road bike
path, I thought I should have taken more time in the porta potty. I had to stop
again. Fortunately my stomach wasn’t upset.
Shortly after getting on the bike path I saw my coach who
was also racing and we greeted each other. I immediately thought about my
running form. Then I kept thinking he was going to lap me on his second loop
and critique me on my running form. The fact that he might run up behind me,
kept me concentrated on my form until I passed the second turnaround which was
about four or five miles into my first lap. It took about three miles for me to
get my legs on the run. They started feeling more normal after I turned the
corner at the Resort at Squaw Creek heading back toward Squaw Valley Road. Until
I stopped at special needs, which I think was at about mile 15, I ran without
walking except for up the short hill behind the resort. At special needs I picked up
some gels, a long sleeved shirt and exchanged my Fuel Belt bottle for one
filled with Gatorade. Throughout the run I ate a gel every 30 to 40 minutes and
drank something to wash each one down. I think I skipped one gel at about the four
hour mark. I also took two Endurolytes every hour for the last three or four
hours. I took water at every aid station
and after special needs, walked through two or three where I also got Coke.
One of the nice things about the out and back section along
the Truckee River was seeing some of my fellow AIMP training friends on the run
course. On my way to the first turn-around, I first saw Dora who said, “Brenda,
you are awesome!” I retorted, “You are awesome!” and a guy behind me said, “You
are both awesome!” This cracked me up. Soon after Dora, I saw Faith and then
John. On my way back, I recognized Byron and Rachael in time to give a shout
out.
When I headed back into the parking lot after the first loop
of the run I stopped in the porta potty again! I felt much better after that,
although I was disappointed that I was losing time with three porta potty
visits.
Finish: Finally the finish line! When I distinctly heard
Mike Reilly say, “Brenda Bettencourt, you are an Ironman!”, I felt a huge surge
of excitement along with a sense of accomplishment and pumped both fists into
the air. I was still a little wobbly after the finish and didn’t notice my
finish time. My average HR on the run was 142 (Z3) and official run pace
averaged 12:34 minute miles.
I hobbled over to the food, skipped the massage, went to my
sister’s room in the village and looked up my results, learning I had finished
in 2nd place with a time of 14:15:51. That re-energized me and I literally
did a happy dance. After wolfing down some chips heaped with delicious guacamole that my
sister-in-law made for me, I showered and went back to the finish line with my
sister and Cecile. We were there from about 11:30 to midnight, cheering in the
final finishers. I was so happy to have Cecile and my sister there with me to
enjoy the atmosphere and positive energy that is Ironman.
Monday morning, I found out that by coming in second, I
earned an Ironman Kona slot. NOW I CAN DO IT ALL AGAIN! Ironman World
Championships, October 2014! I had to pinch myself to see if I was dreaming.
It would be impossible to do an Ironman without a
significant support section. In addition to my husband who supports this
obsession despite the hours and hours of training on top of my long work days,
it takes a village. I appreciate the support of my training partners, new AIMP
friends, and those that cheered me on and encouraged me.
Special Thanks
to:
My coach –
Chris Hauth (AIMP Coaching)
My
chiropractor – Dr. Marshall Luck (Rincon Chiropractic)My nutritionist – Dr. Rich Stagliano (Live Fit Medicine)
