Earning the Ironman badge @ Goa IM 70.3 – Part 2 (Expo & Race Day)

I wrote about my pre-race journey in Part 1 of this blog. If you’ve haven’t read it yet, I’d recommend going through that first. Here is the link: https://aashutosh.net/2023/10/25/earning-the-ironman-badge-goa-im-70-3-part-1-build-up-to-the-race/

Here is the part 2 of the blog where I bare down my expo and race day experience!

a) Landing in Goa – a little late to arrive (in hindsight, that is)

I landed in Goa just 2 days prior to the race day. In hindsight, I should have planned better and landed atleast 4-5 days prior. The heat and humidity equation in Goa is drastically different from Bengaluru and for that matter any other major cities of India so it is worth invesing time and effort in acclimatizing!

b) Athlete & Bike Check-in (the best expo experience ever)

The athlete check-in process is IM Goa was just awesome. It was one of the best event expos with entire set-up centered around the comfort of the athletes. The race briefing was spot on. And, the best part was a bike mech station at the expo where loads of athletes got their last moment bike tweaks done. Kudos to Yoska team for putting up such awesome athlete expo.

If this wasn’t enough, here comes the highlight of the expo. As I collected my race bib, stickers and bags, the volunteers asked me to hold for a bit as there was a special message for me. And, then they hand me a printed note from my wife (Hiral) and son (Vivaan) wishing me the best for the race! This moment was surreal and I felt incredibly loved reading that note from my family. This was a pleasant surprise! Take a bow team IM Goa for this.

The bike check-in was supposed to be done a day prior to the race at the event venue. This again was fabulously managed. There was a basic bike check and then we had to just drop the bike on a rack at pre-marked slot – they had bib number stickers pasted on the racks. All in, it took just 10 minutes to get the bike check-in done. I also collected my timing ankle band here and thats it – all set for the race!

c) Race Morning (Waking up to a semi disaster)

With a 7am race start, there wasn’t much stress about waking up early. However, I woke up at 2:30 am fully drenched in sweat and a bit of a headache. As soon as I woke up, I knew something was off! The room AC was operating at 21 degrees but I was drenched in sweat. Yes, I was running fever and felt a bit head heavy. I tried hard to sleep it out but was too uncomfortable!

I just sat in the room praying that the fever would just pass off soon. I tried to distract my mind and got onto the other pre race chores like getting the fluids ready, packing the transition bags etc but nothing helped. I resisted the urge of popping a combiflam as I knew it can wreak havoc during the race. By 4:30am, my fever situation hadn’t changed much. The only good part was that it wasn’t getting worse. I took the hard call of taking the combiflam finally!

I munched in the usual pre race food and headed out early to the reporting zone. At the back of my mind, I was cursing myself for having such race day issue. For perspective, I have only had such a situation once in 8 years of running. This happened at the Bengaluru Marathon in 2016 and I had to take a combiflam prior to the race and I badly struggled 2 hours into the race!

Anyways, I reached the bike zone and loaded up my bike and met several of my friends. The fever seemed to have subsided – good news, but I was still sweating a bit. I decided to compartmentalize the thought of fever and headache and headed to the start zone after a small prayer! I took my first gel about 10 mins before the flag off.

d) Swim Leg – 47 mins (a suprisingly fast swim, relatively speaking)

The first thought on my mind was to not have any panic attack getting into the water. I had a neat entry into the water and dived in to swim much earlier than others who were still walking as the water was just about waist high. There was a turn buoy just 200 mts from the start line so my first objective was to get into a smooth rhythm by the time I reach that point. I reached there fairly quickly and without much fuss!

Next up was a 600mt segment going into the sea (diagonally) with a sighting buoy (red color) every 50 mts. My plan was to just focus on the next red buoy and swim to it while keeping as close to the shortest race line as possible. 100 mts down on this segment, I felt very comfortable in my rhythm and thanked God for not having any open water anxiety. I saw loads of swimmers clutching onto the turn and sighting buoys to rest/gather themseleves just 300m into the race!

At around 400m mark, I realized that there were two other folks pretty much swimming along with me since past 100m so I decided to stay with that group. However, over next 100m I found that I was faster than those folks so decided to make a move and over took them. This gave me more confidence and I decided to swim at my own pace without bothering about staying with any group.

Another turn buoy arrived at 800m mark and now we had to turn on the left side and go diagonally in the direction of the beach. This was a segment I had decided to push more as it was with the tide. I sailed through this section comfortably and continued over-taking several folks. I noticed many folks taking refuge at the resting pontoon. I thanked my stars for not having to do so.

Soon enough, I reached the second last turn bouy and now we had to swim parallel to the shoreline for another 600m. I kept on with my rhythm and soon reached the last turn buoy which meant it was a straight out swim of 200m to the swim start point. I was elated to be here without any fuss and pushed harder to the shore.

By the time I reached the swim end point, I glanced at the watch and was utterly surprised to read 47mins. I was expecting this to be close to 60mins mark. At 47mins, this was my fastest 1.9k swim! I was happy and charged towards the T1 zone which was 700m away.

e) Transition 1 – 8:46 (like clockwork as planned)

T1 zone was approx 700m away from the swim end point. We had to run across the beach on the sand and its quite tough to get running rhythm going right after the swim. The heart rate rises drastically as soon as body transitions from swim position to upright run posture. So, one has to be be very careful in this segment lest there will be risk of starting the ride at a higher heart rate.

I had a decent run to the walking showers. I slipped as soon as I entered the showers but nothing serious. I headed straight to the my bike rack and took out my T1 checklist which I had prepared pre-race. There were 10 items on it and I ticked them off one by one.

In went the second gel and I was swiftly out from the T1 zone and headed to the bike mount zone.

f) Cycle Leg – 3:33:13 (slow but steady)

I had a neat exit from T1 and was on the saddle and off for 90km bike leg. About 100m in, I heard a nagging sound from the front wheel. My heart sank initially fearing some bike mech issue. Fortunately, it was a stray cello-tape stuck on the tyre and was rubbing against the rim brakes thereby making a nagging noise. I got off the bike and promptly removed it.

Back on the saddle again, I started searching for a good rhythm with single minded focus on keeping myself in 26-27 kmph hour zone. During the training I had realized that while I can push hard on the bike, it was wise to limit myself to 27 kmph zone to ‘save’ legs for the run. The strategy, therefore, was to stay conservative.

By 10k mark, I got into a good zone and was cruising at 27kmph zone. I had decided push in fluids and nutrition every 30 minutes – gel every 30 minutes and water/electrolytes sips just prior to the gel time, so settled into that.

Goa course this time had 3 loops of around 25km each which featured two killer inclines and ofcourse awesome descents the other way around. The weather was holding up well with loads of clouds. Wind was manageable save a few patches where headwinds were strong.

Overall, I stayed strong on the bike leg and cruised by 2 loops. And by the time I started the third loop, I felt a bit of headache creeping in. I felt a bit of a chill as well in patches where there was wind. I knew the combiflam effect was fading. I shunned all the negativity and motored on. The sun was out by this time and therefore my speed starting going down with 60km to 80km zone coming in about 24kmph. I was focused on getting a strong finish but was also conscious of not pushing too hard to burn my legs do did not push despite reducing speed.

Only when it was about 10km to go, I decided to push the pace a bit. The final 10km came in almost 28kmph which was my fastest in the bike leg! In hindsight, I may be should not have pushed this much.

Overall, the bike leg went a little worser than expected but I was happy to have done it without any niggles or mech issues. By this time the sun was out in its fully glory and humidity was picking. I had pinned high hopes on my run leg but that feverish feling was still bothering me.

g) T2 – 5:20 (a little slower than planned)

I muttered a little prayer thanking the almighty for giving me an issue-free bike leg and headed straight to T2. Just like T1, I had a T2 checklist too with 10 items in the list. I ticked off all one by one, downed a gel and headed to my run leg. The sun was up and out fully now and I was drenched in sweat while jogging just 200m to the run start line! I knew at that moment that run was going to be a hustle but immediately shut out all negativities.

h) Run Leg – 2:48:06 (hustle, hustle and more hustle under super hot and humid conditions)

Running is my strength and my strategy was always to save up enough for the run and let my legs do the magic at the end. In normal conditions even after considering the harsh Goa weather I was confident of pushing in a 2 hour HM finish. But, damn the feverish body! I revised my goal to 2:30 and moved onto the run track.

By the first 5K mark, I had aches and cramps across my calf and right lower back. I knew it was going to be tough. I settled into a run walk rhythm now and practically stopped at every aid station to hydrate and pour ice cold water on the body. The volunteers at the aid station were simply awesome and ever ready to give whatever we wanted.

My body was heating up – I didn’t know if it was the heat or fever! But, I didn’t care much. The only objective now was to keep moving. I came across a lot of familiar folks on the track and all of them asked me I was okay as each one of them was expecting me to be running in high spirits. I knew this wasn’t going to be an HM I would be proud about.

My splits kept getting poorer and the gel wasn’t helping either. Half way into the second loop, I felt stomach cramps – may be it was the gel or the fact that I was having more water/electrolytes than needed. I dediced to avoid unnecssary stops and motored on as the last thing I wanted was to stop for a bathroom break. Thankfully, by the time I hit the last loop, the GI issues were gone. Now, it was just 7km to go and I wasn’t going to give up easily!

I was still hoping to run large part of the final 7km and ‘save’ some time. But, it wasn’t meant to be! I continued with my run walk rhythm but this time around started to run a lot more than walk. As I reached the half way point of the last loop, I egged myself on to run the final 3.5km – most of it was either downhill or flat. I ran through the donwhills but stuggled to maintain the pace on the flats. With just 2k to go, I decided to play it safe to avoid any last moment race issue. With just about 0.5km to go, I felt relieved to have come this far. The energy suddenly crept back and I decided to run with longer strides and was happy to pass many fellow runners in this patch.

As I entered the carpeted home stretch, I heard the emcee announce my name as the next upcoming ironman finisher. The crowd support was awesome with people cheering with my name. I pushed hard and hit the finish line with insane feeling of relief. Finally, the dream of earning the ironman badge had come true.

i) The Finish Line (finally!!)

As soon as I crossed the finish line, the volunteers ushered me to the finish tents and offered an ice cold wet towel! What a relief! And then someone else came in and handed me the ironman medal. The feeling of holding that medal cannot be described in words! I muttered a small prayers and thanked all my family and friends for all the support. My family – Hiral & Vivaan, were supposed to travel with me to support me but they could not make it due to last moment change in plans. I badly wished they were there at the finish line but I knew where ever they were they were tracking my progress on the app and knew that I had earned my badge.

I headed to the finish zone and picked up my finisher tee and moved straight to the ice bath zone and immersed myself in the little ice water bath tubs! God bless the organizers for making this happen. This little ice water dip brought renewed energy and zeal back in my feverish, fatigued and weather-torn body.

I headed to the baggage zone, got my bag and made that much needed video call to Hiral and Vivaan. They were relieved to see me fit and fine. Vivaan complained about why I slowed down so much during the run. Hiral was crazy worried tracking my run progress and asked if I had a fall/injury. I hadn’t told her about the fever but explained the context! She understood but Vivaan wasn’t satisifed though and said even he could have run a faster HM :-). He believes in me more than I do; just like all of my family members and running buddies and because of that everyone has high hopes almost everytime I am on a major race event.

I told Vivaan that one day I will be back in Goa and get a 6 hour 70.3 IM! So, a faster 70.3 IM is almost pencilled in some time in future – may be in 2024 itself, who knows?

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Conclusion

Goa 70.3 IM was one of the top experiences in my short endurance sports journey thus far. Right from the day I registered for this event, the journey wasn’t as smooth as I wanted to be. I cannot help but wonder what if I had a perfect race – especially what if I hadn’t woken up with the fever! The counter can also be what if I had a major bike issue or a panic attack in the ocean! But all of that is in the past now! In endurance sports journey we got to embrace both the good and not-so-good sides with an open mind and heart – that’s what I have learnt to do.

What really matters is how incredibly proud my family and friends are about my achievement! And, how incredibly happy I am! Almost all of my family and friends believe that this is just a beginning of my crazy journey of triathlons and there will more to come in future! I concur with these good folks; infact there is a lot more of triathlons coming in future :-D! For now, the focus would be back to marathons with a major finish time goal at the New Delhi Marathon 2024!