quentinbroad

This is a journey that has taken 16 years, from my first Ironman branded race in 2006 at Ironman Austria, when I had a finishing time of 14:26:31 to October 8, 2022 when I had a finishing time at the Ironman World Championships at Kona of 14:10:06. Seems like not much has changed in 16 years, and yet a whole lot of training, some blood, a ton of sweat and more than a few tears have flowed during that time. As usual, cutting to the quick, the results on the day, were as follows:

Swim – 1:23:40

T1         – 11:46

Bike      – 6:14:11

T2        -15:55

Run      – 6:04:35

Like any good story, this does have a beginning, middle and an end. Triathlon is a wonderful sport, three disciplines that create some incredible fitness and a solid aerobic engine. It has been my experience that the sport also supports an above average amount training while lowering the probability of injury given the need to train in 3 different sports.

My beginning truly was in 2005, when two buddies completed Ironman Lake Placed – I had beers with Stew and Christian to hear the tale of Ironman. Of course, throughout the discussion they chastised me for only competing in sprint and Olympic distance triathlons – I needed to step up and be a man – race Ironman! Listening to their experience I certainly had caught the bug, but unlike my bachelor buddies, my family had 3 kids (Corbin (12), Austin (9) and Maddie (5)) and Dianne was running our house and a full-time business. After that night out, it was time to have a discussion with Dianne and to her incredible credit, when I asked her about me completing an ironman, she said that no time was perfect, so I might as well get it done. Of course, when she made that comment, she probably didn’t anticipate sitting in Kona 16 years later, still supporting this passion for long-distance triathlon! Thank you Dianne, if it wasn’t for your support, your patience, your willingness to deal with a hangry husband and your wonderful trip planning capabilities to make the most of these events, this would not have happened.

Fast forward to Kona 2022. For 15 years I have been hoping to deliver a fast enough time to qualify for Kona – the World Championships for Ironman. I had essentially given up on qualifying with my speed and was now focused on qualifying as a Legacy Athlete. Ironman created this segment to “reward” loyal competitors who had raced in at least 12 Ironman branded long-course events (events with a 3.8km swim; 180km bike and 42.2km run). Once you completed your 12^th event, you then registered as a Legacy Athlete and then you went onto a wait list. While on that wait list, you needed to complete an ironman each year to prove you were still capable of completing an ironman. As we headed into the 2020 year, I had booked 2 ironman races early in the year in my attempt to complete 12 and register as a legacy athlete in November 2020 – I then expected to be on the wait list for 3-4 years given the backlog of legacy athletes waiting for their turn. Of course, we all know what happened in March 2020 as COVID wreaked havoc on life. I had to defer the two early races in 2020 I had even booked two additional in late 2020 hoping that COVID would clear – of course, no such luck – deferred.  

2021 would continue to see a bleak race year, with travel challenged and gathering restrictions in place, getting my races in was not looking promising. An opportunity popped up to race Ironman Lake Placid with the Executive Challenge group of Ironman. Ironic that my opportunity to qualify for Kona was coming full circle to that conversation over beers with Stew and Christian. Given the lack of races in 2020 and 2021, Ironman was allocating an unprecedented number of slots for Kona 2021. If I could finish within the Ironman XC group, I had an excellent chance of qualifying for the World Championships in 2021. Well, I finished the race at LP and punched my ticket to Kona. Of course, nothing is ever that easy, particularly in this COVID world. Kona was cancelled in October 2021 and rebooked for February 2022, this was cancelled and rebooked for either Utah in May or Kona October 2022. Each of these required booking and cancelling flights, hotels and activities all of which was creating its own headaches and anxieties. Through all of this, I was given the option of racing in St. George Utah or Kona, of course this was a no brainer, we were going to Kona – of course only if COVID permitted.

The trip to Kona has been a long-time coming. Hawaii is a wonderful place to vacation by all accounts but I had told the family that we would only go if I had qualified for Kona. Well, I had and now I was hoping that the whole family was going to be able to carve time out of their busy lives to join us for this once in a lifetime trip. The kids were able to block their schedules and away we went on September 24 for two weeks of a wonderfully curated vacation (anyone wants tips on what to do in Maui or on the Big island, just ask Dianne) and one day of tough slogging for athlete and spectators.

The weather in Hawaii seems to be hot all of the time. Watching the weather app for weeks leading up to our departure, the days saw highs of 30 celsius, feels like 38! Of course, during the evenings it dropped to a more reasonable 28 feels like 30! For those of you who have read previous race reports, you will know that heat has not been my friend. While I had been training during the last few weeks with the hot box (a home made plastic tent that I put over my bike and heat to 37 Celsius during training sessions) and we had a full two weeks to acclimatize in Hawaii, I was still quite worried that the heat could get the better of me. It was just 10 weeks ago that I dnf’d Lake Placid in the heat as my stomach turned over and my mind quit. This was Kona, I had to finish this race.

We had a wonderful week in Maui – it is not always easy to travel and be with your family 24/7 but we had a great time. We had rented a house that gave everyone their own space, we had a pool to lounge by and Dianne had created an itinerary of sightseeing that everyone loved. From snorkeling, to golf, from seeing the sunrise from the top of Maui, to watching Dianne paraglide, to playing golf, driving the road to Hana and going to a Luau, we had a busy week. Originally I was going to ship my bike directly to Kona, but the cost made me gag (which is ironic given the general cost of travelling to Hawaii) so we brought it with us. I decided not to unpack it until we got to Kona, so the week in Maui was focused on running and swimming in the final prep for Kona. We had a wonderful VRBO, but the downside was that every road out was down a hill, which meant every road back was climbing. I had found an Olympic outdoor swimming pool, that was about 8k from the house, which made it easy to be dropped off to have a swim and then run home. Of course, the run home was all up hill! We spent a lot of time in the heat, getting used to the sun baking your skin (lathered with reef safe sunscreen that doesn’t come off your clothes – something to remember!!)

Race Day

Before I get into the actual day, one of the many challenges of this World Championship was the fact that they were attempting to host twice the number of athletes as usual (5,000), which likely meant at least twice the number of family spectators, for an island that has not grown over the last three years (since the last WC in 2019). Indeed, most states have experienced labour shortages and Hawaii was not an exception. In order to make this happen Ironman planned the event over two days, Thursday – All women and 2 men’s age-groups would race and then Saturday the men would race. We had a briefing from the CEO of Ironman who suggested that as a result of racing on Thursday, a work day, the number of volunteers were significantly reduced and this would mean the “service level” would be reduced. What does this mean you ask? Well, historically, after you were finished on your bike, they would have “bike catchers” available to take your bike from you and rack it while you ran through transition to grab your run bag. Perhaps more importantly, this meant that there would be fewer aid stations on the bike and the run. No doubt there were several other decisions that were made, but these would be the most obvious to a rookie. Given I raced on Saturday, why did this volunteer shortfall on Thursday matter to me? Well, Ironman felt that the fairest outcome would be to replicate the conditions on both days – both days would get the same level of support irrespective of available volunteer pool. And so, the race day would begin:It is amazing how fast things happen. Having waited so long to get here, I wanted to take it all in yet I wanted to get going.  Dianne and I stayed at the race hotel on Friday night so that we would have easy access to transition and the race start. The kids were troopers staying at the house and had to get up at 4:00am. Austin and Maddie had made me waffles and they got down to our hotel for 5am before the parking closed for the day. They arrived on time and I was now up, ready to get going. I needed to get bodymarked, drop off my special needs bags for the bike and run, put my hydration bottles on my bike with my gel flasks (unlike other races, we did not have access to our run or bike transition bags before the race, which meant I had to stack everything on the bike) and then wait for my 7:35 start. The pro men were starting at 6:25, so they would be finishing the swim before I even started. Dianne, Corbin and Maddie went out to the pier to see the swim start, Austin hung with me, helping to apply sunscreen, added some re-skin to chafing areas on the back of my neck (I was wearing a skinsuit, which is supposed to make you faster in the water as it repels water – I don’t wear this normally and I had found it chafed the back of my neck in practice) and keeping me loose as the tension mounted. In the hotel room, we watched the men’s pro race start at 6:25am and several age group waves, before we headed down to the swim corrals. Austin walked me down to the corral entrance chute and gave me a big hug and said “you got this Papi” it made me cry to know that my kids and Dianne were right there with me for this journey. I was supposed to be in my corral for 7:15, but I hovered at the pro-bike transition and was there to see the first pro-men come out of the water and get to their bikes. It is incredible how fast these guys are transitioning from one sport to the next. As my 7:35 start time got closer, we were cattle prodded to the entrance to the small “Digby Beach”, where you access the water and swim 100m or so out to the swim start. As I was coming through the chute, I could see Corbin filming the athletes going into the water, so I gave him a big wave and thumbs up. For the next 10 minutes or so I would swim out to the start, stay about 10 meters back from the line and just wave to Dianne and Maddie who were also out on the pier watching. They could see me in the group as I had a distinctive Blue Ironman XC swim cap (hmmm, blue and ocean might not be so contrasting or distinctive) versus the green caps of my age-group wave.

The Swim – 1:23:40

To provide some perspective on the swim, I have 13 competition long-distance swims under my belt (all wetsuit swims) and they have generally been between 1:14 (Lake Placid this year) and 1:18. I have had one ocean swim at Ironman France, while all the rest have been freshwater. In kona, you are not allowed to wear a wet suit and the ocean can be much more unpredictable than the freshwater lakes that you typically swim in (although some of my practice swims in Lake Ontario can easily rival the chop of the Pacific Ocean). For this race day, it was only men (all the women and some men raced on Thursday) and we were the oldest age group racing on Saturday. The organizers had decided to seed us as the second last group to start with only the young bucks (18-29 year olds) behind us. This should have meant that the swim would have more open water space than usual (areas to just find your swim groove without worrying about other athletes crowding your space) and far less body contact –I really should not have been surprised that nothing could have been farther from the truth at a World Championship!! With almost 400 athletes aged 55-59 competing on the day, the water was churning. When the gun went off, there was barely room to breathe. I had positioned myself back of the start line (I am not a fast swimmer) and to the middle of the swim start buoys thinking it was the best line for the course (it seemed everyone who raced on Thursday started at the right start buoy). Clearly I was not alone as the kicking and slapping was incredible. This is made worse by the fact that you don’t have the padding of neoprene between you and that kick to the arm or shoulder or punch to the leg or slap to the head. This cleared up after about 300-400 meters only to happen again at irregular intervals around the course. The wave action seemed reasonable early but got rougher as the race progressed as the swells were building, or so it seemed to me – a novice ocean swimmer. I had been warned, by an 11 time Kona competitor and friend, that starting later meant that we were likely going to have adverse tidal action. Not having swum in different ocean conditions, I didn’t quite know what that meant or how I should plan for it when swimming.  For those of you who have swum 3.8 kms, you know it is a long way and I have to say when you look out to the turnaround boat far on the horizon, you wonder once again what you were thinking when you paid money to race Kona.

While the swells played a role and the body contact was a challenge, I actually felt like my pace was solid for a non-wetsuit swim. I had anticipated that if I could get to the turnaround boat by 40 mins, I would be happy and as I turned the right corner at the red buoy and the bow of the boat, I paused to look at my watch, I was 40:40 – so far so good.

The rest of the swim was a focus on swallowing as little salt water as possible, catch as many feet as possible (allowing you to swim faster with the same energy or swim the same speed with less energy expended) and do my best to not take more body blows as many of the young bucks were now overtaking us in their red swim caps. This swim is iconic, not just because of the start off of Digby Beach, but the finish along the pier, where millions of dollars of bikes sit waiting for their athletes to arrive. This is definitely memorable from watching years and years of tv footage. This time, was my time, and I would look up at the pier to see if my family was there cheering me in – not there. Ok maybe they were positioned just around the corner as the pier cuts back to the left – not there either.  Clearly I had forgotten that I told them not to wait for me at the pier but rather go up to the “hot corner” where we started out on the bike course.  Ok, I got to the beach, climbed those stairs and had a little fist pump celebration – check task 1 completed.

T1

I was going to take my time going through transition. I wanted to ensure that I was setting myself up for a positive experience. First – spend time under the freshwater hoses, Bill Best told me to get the salt water out of my hair so I didn’t sweat it into my eyes – done. Flush out the crotch so that we minimize the chafing on the bike and run – done. Spray the cool water on your body, to try and cool yourself down – done. Grab your cycling bag from a volunteer – smile and thanked them for being there. Get into the change tent – go pee, put on socks, calf sleeves, shoes, sunscreen the lower back, sunscreen the legs, the arms, the ears, the neck, put on my custom race top (thanks Fam)(I did not wear my race top under my speedskin during the swim as I found that I chafed under the arms during a practice swim – more evidence of not doing anything new on race day), put some Vaseline in the crotch area, eat a maple syrup gel, chase it with 250ml of water, put all my swim stuff back in the bike bag and go get my bike. Once I exited the tent, you run the rest of the pier and then to your bike where I loaded the nutrition into my race top, pulled on the helmet and started running with my bike. I smiled at and thanked as many volunteers as possible (they were easy to see all dressed in yellow, Dianne and the kids all volunteered at Thursday’s race) – I finally got to the mount line pulled to the right, jumped on the bike and now I was into the segment of the event that I enjoy the most!

The Bike – 6:14:11

Kona is renowned for a tough bike, the heat, the climbing and at times the unforgiving trade winds can wreak havoc on the cycling portion of this race. Again, my veteran racing buddy had warned that our later race start would mean that we would experience the worst of each of these conditions (of course the climbing would be the same). To provide perspective, my bike has always been my strongest discipline although there have been many occasions when pundits have suggested that I went out too strongly on the bike and that is what caused a collapse on the run. In training, I was posting long rides at approximately 30km/hour but in the more extreme Ontario heat that was dropping to 27-28km/hr. I would be happy with a ride of 6:15-6:45 – a wide gap but expected given the huge variance in conditions. Normally I would focus on power or watts, which in my case was a planned 185 for the front end and up to 200 if I was feeling good on the last 40km or so. However, as Matt Dixon of Purple Patch suggested to me, this race course makes a focus on power more difficult given the undulations and wind.

Once past the mount line for the bike, you ride 150M or so up the steep hill of Pilani drive where you make a left turn – dubbed the hot corner as you pass by it 6 times on the day – my whole family was there to welcome me with huge cheers – the biggest I would hear from anyone all day. It is an incredible lift to know that your whole team is there to support you in these types of efforts and while it was still very early, I knew I was finishing this race. After passing my family, you ride in a square to bring you back past the hot corner and do a little ride south before retracing your route back to Palani drive and some quick climbing to the iconic Queen K highway. Again my family was waiting for me as I climbed that hill giving me some big cheers, something that would keep me company for the next 5.5 hours before I would see them again.

The heat in Hawaii is unrelenting and while I believe Saturday was not as hot as it could be (Thursday’s race was probably hotter) it is still freaking hot. The sun just bakes you and there is little to no reprieve from trees, after all you are racing on lava fields!! Going into this race, the bike was a focal point for a few reasons. As I suggested earlier, heat has never been my friend. I suffered mightily in the Furnace Creek 508 (I should have known from the race title – duh), and I dnf’d Texas and Lake Placid, both very hot races. So my focus for Kona was to ensure that I was paying attention to my core body temperature by taking every opportunity to cool it down, ensure that my hydration and nutrition were supporting the demands I was putting on the body in the heat. So here was the plan for the bike: wear my regular cycling helmet rather than aero helmet as it comes with more ventilation and access holes to get cold water to my head. Carry insulated bottles to try and have access to colder water/gatorade. Drink a gatorade mix that had elevated sodium levels (660mg/700ml) at 1L/hour. Eat Maple Syrup gels with sodium every 40 minutes. Every aid station, I needed to do something – I had to make every one of those limited number of stations work for me on this race day. It mattered even more that I took the opportunity to hydrate, cool and feed at each station.  As I approached every aid station the routine was almost the same, I would open up my down tube polar bottle, stick the lid in my shirt. I would open the top of the speed fill drink bottle on my aero bars and pour in my pre-made pre-measured gatorade concentrate. As I entered the aid station, I would call out water and point to the first volunteer with a bottle, grab it, pour it into the polar bottle, add to the aero bar bottle; all the while rolling slowly through the aid station. I would have time to grab another water bottle, fill the remaining aero bottle and then douse myself with the rest of the water. On some occasions it was two bottles over my body.  This became my focus on execution.

One of the benefits of being old and being seeded near the back of the bus, was that you could actually race your race. In Ironman racing, you are not supposed to draft on the bike, which means your front wheel can’t be within 40 feet of the front wheel of the cyclist ahead of you. If you go into that “zone” you must pass the rider in front of you within 25 seconds and if that doesn’t happen, then you can risk getting a 5 minute “drafting penalty”. On this day, when I came into the bike transition, mine was one of the few still left on the pier, which meant I was going to riding for much of this race with very few athletes around me. This meant that I could race my race and I wouldn’t need to worry about packs of cyclists, I would be able to manage my passes strategically, I could manage heart rate and power without needing to take actions that were necessitated because others were being aggressive.

On this race course, there were many things to think about while you were out in the lava. Which way is the wind blowing (look at the grasses at the side of the road), how hard is the wind blowing (look at the ocean – are there white caps forming?) watch the cyclist ahead of me to see if they are getting pushed around, take advantage of the hills at the highway’s edge to drink and eat as you will have some relief from the wind and look at the surrounding mountains – where they form valleys will likely be the areas of greatest wind gusts. So between getting hydration, cooling, nutrition and understanding what was happening around you there was lots to keep your mind busy. Of course, there is stunning beauty within the lava fields, the ocean and closer to the turnaround of Hawi, the greenery of the start of the rain forest.

My bike was relatively uneventful, my speed going out to Hawi and the turnaround was hovering around 27km/hour and my nutrition and hydration plan was going well. I felt like I had energy and the temperature of my body felt reasonable. The cooling plan felt like it was working and importantly the sunscreen plan was also paying dividends (I applied sunscreen before I went to bed, when I got up and after the swim) – my body was not going to be fried, which meant I had a chance of performing. The ride up to Hawi is about 20 miles and it is mostly uphill. The wind felt like it was in our face, but I couldn’t see any whitecaps on the ocean to the west of us, so I knew it wasn’t a big wind. Watching the cyclists returning, I could tell their speed was high and so it felt like there was time available to be made up on the way home.

I made the turn at Hawi and stopped at the special needs station, I had packed an extra gel flask of maple syrup and a concentrated bottle of gatorade/sodium. I also packed some potato chips. I pulled over, methodically transitioned everything, had some chips, went to the porto potti and then was back on the road – probably 4-5 minutes of total stopping time, but again I felt like it was sowing the seeds of success for the next 85kms of the bike.

From here on, I was still very focused on cooling the body as we were in the heat of the day. While I had been aggressive with my hydration on the first half of the bike, I could feel my body was starting to resist taking in the same load and so I moved to more water than gatorade. My gels were also extended to just 2.5 over the last 3 hours. I felt good and continue to push my speed, moving the average from 27 to 29km/h – I wasn’t sure that with rolling hills going back to kona and changing wind directions, that I was going to be able to sustain the effort.

Getting back into town the route zigged and zagged behind the local Target store and you pass by the hot corner. Once again, the family was out waiting to cheer me on with signs and huge amounts of energy, something that would once again get me going as I headed out on the run. As I entered T2, I had the realization that I was “just a marathon away” from reaching a dream goal of mine. My total time to that point was almost 8 hours, which meant I had a maximum of 9 hours to complete a marathon. While it is a toss away line to suggest that most anyone should be able to walk 42.2kms in under 9 hours – strolling less than 5km/hour; I had seen first hand how hard things can get just 2 months prior if your mind and body quit.

T2

I spent T2 ensuring that once again I was setting myself up to finish. I changed into running shorts from my tri-kit shorts, I lubed up the crotch once again, put on some more sunscreen, new socks and sucked on ice. I also took a cold towel with me and rolled ice inside and slung it around my neck. Another gel before I left transition and 250ml of water. As I left transition, I filled my handheld bottle with gatorade and ice and off I went to run, jog, walk or crawl 42.2kms to the finish line.

The Run – 6:04:35

Now, in training I have never paced a run that would result in a marathon time of 6:04, that is just a long-time out on the road – . As my buddy Jeff Leisk suggests, it seems harder running 6:30/km pacing than it does 5:45s – so imagine how hard it must be to run 8:36/km – a snail’s pace!!

Well, I came out of transition and started the climb up Pilani to begin a 10k out and back section along the waterfront of Ali’i Drive. The family was once again right there, ready to cheer me on and my spirits were high. There is a ton of cheering going on in this section of the race – bars, food and shade are more readily available and you can see your athletes a few times. Again, got big hugs from my team – with Maddie suggesting that would be the only time she would give me a sweaty hug. For the next km or so I trundled along, giving smiles and getting cheers but increasingly feeling challenged and drained. Despite all the work that I had done to keep my body cooled, I could almost feel myself baking and just began slowing down (and that is something given how slow I was going already). I started to problem solve and felt like I need to go to water and access more ice. By about 5km, my walking stints were now 2 to 1 over my running stints, my persona had turned dark and it felt like I was in for another very challenging marathon. By km 7, I got the bright Idea of putting my upper body into the garbage cans filled with red bull, ice and water. The red bull was only important because it was being housed in the garbage cans filled with water and ice and that ice was not being consumed by athletes. So it was the perfect opportunity to cool the core. So at each aid station now, my process was to empty my handheld bottle of its contents, add one cup of water, two cups of gatorade and as much ice as I could jam into the bottle (of course the cubes never really fit so you definitely needed to argue with them to get them in), then I would find the red bull can and jam my arms in for a minute, then fill my hat with ice from the bucket and it was at this point that I exited the aid station – did you get all of that? Of course, this would mean that I was spending about 3.5-5 minutes or more at each station (my Garmin suggested an average of 4 minutes). How many aid stations you ask over 26.6 miles – 18! So that would suggest that I probably spent 60+ minutes dilly-dallying trying to beat the heat. By the way, I was still trying to cool myself at the last aid station at 25.1 miles.

By the time I was done 10 kms, I was back to the point in the course where athletes turn right to go to the finish line or turn left to do the out-and-back that I just finished. Boy does that feel awful even a bit sadistic. You know that finish line is about 500M away but you have another 32kms to “run”. Even more sadistically, given you have completed 10km (which you won’t repeat about 8km of it), you know that when you hit the halfway point of the run (21.1km) you will still be running AWAY from the finish line very likely in the pitch black of Kona evenings/night. Now, it was just about ensuring that I finished without major challenges. It was going to be about 16kms run out to the energy lab and I was secretly hoping I could get there before dark – HA, HA, HA – no chance. In Kona it is light out until the switch is turned off and then it is dark out. By about 6:20pm, it was quite dark, no cars to light the way and no street lights. Unlike every other ironman race I have competed in, there were no generator mobile lights on the course. It was just you and a light stick.

I finally got out to the natural energy lab – still not sure why they call it that, but I certainly didn’t get any energy from it. I came to the aid station and once again I thought that I should have a maple syrup gel to keep my energy up. Gel went in and I promptly headed for a lava rock to sit down and puke out all of the liquids in my stomach – been here, done this too many times!! Ohhh No, get it together Quentin, figure this out. Well, time to go to just water and nurse things back to life. I got back on my feet and started trudging along to the turnaround that would finally take me back to the finish. At that point I was passed by a guy with a headlamp! Brilliant, follow this guy to Mecca and he would light the way. So I got on my horse and my pace picked up to 7min kms, not much of a pace, but far better than walking. So from here till about 5km left, the routine was the same, I would hang on to him till we got to an aid station, I would bail to do the ice bath, ice in hat, fill bottle with cold water and stuff ice in the bottle – rinse and repeat. I would then get my pace and try to work back up to the guy with the light. During the periods when I lost him, I would be constantly negotiating with myself on my running effort. Ok, see that sign, when I hit that, then start running for 4 pylons, get to the 4^th pylon then negotiate another 2 pylons and so it went. There were large Hoka (sponsor) mile markers that were illuminated, those became easy marks to start my run or finish the running and start walking. I had one thing in mind…..just keep going don’t stop and lay down, don’t sit down at the side of the road, don’t let the darkness bring down the desire to finish – just FINISH!

By 5km remaining, I knew this was a done deal. I still couldn’t see Pilani Drive in the dark, but I knew it was a maximum of 40 minutes (yes I was still booking 8 mins/km). I also knew that when I turned right on Pilani and started down the hill, the energy levels with about 2kms left would be elevated and I would have crowds to cheer me on and my family would be waiting. As I made the left turn at Pilani, Austin was waiting for me with big open arms, I took a big hug from him and we began the fast walk to the finish line. It was a great feeling to know that there was nothing left but to soak in the finish chute energy, give as many people as possible a high five and ensure that I didn’t look down to turn off my watch when I went under the finish arch.

The finish line here is truly iconic with the biggest and loudest crowds I have ever experienced at an Ironman. To put it in context to the other major milestone event – the Norseman – there was a photographer and my support crew at the mountaintop finish line. Well, I made sure there were no other athletes coming at the same time, hoping that Mike Reilly would call me in, indeed as I stepped over the threshold, Mike Reilly announced “Quentin Broad, you are an ironman”! I looked right and saw the rest of my family come out to greet me and give me hugs – you know they love you when they give you hugs when you are hot and sweaty. After getting the hugs and some photos, it was time to get my medal, t-shirt and hat; and then go to the food tent. I was feeling a little woozy, so perched over a garbage can thinking I was going to lose my cookies again. The volunteer was rubbing my shoulders and my family was hovering in support.

There was one thing left to do! After grabbing a cold piece of pizza, taking two bites of an Eskimo pie (yes they were offering ice cream sandwiches), two sips of sprite, it was time to shotgun a beer with Austin. All week we had talked about this celebration and now it was time to deliver. We had planned to do it at the front of the hotel in front of the athlete name wall. On our way there, I met up with Bob Babbitt who gave me a congratulatory pic. We got to the spot on the wall where my name was and unfortunately an athlete was laying in front of our spot – so we asked him and his wife to move!  Austin carved out our holes in the Stella cans, handed me mine and said the tradition is to shotgun on one knee. I took two, and then we popped the top and the beer flowed. I have to say, that while I lost, I put on a good show and the beer stayed down. Of course, I then dropped to all fours – my ironman day complete.

Tags: #ironman, #ironmanWC, #kona, #Triathlon