The Race

Up at 4 . Slept surprisingly ok till 2 then a waking sleep, dozing. Neck the obligatory kilo or 2 of porridge , make up the drinks bottles. Just taking 2 high concentrate high 5 4 plus one. That’ll leave one cage for water from the feed stations . So i’ll always have a cold one on board. My ‘made up’ two will provide food rather than hydration for the most part. Although in an hour they will be as warm as a cup of tea. When you are dehydrated warm fluids are absorbed a lot faster than cold anyway. Get all my gear together. and walk into the pre dawn tropical night. The street lights give off a shimmering lonely aura down a near empty Ali I drive. Only a few nervous tri athletes shuffle like an apology down the side walk. Low murmurs in sheltered tones drift across the lonely still airwaves ,hushed and hurried talk of what the day will bring.
Arrive at transition. Is like an explosion of movement and colour but the sound is always the same. Brightly coloured , normally exuberant people coast like ghosts across the silent tarmac. Its Iron man race morning. Anticipation and fear weigh heavy in the pre dawn light. Its time for the talking to stop and the action to begin. Its Show Time.

Find my bike, bottles in, finding a pump was easy and both tyres are still up which is always a bonus. Double check everything run through the entrance exit ways through your head. Now the wait.The wait. If its a minute or an hour its the longest wait there is. Try to switch off. More people pouring in now. I find a tree to sit under and watch the sun come up over the ocean. People are barely registering as they drift in and out of my field of vision. One of them may have spoken to me a minute ago. I’m not sure. This is full pre occupation. Here but not here at all.The full thousand yard stare. Wandering through the maze of thoughts in your mind of the next few hours. Trying for some semblance of order. What brought you here, who got you here and where are they now so you can give them a good beating.

A Croatian in a red tri suit is pacing up and down in front of me.Like a caged gorilla he walks up and down around and around. I’m vaguely bemused by this, what can only be described, as a show of aggression. I do muse over what i can say to him to set him off. Wouldnt take much by the looks of him. What would be the perfect trigger to make this guy snap? I think better of it .He’s a big unit and i’m not in the mood for a foot race right now.

The gun for the pros goes off. Its time. Swim skin on and the dead man walking gait of short sliding steps of the condemned towards your start.Into the melee of deorganised and crowded people. Like worker bees swarming towards the abyss.

Now there is nothing else as you swim out towards the sea start. You find your spot tread water.The tropical early morning light glimmers across the ocean. A shimmering greyness that promised today will glow hot. Birds sweep and flow in the aerial playground above you looking for breakfast. The sharks out in the bay hopefully arent doing the same.

Jostling / I’m half way across the row 6 rows back. No point in being at the front here everyone is good. Everyone has qualified. Well apart from Ramsey who just paid his way in and has the nerve to be in the same stretch of water of all the other athletes who have sweated blood and sacrificed much to be here. I dont know how he can do that, I find it almost offensive.Insulting . Still i find almost everything offensive. lol

The tide seems to be pushing you forward or it could be the current created by the other competitors as they swim out towards you. Still its getting edgy.

2 minutes to go. Some guy with a loud hailer is shouting something. He’d have to be standing next to me for me to hear it. We start to bunch up . The anticipation now is electric the atmosphere highly charged.Everyone just wants the go go go. Time to rip shit up

And so It begins.