My Ironman Waco 70.3 Triathlon

Hello friends! Ironman Waco 70.3 is in the books! A lot of things went exactly according to plan for my race, and some (very important) things didn’t… but overall, it was an absolutely fantastic race experience. Read on for the whole recap…

Triathlon Training

Mark and I have been training for this event since February of this year. It’s our second 70.3 triathlon, and second time to do this particular race in Waco. The distances for a “70.3” are: 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, and 13.1 mile run. Add up these numbers and what do you get? … Yup! 70.3. When we decided to train for the first one in 2024, these distances seemed daunting, and I guess they still do in a way. But the training plan progressed us from an “average fitness level” starting point, to being fairly confident that we could do the whole event in about 7 hours on race day. At the beginning, we were able to swim about a mile (1600m) with rests, bike 1 1/2 hours at an easy pace, and run about 30 minutes- not all on the same day. Week by week, our distances, speed, long workouts, combined workouts (bike + run in the same workout) and overall training volume increased slowly but steadily, until by mid-summer, we were able to bike for 3 1/2 hours (about 95k) followed by a 30 minute run on Saturdays, and then run for 2 hours (about 17k) on Sundays. Weekday workouts were shorter (about an hour) and designed to improve speed and technique. Our overall weekly workout time started at about 5-6 hours a week, and built up to 11-12 hours a week at the height of training. Then about a month before the race, we reduced our training volume back down to 6-8 hours a week, in order to keep the fitness we’d built, but shed the fatigue so we could come into race day feeling fit and ready.

Triathlon Nutrition

Of course, nutrition plays a huge role in long-distance triathlon success. It’s important to eat enough, and enough of the right foods, both on a daily basis as well as during and after workouts. On heavy training days, I burned close to 2000 calories in my long bike+ run workout, followed by 1000 calories in the next morning’s run. This is in addition to calories needed for recovery, as well as for everyday life, bringing the weekend average requirement to about 3200 calories per day. During these long workouts, I took in fluid and carbs to replace about half my expenditure, but there was still a lot to make up. You can imagine how much time I spent preparing food and eating, especially on weekends. Fortunately, I love doing both! During the week, when workouts were shorter, I still made sure to consume enough overall calories to support my training (about 2300-2500 per day), with plenty of protein to help me recover, carbs to fuel the workouts, and fats to keep me healthy and make it all taste yummy. You can see some examples of what I ate during high-volume training here.

Pre-Race

Mark and I arrived in Texas four days before the race. After spending a few days with family in Austin, we headed up to Waco on Friday before the race on Sunday. I wasn’t feeling well on Wednesday and Thursday… dodgy stomach, really fatigued, and slight headache. I was hoping it was due to traveling 32 hours through 13 time zones, but I felt like it was more than that. I spent a lot of time sleeping those first couple of days, and thankfully by Friday I was feeling better. Not great, but definitely better, and able to do a short ride on the race course. Saturday was a busy day with a short practice swim, buying merch in the athlete’s village, attending the athlete’s brief, checking our bikes into the transition area, and of course CARB LOADING!

Carb Loading

I never really appreciated carb loading before I started doing long-distance endurance events. My “carb load” for bodybuilding events was only relative in comparison to the tiny amounts of carbohydrate I’d been eating during the cut. But this type of carb loading is the real deal: you can maximize glycogen stores in your muscles by taking in 8-12 grams of carbohydrate per kilogram of body weight for 24-36 hours before an endurance event. That’s a LOT of carb! My goal was to consume 415 grams on Friday (7g/kg) and 590 grams on Saturday (10g/kg.) This put me eating close to 3000 calories on Saturday, 70% of it from carbohydrate. I planned out in advance exactly what I would eat, because it’s tricky to get that many carbs without getting too much fat or fiber. So I was not eating Oreos and buttered biscuits here, folks! Instead, my carb loading foods consisted of: flavored instant oatmeal, jello, applesauce, canned peaches, white bread, white rice, Cocoa Krispies, sports drinks, gummy candy, cranberry juice, jam, pasta with low-fat marinara, and rice pudding. This certainly wouldn’t be healthy on a regular basis; however, for 36 hours ahead of a long race, it was exactly what I needed. I can tell you though, I was really craving vegetables by the end of all this!

Race Morning

Sunday morning came early, but fortunately Mark and I were still a bit jet-lagged, so we were asleep by 7:45pm the night before and actually got a pretty decent night’s sleep by 4am. My stomach was blessedly (mostly) calm, and I felt excited and ready to go. I ate my race-day breakfast of 2 packs of instant oatmeal with a few Honey Nut Cheerios sprinkled on top, a banana, coffee, and 500ml of Liquid IV for hydration. Then I got dressed and ready to head out to the transition area to set up my own personal area under my bike with everything I would need to change from swim to bike (T1) and bike to run (T2.)

As I finished setting up my area, I did one final check on my bike’s shifting components (I have electronic shifters, which are super cool and a dream to use… but they do need charging.) I had charged the derailleur batteries fully the day before, so I knew I would be good to go. BUT. I failed to check the controller batteries (located near my hand brakes) and guess what was low?? Yup, the left controller battery… less than 10% juice. I was kicking myself for not checking them on Friday or Saturday; however, these batteries should last for 2 years, and I had just replaced them 2 months ago. But, it was still my mistake and one I won’t make again. (Another mistake- not keeping spare batteries on hand! And even if I’d had one, it would have been difficult to change in the dark transition area that morning.) So as we walked up to the swim start, I was feeling a bit nervous about how many shifts I had left, and made a game plan to stay in a middle gear pretty much the whole ride and shift as little as possible. This wouldn’t be ideal by any means… but it would be way better than getting stuck in either the hardest gear (ask me how I know!) or the easiest gear at some point in the ride, and have to finish it out in that gear. With that in mind, off I plunged into the swim… 1.2 miles down the Brazos river.

The Swim

The swim went really well in the sense that I didn’t panic at all… this is a pretty common occurrence in the beginning of an open water race where the water is dark and people are thrashing around with no awareness that they might be kicking or grabbing you. I felt calm, but it was still difficult to navigate through the heavy traffic at the beginning of the race. I thought it would thin out and I could settle into my stroke, but it never really did, probably because this year I chose to swim close to the marker buoys rather than take the longer path on the outside. I might do this differently next time, as I think the time I saved being on the inside was wasted by having to constantly adjust my stroke for the other swimmers jockeying for position all around me. The constant attention to positioning and sighting made the swim go by really fast, though! And when I looked at my watch getting out, it seemed like I had finished a bit faster than I did last year (46 minutes vs. 47:45 last year.) By the way, my goals for this year were (in order of importance): 1) FINISH! 2) beat my overall time from last year, 3) break 7 hours (last year’s time was 7:01:30), and then if all went really well, 4) do the run in 2:24 (last year it was 2:40), which would put me finishing in about 6:45 or less. I came out of the swim feeling happy and energetic.

Transition #1 (T1)

The first transition (T1) is looooong… after getting out of the water, we have to run up a pathway from the river to the street, cross the road, and run another little way into the large transition area. It was about 700m total. But I jogged the whole way, switched to my bike gear as quickly as possible, swigged some water, and made a quick stop at the porta-potty. Last year I spent almost 12 minutes in T1, but this year I was in there for less than 10.

The Bike

I knew, getting onto the bike, that I had to be really careful about shifting. Luckily the course is relatively flat and gains only 400m over the whole 56 miles. There are two rises that are long and a bit more steep, but nothing like the hills I trained on all summer in Steamboat. So I felt cautiously optimistic that even if I didn’t have full shifting ability, I could still have a good ride and not completely destroy my legs for the run. But about halfway through, I really felt the fatigue building up. Those two little rises would have felt like nothing in the proper (low) gear, but riding them several gears too high made my cadence too low and forced me to really push the power to get to the top. This meant I was passing people the entire way up these long pulls, but I knew I would pay the price later. At the halfway mark, I decided I needed to pull back and lower my power output as much as possible to have any chance of a decent run. Fortunately this came at a point where there were only downhills or (mostly) flat sections left. I didn’t even pedal the downhills, I just gave my legs a break and coasted. I wasn’t in the proper (highest) gear anyway so couldn’t have caught the pedals if I’d wanted to. This strategy worked well and I was able to decrease both my power and my heart rate on the second half of the ride. My legs were still too fatigued, though, and starting to cramp before the end of the ride. But my overall speed was faster than last year and I pulled into T2 with a bike split of 3:09 (last year was 3:11.)

Transition #2 (T2)

T2 was great, although I felt a bit challenged mentally due to fatigue. As I was heading for the exit to the transition area, I asked a race volunteer if it looked like I had everything I needed for the run. She quickly looked me up and down, and answered with lightning speed, “Hat, shades, race number, gels… CHECK! You’re good to go!! GOOD LUCK!!” She was so encouraging that I sailed out of T2 with fresh energy and a smile on my face. I was actually super speedy in T2 this year- 6:15 vs 9:45 last year. So by this time I’d built up a lead on last year’s time of about 9 minutes, which was good because I didn’t think running a 2:24 was going to be possible the way my legs were feeling. When my brain and body are tired, I can amuse and distract myself by doing math in my head, and I calculated (very slowly) that I could if I could run the half marathon in anything faster than 2:48, I would hit my first three goals… 1) finish, 2) beat my time from last year, and 3) break 7 hours.

The Run

The first part of the run went really well. Although I had a few initial leg cramps coming out of T2, they dissipated and I was able to run at my goal pace pretty comfortably for the first 5k. I thought to myself, wow, yay, maybe my legs are not as bad off as I thought they were. But then by about 8k (5 miles), I really started struggling with leg cramps in every muscle of both legs, and my pace fell off significantly. It was also really hot- 89F/32C when I started the run. I didn’t feel dehydrated, but I think the heat kept me from absorbing as much fluid and nutrition as I would have otherwise. But mostly I think it was the fatigue from the bike that was coming back to bite me (literally!) on the run. Despite all of this discomfort, I was really enjoying myself! The crowd in Waco is fantastic! The run course is packed with spectators cheering and shouting encouragement to athletes, no matter if you’re who they came to see or not. A woman I didn’t even know shouted me out by name- she was apparently looking up racer’s numbers to find their name and call out encouragement. Amazing. The volunteers at the aid stations (one every mile) also kept me going. These lovely people are standing out in the heat for hours… handing out gels, water, and sports drink, dousing runners with a spray hose, scooping ice into our hands and hats, and just generally being encouraging, amazing cheerleaders. And it’s not like I’m blazing through anywhere near the front of the pack when things are still interesting for the volunteers… I’m plodding along in the last third of the pack, just struggling to survive. So it wouldn’t surprise me at all if by the time I pulled up, there was nothing left but a cup of lukewarm water handed off by a dehydrated and bored volunteer. But that was not the case- each aid station was truly a well-stocked, energetic oasis that kept me going.

I can say this especially about the aid station at mile 8 (12k), because my intestines decided they wanted to get in on the cramping fun. I had staved it off for about a mile and a half, and ran past the previous aid station wondering if I should stop, but figured I could make it to the next one. So by the Mile 8 aid station, I knew I had to stop, versus taking the risk of trying to push on to the next one and having an emergency situation halfway between. Boy, I am so glad I made this decision! I darted into the nearest porta-potty, grateful that it was 1) relatively clean, and 2) had toilet paper. I don’t think my intestinal issue was specifically nutrition related. I had a good race nutrition plan that I’d tried and tested with good success in several training sessions. I more think it was due to the little virus or whatever I was fighting off earlier in the week. I was just so thankful it wasn’t worse. But time keeps ticking while you’re stuck in the loo, and my watch confirmed that I was in there a long time… five full minutes. But there was nothing I could do except wait for my stomach to settle down. It finally did, and I was on my way. Thankfully I felt so much better afterwards and didn’t have any more stomach issues. And, I was still able to take in gels and fluids for the rest of the race- good thing because it was so hot and I still had a long way to go.

The next mile or so was great after my little stop, partly because my stomach felt better, and partly just for the long rest! But the following 2 miles (16-18k) brought back debilitating leg cramps and a huge amount of suffering. I still had so far to go and I was running (if you can still call it that!) so slowly, because I kept having to stop and stretch out the cramps. With 3k (~2 miles) to go, I knew I still had a small chance to come in under 7 hours, but it would require really pushing through the suffering and not stopping anymore. Thankfully a fellow athlete caught up to me and we decided to pool our suffering and bring the run into the finish together. It was her first 70.3 and she was in new territory by this point. I remember this particular point from last year when you’re just wondering, how much longer do I have to hurt in order to finish?? So we started chatting, and it distracted us both from our pain. She was keeping a faster pace than I was though, so I urged her to go ahead and push to the finish.

The Surprise

By this time I had less than 1k to go. I was only looking as far ahead as my next few strides would take me. I knew I would finish, but I was still hurting, and just concentrating on every step. Then, as I rounded a corner that brought the bridge to the finish line in sight, my eyes landed on something that my brain could not comprehend.. a sign that read, “LWINS for the WIN!” I thought, “LWIN?! …Wait, that’s MY name!!” (Yes, mental function slows waaaay down by this point in the race.) Now, Theda and Sara live in Fort Worth, and Mark and I were not expecting them to come down to Waco for the race. So my brain had a hard time processing why on earth someone would be holding a sign with my name on it. Then my eyes landed on the someones… Theda, Sara, and Alejandro! They were screaming and shouting and laughing and cheering for me as I shuffled up the path. They saw me before I saw them, and Sara captured my reaction on video… there’s a distinct moment where you can see the dawn of recognition hit my face. When my fatigue-addled brain finally put it together- MY KIDS ARE HERE!!!- I felt adrenaline shoot through my whole body. In my mind, I leaped and yelled and screamed. In reality, leaping was far beyond my abilities… but you can see the joy pour across my face.

Seeing them standing there with their sign, cheering and shouting for me, absolutely flooded me with energy, and I didn’t have a single cramp after that. At this point I only had a few hundred meters to the finish line. Ironman Waco must have the best finish line experience in the country- it’s at the end of an historic suspension bridge and absolutely packed with cheering spectators. Time slowed down as I ran those last 100 meters across the bridge, all the pain of the race melting away and leaving only pure joy. The kids had hustled up to be part of the screaming crowd on the bridge, and cheered me all the way to the finish line. It was truly a fantastic end the race.

The Finish

After crossing the finish line and smiling for the photo, I hit “End” on my watch and gratefully came to a halt. Another amazing volunteer gave me an ice-cold bottle of water and my finisher’s medal, and then held me steady while she removed the timing chip from my ankle. I then shuffled to the finisher’s photo booth and proudly held up my medal. It was only when I made it to the recovery tent, collected my pulled pork sandwich (never has anything tasted so delicious!), and gingerly lowered myself into a chair, that I had the chance to look down at my watch.

TOTAL TIME: 7:01:29

The Analysis

Oh my goodness. Sooo close… again!!! I did beat last year’s time by AT LEAST ONE SECOND (Garmin says 20 seconds, and official results say one), so I achieved my first two goals (the second one just barely!) But my other goals will have to wait. My run split was almost exactly 2:49, and I had needed it to be anything less than 2:48 to break 7 hours. But at this point, I was just so happy to have finished under difficult circumstances, and to see the kids, that I felt nothing but joy and satisfaction in my race. As Theda pointed out, “Mom, last year you ran 7:01 with everything going right, and this year you ran 7:01 with so many things going wrong.” So true, and made me feel a lot better about “not improving” this year. My mindset is that I always want to keep improving, which I think should always manifest in a better end result. But sometimes, improvement isn’t shown in the overall result, but can be found in little and big things along the way… a strong, calm, faster swim despite the congested swim course, a positive mindset and faster bike leg even with an equipment problem, thankfulness and joy on the run even when my body wasn’t cooperating, a good nutrition plan that kept me safe & healthy in the 92 degree heat, and a strong mental game that allowed me to not only not give up, but also to truly enjoy the race. And I am sooo proud of Mark for absolutely crushing his time from last year by almost 20 minutes! He has to juggle training with work and travel, and I applaud him for his dedication and perseverance in training, as well as his mental toughness during the race. Well done!

My sub-7 goal is still out there, as is a sub-2:30 run split. There are definitely some things I will do differently next time: most importantly, check my shifter batteries! But also, maybe re-evaluate my bike pacing even under ideal circumstances. I could probably pull back on the bike a bit in order to save my legs for the run. And although my running definitely improved over the year, I had an injury mid-September which prevented me from doing some of the longer, race-specific workouts properly. I probably lost some leg conditioning because of this and that played into the cramps I had on race day. I had a similar injury at a similar time in 2024, so I think it’s worth looking at my overall training plan for next time. And of course, I’ll plan to “not be sick” the week before the race, so I won’t have to spend five minutes in the potty. Hahaha. This is a great reminder for me that not everything is in my control. But I’m so thankful to God, who is in control, for a safe, joyful, amazing experience at Waco 70.3. Cheers, friends!