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Ford Ironman U.S.A, Lake Placid - 23rd of July 2006Back In The U.S.A!Ford Ironman U.S.A, Lake Placid - July 23rd 2006 Dear Sponsors and Friends Well I have just completed Ironman U.S.A in Lake Placid. I arrived in New York on the Tuesday before the race from France after a long Customs line of over 2hrs I had missed my connection flight to Lake Placid and the next plane was delayed and didn't leave until 10.30pm so got in very late.  I was really happy that the weather was hot as I had come from a very hot French summer I had had a few problems in June with races so I was hoping to put that behind me and really go for it here at Ironman U.S.A. The Pro Men's field was awesome and I was looking forward to mixing it up with Victor Zyemtsev (Ukraine) Rutger Beke (Belgium) and Tom Evans (Canada). As the week went on the Weather got colder and wetter I was not liking it and hoping for a fine day on Sunday.Race day came around and it was pouring rain in the morning and very cold not my ideal race situation but I was hoping for good legs. The water was super warm so I opted for a short sleeve wetsuit which I think was the right choice as I was worried about overheating. I had a great start and jumped onto Jan Sebasan's feet. He kept surging and I was struggling to hold onto him then Tom Evans came around me with a high burst of speed and jumped onto Jan's feet. I was comfortable there for 200 – 300 metres then just before the first turn I couldn't hang on any more and a gap opened up! I swam the rest of about 2500 metres on my own so that was a little bit of a bad start. I got on the bike and felt pretty good and could see Tom and Jan on the big hill climb out of town so thought I was going ok. The hard part was to eat or get any gels in as they were solid because of the cold so it was hard to stay on my nutrition plan. At about 50km on the bike I got caught by Rutger, Victor and Luke we were losing time to Tom but it was good to have other pace makers. I had a really bad patch on the bike at 80km and got dropped by the group. I think Rutger had put the hammer down. I was then all on my own again and things stayed the same as I rode really well in the last lap and came home very fast so was happy about that and just stayed comfortable and coming into transition I could see Luke McKenzie so was hoping to catch him quickly and run with him but he was running out like the race was 21km not 42km so he put time into me I stayed with my pace around 2.55-2.56 Marathon pace and caught him before the 21km turn around. I was really feeling good and making up time on Rutger I may have got a little carried away as I must have tried to lift my pace and with 8miles left I threw up really violently and that was it. I lost my legs and I was walking at 4 miles to go and when Andriy passed and I tried hard to get myself back together but it just wasn't happening. I was hope that the finish line was already here. Then I didn't even see Mike Neil as he flew past me with less than 2 miles left to go that was gutting to fall out of the top 5. Some day's it just doesn't happen and today was one of those Days!!! Race Results:
Thank you to my sponsors for there continued support and all the cool new gadgets they are sending me for Hawaii I know that they will do the trick!! Kind Regards - Bryan Rhodes |
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