A confidence builder

On Saturday, I planned the last crazy ride of the Ironman season, before I begin my taper.

It included the following hills:

Inglewood
Ames Lake
Duthie Hill via 40th and Issaquah-Fall City Rd (note that there's more climbing than shown on the map)
Lakemont
Montreux
Zoo Hill

The total climbing for the entire route was around 5,000 feet. Is that a lot? It sure felt like a lot.

Anyway, I had a fall early on, just about 8 miles in. Danielle and I had stopped at a bathroom and we were just getting ready to ride again and as usual, I was talking. She turned to listen and kind of stopped her bike in front of mine - and I couldn't clip out fast enough on the side my bike was leaning towards. So I fell and hit my hip, elbow and wrist - only the wrist hurt after a few minutes, but it still hurts today. (But I can type, so it can't be that bad.)

I won't lie: the hills hurt (except Ames Lake; that one isn't too bad). I almost broke out in tears on Montreux - for some reason, that feels like the hardest hill around to me, and I did take a little rest by circling around a side street before continuing up. I didn't stop the bike, though.

And again, on Zoo Hill I was close to tears when I fell again - I was going something like 3.8 mph at the very steepest part - a 20% grade. Last time I did it, it was very early in the morning, so I didn't have a problem taking the lane. But it's a super-tight switchback and there had been a number of cars in both directions; I was afraid to take the lane. So instead, I stayed to the right - and due to the unevenish pavement, ended up needing to go pretty much straight up a bump. Maybe on a mountain bike I would have been able to do it, but with my regular-double gearing on this bike I just couldn't turn the pedals at all, and fell over. I was able to unclip and catch myself, but I got off the bike completely, sat on the guardrail, and just tried to pull myself together. My heart rate OFF the bike was 170; I could feel it thumping in my chest.

I realized I needed to move. If a car came around the corner really tightly, he wouldn't see me until he hit my bike, or me. But the road was too steep for me in my weakened state to start pedaling again. I walked the bike up the road a few feet, then got back on.

The rest of that climb was better: the road straightens out, and the only issue you have is that you can see these hills cascading up. But there are short flat or even downhill sections between each rise, so I kept telling myself, "Just focus on the next part, then you get a rest. Don't look all the way up."

And it worked. But at the top - Danielle was already there, on the phone - I heard barking. Oh, no! At the house right at the top of the hill, in the driveway, were two loose dogs. I freaked, said to Danielle, "I can't stop! I'm still going to ride!" and I rode a few hundred feet further, hoping the dogs would stay in their yard. They did.

After that we were done with the major climbing and had a three-mile descent. Somewhere along the way I regained my happiness - and even got completely elated. I did it! I didn't quit, I didn't talk myself out of some of the climbing, and I still felt okay! In fact - the pain I'd been feeling in my knees when I was climbing went away. I didn't even feel it on the little climbs we had after all the big ones to get to our friend's house for a party (our hubbies and kids were already there - so we had good incentive to finish, but also good incentive to quit early, which we didn't).

So I feel like I've gained a lot of confidence that I can do the Ironman distance and hills. The question that remains is, can I do them fast enough? I'm extremely worried about not making the bike cutoff. If anything goes wrong, that's it for me - I'm thinking it might take me a full eight hours to do the bike, maybe more, and I know it will take 1.5 hours for the swim. So that's 9.5 hours optimistically, without transition times, and I only have 10.5. There's no room for error.

So...any Ironman Canada veterans out there - what can you tell me about the course? A co-worker of mine said he was able to spin, not grind, on the climbs. Is that true, or is he crazy-strong? (Actually, he is crazy-strong...but I think he knows my ability and I'm not sure he'd mislead me.)

I suppose in a sense it's good to worry: you've got to respect the distance. I wonder if I'm in over my head, though...or underestimating my ability.

Oh, and because it's Monday, I will write about today's workout: six laps in the lake, 1 hour 13 minutes. I hate swimming, but it was totally fine and I definitely feel confident about being able to go that distance in the required time limit.