Ironman Austria 2008: Nikola Tosic version
August 9th, 2008 by nikola
It has been a month almost after the race and I digested a lots of impressions and am finally ready to write a report. Ironman race reports can be as large as books so I have decided to summarize it in small sections to make it easy for me to write and for you to read.
Sleep during week before the Ironman
I went to bed at around 9pm and woke up at around 6am. I was pushing at 9 hours of sleep and sometimes even an hour in the afternoon. I would have been happier if I was alone during the last three days as the commotion of my family and girlfriend and friends was a distraction from focus and sleep. However, as always, it turned out great. I got more than nine hours of average sleep per day during the whole week.
Eating during the week before the race
I lost some 3kg during the 6 weeks before the race. I was at some 59kg three days before the race. I lost weight first during the Istria training camp (I ate enormous amounts of pasta and still lost a kilo due to hard training) and than switched to salads for dinner. One thing which is super which I did is drinking Coca Cola Zero - it did help me loose weight cause it is sweet and has no calories and is full of caffeine (helps fat burning a bit), however its main effect on my weight loss was that aspartame, being carcinogenic, makes me super sick and I loose appetite.
I feel guilty to write this as it might inspire some to do the same, but in the same time it is important to mention that it is super bad for health. I only drank few liters of this poison this year and it was an experiment - green tea on the other hand is more effect and healthy.
During three days before the race I upped my carbs quite a bit. It is questionable if I need to up the carbs at all as three days are more than enough to replenish the glycogen storage by eating normal but I felt insecure about experimenting with this and wanted to stick with what worked. I know some people who do not carboload at all and it makes sense but I will try this strategy on a smaller race first.
Race briefing and pasta party
Totally useless, horrible organization, no new information. Penalty was shortened to 4 minutes which was a clear sign to wannabe drafters that it is OK to draft. I could almost feel a wave of joy in the tent during the race briefing when a shorter penalty was announced. Clearly drafting offers much more gain over the penalty - some people get their results down by ore than 20 mins - so why would they care about a 4 min penalty draft. Penalty should be 30 mins, not only 4. Also the idea to make the regulations more soft is idiotic. Very disappointing management and organization from organizers.
I suggest avoiding the pasta party, it was loud, bad food and too much crowd for the tent (overselling of tickets). Bella Camerford and Stephen Bayliss were in the spotlight - why I do not know? Why are Brett Sutton clients or ex-clients regarded as super stars I have no idea. What magic do they poses that these organizers always love to put them in the show? There were another 20 athletes there who deserve more attention than these two for sure! Same happened in Ironman UK - Sutton’s athletes again are in the spotlight even with bad performances.
Horrible swim start
Since race briefing was crap no one really understood how the swim start works. I understood it only because I asked the referee at the start. We had to swim to the blue line in the water and wait for the start. We had a minute to get there and it was like 80-100m. I thought: I better sprint there if I am to take any decent position. Everybody else thought the same, but when I stopped to wait for the race start most people just went on - they thought the race started. Than I started my watch and that was it. I was told the gun went on when already a lot of people swam through the start.
The first basic element of the sport completion is the start - that we all start at the same point. This rule was already broken in the very first second of the race.
Swim
I had a very good swim. My results show 59 something but I did close to 58 mins. I swam 57 min in a pool few weeks earlier and that was not my max. I could have swam 56 maybe but I had a nice easy relaxing swim. My goal was to be a gentleman in the water and to get out warmed up and relaxed but still under an hour. I let people go buy, I did not rush at all, I made sure I did not bother anyone. It was an amazingly relaxed swim and I still was out at under 59. No huffing and no puffing. Great start!
Transition 1
Volunteers helped a lot! Great job with the T1! I saved at least a minute with their help. I got two girls to undress me and pack my stuff. I wish I had volunteers helping me like this every day of my life.
Bike clothes
I cycled in an Assos top with sleeves and a full zipper in front (easy on/off) as I decided to put all my food in the back pockets. I carried about 10 gels and 3 PowerBars. I also wore Specialized Road cycling shoes, not triathlon shoes, and this was not a problem for the transition. I did not have an aero helmet although I am thinking about one, I am not a fan but I will try it before I make a final decision. If nothing, they are good for sponsors and photos (that cool look).
Bike bike
I rode Specialized Transition aluminium with Dura Ace groupset and with Xentis mark 1 wheels. Good combination. I do not like carbon as I travel a lot and it can get damaged easily and I think it is super overpriced. I will ride carbon if I get it for free but I doubt I will buy it myself. It might be better than aluminium but Specialized Transition is a great bike and I do not think carbon can offer much more than this.
Wrong side helmet
In the first few meters people yelled at me as if my hair was on fire - I’ve had the helmet on backwards. I stopped to fix it. That was my first stop of several. Later on I lost all my spare tyres (I taped them to the seat and due to rain they fell off) so I stopped to see what happened and later stopped again to see if my tires were fine (paranoid).
Fucking drafters
I started the bike well but immediately I was passed by large groups of drafting triathletes. Imagine Tour de France style groups - 20-30 even more people. All in a huge bunch going 50+ kmh on flat and chasing each other on hills. I was super frustrated yet I had to keep breaking so I do not ge a penalty. Referees were often next to me but they never reacted to big groups - WTF! I was totally out of my mind. I wanted to quit the race and move to Xterra or ultra marathon or something. What kind of a sport competition allows this kind of behaviour? This is not a sport if rules are broken yet nothing is done. If this is corporate team building - OK - we can bend the rules a bit, but Ironman is a sport. You do not watch Olympic Games and see some guys swim 90m while some swim 110m. The rules are the same for everyone. This is the basics of sport yet Ironman Astria is not about that. It was clearly more about “lets not make waves for guys with 10k euro carbon bikes who want to go sub 9 hours”.
I had a horrible bike. Rain was annoying. I kept breaking not to be in groups. I think I am the only one sub 10 hours who actually followed the 15 second rule (15 secs to get out of the 10 m drafting box). I kept stopping for bullshit. Very bad bike. In training I did easy 5:15 and faster, now I finished at 5:23. I was emotionally drained.
Run clothes
I ran in a sleeveless running top and Asics DS Trainer shoes. Throughout the whole race I wear a De Soto cycling shorts with four pockets which are very good for the gels the final run. I put four PowerGels with caffeine in the T2 and I keep them for the later stages of the run.
Serbian Ironman Record
When I saw that I started the run at exactly 6:30 I realized I needed to run 3:07 or faster to break the Serbian Ironman Record. It is a funny record but it gave me motivation. For some reason I felt enormous confidence I would have no problems running this and much faster, I just needed to make sure nothing extreme happens.
I did get carried away a bit - I ran the first 10km in about 41-42mins and it felt super easy. I ate too many gels in the start - maybe 3-4 in the first 12km. I passed the half marathon point a minute or more under 1:30 but I started to feel the fatigue. It was too early so I got scared. I was thinking that if i avoid any accidents that I will be ok.
Run accidents
Accidents are something only us Ironman athletes know: I have hit about 2 or 3 people really hard, spectators that were running across or cheering their friends, I had to tie my shoelaces once, I had to stop at least 3-4 times to eat and drink cause volunteers on the run were a nightmare (think demoralized and tired with no clue what to do) and I even had to pass some idiot who rode a MTB in the transition.
The whole run is super slow and annoying: when you run close to the finish (this area is passed some four times) you have to go through a super narrow maze of extreme curves, sometimes a 180 degree angles. All packed with hundreds of other competitors! Most of the run is very crowded and it is obvious the run course needs to be changed, there is absolutely no space to run here.
I passed one person per every 100m! In most cases I had to go in the oposite direction and hope not to hit the people coming at me. It is just a huge mess. If any marathon runner would ever do this kind of a marathon they would run at least 5-10 mins slower cause these are ultimate extreme conditions.
Last 10km
After a while I could not eat from about 10 gels I ate so far on the run and some 10 gels I ate on the bike, plus 3 Powerbars. This was dangerous, I needed to eat more more more. That is how I work - I need a lot of sugar and caffeine. I decided to try and not eat for the last 10km but in one tunnel I got a bit dizzy and than at one curve I almost lost it. I was running on super empty and very very close to the edge. At this point I will either have a great result or I will fall somewhere and wake up three hours later in an ambulance. I needed to force myself to eat.
I stopped and had coke and one more gel and water. It helped. I had some 8-9km to go.
Brad Storm
I saw Brad Storm was a bit ahead. I passed him in Ironman UK only few km before the finish - he had a horrible race. I guess again he had a bad race and it motivated me to catch him. It was only something to do, something to focus.
This is second time I have chased Brad Storm and both times it helped me a lot. I know he is super strong but when he has a bad race he helps me a lot: as a carrot for a donkey.
I passed him quickly. Maybe another 6-7km to go. If I kept a decent pace I will for sure do a new Serbian Ironman Record. Again with this record, its a silly slow record, but believe me, any number, no matter how silly it is, was very welcome as a form of motivation.
The Final Chase
At some 3-4 km to go I passed some guy and suddenly - a surprise! - he started to follow me. I have not see who this is, I only heard his steps. In one millisecond I thought: GREAT, someone to race with till the end; and FUCK, we have more than 3 km to go, we will torture each other next 15 mins!
I sped up and guy followed, than he attacked and I added a bit more. We went like this on and on. I just listened to his steps. It was actually super fun. Than we entered the last 1500m and it was not possible to pass here as it was full of stupid curves and too narrow and full of slower runners. Again what a disaster that the finish of a race is so impotent!
In the last 500m I let the guy pass me, I wanted to make him feel confident a bit and relax. He did pass me by maybe 15-20m and relaxed. I waited. In the final stretch I attacked. He looked left I passed right. He was too weak to respond. I kept going. I was going super strong. I saw some guy just about to cross the finish like and I was only a bit away. I though: Hey maybe this guy is in my age group, I better catch him. I added more and he saw me. He made a face as if a devil chased him for his soul. We fought for the finish line. We actually pushed each other. I used the last atoms of energy to get that one second ahead of him. I won.
No heart rate on the run
I ran without a heart rate monitor strap. I ran completely on how I feel and it worked great. I did not care about my pace, I only looked at it to check if all is ok. This was an experiment I made and it worked out well. However I would only suggest it to Ironman athletes with some experience in racing as for many this does not work well. Especially beginners and slower runners need heart rate to pace them.
Next time I would like to race only with a stopwatch - heart rate is useless to me for most of the race as I usually go over what my coach tells me to do. He is not wrong in his estimates but estimates are one thing and race is something else, I am excited, it is hot or cold, I ate super sweet or a lot of caffeine or not etc… I need to improvise and many times heart rate is not correct.
Drafting
Ironman Austria drained me emotionally. It is the only race after which I did not want to talk to any competitors, I saw them all as drafters and cheaters. I saw some Italian guys in the restaurant that night and I did not want to say hi because I saw a bunch of Italians drafting. I just sat like 2 meters from them, angry.
Ironman Austria is not sport. It is obviously some form of entrainment for yuppies, for German/Austrian/Swiss upper middle class. There are guys there who come with 10 000 euro bikes and they draft. They actually practice drafting and team riding days before! This puts in question the quality of Kona qualification - if this is the kind of people who get to the World Championships than what the hell is this about.
I like Ironman as a sport but I think WTC should check out what these guys in Austria are doing, seems their licence is used in a bit of a bad manner. When Mark Allen was helping with organization I know everything was perfect, now, in 2008, it is a mess of a race. It sells out due to the brand, guys are cashing on the legacy created by Peter Reid, Mark Allen etc… but the quality of the race is a disaster. Every aspect of it was not about sports but about making guys with money happy.
Ironman Austria is a euro yuppie team building project - it is hardly a sport. If you ever meet anyone who qualified for Kona in Ironman Austria 2008 than be sceptical. It does not mean that they did draft but there is a chance they are cheaters.
I had my best time and my worst placement ever, my 160 something position is not real, even with a bad bike I should have been in top 100 and top 15-20 in my age group.
However I do not care any more about this, at least not so much as during the days after the race. I will give it a try as a PRO which I think will distance me from this age group yuppiness a bit.
Friends
Ironman Austria was after all a great experience for me, I met with some very cool people and met some old friends. For this the whole trip was worth it. I am focusing on the sport aspect because this blog is about sports mostly, but Ironman is in my life not because of the sports and results, but because of the life experience, about meeting people, good food, nice locations, happiness.
Klagenfurt is a great place, our hosts were awesome, Milos Kostic was so inspiring, my family and my girlfriend and my coach were there to support me. I enjoyed all this so much. Drafting is only one bad drop in a pool of really good experiences.
Next
My next race is Ironman Florida as a PRO… 
