Finding myself in 70.3 miles

It may not seem like much, in and of itself.

A mere 70.3 miles.

Swim. Bike. Run.

I still don’t know how I finished. I’m not quite sure if I fully believed that I would.

Standing on that shore, looking at the ocean waves at dawn, I have never felt so unaware of what I was about to do.

Yeah, I can swim, I bike pretty good, and well I think I can finish a half marathon? But this? This is something else entirely.

We darted into the water on fresh legs. The sand beneath our toes, the water devouring our feet, our ankles, our shins, our knees, our thighs, our hips and finally we dove into the waves. The cold water engulfed my body as the wetsuit worked its magic to slowly heat up the water next to my skin.

I was too terrified to ever feel the cold. The waves were too strong to make sense of.

“GOING UNDER” someone shouted.

I don’t know how many feet above our heads it was, but there it was, the white cap wave. A rush of water like you’ve never felt before.

Breathe.

My goggles disappeared. My whole game plan was gone. How can I see without them? Here comes another wave.

Close eyes. Dive under.

Breathe.

I don’t know how long it took me to realize that my goggles were actually just around my neck. I put them back on.

More waves. Now foggy goggles because everything was wet.

I saw someone flip over on their back to face the waves a little bit differently, so I tried it. It was a little easier to breathe. So I just kicked with all my might.

The waves got a little easier over time, but my breathing hardly slowed down. I was trying to sight and kept getting lost. I was still on my back and hyperventilating. I don’t know why I couldn’t breathe. But I just kept floating, kept kicking. Each swell brought a new wave of anxiety, too.

Just keep breathing. Just keep kicking.

I almost missed a buoy and had to circle back. But I’m glad I did, otherwise I would have been disqualified.

Then the swells eventually calmed down, and I was able to find my stroke. I added in extra breaths. I just wanted to breathe. I wanted to be out of the water.

At one point, I looked at my watch and realized I had less than 20 minutes to finish. The clock said 51 minutes. We had 1:10. I swam hard, knowing that I was either going to be going home or I was going to ride my bike up into the mountains.

I stepped up on that ramp at 1:05, hamstring cramps and all, with a big smile on my face. I was so thankful for the helping hand pulling me out of the water, unzipping my wetsuit, leading me to the exit toward transition. I can’t even tell you how amazing it felt to be there.

And guess what? I made it. So here we go.

Getting a wetsuit off isn’t easy, but it’s even harder when you’re in a bit of a panic mode. I couldn’t get it off my ankles. I had to sit down for a moment. I peeled it off deliberately and was glad to finally be through with all that nonsense.

Dry feet. Cycling socks. Eat banana. Put on all my gear. Am I missing anything? Let’s go.

The ride was amazing, but that hamstring cramp that popped up in the first 5 miles was absolutely unwelcome. It was the hamstring that wasn’t cramping in the water. I’m not sure where or why, but I started giving myself water, salt, and sugar. It managed to go away, but I was afraid to push it too hard, which wasn’t easy on a 56 mile ride with almost 3,000’ of elevation.

Hell’s Hill was fun to go up. It was even funner to go down. The sun popped out and it warmed up. My suit finally dried and I felt good.

“The ocean can’t hurt you anymore.”

I said that to myself more than once.

It was so, so beautiful out there. Camp Pendleton is a military base, so it was quite quiet and calm. I was happy to be there, and happy to be doing something that I love.

Yeah, I had an amazing bike ride. Weaving in and out of the mountains of the California coastline. No houses here. Just great blue skies and big brown peaks. A taste of salt in the air. A few people in uniform cheering for you occasionally. A touch of headwind on the last 10 miles back into town didn’t slow me down.

Head down, power through. The IRONMAN motorcycyle and film crew found me there. Gave me even more energy!

Rolling back into transition, I had more confidence going into the run. I was doing good on time, and now was more sure I could finish this damn thing.

Change socks. Running belt. Hand bottle. Running shoes. Go.

Not much to worry about here, which was nice. My legs felt a bit numb but they were still working just fine. I had a good pace until the cramps came back to visit.

One of them stopped me dead in my tracks about mile 8. I walked for a while, worried it’d come back. I threw salt and sugar and water at it with a vengeance, but I just didn’t know what I needed at that point.

If I’m going to walk, I’m going to walk fast, I told myself. So I started speed walking. The fastest pace I could manage to go without actually running, which was just a little over 13 minutes per mile. Actually, not to bad.

I did that for a solid 3-4 miles. And at the home stretch, I gave it a go again.

Finish line in sight. The arch — there it is. Just hope that I don’t get a cramp and fall down on the red carpet!

Finish strong. Picked up my feet and my pace for the last half mile.

It took me 7 and a half hours, but I finished you, IRONMAN Oceanside.

****

I’m not the same person who went into the ocean early that morning, on Oct. 30.

This race has changed me in ways I wasn’t expecting. I knew I would feel a big sense of accomplishment if I did actually manage to finish (which was my goal). But I never thought I’d feel like something inside me actually changed.

It did, though.

Maybe it was the words of advice our team received the night before: “Give your body what it needs in the moment.” Something I took to heart both during and now after the race, kind and empathetic words I think we all could use as a daily mantra.

Maybe it was the months of training, crossing new milestones, getting burnt out, trying to remember the end goal while also trying not to lose my mind — and actually having it pay off.

Maybe it was because I did something that wasn’t just hard — it was extremely hard. “There’s a reason not a lot of people do these.”

Maybe it was because I reclaimed a part of myself that I’ve lost for so long, that girl that loves adventure, that loves to do something different, that loves the challenge, because I’ve always been that girl that deep down inside always wanted to do something but never had the guts to do it.

I’m not that girl anymore. I found the friggin’ guts. They’re right here. I found them while mountain biking, and I found them while gravel racing, and I found them every single day since I left the comfort of my former everything, but I especially found them in that darn sea that tried so hard to push me back to the shore.

If I had stayed there, I never would be here.

It took only 70.3 miles to figure that out.

And now? Well, life will never be the same.