Hello from Madison - It's IMWI week!

Wow, I can't believe it's finally here. It's race week! Just three more sleeps until race day.

A little update from this week.

Karel, his mom and Campy started their journey to Madison, WI on Monday morning with a long drive to Indianapolis. They spent the night and then finished the drive on Tues. With traffic and a few stops, it was a long two days of traveling. The house was pretty quiet for me for a day and a half but I kept myself busy with a few light workouts and work until I left for the airport on Tues afternoon. My athlete and friend Thomas and I flew from Greenville to Detroit to Madison on Tues evening and all went smoothly. Since Karel had our bikes and all my race stuff, I traveled pretty light with only a backpack.

To be honest, the week was a little stressful to start because of all the flooding in Madison and the great possibility of a cancelled swim and the unknowns of the bike and run course. Thankfully, the Ironman staff went above and beyond and the course is on for the entire 140.6 mile distance. Sure, anything can change between now and race day but the weather is looking good for an amazing day of swimbikerun come Sunday.

Our homestay and friend Ed picked Thomas and I up at the airport on Tues evening around 8:30pm and it was nice to reunite with Karel and Campy when we arrive to his home. With all the chatter about the weather/rain in Madison, all it took was a drive through downtown - in route to Ed's house in Fitchburg - to remind me why this race is so special. No matter what happens on race day, Madison knows how to put on a top-notch Ironman event. This will be my 3rd time racing IMWI and although it's a challenging bike/run course combo, the crowds are unbelievable!

Campy has been on squirrel (and rabbit and chipmunk duty) since he arrived and he is loving looking out the windows for any intruders.

Ed made us the most amazing pumpkin waffles on Wed after our wet run. YUM!

After a good night of sleep on Tues evening (the one-hour time change wasn't too hard to get use to!) we woke up to a very rainy day. This was expected according to the weather channels so we adjusted our planned training and instead of riding a loop of the bike course we went out for a morning run and finished the day with a late afternoon swim at Pinnacle Fitness.

Run workout (mostly on a bike/run path):
~15 min warm-up w/ walking to reset form and to control breathing
MS: 3 x 6 min build by 2 min to strong w/ 90 sec walk/rest between
~10 min smooth form focused running

Swim workout:
600 warm-up
Pre set:
200,175,150,125,100,75,50,25 w/ snorkel and buoy
MS: 2x's
2 x 100's build to strong w/ 15 sec rest
50 smooth
50 fast

Cool down: 100 EZ

Between the run and the swim workouts, we stocked up on groceries from HyVee and Karel's mom made us the most delicious vegetable and potato soup for dinner.

Because Karel is not racing, he is able to shuttle me around and also get in a few workouts of his own this week in route to his busy end-of-the-year race schedule with Augusta 70.3, Kona and IMFL all within about 8 weeks.

This morning we drove to Verona to bike one loop of the course. I really enjoyed being on my new Ventum and seeing the Wisconsin landscape of cows, farms and fields. Several of the roads have been paved (and others are still super bumpy) which was really nice. The course is challenging but it's also a lot of fun because it's constantly changing - up and down, left and right. It reminds me a lot of Greenville so it's not far from what we train on on a daily basis.

After the bike we drove back to Ed's house and had some lunch and then ventured to downtown Madison for the athlete briefing and check-in. Although this is my 14th time going through the athlete check-in procedure, I still get excited as if I am a first timer. I always go to the athlete briefing as you never know what updated or race-specific information will be provided. In the case of IMWI, a lot has changed such as the new bike course (first and last 3-miles) and the new swim course and rolling start (instead of waves). Also, IMWI has indoor transitions so it's also worth scoping out the layout before race day.

It was also fun to run into so many Trimarnis this morning. We have 13 athletes racing! 

While it seemed like a busy last two days, it has actually been rather smooth and relaxing. I have stressed myself out in the past by trying to do too much in one day and leave little time to myself to rest so I have tried to do a better job of this before my races.

Thanks for following along!