Mark Allen is famous for winning the world championship Ironman in Hawaii six times.  As legend tells it, he became interested after watching it on ABC Wild World of Sports in the 80’s.  He started to train for the Ironman distance all on his own to see if he could get his mind wrapped around a 2.4 mile swim, 110 mile bike, and the infamous full marathon run at the end.

Finally, he just had to know if he could do it so he plotted out his own course in Northern California.  He dropped off food and water at certain points on the side of the road early in the morning before the sun came up, had his girlfriend and mother standing by at the run transition with his shoes and more food, and made sure they followed him through the run to see if he would make it alive.  He did just fine.

Today, I similarly woke up tired of thinking about doing a triathlon and decided it was time I take matters into my own hands.  I was not quite as ambitious as Mr. Allen though.

• Goal #1 – Swim a non-stop open water mile
• Goal #2 – Then, ride around Mission Bay including a few spins around Fiesta Island where the first triathlon actually took place
• Goal #3 – Run a 10K (6 miles) after the bike

After doing a little morning work for clients, I started packing up my gear.  The first thing I learned is that you need to pack a lot of gear for one of these things.  Clothes, wetsuit, goggles, sunscreen, helmet, bike, running shoes, bike shoes, swim cap, etc., and most importantly….food.  Food in solid, liquid, and gel form for use on the appropriate leg of the three disciplines.  Once packed, I loaded the van for the trip down to Mission Bay.

Basecamp for this exercise was Bonita Cove on Mission Bay.  I had swam here before with the Triclub San Diego beginners group.  A bit murky, but I knew the territory.

After rolling the incredibly tight triathlon wetsuit on (you roll it on, you don’t pull it as it could rip the exterior rubber that is a bit fragile), I was fortunate to find a nice vacationing couple from Washington state who agreed to zip up the back of my wetsuit.  It is tough to do by myself without ripping the zipper right off the suit because it is so tight.  Nice folks from up North.

With that, I began the one man triathlon race.  A race no matter how bad it would end, I would win!

I made a conscious decision to not hurry the swim and rather simply find a rhythm.  I was betting that a steady pace would end up being the same, or faster, than my pool time.  I wouldn’t have to slow down in the open water because there wouldn’t be a wall that would cause me to pause and turn around.  My bet paid off.  I ended up 50 minutes just like in the pool even though I had to stop a few times to clear salt water from my goggles.  This is great news considering it beats the cut-off time in Austin with 20 minutes to spare.

Once out of the water, I wrestled with my wetsuit to get it off.  I probably burned more calories doing that than during the mile swim!  Once I was released from the neoprene exoskeleton, I grabbed my gear and headed to the van to launch the bike.

Part of this transition trial was also wearing my tri-top and tri-shorts under the wetsuit just like in real race.  Something I had never done before.  Basically, you come out of the swim with wet clothing and hop on the bike and go.  I specifically decided that the afternoon sun would be good for this first time out to keep me warm just in case I would end up wet for the next few hours.  I was pleasantly surprised, the technology worked well and it all dried out quite quickly instead of a long time on the bike in wet, soggy spandex.

As I was not totally familiar with Mission Bay, I kept the bike route simple and followed the path around the bay.  It was a little more crowded than I would have liked, but the bike is the least of my worries.  I really just wanted to get a few miles in to see what it felt like with wet gear and understand how long it took them to dry out.  I also wanted to find out how the thin pad in the tri-shorts was going to work out.

All performed well and I am happy to report that the tri-shorts actually provided very comfortable protection to my bottom personal drive train after a 20 mile spin around San Diego’s playground.

Now it was time to boldly go where I had not gone before.  Sure, I have swam and run.  Yes, I have swam and cycled.  This would be the first time I would put it all together.  Additionally important was that I was also testing my on the bike eating habits to fuel my body in advance for the run.  The danger of running out of fuel on the run is common and I’m not interested in crawling towards the finish line for the drama effect or passing out and not finishing.

My run goal today was 6 miles.  A flat 6 miles around a portion of the bay.  I was going for a win, but didn’t want it to be a short win.  I wanted to work for it.  A quick change from my bike shoes to my running shoes, packing some energy gels into a super secret compartment made for them my shorts, and I was off.

The run was as pathetic as it has been since I started running again a few days ago, but it was steady thanks to the pancake flat route.  It would have been nice if the surface would have been as soft and fluffy as a pancake.

Along the way I passed many a young, ripped, and tanned beach dude out for a run.  It is the beach after all and they were apparently showing off what they have been working so hard to achieve.  I simply achieved getting back to the van.

Sure, the bronze gods of the beach were looking good for those brief glimpses.  However, I kept telling myself that they probably were just out for two or three miles while I just completed a mile swim, 20 mile bike, and 6 mile run.  No matter how slow I was, and how blinding white my exposed shoulders still were, I had a win today.  A win that has given me more gas in the confidence tank.