LP 2023 days 5+6

After going to sleep so late (1AM is very late for me) I would have slept way past my normal 5AM wake time if I hadn’t set my alarm for 5:30.

I wanted to collect the tents (2, as I had also brought the Love and Sprockets bike shop tent with me) and get in a long swim before the 8:30 AM awards ceremony breakfast.

It was so quiet when I was loading the tents and chairs into the van. Just the sounds of birds, so different from the bustling and cheering the day before. I was the ONLY person in the lake for my first lap of the course, on the second one a few other people had showed up and when I got out there were a dozen or so swimmers and people sipping coffee on the shore. When I did Lake Placid in 2016 I came down to the lake the morning after the race for a relaxing 30 minute swim and stretched on beach.

I had to do a long swim because I had a 10KM swim in Welland, Canada I’m just a few weeks and had not been as good at getting in really long practice swims as I had last year. For my 10K swim on Lake George in 2022 I wore my wetsuit and did it in 3:15, the “real” marathon swimmers just wear bathing suits. My goal for this year was to not use a wetsuit but this swim (without one) I got a calf cramp at around 4500 yards and realized that at my slower non-wetsuit pace it wasn’t going to be a good idea this year… maybe next year.

I had a great 10K in Welland….

My pace with the wetsuit is MUCH faster.

Great article from the NYT about open water swimming. I love so much more than a pool, even when water cold or rough. I have started finding spots to swim on vacation, pond in London, England; Mecox bay in Southhampton, NY; Giardelli cove in SF.

After my swim and getting dressed in the van I drove to the Horse Show grounds where the awards would be.

This is just the 2 minute version not the longer one with stories about people overcoming cancer, awful bike injuries, etc.

The World Championship until Covid was for the last 30 years the Kona, Hawaii Ironman in October. The 2000 best athletes from the world got spots there by finishing at top of their age groups in Other Ironman Races. It was usually mostly men as less than 20% of racers in all races were female. After Covid ( when the World Championship was held in Utah, as Hawaii had stricter Covid rules) Ironman decided to have a female race on Thursday and a male one on Saturday. This allowed for many more women to participate but logistics didn’t really work. The town of Kona was overwhelmed by even more visitors than normal and they had a problem when many people didn’t show up to volunteer on Saturday. So….. now for first time this year they are starting a system where the men and women will alternate their WC races between Kona and Nice, France. This year the women are in Kona and there were 100 spots for the 600 women finishers but only 50 spots to Nice for the 1300 men finishers. The Kona spots were all snapped up but the Nice spots were only accepted by 48 men even after they at the end offered spots to ANY male who finished the race. I will be watching the Nice race in September on TV to see the course. I am curious as to how they will get anywhere near 2000 women to sign up for it next year…. One of our Buffalo Triathlon Club women got a Kona Spot, she is in 60-64 and super tough. I got a great video and photo of her going up and accepting and getting her Lei (the Nice guys got cheesy little French flags).

I must look trustworthy because Scott (he and his wife are moving from Louisiana to Buffalo in September) entrusted me with his ? $7K triathlon bike. It is still sitting quietly in my basement 🙂

I grabbed lunch in town and then headed back to campgrounds where I took a long afternoon nap in Scrat.

I had dinner again at Tail of the Pup, going for the amazing BBQ chicken this time.

I saw this very pretty mushroom in the campground but my iNaturalist app suggested not a good dessert choice 😉

Amazing app, it identifies plants, animals, etc very accurately.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/inaturalist/id421397028

I went to bed very early and still slept later than usual ….

The morning was gorgeous and I went for a long run (should have brought a water bottle but it was cool enough that I didn’t completely wilt)

While running (and then for drive home) I listened to Wayward Pines.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2618986/?ref_=ext_shr_lnk

After a long stretching session and some breakfast and a shower I said goodbye to my excellent campsite (and at $18 a night quite the bargain).

Notice that I gave his bike the safer inside spot 🙂

I did like that the Ironman stickers on bike would make people on highway think I raced this year 😉

Another great vacation in Scrat!

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