1. You have two major meltdowns, tears included, on the day of athlete check-in and barely notice you have arrived in beautiful sunny Florida.
2. Your husband is abused and treated slightly like a doormat by you as a result of stress, pent-up anxiety and nerves due to the looming race day. Plus you have been tapering and unable to workout enough to get rid of excess stress. Not that any of that makes it okay to mistreat others. Sorry, I love you!
3. You're not a fan of stepping on the scale in front of everyone at athlete weigh-in at the check-in tent. Never mind that you're probably in the best shape of your life after 6 months of IM training.
4. You ask a million questions of complete strangers about the water and the IM swim loop while standing on the beach before a practice swim 2 days before race day.
5. You take pictures of your gear check bags after obsessively packing them for over an hour.
6. You obsess about exactly which spot on your bike to place the adhesive race number, trying several different places and calling your veteran IM bud with questions about it, before finally deciding on the perfect place. And then you take a picture of it.
7. On race day you feel like a rock star when all the volunteers are so overly nice and helpful all day long. It starts when the "peelers" rip your wetsuit off in 3 seconds at the end of the swim.
8. You cheerily say "Nice Job!" to someone who passes you in the first mile of the bike course. I'm such a newbie, there's a long way to go, duh.
9. You realize you have had a permanent smile on your face all day long when spectators keep commenting on your smile throughout the 26.2 mile run in the last hours of race day.
10. You scream like a banshee with your arms up in the air as you cross the finish line becoming an Ironman for the first time.
BONUS #1: You wear your IM Florida hat and t-shirt to breakfast the morning after race day.
BONUS #2: Drum Roll....Definitely a First Time Ironman when you continue to wear your blue ironman wrist band for 3 days after the race is over. And then you cut it off but keep it for memories.
What a nerd. :)
Don't worry, a blog post with my race story is still coming, I promise....
3 comments:
Awesome...this was very interesting and funny. Kinda not a nerd...
I love the short blurbs that are getting your writing juices going. Can't wait for the book version.
So not a nerd. I mean, I cannot believe you cut it off after only 3 days. I think I would be still wearing it.
Post a Comment