MrsTiki wrote:
It was my first IM last December. Things to note:
-- If the swim is an issue at all for you, this is the one to do. Especially now that you are swimming with the current (tail wind). Plus the water is super salty and you are much more buoyant. (I live in Hawaii an noticed a very big difference there) The water is just amazing.
-- The road is NOT a "freshly paved and very smooth" road on the bike course. It's a rough mess. I saw so much carnage on the road - even bottle cages! The only smooth part of the road is the part along the ocean and that's just hellish headwinds for about 15 miles. 3 times. Prepare for that.
-- Since the bike and run are multiple loops you CAN access your special needs bags on any of the loops. (but just the one time, they don't put your bag back on the rack, they toss it in a pile when you are done)
-- If it rains, and it probably will - expect the run course to flood instantly. And by flood I mean above ankle water depth. Put dry socks in both special needs bags if it matters to you.
-- IronMike doesn't call this race. And the system totally broke down for me. No finish line video. And if I didn't have my name in huge letters on my shirt, I would have gotten the generic "You and you are an Ironman" calls they were doing. They also ran out of food, there was vomit all over the recovery area, the official finishers photo was in front of a chain link fence AND they ran out of finishers shirts in my gender/size.
-- There were tequila shots on the run course. :-)
Denise
haha, dang sounds amazing.
Well, I have bad news anyway. I am an engineer for a large oil field service company and we are assigned to certain rigs. When the rig is drilling a certain section of the well, we are working. We they aren't, we are off. So we usually end up working 25 days on and about 15 off but it varies. Anyways, because of this schedule they don't allow anyone to take vacation between Nov 21 and Dec 4 and between December 18 and Jan 2. That way there are no conflicts from choosing someone to have vacation during those holidays and denying someone else. So basically, if you're rig is not working then you get the holidays off but it is a complete crapshot at this point.
Anyways, I forgot all about that and sent my vacation request in today and got the call reminding me of this policy. Freaking sucks. I still technically could end up being off but it is just too much money and training time to risk finding out last minute I have to work.
So looks like I am SOL this year. I have never done a half so I am going to sign up for a local half distance race called the PrairieMan in September and then be ready to register for a good race for early 15 when it opens up. A race that I know I will be able to take vacation days for.
Thanks for the replies btw.