I had the bike at 110. It was a complete disgusting draft fest. All you f’ers know who you are. 40 person pelotons, seemed like no one gave half a shit about trying to ride clean and I feel like a schmuck for trying to. FOP, MOPers, female pro in the fastest male AG peloton, multiple people from the top AG teams. Complete bullshit. I soft pedaled minutes to let each one by. This is my first time at this race, is this normal? I didn’t do IMFL for a reason.
Not one official on the highway handing out penalties. Did not see one person in the penalty tent. I’m obviously outraged and ranting. Wtf Ironman.
I had the run at 26.0 so pretty accurate for an IM. Others had it spot on.
I assumed this had already been posted as I’m just getting home. But I echo pretty much everything to the letter.
I had it at 110. I had the run about a quarter mile short, but could be GPS being off under the trees.
But the drafting pissed me off and I am just a guy trying to finish. I finished my swim in 1:15 which isnt lightening fast obviously, but there were tons of strong bikers coming up behind me. I probably saw 4 or more pelatons of 40+ people. And at the end, would be some schmuk I passed up 10 miles earlier who latched on to the back only to have to pass them again when they fell off. and it was always the at the section with bridges and the guy would slam the uphill to pass then coast making me pass until we got to a flat long enough for me to drop them. I did not see a single Marshall the entire day. Not a single one.
My garmin for the run was 26.18 miles with a really long walk/run time. I messed up my bike computer so I can’t help there. Total draft fest as reported and I also did not see a single draft marshal, large packs with some pretty significant crashes as well. The emergency response and medical staff were seemed to be kept very busy.
My garmin for the run was 26.18 miles with a really long walk/run time. I messed up my bike computer so I can’t help there. Total draft fest as reported and I also did not see a single draft marshal, large packs with some pretty significant crashes as well. The emergency response and medical staff were seemed to be kept very busy.
JOOC - Was it wetsuit legal for AGers??? What about for pros??? Despite her finishing out of the women’s top 10, i thought it was cool that Lauren Brandon had the fastest swim split of ALL pros, male and female!!! I think her swim was around 49:15-ish.
My garmin for the run was 26.18 miles with a really long walk/run time. I messed up my bike computer so I can’t help there. Total draft fest as reported and I also did not see a single draft marshal, large packs with some pretty significant crashes as well. The emergency response and medical staff were seemed to be kept very busy.
JOOC - Was it wetsuit legal for AGers??? What about for pros??? Despite her finishing out of the women’s top 10, i thought it was cool that Lauren Brandon had the fastest swim split of ALL pros, male and female!!! I think her swim was around 49:15-ish.
My garmin for the run was 26.18 miles with a really long walk/run time. I messed up my bike computer so I can’t help there. Total draft fest as reported and I also did not see a single draft marshal, large packs with some pretty significant crashes as well. The emergency response and medical staff were seemed to be kept very busy.
JOOC - Was it wetsuit legal for AGers??? What about for pros??? Despite her finishing out of the women’s top 10, i thought it was cool that Lauren Brandon had the fastest swim split of ALL pros, male and female!!! I think her swim was around 49:15-ish.
As an ex runner I run pretty good tangents, started my watch a little late while it got signal, and was at 26.0. Admittedly dont run lines as good as pros but doubtful it’s worth a mile.
Yep. No way you can run tangents and take a mile off.
The other thing that happened today was a lot of crashes. I was just past a rider I saw crash. I think he or she may have gone over the guard rail. He was alone to the far right which was supposed to be a traffic lane and he went down. It was terrible. I saw it just behind me to my right. My last look back was a bike on the ground and no rider. I’m hoping he’s ok. I tried to find an official to get back to him but sadly there were none. That was right after I a saw a lady on what I think was a backboard.
The thing with the packs was that apart from drafting they were many bikes wide and would gobble up slower riders. Pass on the left and right. It was terrible. I hated that ride so much and even corrected for distance (I had 176.8k) it was my fastest Ironman ride on IM #14. I killed myself with a whole ton of power spikes to try to get past them and ride clean. Lots of times I rode the car lane to the right to take wind and lots of time i rode to the far left to take wind. We did have some wind on the trip out the second lap. Those power surges were not productive for my run either which sucks again.
If I had just sat in when they went by I’m sure my time would have been a lot faster. I got in a few fights out there. F bombs you name it. I saw one marshal early on. He watched the draft pack I’d just got out of ride away into the sunset. He did nothing. That was the only official I saw all day. The only reason not to draft was your conscious and apparently in our sport not many people had one.
Take all results with skepticism. I hope all the thousands who chose a free ride feel like shit tomorrow when they realize what they did. I’m sure they won’t though. I’m also sure they all had huge run pr’s too. I did Clearwater in 2009. This was every bit as bad as that to give you a good idea of how bad it was. I don’t think I will ever do this race again. Reading above that it wasn’t like this last year is surprising to me. Why this year more than last? There was less wind this year ? I know in Clearwater people came to the race seemingly expecting to cheat. That’s what this felt like as well.
Final though. I would go past a pack and they would sit on my wheel. What are you supposed to do? This was on the return trip home second lap. I would have a huge pack behind me. I couldn’t get away and I couldn’t do anything to make them stop. It was demoralizing.
Oh… I had the run at 41.8k so 400m short. Congrats to all who’ve finished and if anyone knows about the rider who hit the guard rail I’d very much like to know how he/she is doing.
Congrats Matt! Not taking anything away from your battle and your win , but I think we can agree certified courses are measured by the perfect tangents, aka shortest possible route. So normally on a certified course GPS would be a tad over 26.2 because no one runs perfect tangents. Thanks for posting the data and congrats again!
Congrats Matt! Not taking anything away from your battle and your win , but I think we can agree certified courses are measured by the perfect tangents, aka shortest possible route. So normally on a certified course GPS would be a tad over 26.2 because no one runs perfect tangents. Thanks for posting the data and congrats again!
Matts GPS files starts while he is already running so misses a part.
Sam