I'm going to write up a full race report, which will be an interesting analysis because my training was polar opposites across both years. 2017 was the minimal approach (only started swimming 3 weeks before, minimal bike volume but high quality, and longest run about 14 miles) ---- and then 2018 was the "all in" approach (multiple 25hr weeks, fully committed swim, and decent run form other than a slight injury forcing me off running for a few weeks). So I was in MUCH better swim/bike shape (like lifetime best), and reasonably good run shape (not lifetime best but almost). Everything else was the same, except I was on a new, smaller Dimond with a better position.

Swim: 57 in 2018 vs 1:05 in 2017. Very much expected given my vastly different swim form. Also it was wetsuit legal, although I'm not usually much faster in a wetsuit (maybe 1 min). The course was identical.

Bike: my IM power target (based on current training and fitness) was about 20w higher than 2017. I was expecting to ride 4:15-4:20, and I was well on track for 4:15 until I got a flat tire. 10 min later I was back riding again, but by that time the peletons had caught up to me. So the next 30 miles or so was a lot of surging to try and get away from the packs. I would be riding about 270w and they would envelop me. I'd then drop back to try stay legal, and be soft pedaling around 130w. Then they would sit up in front of me, forcing me to overtake the whole lot (I don't slot in like they were doing). So it would be about 30 sec @ 350w then back to steady @ 280w in the front. Then they overtake me again. Eventually I just put in a long 5 min really hard effort and ditched them for good. But that yo-yo riding messes up the power comparison a little bit. By the end, I was at 240w NP, exactly the same as 2017. I was 2 minutes slower, but taking the flat into account I was 8 minutes faster. I feel my improved position accounted for about 4-5 mins of that, and the slightly better weather conditions for the other 3-4 minutes. In 2017 there was some wind, but I missed most of that, so I feel that for me, the conditions were very similar. Both years I was alone for the majority of the ride. In 2017 I did not have to drop the packs.

Run: my plan was to run 7:15 pace from start to finish. I was 100% on track for about 90 mins and then by mile 12/13 started slowing down. I think the surging on the bike was beginning to take it's toll. It felt to me like the run was hotter than 2017, and it was very sunny, so I was expecting slower run times. I ran a 3:21 and I'm definitely in better shape than that. My heat acclimation was pretty good but I just felt flat in the middle of the run, I think because of all the big efforts on the bike. I was quite surprised by the number of very fast runs. For starters there were some very good runners in the field, but also, there's a very high % of guys who just sat in the pack all day @ 150w and were fresh for the run.

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I put this in one of the drafting threads. Same bike course. No wind this year definitely helped, but it was all drafting that lead to these times. We don't have any footage of the pro race to know if they were drafting too or not (lots of talk about pro women drafting but haven't heard anything about the men). Starky's ride was faster probably due to no wind and him knowing that he could go sub 4.



2017 Male AG bike splits
1 under 4:30
9 under 4:40
29 under 4:50
78 under 5:00


2018 Male AG bike splits
63 under 4:30
178 under 4:40
277 under 4:50
345 under 5:00

thanks for this

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I'm not nearly as fast as you but year before last at wilmington half ironman I had the same issues with surging on the bike contributing to my poor run. In case of wilmington, it was super windy and people just hunkered down into packs. I ruined myself surging to get past pack after pack and my run suffered for it.

These numbers, paired with the footage, are staggering!

Those numbers are quite staggering. I raced last year and not this year, but I will say that the wind was definitely an issue last year. And this year there was almost no wind.

A cold front blew in mid-morning, so the day started with a light south wind (headwind, as the riders were headed south), but some time around 10-11 the wind shifted to a strong northwest wind. My very biased opinion was that the front came in right when I was at the very southern tip of the course (on Hardy toll), and I had 30 miles of direct headwind all the way back to T2. The return on the 2nd lap was noticeably much harder than it was on the first.

That's not to say that the drafting wasn't a huge issue as well. But I doubt many of the under 4:30 and 4:40 guys were drafting too bad this year. They were probably much more spaced out than the "peloton" videos I'm seeing.

Thanks for the clarification on the wind last year, I didn't think it affected both northbound sections so that definitely hurt the times.

But I'm not so sure about the 4:30-4:40 guys this year not drafting. We know the prince went 4:30:xx and we have photographic evidence of him sitting up in the middle of a peloton.

Agreed - as a competitor both years, there was zero wind this year while a strong front blew through around 11:45 am last year.

But, for the pros bike times, last year the wind wasn't much of an issue as they were likely off of the toll road by the time the front blew through, as there was no protection from the north wind that had gusts to 30mph. This year, not a breath of wind the whole afternoon. Also, the Ironman's facebook page released a post that they were shortening the course by two miles (assuming that was I saw was not a fake post) which likely removed a few minutes as well. Won't get into the pelotons, but that likely affected a few times as well, though I'm sure that no one was involved in any of the 3-4 groups of 50 or so cyclists.

I did both. My bike this year was a lot faster: 4:39 versus 5:02. I explain the difference as:
1. I was a lot better prepared and was a lot more aggressive on the bike (224W vs. 203W NP).
2. There wasn't as much wind this year—although there was a definite headwind going south the second time.
3. There was some residual drafting. I raced as cleanly as I could—and what Rob describes was pretty much my routine (albeit at a lower power): get passed by a seemingly interminable group, drop back, get nervous and frustrated, pass the whole thing again pushing power way over target, try to drop them, get caught, etc. So I never sat in the field, but it's pretty clear to me that, as I was making my way to the front of the pack, I was in the air mass, benefiting from the bunch of dudes (and quite a few women, too) seating up and soft pedaling to my right.

Full race report coming soon.

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Clay,

Actually, there was a big group just up the road from me that was riding sub 4:30 pace (better swimmers). I saw them all day long and the group just kept getting bigger as they went by faster swimmers. I looked at several of the top 10 in my AG and none have done a sub 5 hour bike in the last couple of years (many had done really fast/short courses like Austria), and also non had cracked 3:20 on the run...yesterday all were 4:30 or better and ran better than their best in the last couple years....

Jack

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I think you are slightly misinformed.

I rode 4:56. FTP 245 +/- and weight of 68 kilos. I know everyone is saying this, but I did not cheat. I can *kind of* prove it. ~25th amateur out of the water, ~300th off the bike. Well I guess it is possible I just suck at drafting! (for the record, I didn't draft because...I am afraid. Afraid of getting caught and afraid of crashing. No pillar of morality claims by me).

I have 5 friends/acquaintances who road under 4:33. One of them is capable of doing that. And when he came up to me he was leading a train. He bike 4:37 last year and 4:31 this year. SO with Rob's numbers, we have two data points that show it was maybe 5-7 minutes *faster* this year.

But ther otehr 4 are not even close to that level. I had 4 opportunities to latch on. Not judging anyone, but it would have been easy to do. And it was quite clear that it wouldn't have mattered as there was no stopping it.

Jack, I'm very sorry to hear that.

What made people so blatantly start drafting?? I know that there were no officials on the Hardy toll, but I seem to remember there being officials last year? Did people know going in that there wouldn't be officials?

This makes me really mad, almost to the point of wanting these peoples names to be called out either here or on facebook.

Before I just thought that the "peloton" groups I saw on videos were just happenstance groups that formed amongst middle-of-the-pack age groupers. Knowing that many of these cheaters ended up with Kona slots changes everything.

I don't know how it all started, but there were almost no race vehicles on the course from the very beginning, almost a bit surreal, which had to be part of it. From what I saw, I passed only one group on lap one, and saw the group forming ahead of me (that RF was trying to blow up and get away from) as I hit the south end turn around. On lap 2 it was like one peloton after another.

I hear ya, the winner of my AG was a doctor from Germany that has lots of Kona videos but few results...

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"Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go." T.S. Elliot | Cycle2Tri.com
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Jack I don't know if this will make you feel any better but when I saw your name in the results (you are jack C, right?) I thought, "well there is a guy who got screwed."

Thanks, mate.

I rode through those groups and saw guys (I especially remember Petr) that I saw later running like they were fresh as a daisy.

It was a crushing day for sure.

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"Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go." T.S. Elliot | Cycle2Tri.com
Sponsors: SciCon | | Every Man Jack

Per this tweet it was announced at the pro briefing that there would be no course marshals on the 2nd loop of the bike, so perhaps word got out. But I also think it's just something of a pack mentality, and the longer you go into the ride without seeing a moto, the more emboldened you become.

Jack - Very sorry. After crushing our AG at TX 70.3 and I could tell something wasn't right as soon as I saw the results on Saturday.

I did IMFL last year in very similar conditions - negligible winds, decent temps, flat course. The entire ride I saw one draft pack of about 12. As others have stated, it's not hard to sit up and just get spit out the back, then start riding again. Not hard at all.

There were guys who stupid cheated: guys on my level (south of 4.0 w/kg) who threw down 4:25-4:35 splits. They - fortunately - were not rewarded with spots because they were spent. Then there were guys who are north of 4.0 w/kg who split 4:25-4:35 - probably still above pay grade but they then ran their butts off because it was a relatively easy ride. And those guys got Kona spots.

I am driving myself crazy looking at the results where I out split guys for the first 16.2 miles of the ride but then I got crushed for the remaining 94.

Some jackhole in my age-group Marcel Munoz:

Me / Him
Out of T1: 59:01 / 1:01:55 (+2:54)
Split @ 3.2: 1:12:38 / 1:09:05 (+3:33)
Split @ 16.2: 1:43:35 / 1:46:24 (+2:49)
Split @ 37.1: 2:38:31 / 2:38:11 (-:20)

So he puts no time on me for 45 minutes and then suddenly crushes me. And this guy is going to Kona.

Sorry to change the subject a bit, but how theough the ranks did Kona slots roll down (for the 40-44 men’s age group).

In another thread someone said there were only 2 rolldowns total and they each rolled only 1 place. I do not know which AG's those were.

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This. I looked at the results of a handful of the guys in front of you. Things don’t add up. Quite a few have never broken 4:35 in a half and managed to break 9 in a full. Hmmm...

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From a friend who attended the slot fun, none dropped in the mens 40-49, not 1.

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"Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go." T.S. Elliot | Cycle2Tri.com
Sponsors: SciCon | | Every Man Jack

Hi Brett!!!

http://blog.trisutto.com/ironman-texas/

I've been looking at a few ride files post-race - one guy in my AG that KQd and has his ride file on Strava went under 4:30 on 200w NP

I ran those numbers through a BBS simulation (including his weight which is in his file) and his estimated CdA was 0.19!

In addition he was clumped with a group on the bike split spreadsheet for over half the ride

This isn't unique - I have found 3-4 other KQs with the same ridiculous numbers. Disheartening.

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Strava

To all those saying there was no wind at all this year, that is slightly incorrect. We had probably the most favorable wind conditions we could have encountered.

When I was around mile 55 I felt what I thought was a very slight tailwind. When I made the turnaround to go back south at mile 60, sure enough my suspicions were confirmed. That was a slight headwind, then, from miles 60 to 80 and I I can see that my average power came up and my speed came down quite a bit on that stretch.

Once we turned around at the southernmost point at mile 80 that obviously became a tailwind and I felt it had picked up at that time. That tailwind that took us the entire 30 miles back to transition.

So anyone riding in the sub-5 range would have experienced a modest headwind for a while, but then a very nice boost home right when you otherwise were getting tired of being on your bike.