Grand Columbian Half Ironman

For my last race of the 2008 season, I decided to revisit the site of my first Half Ironman, the Grand Columbian. This year has been about physically rebuilding myself from the winter’s hospitalization and testing myself against 2007’s results. The goal was to PR in every race, at every distance raced.

We jammed up to Grand Coulee on the Friday before the race to get settled in, check our bikes in at T1, and drive the bike course. Our hotel was located 200 yards from the finish line, so we were situated perfectly and comfortably to enjoy and cheer on the finishers in both the Half and Full Iron distances.

The Grand Columbian course was 50% different this year, as half of the bike course and the entire run section were back to their normal routes. Last year, wildfires forced the race to reshuffle the deck and make the course much easier. This year, the swim remained in warm and clear Banks Lake, but the bike and run were much grumpier bedfellows. The bike portion dished out over 3800 feet of climbing in the first 40 of the 56 miles. To give you a taste of how that compares to other races, Ironman Canada, considered by many to be a daunting bike course, has just over 4000 across 112 miles. The run follows the Columbia River on crushed gravel and kills you with a hill over the last mile that contains 600 feet of elevation gain. It has been said that the Grand Columbian Half Ironman course is 20 minutes slower than many of the region’s other courses.

Race morning was clear and gorgeous, and I was ready to race. For the swim, I situated myself in the front and dead center, 2 people away from Tom Evans. The prerace chatter amongst those around me focused on projected swim times of around 24-25 minutes, whereas I was hoping for a 28-30 minute effort. As the gun sounded, I hammered the first few hundred meters to get myself clear of the racers behind me, and watched the elite swimmers disappear into the darkness of the lake in front of me. I had clear water for the bulk of the swim and had spotty success when attempting to draft. My strange experiment was to pull the entire swim and rest my legs for the bike, and it turned out okay as I logged a 29 minute swim time. I was really happy with this, as it legitimized much of the interval work I’ve been doing in training.

T1 was speedy and I was out of the change tent (which slows things down in my opinion) and on my bike in 2 minutes 30 seconds. Sounds slow, but actually felt relatively efficient.

The bike section began with the Almira Grade, which is a hellacious hill for the first 2 miles out of transition gaining nearly 1000 feet in elevation. Per coach’s instructions, I spun as freely as possible in the saddle, and kept the wattage around 300. I passed a good number of folks on the climb and moved out to the rollers where I hoped to hold 230 to 240 watts for the duration. From the town of Almira, to the beginning of the final descent back into town, the headwind was strong, and was certainly slowing down the already grating bike course more. All of the slow cadence interval work was coming in handy at this point. Upon reaching the final descent, it became painfully obvious that finishing my bike in the 2 hours 30 minute realm was a far off dream. As the wind picked up, I hammered the downhills back to the Dam, but could barely keep it above 30 MPH due to the headwind, even when fully aero. Only one competitor passed me on the bike, and he was the Master’s champion, so it didn’t hurt my feelings too much. In retrospect, I probably didn’t nail the bike as hard as I could have, but my effort felt respectable. 2 hours and 48 minutes was my bike time.

I came into T2 with what I thought were fresh legs, ready to roll 7:30’s and call it a day. All of my metrics told me this was possible: heart Rate, bike wattage, nutrition. The things I could not account for was the dry wind and heat. My first two miles clicked off comfortably at 7:45’s, and I caught the guy in front of me in my AG, who happened to be someone who I raced on the run last year at this very event. We stayed side by side until mile 10 where he slow due to cramping, and I continued on. What I have failed to mention is that during that 7 mile stretch, we slowed by nearly a minute per mile. The heat combined with the wind were so drying that your head/visor would be dry within 30 seconds of pouring a cup of water on your head. It was a very odd experience, and made hydrating/cooling yourself very difficult. My heart rate stayed near Z1, but I could not make the machine move any faster no matter what I did. Normal cardiac drift was nowhere to be found. I got to the last mile, having passed and few folks and not being passed, and had to drag myself up what felt like Mount Everest. The final mile was the hardest, most excruciating part of any of the races I have done.

Bar none, this was the strangest run I’ve ever had, in training or racing, over the last two years. It made no sense based on heart rate or nutrition, and seemed to be slowed by some mystical force that effected the entire field. I ran a 1 hour 52 minute time and didn’t get passed? Who does that in a highly competitive Half? That, to me, speaks volumes to what the conditions were doing to racers.

My goal was to go sub 5, and that certainly didn’t happen. Another course on another day.

I do love this race and will do it every year. Racing hard courses is fun if you can get past the times they dish out. What I’m proud of is another PR by over 7 minutes, and a nice closing race to the 2008 season. Up next, the Portland Marathon.