So, updates here at Rowe Running are about to go quiet over the coming days, so I thought I’d post a couple of links for anyone interested in tracking my progress.
Race registration is on Wednesday-Saturday, and I’ll most probably be ‘signing-in’ sometime on Friday. On Saturday there is a shorter ‘Olympic’ distance event taking place where we’ll be supporting some of our ‘pirate’ supporters, who will in turn be able to support us on Sunday. For information, there will be about 50 of us ‘pirates’ racing on Sunday (not counting our ‘support team’), all clad in yellow and black lycra with a large skull and crossbones on it! More information about the pirates can be found at the official website. Saturday evening I will be ‘racking’ my bike in preparation for Sunday.
The race start is at 7am local time Sunday, which is 6am GMT, so by the time most of the British people reading this blog wake up I will probably be battling through the 2.4 mile swim. When you’re having lunch I should be halfway through the 112 mile bike leg, and by the time you’re having dinner I will hopefully be nearing the end of the marathon run. The race is called Ironman for a reason - this isn’t a knitting club you know!
During the race I’ll be wearing an electronic chip on my ankle meaning that my progress should be available online. Throughout the day on Sunday you should be able to go to www.ironman.com and find a link to the online tracking site. Once you’re there you can either enter my name or my race number, which is 1171.
If you’re after more gossip from on the course, then there’s an active forum thread at the Runners World website which is going to be extremely busy come race day which can be found at http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/forum/forummessages.asp?UTN=143930. On, and in this world of ‘cyber-identities,’ any mention of me on the forum thread will be under the name ‘funkin.’ I would expect Sharon to send the occasional SMS updates on my and some of the other pirates during the day - well, she’s got nothing else to do for 12+ hours!!!