Born Under a Bad Sign

a few years back, the Canadian TV coverage of IMC had a bit where they interviewed various multiple ironman finishers and i remember one chap, probably in his 50's, with a South African accent (or so I think) saying that when you return from finishing an ironman, the buzz is tremendous, and your finishing time is "inconsequential".

i believed that at the time.

i don't feel no buzz really. except the buzz of how fast i am recovering from my ordeal last saturday. and the other part where that guy on the TV coverage was wrong, is that no-one really gives a fuck. they are already used to me doing ironmans. for them, finishing is not a big deal, not for me. it is like farting. no-one is particularly impressed by my time. most especially those close to me who see how much i friggin train. to them, it must seem like a colossal waste of time...i mean no-one says anything, but that is exactly the point, no-one says congrats on finishing, or good for you for gutting it out when your day was going sour.

Ironman Texas 2015 pour moi, was, as it turns out, born under a bad sign.

the first 100 meters were quite good. then i swam into someone's feet and, i don't know how this happened, but my goggles got knocked off my face. a rush of pain went up my jaw and neck, i gulped some water, i saw my goggle floating in a chaos of murky water and then i got dumped from behind. it was like being waterboarded...i panicked. suddenly i am treading water, just trying to recover while masses swim by, just trying to get my breath and figure out what comes next

"my race is over" of course, this makes, sense, how can one race without goggles????, but as the panic settles, i start to remember alistair brownlee swiming without goggles in edmonton last year and winning the race. it CAN be done, i tell myself. i am no brownlee, but then again, i am...my will must be at least equivalent to his, it must, it must.

so, off i plod, into the murky, dark waters of lake woodlands; swimming, stopping to breathe and sight, treading a bit, breast stroking, front crawling, whatever gets me moving forward.

a kick to the calf reminds me that i am still vulnerable. i cramp like a motherfucker in the canal and tread water, somewhat panicked again, waiting for the cramp to subside, which it thankfully does.

i exit, somewhat traumatized. i still have ptsd. my shirt is brown with the muddy lake water. there goes my finishing pic. emilio will never want to use that on his web-site.

ages go by in transition. i am in no hurry. i am clinging to un-emcumbered breathe and clear vision (as the muddy water filters from my eyes with several wash outs from paper cups) as though they were divine gifts. which they are, as it turns out.

the bike begins, eventually, and in not so bad form. passes occur left and right, by the hundreds. power is low, but i make a conscious decision early on, not to really care. i just ride through the forest and look out for fairies.

hsss......no-one likes that sound. but alas, pit stop really works. krishna bless pit stop.

a while later, my arm pad literally melts off from the humidity. i throw my bike into some thrush, run back to get the pad, and solider on. no way it will stick back. i put it in my pocket and ride on.

what is that strange sound i have heard for last hour? brake rub? i guess throwing my bike into the thrush put something out of order?  oh fuck no. you mean i am working even harder than i need to???

i have to pee. at this point, i can see no good reason to pee myself. i am not "ripping it" as they say, so i may as well have a dignified, standing  piss (that is, if any piss in a port 0 potty in rural texas can be considered dignified) and see if i can do something about that arm pad.

at the next aid station i find: shade, cold gatorade, white tape scraps (go figure), garbage bags, a smelly porto potty, shangri-la.

i wrap my arm pad onto the base bar with a combo of discarded tape and garbage bag, i pee, i chat up a race official, i stretch, down a gatorade, and i am on my way.

what a civilized way to ride an ironman, i think. the call of the aid station, has infiltrated my soul like a siren. i am hooked. i make stop 2, 3 more times. who is counting? this is ironman, i am noodling around now. i WILL finish i tell the big HUGE, barrier in my head that is protesting at the thought of a marathon to follow. but, as they say, the time is inconsequential. or, at least today, that seems to have become the case.

i am a broken man. a broken ironman. i no longer care about time. there is no way i am going to meet any of the lofty goals i had for myself. there is no way i am going to impress my coaches or my spouse. i am here to finish.

the bike is over before you can say i want hot sauce with my bbq, and i am in the luxury of the transition tent once again, holding my head and my gonads, in shame.

i waddle around with my equipment like it was the first time i had seen any of it. anything to delay that inevitable moment when i have to emerge into the sun and humidity again and begin the final leg of my inglorious day.

once running, i don't feel half bad. (and that would be about it, not half bad; not really good at this point, but not as bad as i thought) but, just like the first few months dating a girl with borderline personality disorder, i have learned not to trust that feeling.

as it turns out , i am right to be cynical, the crash comes in the form of heat, fatigue, shortened stride length, mental burn out, wishes to stop, and feelings of dread about the next two laps.

"there are many ways to do an ironman" i tell myself. and at the end of the day, it is all about finishing. after getting sick in arizona and having to DNF, i am definitely not up to stopping...no matter how degrading this gets. i am up for just about any level of degradation, as long as it ends at the finish line...

funny how once you give up on your more lofty goals, your standards sink real low real fast. at least for me, this is true.  if i can't be ripped and lean, then let me be a fat pig. if i am not in charge, then let me just quit the job. if i am not ripping it out on the run course, then let me run/walk. i mean, who cares i have never done that in my life and i don't know how to do it? it sounds like a nice way to get through the next 15 k; (turns out it only prolongs the pain). so....i start to walk. and run. and walk. and repeat. and i may as well have shit myself in public for all the pride that i lost. but i kept soldiering on.

at some point, i glorify what i am doing by telling myself that at least i can tell my 5 year old that her "daddy is not a quitter". but then i get a reality check and realize that she absolutely doesn't care and cannot relate to what i am doing down here is texas. she just wishes that her daddy was there with her giving her a bath and putting her to sleep the day before her birthday, not a thousand miles away, torturing himself for no discern-able reason in the texas sun.

yes, i am just a selfish asshole. and i am sucking shit at this ironman. and no-one cares. this is my own lonely cell of mediocrity....there is no real lesson here for my daughter.

the one thing that gets me going is when i find one or two other fellow mediocrites who are sledging away, to run beside. i find i can run with them. and i actually get a weird energy when they tire and bow out to walk at the next aid station. i find some weird competitive spirit in the midst of the middle of the field and this gives me a push, and i actually run the last 5 or 6 miles, and i start to feel swells in my heart and a kind of determination sets in that makes me feel good. this is why i do this. i like this feeling of resoluteness and strength. did i access this myself or did i need those other runners to get at it? i still don't know.

the run course in texas is beautiful and also filled with a party atmosphere that i have not encountered anywhere else. there are hundreds of people cheering me on, calling out my name, giving me high fives. i feed off their energy, and, i suppose, they are there to feed off mine. together, we make something beautiful. we comprise some kind of inter-experential celebration; a liminality that emphasizes what is human in us. i am moved by how these total strangers throw their energy at me, spurring me onward, and my eyes well in tears as hands, young, old, male, female, reach out to give me a high five and scream at me to "get it done".

the finish line comes. and i feel spent, proud, ashamed, relieved, disappointed, and strangely ecstatic. i guess that time is inconsequential after all. at least in that moment it is.

days have passed.

i am reminded of the inscription over the ancient temple of the oracle in Delphi. "know thyself"

time does matter to me. finishing is better than a DNF, but it is not enough. i want what i want. and it is desire, as Spinoza would say, which creates the illusion of free will. i am addicted to that illusion. desire makes me feel like i am a ghost in this machine, it makes me feel like an agent inside this matrix,  and, "Mr. Anderson", we all know that it is agents who run the game.