For the past few years, my attitude going into a race is “Just do my best and finish.” This year, however, I have set some goals and I have worked towards them with a more regimented schedule than I have ever had before, thanks to my coach and buddy Dan. This weekend is my A-Race: the Great White North Half Ironman Triathlon and I have high hopes for my times and goals.

A few weeks ago I had the swim of my life at a local race and I would like to do that again. At Spin off Spadina, I took 9 minutes off of my PB swim time. I hope to take more than that off for this one (more like 13). I would also like to take about 10 minutes off of the bike. The run is where things will get challenging because of my knee problems. I’m working on icing and massaging my IT band. I think that if I do a 9:1 running schedule, I should be able to make it in the 2:30 that I did last year. All told, I want to take off 33 minutes off of my previous Half IM PB. I know that it doesn’t add up, but if I have a good day it is possible. In actuality, I will be happy with anything under 6:30, but closer to 6:00 would be great. That being said, if my knee is killer sore and I have to walk the whole half marathon, obviously all of my goals are going out the window and my goal will go back to “just” finishing. I’ll be very happy to have my partner in crime taking pictures and taking care of the dog while I’m out there… and of course, meeting me at the finish line. )

Previous years, plus my high goals:

Two weeks ago, I realized that I hadn’t followed up on ensuring that I would be able to eat at the Carbo-loading supper for the Half Iron(wo)man I was doing on the July long-weekend. So I emailed the race director and he gave me the number for the caterers. I called them and left a message saying that I was vegan and needed to be accommodated (I think I also mentioned something about the supper being worth $25, which is what my partner was paying). The race director then called me to tell me that they would accommodate me, but it seemed begrudging. It didn’t seem like he REALLY wanted to accommodate me and told me that I was the only person that had requested such a meal. I told him that I knew of at least one other vegan that was coming and that just because no one had talked to him about it, didn’t mean that vegans weren’t coming but that they weren’t eating the food! I suggested that he make an option on the online sign-up for a veg*n meal or meat. He didn’t seem very receptive to this, but I think that I will follow-up on this because I have seen it done at other races and can’t see why it would be a problem.

At one of the suppers, the chef (I got to meet him personally and he called me “the vegan”) told me that they don’t advertise the veg*n option. I still don’t know why they don’t. He prepared a stuffed pepper, which was pretty good. I know that I could have done it better, but it was pretty good. Better than nothing! They only prepared 6 veg*n meals for over 700 participants! I don’t know the stats on veg*n triathletes, but it seemed pretty disproportional considering that triathletes are generally health-conscious people.

At the end of the Half IM, I said to the race director after he gave me my finishers medal that vegans can finish too. He laughed, gave me a big hug, and said, “Of course they can!” It was a nice ending to the saga of the food at the Great White North Triathlon.