1/2 Ironman

Sunday was Lou's 1/2 Ironman.  We had a communication problem. I thought Saturday he was driving to Augusta with a friend and then I would drive up after the trial on Saturday. But when I got home Saturday, his car was gone. I called him and he said he drove up. So now will have two cars there. Hmmm. So since he had a car, I didnt need to come there Saturday night. I drove up Sunday morning.  The weather wasnt great for picture taking but from extreme exercise, it was great. Very overcast, misty and  cool. Funny, Friday I was sweating my guts out and Sunday I was chilly.  The Ironman goes, swim 1.2 miles, bike 56 miles and run 13. 1. I made it to the bridge  to watch with plenty of time.

Sorry this is blurry. It was so dark, cloudy and then taking the picture under the bridge, not much light. Kinda scary seeing these guys waiting. Makes you realized what could happened.

Lou was in the 4th heat to take off. Can you see him in the yellow cap??

 They are suppose to stay in the inside of the yellow floating markers. Not sure why there were so many outside of it.

 Then after a bunch  of swimmers had swum by, I hear this guy yellow for help. Ugh. So the kayaks go over to him. Then I see this other person. I thought this person was drowning.

 I dont know if something was wrong. There was a cop boat right near him. I dont know why but I didnt think this was Lou. (and it wasnt).  There was lots of hydrilla in the water. Hydrilla is kinda like really big seaweed.  It can get wrapped around everything. I dont know if you can see it in the back of the person, in the water.  I did hear someone say that this lady, who had done lots of these event, got tangled in it. Freaked out and could get her head back together. So she pulled from the race.
I moved to the other side of the bridge. Then I decided to walk all the way down to where they come out of the water.  It was a long hike.  I never made it to where  he came out of the water. But he did pass me on the bike. I yelled, "go lou". He looked right at me, but later he said he didnt hear me.

My husband said the strippers, down by the bikes, really liked his wet suit. Strippers , his were to college girls, are people who pull you out of your wet suit because they are so freaking tight.

So then I walked back to my car, then all the way down to his car to get the ipad. Then back to the race end area. I was so freaking tired from that walking. LOL But I cant complain , since it was  nothing compared to what he was doing. So I was at the end, by the big time clock, where you run under at the end. But then across the street  was the running part of the race.  So I went over there. They run down one side of the road, back up  then down and back again. You should see them 4 times. Then  they run all the way around and up the other side into the end timer thing. So I saw him near the beginning of his running part.

He didnt want me to worry, so that why he did this ( so he says). He didnt want me to see how tired he was. But I dont think that is true. When he ran his first 1/2 marathon ( 13. 1 miles)  he looked so bad at the end, it was scary. I know he couldnt have acted like this if he wanted to. And the first time he did a bike road race, I think it was around 70 miles, again he looked like crap at the end.  So he is looking good here. Its hard to fake looking good.

This is him coming back up the road.

 

Then I freaking missed him the next two times. Ugh!! How, I dont know. He said he even called my name. But they were playing the music so loud, it was hard to hear.

So Im waiting, looking at my watch , starting to think I must have missed him. Or worse something happened to him. The end, was behind me on the other side the street. So I hear them say, as they announce all the runners names and where they are from as they cross the finish line, "From Irmo South Carolina:. Hmm, how many runners could be from Irmo.  Then I hear them say, "this is our first para-Ironman" ( a guy that was missing a leg). I knew that guy was running behind Lou. Ugh. I went to the finish line and didnt recognize any of the runners coming in. You start to know the people running around your person and it helps you locate them. Then my cell phone rings and its Lou. Ugh, I really did miss him. I felt terrible.

 

 

Guess what, they had beer at the end. How weird is that. So Lou had a beer but didnt drink it. He said it didnt taste good.  Now trying to go back to get the bike. OMG, I dont know how he had the energy to do that. Again, I wanted to complain but since he wasnt, I figured I better not. It was a really long walk to get the bike and then get back to the car.
Man, there are a lot of bikes.

Lucky it didnt start pouring down rain until we were almost to the car. I felt bad as I drove pass people still running the course all by themselves , in the pouring rain. It had to be a long, lonely run.

So everything went well and he finished quicker than he thought. I think he was about 5 1/2 hours. Go Lou!!!