A man made of Iron

Well, now that I've made you wait with bated breath on the actual RACE DAY, let's fix that!!!

hmm, what should I do today?

Sunday, July 24, dawned bright, beautiful, and EARLY. The hubster and I were up at 3:45, pre race brekkie, then on our way into Placid. I dropped him off to sort out gear and nutrition, found a parking spot, ran into Dad G and we were off to get our soon to be ironman on his way! He was pretty good-a little nervous at first, but some Europe calmed him down and made him smile :-) Lubed up with sunscreen, body glide, a few deep breaths, kisses, got "un" married (I held his ring so it didn't fall off into the lake!) and at 6:40, we parted ways so he could make his way down to the lake to start his race off!!

Ever wonder what 2400 athletes in the water looks like? Well, there ya go. Complete chaos. But very exciting :-) Dad G. and I took our spectating VERRYY seriously and took videos of the swim start for post ability (check out facebook !)The swim was two loops, so we went back 'round Mirror Lake to see if we could spot the hubster starting loop 2. I know, in a mass of 2400. But guess what....I FOUND HIM!  And what's more important, I got a picture!!  In for lap two, and the hubster exited the water in 1:14:xx.  Sweet! 

What, WHATS next?!?

 The Bike

The hubster headed off for his 112 mile bike (yes, you read that right!) and I headed out for my 20 mile run.  I ran the first 7 miles on the run course and hit 86 to run up down till I  saw the hubster.  Hit the bears up (holy run hills!) and caught the hubster at mile 50, lookin' super strong.  Ran back to the car, jumped in Mirror lake to cool down, and changed to head out to catch the hubster coming in from the bike.  Chilled out with Dad G. and made up a few time bets (he won :-P)  After a bit of hurry up and wait (the main theme of triathlon spectating) the hubster rolled in from the bike at 7:20:xx (Stinker beat me by 59 seconds, isn't that nuts!)

 

 Two down, one to go!!  And if you know the hubster at all, this was his nemesis:  the run.  He has gotten oodles better in the last year, but I knew that he was a bit nervous about it.  First marathon post 112 miles of biking and 2.4 miles of swimming?  No sweat :-P

The Run

As the hubster changed his "costume" in transition 2, Dad G. and I hustled off to mile one to get ready to bring out our cheering section action!  We situated ourselves at the top of hill one to get him up it, and cheered our little hearts out.  The soon to be IM reported some cramping, but felt really good about the bike and swim, and relayed the AWESOMENESS of his day.  Super excited to hear that!  We parted ways, and Dad G.  and I took a nice stroll down the course to try top hit up the hubster at mile 9 (the course does a loopy and then an out and back).  We walked about 2-3 miles down the course (Dad G. is a super trooper and walked probably about 10 miles with me by the end of the day!!)  Waited once we got to mile 9, chatted it up, and sooner rather than later saw....OUR BOY!!

 Looked great, ran a few steps with me, and got the big ole thumbs up.  YAY, still happy and going strong!  So now what?  Well, we walked again back to mile 14/1 to catch him on his second loop.  Looked at projected finish times...still too soon to tell :-)

And about 20 minutes later, we saw him!  YAY!!  Still truckin' still going strong!  Dad looks at me and says "Now what?"  Well, we walk :-P  I told him I was gonna walk the course again down to the out and back to give our boy a rah rah on his last 5 miles!!

 Headed out to River Road....about about 45 minutes later....HERE WE COME!  Less than 10k to go!  At this point, he was hurting a bit more, but we did the essential "finger check". 

Me:  Hey, does your pinkie hurt?

The hubster:  Nope.  Feels good.  I'm good to go :-)

Sweet!  We chatted up for a bit, then I left my man to finish the last of the course...out the last two miles...back through the Olympic Oval....to..Mike Reilly saying...

GREG GLASER, YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!!!  14:41:42.  140.6 miles of glory.  7 months of training.  And he did it!

Once again, so.  stinkin'. proud.  I love you, baby!

But why take my secondhand narrative's word for it?  Read the real deal right here!!!