1 Week

In 1 week I will be in St. George, Utah participating in the inaugural Ironman Triathlon.

What am I nervous about?

• The swim start. The swim start can be brutal. With all the other "mass starts" I have done, the swim start has been only with other racers in my age group but the way Ironman does it is that everyone starts at the same time and I mean everyone. I haven't yet decided on my strategy for the start. Do I sit in the back and pass people as I need to and sacrifice time or do I take the more offensive approach and get into the mess of it all? This might be a race day decision. I do know that in order to keep my faculties I nned to keep in mind that I'm not surrounded by 2,000 people but that I'm only surrounded by 6 people
• My ankle. I had some tendinitis flare up in my ankle a few weeks ago. It's definitely not disastrous or a game killer but I have no idea how this is going to react on race day. It doesn't tend to rear it's ugly on the ride but on the run it becomes a little uncomfortable.
• Hydration. This is a double edged sword. You have to drink a lot but then you also have to use the bathroom more which also eats up time. I usually have to hit the bathroom far more than I would like so I need to try and get this done while still on the bike and moving forward.
• Weather. I have no control over this one so I'm trying not to think about it too much. At this point the weather is showing that the day will have a high of 63 with a 30% chance of rain, this would be great weather. The X factor is the wind though. The wind could be hard enough to actually cancel the swim due to excessive chop. Let's hope this doesn't happen.

I must say with being this close to the biggest and most difficult race of my life I am relatively calm. I've trained through horrible cold and ice, rain, sun, wind and every imaginable weather condition that Texas can throw at me so I feel as though I have earn myself a good race. I've done multiple rides of over 100 miles, 7 runs of half marathon length or longer and last week did a 2.7 mile open water swim in 1:24. Due to these facts I feel as though I'm justified in my confidence.

What's going to keep me going through this whole thing? More than anything the fact that I'm going to have quite a bit of family there cheering me on. They'll be Kati, my mom, sister, brother-in-law, niece (the one that doesn't like my beard) and two cousins. Knowing that I'll see them multiple times during the day is going to be my driving force and motivation.

So what are you supposed to do if you can't be there? Not a problem. Just go here and at the top of the screen in the middle there is live coverage, click on "Athlete Tracker" and type in either Stoddard or my bib number which is 921 and you will be able to see what my splits have been during the day. There will be one swim time, multiple time checks on the bike and run but unfortunately it won't show you exactly where I am at that moment. I'm also going to be giving Kati my phone so that she can do Facebook updates with where I'm at and how I look and feel. There will also be a way to watch me finish but I'm not sure whether that will be on Ironman's website or on the actual races website. The race starts at 7:00am (8:00CST) and my goal time is to be finished in 13:30 which would put me crossing the line at 8:30 (9:30CST). That time is if everything goes pretty well.

I guess that I don't have anything else to say. This is it.