Maybe I can come up with interesting ways to describe the pre-race sore throat that has now become a full-blown cold. On Saturday I felt like someone had lightly scuffed my throat with a Brillo pad. I'd swallow and think, hm, allergies?, rationalizing that the rural area that hosted the race might be home to new and interesting pollens that had set off my histamine firehose. That would not be the first time this has happened. I spent the entire week before Ironman New Zealand thinking I had a horrible cold before I realized that hey, I felt totally fine aside from the snot storm brewing in my nose, and that my immune system simply didn't agree with the sudden change in seasons brought on by 14 hours of air travel. Nothing a little Claritin couldn't clear up.

So. On Sunday morning I was harboring a cold but felt pretty OK. We got to the race start and I squeezed into my wetsuit, which I bought 20 pounds ago and which is officially at least one size too small. Kudos to Ironman Wetsuits for the flexibility of their neoprene -- it worked great.

The swim was a breeze. The reservoir was probably 70 degrees and didn't taste too bad. (Dave did point out a dead fish draped over the "NO SWIMMING" sign near the start, and I wish he hadn't.) Since there were fewer than 250 competitors, they threw us all into a mass start, which was totally fine. Near the end of the swim, my cap crept up to the top of my giant head and threatened to pop off, and with every other stroke I tried to yank it down over my forehead, to no effect. Dave made fun of me as I ran up the ramp: "Ariel! Nice job keeping the swim cap on!!!" For the sake of the race photographers, I refrained from greeting him with my middle finger. I exited the swim in just over 40 minutes, which is exactly what I expected.

Onto the bike. The first few miles of the bike were lovely rolling hills. Then around mile 10 we got to the boring residential neighborhoods and the wind. The course was mostly flat, with one extended climb and several short, steep climbs, and a good dose of headwind. But I spent a good amount of the ride flying in my aerobars. I remember at one point, around mile 30, looking down at my bike computer and thinking: HR 150, cadence 95, speed 20.0mph: perfect. And given how much time I felt like I was going 18-20mph, I expected a faster bike split than I got. But those few hills and the windy stretches really slowed me down. My bike split was 3:22, or 16.6mph.

By the way, there were no porta-potties on the bike course. They made this clear in the pre-race announcements. It's impossible (for me) to ride 56 miles without peeing. This leaves a person with few options. Use your imagination. (Or don't.)

My socks were wet going into the second transition (see previous paragraph) so once I racked my bike, I took time to change into dry socks, which are crucial to my happiness on a 13.1-mile run. Something that is crucial to my happiness the day after a 13.1-mile run is applying sunblock, which I should have done at this point, but didn't do. The stuff I applied at 4:30am had pretty much rubbed or sweated off. Big mistake.

I headed out onto the run feeling just OK. I started clicking off 10-minute miles, not pushing it too hard, and thinking nice and easy. The effort wasn't too hard, and I felt like I could keep it up for over two hours for sure. The course was completely exposed, though, and it was getting hot. The clouds that had blanketed the sky during the bike had disappeared completely, and there was very little shade. I got to mile 8 still feeling fine, but mile 9 was a gradual uphill that completely blew my pace. From there on it was a sufferfest.

I went through every trick in my book. The most effective was to keep telling myself, don't walk, just slow down. And it worked: I didn't walk (except briefly through the aid stations), but I sure did slow down. I lost eight minutes somewhere in the last five miles. Still not sure how that happened. I mean, I was passing people! In the last mile alone, I passed three people. One of them was a woman whom I'd been chasing for the last six miles. I made a firm decision that I had to crush her spirit (sorry lady!) or risk having her pass me back, which she totally could. So I rallied and passed her like she was standing still. Then fifty yards ahead I slowed back down. My run time was 2:20 and change, which is second in slowness only to my first-ever half-ironman back in 2002.

I finished in 6:29. That's right between my best half (6:03) and my slowest (7:0something on the notoriously tough Wildflower long course). I was pretty darn happy to be finished. I was 33rd out of 65 women. Which means my time IS the median time.

I was second in the Athena division and won an armload of merchandise, including a small bottle of Lucero olive oil. We tasted their whole line of extra-virgin olive oil at the little race expo. The stuff is fantastic and the company is run by a young triathlete and his family. If you ever see it at a farmer's market, by all means buy some. We took the olive oil with some freshly baked bread on our kayaking trip the next day, and it sure did hit the spot. (We also took a hunk of Cowgirl Creamery Mt. Tam cheese. But NO WINE, believe it or not. And no quips about the wetsuit not fitting, I know, I know, sheesh.)

So that's the story of my 20th triathlon, my fifth half-ironman. I'm proud of it. I kept moving despite my legs begging me to stop. Although I don't find the long races to be fun, every time I finish one, I reaffirm that I have the power to change my life, that I can persevere, and that I can do extraordinary things. And that's pretty damn cool.

CaliMan 1/2-iron-distance triathlon: 1.2-mile swim, 56-mile bike, 13.1-mile run

    Swim:    40:28
    T1:       2:56
    Bike:  3:22:47
    T2:       3:08
    Run:   2:20:18
    Total: 6:29:39