Race Week

Well race day has been and gone.....really, did I miss something?! 20 weeks of training, eating, sleeping, needing to sleep more and missing out on a social life....and D-Day has been and gone! And now the de-brief of race week and all that went with it! So much in so few days - it'll have to be 2 blogs!

Emma, Craig and I flew to Auckland last Tuesday night...excess luggage paid (Emm and Craig packed the kitchen sink!), race week schedule prepared, nerves currently on hold, excitement starting to build. We were soo organised, even went for a swim Tuesday afternoon and a run on Wednesday morning in Auckland, before driving down to Taupo to get amongst the race frenzied athletes and face the reality of 3 days time lining up on that start line to compete in Ironman New Zealand!

Jobs to do:

- Unpack and reassemble bikes: check

Is Craig's bike actually in there?!!!






- Get bikes checked by technical officials so we could ride them, get helmets safety checked so we could use them: check
- Take bikes for a spin up Taupo hill: check
- Get wetsuits dipped so we could swim in the lake: check
- Swim in lake: uh.....not check. The wind was so strong that we decided that maybe this was an afternoon phenomenon and that really it wasn't going to be that windy at 7am race start so really we should put this off until Thursday morning. So sensible!


The rest of the week was blurry in a way, but very real in another. We did swim Thursday morning, but the wind was far worse than the previous afternoon and we bobbed and rolled everywhere among the white caps of Taupo lake! But by Friday morning the lake was pristine, calm, beautiful and a delight to swim in :-).
Registration loomed on Thursday morning and we were all weighed, issued with our race pack and officially 'in the system'. I caught up with Bec, Sophie, Jacque - all facing the reality hit of 'this really is it isn't it?!'

Carb loading, lake swims, trying to sleep well, getting transition bags ready, checking out the course...the time was rapidly galloping towards race day!
Some pics of the final preparations ;-)