Few reasons why I didn’t think it hugely mattered to do as brick:
I’d proven to myself the week before that my bike pacing was OK to do a good 20km run as a brick finishing strong.
I did the April 70.3 run at marathon pace as practice brick.
I’ve done about 5 very short bricks to practice that first 2km.
And running off the bike has never been an issue previously.
So I could have bricked yesterday, wasn’t against it although potentially slightly increases run risk when I’m relatively pushing volume compared to march and april, and only 2.5hrs gap so still be running on tired legs.
But ultimately the real reason is it was my only day off work and I wanted coffee and cake with my missus since I’ve not seen her all week.
Race Plan will be:
300g carb from infinit in 700ml bladder (super concentrated, should be 100g/L if isotonic)
~150g from gatorade on course via 5x bottles
100g from infinit between arms bottle that start with
30g from 1 bar
30-60g from maurten gels if grab on course (depending on tolerance/hunger/if had bar)
Yep caffeine obviously a potential factor. I’m pretty much commuted to the fact I’ll be losing 90s in a portaloo. But I’ve always dosed on caffeine and never had an issue, but lack of running training hasn’t helped train gut to tolerate running. Think 90% of training runs lately I’ve stopped regardless of caffeine.
But hopefully reduction in fibre, fats, fructose in days pre-race will help there.
I’ll note this definitely wasn’t the plan. But race guide released this week shows there’s no carb-free electrolyte on course, only gatorade or water, so bought a tub of gatorade Wednesday to try yesterday. I’m guessing ~150g CHO assuming it’ll be made up 25-50% weaker than instructions.
Yeah it’s not the bog standard gatorade, is a weaker carb more electolyte version. But yeah interesting as it didn’t remotely fill me yesterday I was hungry all ride.
Yes inbuilt bladder in Shiv. Plan was to keep nearly all fuel in there and just exchange bottles for fluid, but on course gatorade means will need to mix both.
I’m travelling airport to accommodation now, and the humidity feels very real to me as much as locals say it’s fine for mid-winter. Suddenly noticed the wave once airplane doors opened even from seat.
But was 29C today so that drop in temperature will be significant by weekend.
I’m in good enough shape to. But you’re the first to point out that has to be a very obvious given for any time goal.
Whether I’m in potential 8:45 shape to be more confident is a scary stretch.
Not knowing the course or conditions it’s a little bit down to star alignment to say for sure, even aside from just whether it’s my day.
Proud of what I’ve done, and looking forward to the next one more than I expected. Haven’t had that fatigue of training or craving taper/off season at any point
You do kind of just need the ‘starts to align’. I was seconds of 10, and that was partly due to my poor maths on the run (where the finish was about 1km after T2, so you actually did 4 and a bit laps).
Unclear, need clarification from race directors as different sources conflict but think race starts at 08:10. And Cairns is 9 hours ahead.
Originally said AG at 07:40 with no mention of pros.
Now says pro men 07:40, pro women 07:41, and AG starting after the pros at 07:11??
Assume they meant 08:11, or 07:51. No idea really. But was hoping AG might start 5-10 behind pro men to get up to the poorer swimmers.
