Dun Laoghaire Ironman 70.3 2018

joey100

Do what ever you think will make you the most comfortable. If that means taking an extra minute in transition then take that minute. Lots of uphill will let you heat up but might be no harm having something for the downhill sections to keep the wind off. You will see people going out in sleeveless tri suits and some putting on near winter jackets and everything inbetween.

Put a long and short sleeve jersey in your T1 bag and you can make the call on the day if you need.

The Machine

joey100 wrote: »

Do what ever you think will make you the most comfortable.

Well said.

Statler

dickidy wrote: »

This may also be a stupid question. Do people wear tri suits throughout or change after the swim to something warm ( long sleeve cycle top). I'm gonna be on the bike around the 4 hour mark.
Some day I hope to ask which bike to use or best advice for aero helmet

Tri suit all the way, they're called that for a reason:)... Regardless of whether it's raining or not it's still going to be warm and humid on Sunday, so no need for a long sleeve top.

dickidy

Cheers. Pack for all occasions and see what happens. Thanks

Diego Murphy

Statler wrote: »

Tri suit all the way, they're called that for a reason:)... Regardless of whether it's raining or not it's still going to be warm and humid on Sunday, so no need for a long sleeve top.

Agreed. It's expected to be very humid. Looking at Yr.no, it's now looking like the rain could well be gone by the time the swim starts. It's expected to be dry for the day then but warm and humid. I'm looking forward to it now.

rxchxy

This is probably a stupid question but how do things work if you get a puncture? I'm just thinking of that but coming up to Ballinastoe where they've recently put down loads of loose gravel.... Are you completely on your own in terms of fixing it? I will be carrying a spare tube, tyre levers and cartridge but just if I'm having trouble. I know in the athlete guide it does say there are mobile mechanics but just in practice how does this work? Does anybody have any previous experience with this...

cjt156

[QUOTE=FAQs PAge
]Bike facts
- iPods, MP3 players, phones, video cameras etc. are not permitted on the course
- Your race number must be worn on your back
Note that athletes must be able to repair a puncture without assistance and should carry spare inner tubes and tools. IRONMAN will provide mobile and static support for other issues that athletes cannot fix themselves but these staff are not on call and we cannot guarantee that they will be available to assist with a problem.



Originally from: http://eu.ironman.com/triathlon/events/emea/ironman-70.3/dun-laoghaire/athletes/faqs.aspx#ixzz5OR1txX4l.[/QUOTE]
I'd always carry 2 tubes, 2 CO2 cartridges and tyre levers.

TriFirst

rxchxy wrote: »

This is probably a stupid question but how do things work if you get a puncture? I'm just thinking of that but coming up to Ballinastoe where they've recently put down loads of loose gravel.... Are you completely on your own in terms of fixing it? I will be carrying a spare tube, tyre levers and cartridge but just if I'm having trouble. I know in the athlete guide it does say there are mobile mechanics but just in practice how does this work? Does anybody have any previous experience with this...

To decrease the likelihood of getting a puncture , make sure you are running the correct tyre pressure and stay away from the very edge of the road where there is always an accumulation of grit, stones and dirt which have the potential to cause a puncture. Personally I never run lower than 90 psi myself, but the tyre pressure parameters will be on the side wall of your tyres. Just remember the harder you run your tyres the less grip you will have especially in the wet.

TriFirst

With met eireann predicting this storm to hit Saturday night into Sunday morning it'll be very interesting to see how this race is affected, both in terms of the swim and the cycle. Will they cut the swim short if necessary ? The temperature will be a good bit cooler on Sunday compared to tomorrow also. If the roads are wet for the cycle it will be treacherous on the descents, throw in higher winds. Im predicting quite a few not making the cut off on the bike leg.

Diego Murphy

TriFirst wrote: »

With met eireann predicting this storm to hit Saturday night into Sunday morning it'll be very interesting to see how this race is affected, both in terms of the swim and the cycle. Will they cut the swim short if necessary ? The temperature will be a good bit cooler on Sunday compared to tomorrow also. If the roads are wet for the cycle it will be treacherous on the descents, throw in higher winds. Im predicting quite a few not making the cut off on the bike leg.

I honestly don't think the weather is going to be an issue. Yr.no is showing the last of the rain being gone by 6am and wind isn't being forecast as an issue for during the day.

Stevegeraghty

Can anyone swim the course tomorrow morning, is it already set up?

The Machine

Stevegeraghty wrote: »

Can anyone swim the course tomorrow morning, is it already set up?

At the briefing this afternoon they said the practice swim is a small loop in Scotsman’s Bay, about 500m. So its a short version of the course but you can do it as many times as you want.

Stevegeraghty

The Machine wrote: »

At the briefing this afternoon they said the practice swim is a small loop in Scotsman’s Bay, about 500m. So its a short version of the course but you can do it as many times as you want.

Is it set all day or just 8-9

Diego Murphy

Best of luck to everyone tomorrow

reidman

Diego Murphy wrote: »

Best of luck to everyone tomorrow

Yep wish you all a good race, enjoy, especially if it’s your first 70.3!

dickidy

Thanks for all the advice on here guys. You're all wonderful people. Made a 70.3 virgin slightly less nervous.
Hope everyone has a great race and makes it back safe and in time.
On a side note. I've never seen the pier look so long

stampydmonkey

Good luck everyone. Safe racing!!

stampydmonkey

Well....that was tough.

G1raff3

That really had to be earned today, fair play to everyone!

Diego Murphy

I'll leave a more detailed race report later but that was a savage event. A very challenging swim, with currents changing and choppy waters.

A cycle more reminiscent of a Sportive. Tough climbs from 20k to 70k with some relieving descents in between but with some incredibly technical descents. Awful weather conditions up those mountains. Strong cross winds and a very heavy misty type of rain, with visibility down to zero at times. It's a pity that people couldn't see what we went through up there because it was like a different world.

And then a run involving laps of the town. Really loved the run. The support was unreal throughout it.

I really think that this has surpassed expectations and rocketed to the top ten list of most difficult half ironmen in europe, not to mind Ireland. Forget that it's heavily branded for a minute, and give credit where credit is due.

Would I do it again next year? Probably not, because I'm not sure I'll be as well trained as I am this year. That's how hard it is. That's no reflection on the quality of the event but more on the difficulty level. It's not one just to rock onto with minimal training.

Over 1800 registered for this event. I'll assume that there were some non starters, but the finishers dwindled go the 1200 mark. There were literally hundreds that didn't make it to the finish. That all give you an idea as to how hard it was.

Finished in 6:29:26 and felt great at the end. 7 weeks to barca

EDit

Couldn’t agree more with what Diego says, it was tough. I don’t have anything to compare with as this was my first half distance race, but the conditions on the swim and cycle were pretty dire. Here’s my experience...

Swim: very tough!...toughest part of the race for me. I wouldn’t be the strongest swimmer anyway and I don’t have much experience swimming in the sea, so I found this a big challenge. Despite this, I felt ok through most of it, mainly by just keeping to a reasonable pace and not going off too strong (although the point where they started moving the first big red buoy threw me off a bit...what was that about?) However, somewhere around the last big red buoy I started to tire a bit and also started to feel nauseous (I can only assume this was due to swallowing quite a bit of sea water) and I genuinely didn’t think I was going to be able to climb on to that pontoon...but I did 🙂 swim time was around 50 mins

Transition 1: exiting the water, got a boost from (a) hearing my name and words of encouragement over the loud speakers, and (b) seeing my wife in the crowds cheering me (amazing the difference this made to my mental state)...rest of transition was as expected, although I forgot to put on my cycling gloves :mad:

Cycle: I’ll keep this short as I could write an essay on this TBH. Early part before the mountains was good...I felt strong and kept a good pace. Up in the mountains, weather was pure ****e. That said, I didn’t ever feel like I couldn’t do it, I just kept an eye on my average speed and paced myself up the inclines. I also kept to my race plan and stopped periodically to rest the legs and have a gel (only about 20-30 secs each time) but interestingly after doing so I generally re-overtook everyone that had passed me while I was stopped as I just felt refreshed and strong again. Overall I was happy with cycle and did it in around 3 hours 50 mins, which I was really pleased with.

Transition 2: nothing to note here, except the amount of people talking about weather in the mountains

Run: really enjoyed this...felt really strong for first 2 laps, but tired a bit on last lap. Encouragement from crowds was unreal...I really had no idea that some stranger shouting “come on EDit, really good running” would give me such a boost. The crowds really do have to take some credit for getting me around TBH. Overall very happy with pace considering what I had done beforehand, and got around in just over 2hours.

Overall: fantastic organization and really great atmosphere...the whole of DL was buzzing and I can’t tell you the amount of people who said well done as we passed them on the streets. On a personal level, having only done my first try-a-tri in June last year, I am very pleased with myself this morning (albeit very sore )...overall time was just over 7 hours

Well done to everyone that took part!

dermabrasion

There was talk that IM are not running this next year in favour of a full IM in Cork. Did anyone hear this too? I'd love another pop at this.

Inspector Coptoor

I can’t overemphasize how hard that course was today for the swim and the bike.

Currents were so strong on the swim that it pulled a buoy out to sea and ended up swimming 400m more than I should have.
I thought I’d get the swim done in 45 mins and ended Up being 53 mins.

Bike route had 1450m of climbing, there were 26km/hr head winds and horrible rain in the Sally gap with a mist that reduced visibility to around 40m at times.
Im really glad I knew the route well.
There were some nasty crashes at various stages.

The run route was fine & the support was fantastic.

It’s not a course I’d rush back to do again next year even tho I live in the area.
Much like the previous poster, I won’t be able to train as much for family reasons next year.

Glad to have my first 70.3 done. Good bit of weight to lose if I ever go after a 140.6.
Running half marathons at 103kg is zero craic altogether.

Got around in 8 hours.

Milk_Tray

What a tough tough day!! Really struggled throughout from swim to run! I've done the bike route several times so knew not to push when I really wanted too! Just curious is anyone elses time missing from the finishing? I am now showing as no finish time even though I was but not any more??! Weird!!

6:27 was my time - my goal was under 6:30, didnt think after the swim I'd do it!!

Oh and no Jelly fish!!

WattsUp

Hadn't realized the first orange bouy moved. My watch made the swim 2300m and the I was pretty sure I swam reasonably straight lines. I did 48 for whereas my usual time for that 1900 is 38

The bike was very tough but we were lucky we never really had a head wind for long, it was warm and all key descents except Cruagh were dry.  The cross winds were probably the biggest danger. The visibility and the mist were a nuisance and but they came about because it was warm and humid. If it had been a cold wet day, such as 13-14C in Dun Laoghaire it would have been less than 10C at the Sally gap and we would have had much more uncomfortable weather.

I had done the cycle course twice and that helped a lot. The only nasty surprise was that 2-3k loop between roundabouts near the end.  The Road Bike with TT bars certainly felt like the right decision as I used the TT bars a lot on between Dun Laoghaire and Kilternan. 

Run was great with all the spectators packed into approx 3km of road made for great atmosphere. Because I was recovering from an injury I started conservatively and was a nice feeling to able pick up the pace as I went, rather the usual start fast and shuffle over the line strategy I normally seem to employ!

The finish was the best organised of any race i did. Great noise from spectators and having the underground carpark to to collected gear would be a a great addition if weather was poor.

Did 6:10 with 48 swim, 3:15 bike and 1:56 run. Very happy with my day out and decision to sign up. At least I got an 70.3 completed in an injury curtailed season.

dickidy

Well I'm certainly feeling that race now.
What a day that was from start to finish. I honestly didn't realise how much goes into getting one of these up and running and effort from hundreds of volunteers so firstly congrats and thank you to them.

The swim.
I wasn't nervous about the swim as I had trained well for it and had it down as 40/45min and was feeling great as I was coming to the first red marker. Then all of sudden it was miles away and felt like getting further. In the end it took me 55 min and 2300 on the watch. ( my Garmin likes to add a few meters sometimes ).

The bike I knew what to expect as I'm from the area but the weather was crazy and made things very difficult. It was not nice up there, even though all my mates were saying it must have been a lovely cycle with the weather so nice and hot. I had done the loop a good few times so was very familiar with the descents. Was great fun flying down them ( especially past all the tt bikes, who caught me back up on the flats) . Had the bike in for 4 h but made it back in 3:35 and very happy.
The run I loved. Probably the closet you feel to being famous with randoms shouting you name or what close to your name. I got " go on Gerry " a lot. My names Garry, but **** it Gerry would do today. Wasn't my best run as my Achilles git very stiff and sore but managed to kiss the family and run the full run. Mission complete in 6.32
Would I recommend it, yes. Would I do it again 🀔 I'll give that one a few day.

EDit

20rothmans wrote: »

Hadn't realized the first orange bouy moved.

Neither had I...that explains why, after it was getting closer and closer, suddenly it wasn’t and then everyone just turned left and started swimming towards the second large red/orange buoy. I guess someone from the support staff indicated this (I couldn’t hear anything, but just followed the crowd )

EDit

dermabrasion wrote: »

There was talk that IM are not running this next year in favour of a full IM in Cork. Did anyone hear this too? I'd love another pop at this.

I haven’t heard any rumors, but it isn’t listed on their website (even with a TBD date) whereas other events are already there. I hope they run it as I would quite like to do it again

terrydel

The amount of discarded water bottles and gel wrappers left on the way down from kippure to around glencree was a bloody disgrace, I must have seen around 200 when I cycled up there yesterday. How about sticking them in your pocket and keeping the bottles on the bike?
Never see this carry-on on any of the many sportives I do, must be a triathlon thing :rolleyes:
Its a beautiful area so a bit of respect for it wouldn't kill anyone.

TriFirst

terrydel wrote: »

The amount of discarded water bottles and gel wrappers left on the way down from kippure to around glencree was a bloody disgrace, I must have seen around 200 when I cycled up there yesterday. How about sticking them in your pocket and keeping the bottles on the bike?
Never see this carry-on on any of the many sportives I do, must be a triathlon thing :rolleyes:
Its a beautiful area so a bit of respect for it wouldn't kill anyone.

As a nation us Irish have a blind spot when it comes to litter. The streets of our towns and cities are deplorable when it comes to discarded rubbish,so sadly any waste discarded in the hills of Wicklow doesn't surprise me.