Chasing Kona

by Rob Cummins

  I broke through another barrier not just physically but also in my mind. I didn't quite go home and enter the Ironman that day but in my head it was a done deal. I was going to do so. I was right back at the start of another journey as a complete beginner. I had no idea if I could complete an Ironman. It was even scarier than the marathon.

  I started training properly in January for the race in June, the same time as I committed to it and entered. By that stage the bike shop had grown and it was much more specialist triathlon and much less of a regular bike shop. I had a sponsored team of eight athletes racing in our Wheelworx colours. A couple of them were very experienced long-course athletes so I had no shortage of advice and help.

  My typical training week ran between six and ten hours but I was often inconsistent. Sometimes as a result of overdoing it and becoming too tired to keep on the training plan, I just trained however I felt on the day regardless of what the plan said. If I was down to do a two- hour easy ride and I went out and the sun was shining and I felt good I'd stay out for three or four hours often in the Dublin mountains which was my favourite place to ride. The result was a rest week that wasn't restful and the next week’s training would suffer. It took me a long time to learn to do what I was told. I suppose that is a big part of why I work for myself. I don’t like to be told what to do and I usually think I know best. In this instance it wasn't helping me a whole lot.

  The other thing that got in the way of training was just life and in particular work. The race was on in June in the middle of one of the busiest times in the shop, so I was working long days and weeks and skipping sessions.

  For my first Ironman most of the training time came from family time. I had the green card for this at the start, but I think neither of us had any idea of the effect it would have in reality either during the six months or afterwards. I learned lots during that period. I learned to love the discipline of getting the training done regardless of weather, mood or motivation. I loved the feeling of growing fitness and strength.

  I used to do my big day of training on a Monday as it was my day off from work. I started in the morning with a two or three-kilometre swim with one of the athletes I sponsored. We then had breakfast before heading out for a 100km ride, followed by a ten-kilometre run straight afterwards.

  I often didn't finish training until 5pm or later and at that stage I was in no shape to start cooking for the family who were due home shortly after that. This didn't always go down so well with my wife, who although supportive at the start ,understandably found it hard after months of disruption at home. To be found half comatose still in wet, sweaty and dirty kit on the couch when everyone arrived home shortly afterwards from work and school didn't go down well.

  It became all-consuming . . . all I could think and talk about. That quickly became another source of tension at home so I kept most of my training and racing talk for work. Most athletes find that their first Ironman affects every part of their life, unlike anything else one could ever experience.

  Every decision is made based around how it might affect the next training session or the recovery from the last. Like I said earlier I tend to go at things in a very ‘full on’ sort of way and often overdo it. This situation was no exception to that rule.

  Even with my newfound love of training, discipline and my ‘all in’ attitude, I found that I eventually ran out of steam and four or five weeks before the race, motivation and desire headed out the back door and I found it impossible to get out training. I just wanted to race at this stage. I'd had enough and wanted a break, but I wouldn't quite say I wanted my old life back.

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  Chapter 10

  Life changes and Ironman Switzerland 2009

  My life changed dramatically over the next year. My marriage of close to eighteen years ended and I entered a new relationship. Aisling my new partner was an elite international ultra runner and coincidentally had just completed her first Ironman. Being with someone who enjoyed training and racing as much as I did meant the lifestyle I'd come to love over the last year was easy to fit in.

  I entered Ironman Switzerland the following year with the aim of becoming a lot faster, as I wanted to be competitive in my age group. I also thought that it would be a great idea to give Aisling an entry as a Christmas present. If you're looking for some advice, don’t give an Ironman entry as a present to somebody unless that person specifically asks for it. She smiled politely and acted like it was a lovely and thoughtful present, exactly what she always wanted. It turned out however that it wasn't the best idea. Looking back at it now it seems obvious, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. I was in love with the sport and Ais had just done her first Ironman and loved the experience. I just assumed she would be as delighted with another entry as I was.

  I began to train even harder than ever. My new life allowed me more time and I dreamed of being fast. I trained so much harder than the previous year that I expected big things from Switzerland and indeed I was faster. But that was really only down to it being a flatter, easier course and the temperature not being thirty-eight degrees on race day.

  I finished 900th overall and 182nd in my age group. My swim was seven minutes slower, at 1:19:32. My bike at 5:40:35 was quicker by about forty minutes but that was mostly down to a faster bike course. My run too was faster but at 3:51:17 was not what I'd hoped for and again part of that could have been down to cooler conditions, although I'd managed to run the whole thing having learned from Aisling that walking during an Ironman marathon wasn't as inevitable as some would have you think. In fact walking in any marathon, including one at the back end of an Ironman was frowned upon – ‘we’re runners’, I was told. ‘We do not walk’.

  I'd finished my second Ironman and had another nice shiny medal, but despite the elation and satisfaction, I was secretly disappointed if not completely surprised to discover that I hadn't become ‘fast’.

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  Chapter 11

  100k Ultra

  In 2010 Ais and I opened a new business. It was a 14,000 sq. ft. specialist triathlon and bike store in Dublin. As you would imagine it resulted in a huge workload for the first year and we took a break from Ironman.

  We continued to run three or four times a week for forty to fifty minutes at a time, even at the craziest points of starting the new business. For the first five months we didn't take a day off and we worked an average of eighty hours a week, hitting 100 hours a couple of times. The running was more to keep us sane, a way to get a break from work and to try to just stay somewhat fit. It certainly wasn't what could have been called proper training.

  One of the things that I love most about us as a couple is that we have never reached the point where we've had enough of each other and needed a break, despite the fact that we spend so much time together. The business was growing faster than we could have ever predicted and it was a real roller coaster of a year trying to keep up with it.

  At that time Aisling got a phone call from the selector of the Irish Ultra Running team who was going to race the Celtic Plate 100k. It's a Four Nations Championship race between Ireland, England, Scotland and Wales. Aisling had raced it before earning her first International place. This time she hadn't been training for anything long however, and the race was only five weeks away. We were driving home when we got the call and she covered the mouthpiece and asked me what I thought.

  ‘Ask him if it's an open race as well as the championship, and if it is I'll do it with you’, my mouth somehow managed to blurt out, before my brain had a chance to step in. She asked him and he confirmed it was open, so just like that we had five weeks to prepare for the longest ultra marathon I'd ever done.

  Ais like I said had done the race before, and in fact she had gone much longer, having completed the 158k UTMB Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc in 2006.
The UTMB is considered to be one of, if not the hardest footrace on the planet. It’s a non-stop ultra marathon that starts in Chamonix in the French Alps and races through both the Italian and Swiss Alps. At 9,600m vertical gain and loss it has more climbing and descending than Mount Everest.

  In 2006 the time of the average finisher rate was just over 30 per cent. I think now it's still less than 50 per cent and it’s significantly less than that for first-timers. Ais finished at her first attempt in 43 hours of non-stop climbing, running and descending in some of the most remote parts of the Alps. She still says it's the hardest thing she's ever done. I have believed almost since I met her that when it comes to racing and pushing herself up to and beyond her previous limits she is mentally the strongest person I've ever met. That leaves me in the conflicting position of having probably the best teacher possible beside me, but also someone a full foot shorter and almost twenty kilos lighter who was most likely going to kick my arse.

  We thought we should get some training done. As we only had five weeks, the plan was that three would be building up and two of them would need to be tapering down. Our first attempt at a long run went against all conventional wisdom. We decided that as we (meaning Ais) were fairly experienced we would be ok to jump straight in with a three-hour run. I would just like to make this clear – this is not good advice! We lasted about two hours and forty minutes before we both decided that we'd had enough. Five weeks to train for a 100k race was looking like a stretch, a very big one.

  I also blistered quite badly on that run for the first time that I can remember. When I pointed this out to Ais, not fully expecting but half hoping for sympathy, she smiled at me with an expression that said ‘don't be a wuss’ and told me it would be fine. I was far from convinced.

  The plan was to run again the following morning after the previous day’s attempt at a long session. Ais is a big believer in doing this as it teaches you to run on tired legs, which is an important skill to have when taking part in an ultra.

  Not surprisingly the blisters hadn't miraculously healed by the next morning so I gingerly applied Vaseline and carefully put on my socks and runners before heading out. I hobble-ran for the first couple of minutes before realising that I couldn't feel the blisters at all. I shouldn't really have been surprised to discover that yet again Ais knew what she was talking about.

  We continued to bring the mileage up quite quickly. The following week, running from home at the foot of the Dublin mountains to Enniskerry – a village about three-and-a-half hours and thirty-five kilometres away over the mountains – we set out with a bag, food, gels and water and some money for lunch and bus fare home. It was one of the most enjoyable runs I'd ever done. The next week we ran five hours to Roundwood, another small village in County Wicklow. Again we went over the mountains, mostly on trails, covering about fifty kilometres this time. Dad came down to meet us for lunch and bring us back home after that one.

  These runs were really pleasant. Setting out with a bag on your back with food and drinks for the day feels like an adventure every time. It was great mentally, as we both felt that we could have managed six or seven hours the second time. So three long runs was about the extent of the specific preparation for the 100k. This was very far from ideal but there was no time left to do any more.

  Race day came around and we had a plan in place regarding pacing. The plan was that Aisling was in charge. I had no problem with this because as I'd discovered while running my first ultra the previous year I hadn't got a clue when it came to pacing. I started way too fast and blew up fifty kilometres into a sixty-nine kilometre race. The last nineteen kilometres taught me a whole lot about how much somebody could suffer due to stupidity.

  I still panicked a bit when we were dead last after the first kilometre, but I trusted Ais, so we stuck to the plan. We had Aisling's brother Eugene crewing for us and this was really important in such a long race. As you get further into the longer races it can be hard to keep track of what food or drink you've taken, so having someone telling you what to do and making decisions is a priceless asset, especially if you're as inexperienced as I was.

  The race was on quiet country lanes and was made up of a lap of just over three kilometres. The short laps made nutrition fairly straightforward. We shared a bottle of carb or electrolyte drink at the start of most laps and carried a gel for halfway around. I had some minor stomach issues in the early laps that required a couple of toilet stops but that didn't really cause any big problems. Ais kept the pace really even with every lap clocking between eighteen and nineteen minutes.

  Even the marathon distance came and went without incident, and Aisling's pacing strategy was working as we were picking off people and moving up the field. Fifty kilometres, then sixty kilometres, and the pace was still exactly the same. I was feeling really good and started to push a little at around sixty-five kilometres as we were caught by a friend of ours. He was also on the Irish team and he was a lot faster. I sped up a little to chat to him. I was feeling so good it couldn't do any harm. However, this was a stupid rookie mistake.

  I started to struggle about five kilometres later. Coincidentally that was the time that Ais was starting to feel ready to race. So as I slowed, she got progressively faster.

  I dug in and tried to get more food and drink in on the next two laps but that didn't work and I felt sick as well as sore and slowed a bit more. I only took on water for the next few laps and the stomach started to feel better. I couldn't go any faster but at least I was still running.

  I calculated somewhere around the eighty-five kilometre mark that Ais was likely to catch and lap me. I was losing two or three minutes a lap on the pace we had been doing and she was going about one minute quicker.

  Sure enough with two laps to go Ais caught and passed me and she was flying. I was really struggling but I did – as I had expected – get a good lift from seeing her running well and her big happy smile and her shout of ‘Hey Lovely Bob’. This is what she calls me. And before you ask it's because I am lovely. Well she thinks so anyway! Some guys get cool nicknames like The Rock or The Hammer. I'm simply Lovely Bob.

  Like I said, I was struggling really badly but had made it to ninety-eight kilometres with no walking. I hadn't been able to take on food for a long time because I felt sick, so I was completely empty. I couldn’t even begin to describe how sore my legs were. And it was not just my legs. One of the things they don’t tell you about running ultras, particularly as a beginner, is that everything hurts. My arms hurt from holding them in the normal position they'd be in while I ran but they had been doing that for nearly ten hours. My head, feet, hands, I think even my ears hurt. Don’t ask me how, they just did.

  Every step sent fresh jolts of pain and hurt through every part of my body. Time and distance had somehow slowed down, so that seconds seemed to take minutes. I started to retch but there was nothing in my stomach. I was still sort of running, but my eyes kept closing and when I opened them I'd find myself on the far side of the road still shuffle- running and not sure how far I'd gone, while almost blacking out and still moving.

  I retched again and had to stop while trying not to throw up. I got going and opened my eyes to realise I was 20 metres further down the road. After what seemed like ages but was probably only five or six minutes of walking a bit, retching, jogging, cramping, retching and walking again I slowly started to recover.

  I tried to start running very easy and this time the cramping and nausea held off. For the last kilometre I actually managed to pick up the pace to something resembling a proper run.

  Crossing the line was a huge sense of relief. For so long all I had wanted to do was to stop moving, just stop, and lie down.

  Ais was finished just over forty-five minutes before me and in the process had made her way up to fourth place. She was catching up to both third and second, but ran out of road and time. It's a bit hard to believe, but I think 100k is almost too short for her and I think she will do even better at longer distan
ces.

  I was delighted to finish and even more chuffed at being able make it to ninety-eight kilometres before having to walk. I loved this race. We both had a great day out and I would very much like to go back and try hanging on to Ais a bit longer to get closer to her time . . . maybe even hang on with her to the finish.

  In the end I finished in ten hours and thirteen minutes and Ais was nine hours and twenty-seven minutes. There have been several ‘Ah-Ha’ moments since, where I have gained a new belief or have had a new insight or have pushed back the mental barriers and boundaries of what I previously thought was possible.

  Before this race a marathon seemed like a really long way. After running 100k it now looks short. Probably most importantly it looks short at the back end of an Ironman. I was to take this new perspective into my next Ironman race and it made for a very different experience to any that I'd participated in before. I have found again and again that my perspective on things changes after I do something so demanding or achieve something so thrilling. Much less often am I in awe of others watching them do what had seemed impossible to me in the past.