This year I decided to up my triathlon game. I chose to move up and have a go at the Half-Ironman distance. That’s 70.3 miles: 1.2-mile swim followed by a 56-mile bike followed by a half marathon (13.1 miles). In the off-season, I thought, what’s the most diabolical and badass race I can pick for my first half-iron distance? Oh, wait…the heat and humidity of Kona beat me into submission at Lavaman Keauhou 2010.  Add to that the fact that the swim is in the in open ocean, the bike is on the upper (and harder) half of the Ironman World Championship course and the half marathon is mean and pretty much fully friggin wind-shaded. Yeah, seems like a good fit.

In 2010, Lavaman fully established that, as a 195lb with LUSH dark body hair, the Big Island overheats me almost immediately. I experienced that at Wildflower and the dozen half marathons I ran last year as well. But, for Kona, I needed to find a better way to cope. That said, the wifey and I started researching and working through strategies that would enable me to succeed in Kona.  This is where we netted out. I hope it helps others.  Let me take a second a caveat this post, in its entirety, by saying use common sense, use a heart-rate monitor and listen to your body. If you can’t handle parts or all of this, then DON’T attempt it. I’ve spent the last several years learning about my body continue to be certain that it’s capable of taking what I planned for it if not much much more. I expect you do to the same. This shit can literally kill you if you’re not smart about it. This sport is about fun, proving yourself, and most importantly for me, extending my life.

About 2 months before Ironman 70.3 Hawaii, I started implementing our plan.  We broke it into 4 major parts:  Training, getting my body more used to working in hotter and harsher conditions;  Clothing, what I would actually wear during the race;  Hair, how we should deal with the fact that I’m a furball and how it contributes to my heat issues; and my Cooling strategy in-race.  In practice, the plan worked very very well and definitely helped me more than I expected.

Training

As I entered the sharpening phase of training (about 2 months before the race), I started doing my bike and run workouts at the hottest parts of the day.  In addition, I started dressing “up” for all workouts. On the bike trainer, I closed all the windows, turned off the fans and went for it. On runs, I wore black running leggings, a tech shirt under a long-sleeve tech shirt and beanie and went out to “bake” on sunny, 75-80 degree (F) days. On outdoor rides, I wore cold-weather leggings and tops. This does 2 things for you.  First, it adds anywhere from 5-10 lbs to the weight you need to move in workout due to the gear absorbing the torrent of sweat coming off you.  Second, it adds 5-10 degrees (F) to your normal workout core temp.  There’s really not a ton I can elaborate about here, outside of the fact that by doing it, you improve. That’s it.  My recommendation is to ease into this.  Start by going out at peak dayparts dressed as you normally would for the conditions.  Then, slowly, add layers if you so desire.

Race Kit (Clothing)

As I’ve gotten more wrapped up into triathlon, I’ve kept relating to a particular athlete insofar as we had similar body structures and issues with heat. Torbjorn Sindballe, an amazing pro, who’s held the IWC bike course record and who podiumed Kona in 2007.  He has written and talked repeatedly about his heat intolerance and how he and his trainer had devised plans to deal with it.  I highly recommend reading it through as well.  For me, the wife and I both agreed that I needed very lightly-colored race kit (jersey, shorts, hat, etc) for the race. Whatever we could do to reflect off sun and UV was gonna keep me cooler than running in the kit I’ve used in the past.  We tested this a little at Wildflower.

First, we picked up a Sugoi Sonic Tri Jersey and used it for the race.  It features much better mesh cooling and wicking than the jerseys I’d used in the past and was able to stay pretty cool in the high heat.  Kona, however, is not Central California.  We knew that we were gonna have to go to the “9s” to keep me from popping on the run course.

For shorts, we chose the lightly-colored 2XU Compression Shorts as the bottoms to go with.  The were MUCH cooler (temperature-wise) that the Pearl Izumi’s I used last year.

Next we picked up a pair of Pearl Izumi Sun Sleeves.  After a 90-min test ride with them a couple weeks before the race, I found them to be thoroughly and surprisingly awesome at what they do.

Finally, we picked up a great running hat, the Brooks HVAC Infiniti Mesh Cap. It was closed enough to not hemorrage water, but not so closed as to not let my head breathe.  If you find this post helpful, please help me out and pick up an item or two via the links. I’ll make a couple bucks and it’ll make me feel like sharing is in fact caring. If you go off and pick them up locally, that’s obviously totally cool too. That’s as far as my profiteering plug goes.

Hair

Well, yep, I’m a furry monster. My father was a furry papa and I was lucky enough to get it too. I’m the “oh shit they don’t realize that I have back hair” guy that’s kinda quiet during group jokes.  The wife and I have to manscape regularly to keep it under control.  In races, it’s a full-on hinderance to performance. I’m the first to overheat and the worst to manage the problem once it starts.  As much as it scared the crap outta my self-perceived masculinity, I embraced the concept that I had to go sans-hair for Kona. It’s really quite simple. So in the week before the race, we finally clippered me and holy crickey is the world a cold place! Originally the plan was to clipper, then nair (maybe) and wax. We got through the clippering and decided that was enough to do the job. I felt like a Russian olympic gymnast as I did my legs, arms, chest etc. Contortionists have NOTHING on me. Best thing…I apparently have a the inklings of a six-pack. Invisible under the furball until now.  It was fun, I’m glad we did it, and it fully paid off.

Heat Strategy

Well this is really where the rubber hit the road. In race, I needed to do something different when I got out on the asphalt.  Starting on the bike, I pretty well followed the strategy I devised after doing a sweat test.  The trick in Kona was making sure I took in 2 liters of fluid/hour PLUS cool myself down AND THEN keep myself from getting slosh from the Cytomax, gels, etc.  I plan on going in pretty significant (and probably mind-numbing) detail in my race report on nutrition for the race. So I’m not going to repeat it here.  Understanding that the course would have aid every 8-11 miles on the bike and every mile or so on the run I chose to roll with 3 big bike bottles w/ 1.75 scoops/bottle of Cytomax for electrolyte hydration on the bike.  After the 2nd or third aid stop, the plan was to dump one of the bottles and replace it with pure water to use as cooling and non-Cyto drink. This worked out well. I ended dumping the bottle at the third station and used the aid water bottles to drench and quench between each station.  I was successfully FAR from thirsty, and not sloshy for the entire ride.  I, also importantly, forced myself to use nearly all of the bottle’s contents and discarding it just before the aid station (within the dump area).  This was to make sure I kept moving and stayed safe.  Someone dumped their bike right at the beginning of the race after getting wrapped up in the very first aid station.

Once I hit the run, I already had the beginnings of overheating.  It was quite miserable.  Not as bad as last year from what I’ve been told, but it was stifling.  Here, the goal was to take ice, sponges and water EVERYWHERE possible.  Every mile, I would dump 1 cup of ice into the Brooks hat, 1 cup into my jersey, dump 1 cup of water on my body and then drink a cup of water.  If possible I’d try to grab a block of ice or another cup of ice and run with it upside down in my hand.  Torbjorn had found that having ice on your hands cooled the body .2-.4 degrees (F) per hour better than ice in the hat. I went with (E) All of the above and it definitely paid off. I stayed pretty cool with mental fatigue causing my issues far more so than physical.  I highly recommend the ice-in-hand option, it works amazingly well.

Wrapping up

Ultimately, all of our research and planning paid off for the race. While I didn’t sub 6 hour the race like I’d hoped, I did hit my marks for the major pitfalls of a race in a place like Kona. My failure to sub-6 was training-related and from that I’ve learned and will adapt.  I hope this helps people as I spent a pretty decent amount of time tweaking this to work for my needs.

Race well, be kind and ALWAYS enourage folks on-course (and off) when you see they need it.