Sérgio Marques Blog

a great sunday

a early morning long run that was GREAT, then homemande pancakes, yummi (thanks joanna) a easy ride and sunday night football with some guys and gals.

Great sunday

today i did the Mount palomar climb… tough but after my lusobike classic, everything seems eeeeeasy.

and i actually had my camera, but no, girls normally stick to the beach areas

Early in the ride

Lake Brunsworn (dont think its even close to the real name)

the classic photo

near the Summit

a casino in the middle of nowhere, typical

http://ironman.com/events/ironman/worldchampionship/matthew-dale-profiles-age-group-competitor-brian-scott

i have been training with him here and there. awesome guy, cool article.

Week one of the few i have left to hawaii. I will still manage to have about 3 weeks ond kick ass training in a scheduled way…

So far so good, im enjoying riding in totally new (for me) roads and the trails just outside my door are Fabulous. David and Joanna ARE fantastic and i have everything near me. and this weekend i had plenty of company on most of the workouts witch was great. Im spoting (of course) lots of fast guys. the one i saw most was Luke Bell, the first time he seemed like Mick Dundee AKA Crocodile Dundee coming out of the bushes while running. i only had time to say a very shy ‘hey luke’ instead of an ‘hey dude wazzup wanna show me the trails around, im new here’

anyway after getting the first week out of the way i feel good and im extremely motivated right now.

Did i say there are tons of good looking girls around?

visited friends in Madison, WI. visited the trek factory, including the top secret prototype room and watched a great performance from Chris and Hillary in Ironman Wisconsin, still one of my favorite races.

I had tons of fun and a very relaxing week before getting back to Kona. some photos:

here is the overview of my race…

 

I arrived to Louisville on Thursday night, Vince and crissie helped me a lot and all the family was great, I had a very relaxing couple of days before the race, probably one of the best, maybe because I wasn’t throwing too much pressure in my own shoulders. I have prepared this Ironman like I never did before, after Lake placid I pretty much done what I wanted daily and didn’t follow any scheduled plan, I ended up doing some crazy stuff like the “lusobike special” that I wrote about in my blog (that was a lot of fun though and I will repeat….not so soon though:P). And fun was what I wanted during this time. I did have some more concentrated 2-3weeks prior to the event, when I made the decision of racing.

 

Weather was warm and kinda humid…that was great, no wetsuit in the swim, it was almost a little
Hawaii training session. The swim started without much light, almost dark I would say. The swim itself was more of the same, start/punching/kicking/get out of the water alone. Right at the beginning I was side by side with Michael Gonher and the eventual winner Max longree that was good for me but after a few minutes I had no company since both dropped back, now I was worried about if there would be currents coming back after the turnaround, I couldn’t see anyone ahead nor at the sides, I just choose to go the closest way till T1, and it was with around 100m to go that I finally understand that there was a guy in my feet all the time, good work, I never felt him until he passed me. Came out of the water with 57minutes and that was actually pretty good for me.

 

At the transition I had my bike mixed with the age group category, I had number 2509 ,awesome and that was actually a good spot to see the rest of the pros leaving the ohio river, Michael gonher and Max where about 2 min behind me and that was a good boost for me.

 

I got into the bike with no worries, steady and sure about the fact that Gonher would catch me somewhere in the early stages of the ride, and so it happened, with around 15-20km Michael and Max passed me, Michael immediately took off and dropped Max that stayed with me, I guess we (me and Max) knew how running to the finish is our best qualities. I had some racing going on and we where “together” in most of the first loop but I started to feel the pace a bit too hot so I “let” him go for the rest of the ride and rode alone the rest of it with some passes at the end of the ride, not much else happened. The course was really nice by the way I would just comment the location of the special needs bag that was far from ideal, I always don’t get mine but if I wanted it would be impossible for sure without loosing a lot of time.

 

Run time, I started at my “usual” pace, I immediately knew that the leader, Chris Macdonald was 17min ahead (thanks ben), and Max was about 5min, a bit too much since he is a great runner. I was cool and was expecting to know how the race developed in the run. Passed Chris hauth before the turn around and Zach after it. It was then that I felt me slowing down a lot. That was a bad sign of course I had around 18-19km of running and I was already over the 4min/km pace. I was in 4^th and I knew that I wouldn’t be in contention for much more that that. After that I got into a kind of survival pace and I only was able to get a bit faster after the turnaround in the second loop where I saw Michael in big trouble, I caught him a lot sooner than I would expect and that was it, survival pace till the end. A hard 3^rd place with a run where I talked a lot with myself

 

3^rd place was awesome for me, for the people I know and had the chance to talk about doing this race, finishing was all I wanted. I had a long break in scheduled training as well as a mental break where a lot of changes happened and now I have a mental boost so this suits me fine…

 

After a recovery week ill head out to Sandiego for training before Kona, I never been to Sandiego, well at least for “serious” training so if someone reads this and trains in the area, if you see me say hi and let me know about the best roads

In case you didnt know, and i have havent announced my race for that reason i just finished ironman Louisville…

it was a late registration because i have been unsure if it would be a good idea. but i went for it.

It was a kind of a shot in the dark given that my training was totally unsheduled, i did what i wanted each day and then did a more concious “taper”. I really wanted to go back to good results as of course the begining/middle season was veeeery frustrating.

so i arrived to the race site on thursday and just went for it, no course driving no nothing just race and see what happens.

the race it self, and i will write a more decent race report when i get to wisconsin (relax Alex im not racing :P) was just ok, i didnt felt in my best shape, a bit far from it, im sure it could be better with more time to prepare it decently. but i was abble to finish 3rd, my goal was to spend the least energy possible (if that is possible in an IM) so i spent a huge amount of time in 4th it was just when i saw a fading michael gonher that i pushed a bit harder then after passing him i got back to a ….well… slow pace. dont get me wrong i did what i could to fight for the win but it was impossible today.

But im really happy, i really needed this to bost my confidence a bit, i wasnt fast but it was a decent race.

now im really making sure i recover well and prepare for kona, in san diego

in case you noticed i am back to blogging…

i have been doing the usual stuff except yesterday where i went to do a bit of a crazy stuff at serra da estrela with my friend renato that has been doing some workouts with me here and there, the one and only place where i can climb a hill till 1993m of altitude in portugal.

There are now 4 climbs to the top and i had the idea of doing them all, ALL. lets see that is 3 special category climbs and a 1st category.

I had a blast and it was tough!!!!

Numbers

187km
5700m of altitude gain
0km in flat terrain
More hours in the saddle ever by a lot

here is the map

http://www.mapmyride.com/ride/portugal/covilha/846636317

the best one was of course the last climb, a 26km one that goes from around 300 to the top. sweet…
to repeat but not so soon there is a profile of the course in the map although its not very accurated

and of course some photos

me and renato early in the morning

almost at the end…of the first climb, Covilha. still with a lot of weith at the back, 2 redbulls

second climb, Manteigas

almost

bikes wait a bit for a coke/water stop at 1993m of altitude

3rd climb…seia

final stop before the last climb for more water/coke it was a very hot day

the last one, Vide. the best and toughest!!

steep

14% steep for large amout of kms

the sweeping road

i was stupid enough to take a shot in the 14% roads

almost at the final top

me and renato, for the final shot in the final climb, just a 20km downhill, that is easy and fun

LOL

well, i guess i dont need to write much about the race…

after 7h in the cold and rain (never seen so much continuous heavy rain) i finished in the medical tent for more 2h with hipothermia (sp?). the second lap of the bike especially the long downhill to keene destroyed what was left of an “hang in there” first loop.

i will resume my “race report” to this. the course was actually quite beautiful as well as the whole race, but i had a “i will never return to this place again” feeling.

more soon

Ps: thanks Alex for everything