Mark ‘Ironman’ Butcher

Well I think most of you know by now (and thank you for your messages)....I AM AN IRONMAN!!!

I’m not sure that I can really describe the race experience, but I’ll give it a go.

Friday 29^th July

I travelled up Friday morning. Eventually leaving Cardiff around 1030 and getting to registration (in Wigan) at about 1430. As I’d hoped, registration was quiet and I avoided all the queues. Once again, it was full of statuesque blokes (not in a gay way) with top of the range bikes and a ‘suns out so shirts off’ ethos. There seemed to be a lot of foreigners too. If they’ve travelled from abroad to race they must be good? I kept spotting the odd ironman tattoo as well...everyone’s done it before; they all know what they’re doing. There was a race Expo at registration as well (essentially stalls selling ‘go faster’ gadgets). A lot of people were stocking up more gels and kit but I had a word with myself and decided that the prep I’d done was fine.

I had a bit of time to kill before checking in at the hotel so I figured I’d go and have a look at the lake and transition 1 (swim to bike). The lake looked BIG...and I was doing two laps of it.

Saturday 30^th July

So I had pasta (again) for dinner Friday night and slept pretty well too. Saturday was the set up day for race day. I had to check my bike and transition bags (full of the kit you need to change in to for the next discipline) into the relevant transitions. T1 and T2 were in different places for the ironman so it took a fair bit of time. Once the bags were checked in I relaxed a bit. Everything was in place now, all I had to think about was the race. Although, I still was a bit unsure about the protocol on taking a pee during the bike ride. The rules state that you’ll be penalised and potentially disqualified for nudity, but ideally I didn’t want to waste time queuing for a port-a-loo if I only needed a whizz. I spoke to one of the marshalls...his advice was to stand up and pee whilst cycling. I didn’t fancy that but agreed and moved on.

After checking the bags in the Old Man drove me round some of the course. I was analysing everything. Questioning every incline....how difficult would it be, where I could get some food down, where I could get out of the saddle if I needed too etc. I was really keen to see the ‘killer climb’ that everyone had been talking about too. You can never really tell until you’ve ridden a course but it looked OK. Not easy, but I’d done bigger climbs and this was supposed to be the hardest bit of the course. That gave me a nice confident boost. I still had to climb it three times, but it didn’t look too bad.

Later on in the afternoon all athletes had to report for a race briefing. 1300 of us cramped into a conference room at the Reebok Stadium (Bolton Football Ground). The race rules and regs were explained to us, as were the health risks associated with an event of this proportion. No mention of the urination protocol though. I wasn’t going to put my hand up and ask either...didn’t seem like the done thing. At one point the speaker asked every ‘ironman virgin’ to stand up. I waited to see if anyone else was going to get up. Half the room did. You could feel the collective sigh of relief. “I’m not the only one!”. The other thing I remember was the words of advice given to us...If you think you’re going slowly. Go slower.

Saturday evening was another dinner of chicken and pasta and an early night.

If half the competitors were new to Ironman, why weren’t people coming back?

Sunday 31^st July. Race Day.

Up at 3am. I’d managed to fall asleep at 9 the night before and I’d slept better than expected. I forced down a bowl of porridge, banana and energy bar. It wasn’t exactly appetizing but I knew it was important to get as many calories on board as possible. We set off to the swim at 0430. Transition was already pretty busy. I checked the bike (for the 20^th time), had my number marked on me and got into my wetsuit. The organisers wanted to get people in the water from 0530 for a 0600 start. I didn’t want to get in too early, but at the same time didn’t want to be stood on the shore when the gun went off. I got a position in the middle of the queue (after a few photos) and waited to be shepherded into the Lake. I saw one guy throwing up by the railings. I don’t know whether he’d drunk too much energy drink or tried to eat too much or whether he was just really nervous. I remember thinking- ‘don’t look in case it makes you sick’, and ‘unlucky mate’. All heart, me.

Just before we entered the water, the pro athletes and a team from the injured soldier unit walked through the middle of the queue to the front. Applause followed the soldiers’ as they made their way to the water –it was pretty inspiring. There were single, double and even triple amputees racing either as part of a relay or by themselves. Amazing.

The swim start was about 300m from the shore so I got in about 15 minutes before the start so that I could get a good position. In the swim the options are either get stuck in and put up with mêlée or stick out wide or to the back and look for clean water. Getting in the mix is a bit of a risk as you can end up getting kicked/punched in the face, possibly ending your day. I felt like I could come out with a good swim time and didn’t want to be held up dodging breast strokers at the back so I decided to get stuck in. It wasn’t too bad. It was a bit congested at the start and I had to clamber over a few stragglers. I was trying to keep my stroke long and relaxed, conserving as much energy as possible. If I’m honest I probably went out a bit quick. The adrenaline and mass of people just make you swim quicker I guess. The downside of being in the crowd was that it did get pretty hectic around the buoys where people were turning, so on the second lap I decided to go out wide. This gave me a nice bit of clean water which allowed me to swim my own stroke at my own pace. However, it does mean I was swimming a longer course without the benefit of drafting. As I approached the shore toward the end of my second lap I felt like I could probably do with a pee. I didn’t want to waste time in transition so I decided to do it on the go. After much concentration (whilst still swimming crawl) I managed to start weeing! Another first for the weekend.

In retrospect , I should have swam out wide at the start and come into the crowd for the second lap, once the field had spread out a bit. Anyway, I came out of the swim in 1 hour 7 minutes, 384^th in the field. I was hoping for a 1:15 – 1:30 so that was quick. I felt good though.

It was about a 200m jog into T1. Off with the wetsuit (after struggling to get my bag off the racks) and on with the cycling kit. It sounds as if that was a smooth, flowing experience. It wasn’t; more of an orchestrated fumble. So after buttering myself up and getting my cycling gear on I went to get my bike, running past a guy who’d already got a puncture. He seemed relatively upbeat about it though!

The bike involved a 16ish mile uphill ride out of Wigan and onto a 32 mile loop that needed to be completed 3 times. In total, the bike course was 112 miles with 7291 ft of climbing. On a typical training ride I’d average about 17-18mph so figured that if I could keep my pace at around 16mph I should be okay. That meant taking an hour to get to the loop and 2 hours to complete each lap of the loop, giving me a bike time of 7 hours. In the back of my mind I was hoping for a 6:30 though.

I paced the ride out of Wigan just right. It was more uphill than I expected and I was overtaken by quite a few people. That always happens though- come out with a good swim time and get overtaken by expensive bikes. I was fine with that, thinking in the back of mind “I’ll catch you later- you’re going to quick”. I started taking food on after half an hour and made it to the loop with 5 minutes to play with. The loop was more or less 16 miles up hill followed by 16 miles down according to the elevation map I’d got hold of and I felt like I was cycling pretty quickly over the first lap. I still felt like I was only working at about a 6/10 (effort) though so I kept going at that pace, thinking that if I could get a bit of buffer time in the first lap it would be a bonus. It turned out that the downhill section of the ride was more of a rolling section, and it was into a head wind. I completed the first lap, expecting to be well ahead of time. I wasn’t though, coming in at only 5 minutes ahead of schedule. I was going to have to cycle pretty hard to get the time I wanted.

I’d said before that my race plan was to take the first 30 miles very steady, the next 30 steady, the following 30 pushing a 7/10 effort and finish up around an 8/10. By 50 miles I was looking at the bike computer; clock watching. Effort wise I was feeling about 10-15 miles ahead of schedule (as in by 45 miles I was getting toward the 7/10 effort). I’d packed 7 energy gels, 7 energy bars and a ham roll for my nutrition on the ride. By the three hour mark I was beginning to feel a bit sick from all of the energy drinks/gels and homogenised bars so I picked up a water from the aid station and tucked into the dry ham roll. The water was just the best drink ever and the roll tasted awesome. Eating the roll was a bad move though. It was too stodgy and dry and took ages to digest, making me feel a bit ill for the next hour or so. By Four hours I was really beginning to lose my head. I was so far into the ride that I couldn’t see the beginning or the end. At the beginning you’re really grateful for all of the supporters along the streets, thinking how nice it is of them to give up their day to try and spur us along. After four hours on the bike though you just want them to stop ringing their fricking cow bell in your face (that’s not a euphemism). And if one more person tells me to “keep going”....I know I have to keep going-that isn’t advice! You know you’re being totally irrational but you can’t help it. I’d love to say that thinking about all of the sponsorship helped me to finish...but in all honesty it didn’t. You could have offered me a mansion in LA and I’d have told you to piss off quite frankly. I was ready to stop at the 80 mile mark. My knees were aching. My bum was aching. I was feeling sick of energy drinks/gels and I didn’t feel like I could eat any more bars without throwing up. It’s a horrible place to be. Feeling like if you eat anything else you’ll throw up, but knowing if you don’t eat you’ll never finish. At 100 miles I had no choice but to eat my last remaining bar. I didn’t throw up but I couldn’t wait to get to T2 just so I could get some more gels. Not that I wanted them, but I just didn’t want to eat anything solid.

The last lap of the loop I felt stronger than I had done on the previous lap and the wind felt less inhibiting. Whether it had died down or whether it was just a mental thing I don’t know. I just got to T2 as quick as possible without totally blowing my legs.

In T2 there was a guy laid out in first aid and a load of people just sat down getting themselves together. The last thing I wanted to do was run a marathon. There wasn’t really another option though. I took a seat – it felt great – and slowly got changed into my run gear. Running felt surprisingly good. I guess it’s because you’re using your leg muscles in different ways. The run course was a 6 mile run into Bolton city centre, followed by 3 laps of 6 mile loop around the town; 3 miles up hill, 3 miles down. Early on in the run we passed a pub with a large group of spectators.  One of the guys shouted “Well done 359- looking strong- running well”. I thought “brilliant- I must be running quite well’. Then I heard “Well done 206- looking strong- running well”. Nope-just another encouraging sound bite. At least he didn’t tell me to keep going. The run around the town centre was soul destroying. You ran past the exit to the completion run-in on every lap. The uphill section of the run was torture. Dad said I was black under the eyes at one point. I felt ill for pretty much the whole thing; on the verge of puking. I didn’t want another energy gel, or banana, or Gatorade. The promise of fish and chips on the finish line wasn’t doing much for me either. After about 2 hours of the run (I think- I can’t remember really) I found that having a bite of banana after each gel stopped me feeling so sick. That became the norm then. Reach the aid station, have a gel, bite of banana, sip of water, chuck a water over myself, set off again.

 I kept pretty much to plan with my walk run strategy. Although I did adapt it to make sure I was walking through the aid stations and up the big hill. I always ran around the town centre (where most of the spectators were) too. I got to 10 miles without really thinking about it. My knees were throbbing but there was no way I was going to stop. Lap 2 was grim. Again it was that ‘no man’s land’ part of the course. Just running. Mindless running. It was about this time (I think?!) that I remember thinking – I should thank the family for coming up and supporting me. As I thought this I got all choked up and was on the verge of breaking into tears...What the hell are you doing Butcher?! Again, I knew I was being ridiculous. I was just so emotionally drained that I wasn’t behaving normally. My emotions were either up or down. No middle ground, and mostly down during the race! I was exhausted.

On the last lap I got talking to another bloke walking up the big hill, also on his last lap. We got talking and ran the last circuit together. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have kept up my pace if it wasn’t for him at the end. Chatting was a welcome distraction and there’s always that element of ‘I’m not going to break first’ when you’re running with someone else. The run downhill into town was quick and I’d been on the edge of cramping up since halfway through lap 2. If I moved me head to the side to look around I’d feel a twinge in my entire left leg, so I couldn’t look around for the family when I came down the finishing straight. I couldn’t cramp up on the finish straight, that’d be too embarrassing. I wasn't the only one feeling the pain though. Rachel found out the hard way that getting too close to the competitors can end badly. I say 'too close' because she was close enough for a bit of foreign sweat to land on her top lip just as a particularly sweaty gentleman limped past! Those of you that know Rachel (and even those of you that don't! ) can imagine how impressed she was at the whole thing!

Crossing the line was amazing. Everybody cheering. The swim, the bike, the run. Just a bit of a blur really. And more importantly, I could stop eating gels. I don’t remember the words “You are an Ironman”. To be honest I was a zombie come the end.

Someone took the electronic chip off my ankle and I walked through to the finishers area to pick up my medal, have a photo and grab my finishers t-shirt. At the time I remember thinking. Never again. The day after it became a decade, and now I’m thinking 5 years. I don’t think I’ll be able to achieve any significant time improvements before then. I’d like to focus on the shorter tris and try and get a quicker. I’d definitely return as a supporter next year though...so if anyone else fancies giving it a go?!

The magnitude of what I’d just done didn’t really sink in on the day. To be honest I don’t know that it has yet...the goals you set yourself always seem smaller once you’ve achieved them. It was by far the most emotionally and physically challenging thing I’ve ever done. I massively underestimated how difficult it would be. I found the half Iron distance relatively easy and thought the full thing would just be twice as bad. It wasn’t. It was a different league. Absolutely epic. Looking back on things I was prepared for the physical aspect of it. My split times came in virtually perfect. Although I didn’t feel like I was going the same pace, in reality I was spot on. Plus I was still walking afterwards and my appetite came back pretty quickly. Emotionally I was nowhere near ready for it. I guess that’s where the forces’ guys realise an advantage. I’d be much more ready for it next time though.

 

So to finish, I guess all that’s left to say is a massive thank you to everyone that’s supported me and sponsored me. We’ve passed the £1000 mark in sponsorship now and the total is still growing. For now, I’m looking forward to training purely for enjoyment...but who knows what the next challenge will be?!

PS. forgot to mention my times! Total time was 12 hours 55 minutes. 1:07 swim, 7:19 bike, 4:12 run. I finished 617th overall (out of 1300) so very pleased!