After a brief opening ceremony where everyone (athletes and crews) held hands in a circle...and some bagpipes...it was time for the swim start. Barbi secretly had set a goal (one of a few secret goals for this race) to try and break the women's swim record for the 10 k open water swim. I had the privilege of being the swim escort ...in a kayak....each athlete has one. Barbi and I had joked the evening before that sighting across the LONG lake wouldn't be a problem since she wouldn't be first so we could just follow the kayak(s) in front of us. Well, 150m into the swim she was up in front with nothing but 10k of water in front of us. Geez! Luckily we had cycled the length of the lake the previous day so I had a taken note of land points that were important...and the visibility was amazing...and the water very calm.
At 2k Barbi had a lead of about approx 100m on the second overall swimmer...who was also female (Shanna Armstrong...multiple and current Ultraman Hawaii World Champion), and an even larger gap over everyone else. Very quick stops for sips of fluid every 2 k (and one pee break) kept us on task. The gap back to Shanna remained the same until about 6k and both women were tearing the swim up.
Finally, between 6 and 8 k as Barbi remained strong, Shanna began to slow and the gap began to widen. When we finally arrived at the FIRST marker at 8k (visually it felt like we would never get there) Barbi was ahead by a fairly comfortable margin of about 300m-400m. The last 2 k were tough mentally and physically but Barbi powered through and arrived first overall to the swim finish....2hours 41minutes....beating the women's swim record by over half an hour!! The crowd (including the voice of Ironman Steve King) were buzzing that this Ultra rookie had exited first overall. Another interesting and amazing fact is that all of the top three athletes out of the water were women. Barbi first, Shanna second....and Amber (from Reno and girlfriend of X-terra star Conrad Stoltz) third.
Quick transition (blazing really) and it was onto the bike. First overall! WOW.
The first stages of the bike went very well...some arm and back soreness from the long swim but Dr. Peggy helped with chiro and the rest of the team kept the nutrition coming and the sponges and super soakers to keep the core temp down as the air temperature rose to 35c. Things got very uncomfortable temperature wise during the climb up Richter pass..extra ice sponges and ice water sprays were needed.
Barbi remained in first place overall until 92k into the bike ride when Amber finally took over the lead....but still no men in sight...and Shanna seemed to be dropping back some from 5 minutes back to over 20.
Finally, at about 110k the first male (Josef from Spain) passed by. Things stayed the same until the climb to Yellow lake....that is where things became tough for everyone. Barbi, who had been complaining of quad and hamstring cramping really started to suffer mentally and physically in the heat. Nutrition had been good...and we increased the frequency of ice sponges and spraying to try and reduce core temperature. Although there was a lot of suffering...it seemed everyone was starting to struggle. It was here...at the same time that Barbi was at her lowest mentally and physically that she started to gain ground back on Amber...and even Joseph as she climbed to Yellow Lake.
Almost at the top of the 5k climb to Yellow Lake Barbi passed Amber again and rode in second place overall all the way down the decent to the finish at OK Falls ....finishing just 90 seconds behind the male leader of the race....and setting a new female overall course record for Day 1 of this event! Team Ultra Barbi couldn't be more excited or proud.
Quite a day....
Back to the hotel for an ice bath, food, massage, chiro and sleep. Bring on Day 2!
275k ride tomorrow.
Blog by Steve
Awesome Barbi! Stay positive and one step at a time. SV: great updates, please keep them coming. Go Team Barbi!
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