The local support in
The Course:
As for the course, being one of the premier dive locations in the world it is pretty simple to say that you would have a hard time finding a cleaner more beautiful swim. One counter-clockwise ocean loop with plenty of sea life (a few jellyfish) and about 200 feet of visibility makes for wonderful views.
The bike is a 3 loop course that is a challenging as a flat course can be due to the high winds with no shelter and little to no shade from the sun. The roads were in good shape and about 90% of them were completely closed to traffic. The deep blue ocean and white sandy beaches make for some great scenery along the way (assuming you are not one of those head down hammer the bike type athletes). Aid stations were set up about every 6 miles and were well stocked with water, Gatorade, gels and power bars. From the middle of the pack I did not see much drafting, a few small groups of 3-5 but nothing too blatant.
The run is a 3 loop out-and-back leaving downtown and heading north. This gets a little boring on the third loop as far as scenery but the local support helped. The aid stations were every km to give you plenty of chances to fuel up. They were well stocked and the volunteers were great. I saw bottled water, Gatorade in cups, bananas, oranges, coke, gel and powerbars. Near dusk the mosquitoes starting coming out and they were nasty little things. A few of the aid stations had bug spray and that seemed to help keep them under control.
Getting to Coz:
Getting to the
Our flight to
Once in scary old van with AC private shuttle down to the ferry in Playa. The guys at Cancun Shuttle made this process pretty simple and they told us what time to meet them for the return trip home. Once in Playa it was a short walk down to the ferry. We avoided the men with carts thinking they were a rip off, but found out that they carry your bags for free and only work for tips, good to know for any future trips. Boarding the ferry was a little bit of an ordeal. The ferry company was not prepared for the shear number of bikes heading over to the island. I estimate about 200 bikes where on the dock at the time we where heading over. They called a second larger ferry to assist in transporting all of the bikes. They tagged our normal luggage but not the bike boxes, I assume they did not want to assume any liability for the bikes. Wanting to make sure that my bike actually made it on the boat I stood on the dock until I was sure it was loaded on the boat before taking my seat on the upper deck.
Finally, the warm breeze and blue oceans were here. The ferry ride over to
We stayed at the El Cozumeleno on the northern part of the island. It was about 3-4 miles north of the ferry dock and a relatively short cab ride. It was actually right before the turn around on the run course. Once in the hotel they greeted us with welcome drinks and I got checked into one of the deluxe room overlooking the ocean.
The hotel staff was great, my only caution would be to avoiding the guys in the lobby that sell tours and rent vehicles. The only major knock about the hotel was on race day, they hotel did not have any food out for breakfast in the morning and the dinner service stopped at
Friday morning I had planed on heading down to chankanaab park to get in a practice swim, however due to the high winds and strong currents, the practice swim was cancelled. Being the supper stud of a swimmer that I am (sarcasm), instead I took Mrs. Scott out for a 40 minute ride to make sure everything was working smoothly. She seemed to have made the trip just fine with the exception of one broken water bottle cage; carbon fiber can be so fragile. It was not broken too bad, just a minor crack near the top so it still functioned for the race. The ride down into town was nice with a little tail wind to help us along. Coming back we pushed against a slight head wind, the trees seemed to give a little protection. Leaving town JB decided to draft an ATV as I hung back and kept an eye out for any crazy drivers. Could we draft ATV’s for the race? No the roads would be closed to traffic. During the ride I noticed that my seat felt a little low, apparently my tape mark on my seat post moved during the trip so my seat was about an inch too low. That is a big adjustment! I moved the seat up and think I got it about to the right height.
Later that day we headed down to the convention center for packet pickup. It was not as crowded as predicted and getting the packet was relatively simple. The only complaint is that we had to return between 4 and 5 to pick up our special needs bags which again did not take too long, but it would have been nice to do this all in one trip. Another snafu was that they took the time to stamp a number on all of the athlete wrist bands, but they did not hand them out to correspond to our race numbers. Someone apparently wasted a lot of time stamping those wrist bands.
Great spelling
After getting our stuff we roamed around the area and stopped into the Mega pelican (the local grocery/everything store) and then headed over to a local bar overlooking the ocean for a cocktail before the pre-race meeting.
We were their guess
The pre-race meeting was pretty uneventful, we sat near the back so we could get out of there and catch a cab as soon as it ended. We elected to skip the pasta dinner and instead ate at the hotel (nice benefit of being at an all inclusive).
Saturday was a pretty low key day. Early in the morning JB and I headed down to chankanaab park to get in a little practice swim.
The first thing I noticed was just how clear the water was. We swam for 20-30 minutes, just long enough to test the currents and for me to realize that I will not be racing with the clear goggles. The clear goggles are nice when looking under water, but the sun was blinding when breathing to the sun side. We saw a few fish during the swim and the water seemed to calm down a little from the previous day.
After the swim we headed back to the hotel and I took the bike out for one last spin to test the “new” seat height. Everything felt good so after a quick shower and packing the transition bags it was time to chill near the pool.
Empty bags
My gear ready to be backed
Mrs. Scott ready to roll!
After lunch I boarded the bus to head to transition. It was strange we had a whole bus with about 10 people on it due to all the bikes. The first guy on had the same bike as me but he had a nice set of Hed 3 spoke wheels, I was a little jealous. Bree Wee also rode the bus down, who knew, I was staying at the same resort as a pro. Once at transition I found my spot, locked my shoes onto the bike and gave Mrs. Scott a kiss goodnight. Then I headed over to dolphin discovery to swim with the dolphins. What a great way to keep it low key before the race. The highlight of the whole experience was the foot push. Two dolphins pushed me forward by my feet until I was standing out of the water flexing for the camera while standing on two dolphins. Classic!
After playing around with the dolphins and diligently trying to convince them to help me for the swim the next day I caught a ride back to the hotel for an early dinner and some shut eye.
Dreaming all night of what was going to happen at the first ever Ironman
