I woke up today wondering if I should go swimming with the tour group. I was kind of tired, still a little bit not over jet lag, but I dragged myself up to at least go get free breakfast. I chatted with pro Andrea Fisher over coffee and eggs, and then proceeded to get all my stuff together to go swimiming in the lake. I figured it would help keep me awake; one of the most important things I’ve learned about getting over jet lag is to KEEP MOVING. Do not sit down, do not read a book, but get up and walk around, talk to people. Once you settle down somewhere, it is easy to lose focus and then you’ll be nodding off. Not good to be nodding off on the bike or run on Ironman Sunday!
At least I found out that the water was cooler than yesterday. Very comforting! I thought I would overheat during the swim since yesterday’s swim was in water a bit warmer than today. Hopefully it will be even a little bit more cooler on Sunday.
After swimming, we came back to hang out at breakfast. Another coach with her athletes was organizing a pool to guess the sum of all their finishing times. Very amusing and interesting to see that they all guessed very close to each other!
After breakfast, I went out on a trek to find an ATM machine that would give me money. So far my ATM has worked at London Heathrow Airport and Klagenfurt airport, but not in town. How frustrating! And I’m running out of euros! As much as I’d like to think we’re in the 21st century, it’s issues like this that make me think we’re still in the dark ages. At least Klagenfurt has city-wide wifi, which is accessible in the hotel and allows me to post!
Finally I find a bank’s ATM which will give me cash. It’s really annoying. The other reason I need cash is because the Ironman Championships Kona slot roll-down meeting is on Monday, and they require you to pay $485 US to get your slot. The kicker is…you need $485 US in CASH! Who carries that much cash around? It’s silly. And they don’t take credit cards. How backward. But nevertheless, I have a combination of US dollars and euros which add up to be about $485. I am now ready for the miracle of qualifying for Kona. Very much a long shot, but you never know.
Another funny thing. The hotel has no air conditioning and it can get sweltering hot here. So glad that it’s cooled down considerably since I arrived. I hope for a relatively mild day on race day Sunday.
Later tonite, we head for the pasta party. Almost all systems are a go for Ironman!
I feel pretty good and confident. The run course is truly flat (the website did not LIE like other Ironman course descriptions), and the bike course seems very fast even though it is a constant set of rollers. Already I am thinking about next year and which Ironman to do…