Race Day
We got up at 4:30 that morning for a 7am race start. Once Jenny was situated in the swim start area I went and got myself a really great position to watch her and get some good pictures of her.
That is, if I saw her.
There were 1,800 people in the race, so trying to find one very small Taiwanese girl that had the same color swim cap as every other female in the race was hard. The cut off for the swim was 2 hr 20 min., meaning, if you didn't finish the 3.8km swim in that time you were done your race right then and there. The average for the age groupers (as opposed to the professionals) was 1 hr 12-20 min, and at the 1 hr mark I peeled my eyes watching for her. But when the 1 hr 20 min mark passed, and then when the triathlete with no legs below the knee came out...and then the triathlete with 1 arm came out...I considered the possibility that I'd missed her.
I MISSED HER?
Dang it. I stood there in a very tight space with a very big camera and VERY heavy lens hanging from my neck from 6:30 to 9:20am and MISSED HER!
But I saw her a number of times during her bike (180km) and her run (42.2km), so that made up for it. And she was on fire. Really. So many athletes were clearly suffering in the heat (32 degrees), and struggling up the many hills (maaaany), and there's Jenny running in her new shoes that she bought a couple days before and had never used, and then riding a new bike that wasn't hers and was pieced together from friends' bikes and that she'd never ridden, and she just soared to a finish of 49 minutes faster than her Ironman in China to a time of 9hrs 59min 35sec.
Unheard of really. She's the epitome of natural talent.
Her time placed her 3rd in her age group (women 30-34), but the 1st and 2nd place girls in her age group were only faster by less than 5 minutes. So, IF Jenny actually TRAINS for next year's Kona Ironman (she automatically qualifies) she could very likely be first.
The awards ceremony was the next evening. We got to see all the pros and hear all the speeches, see everyone's time. But the inspiring parts were the people that were racing with real big strikes against them. For example, an 80 year old man that has done this race for 25 years and since he's the only one in his age group automatically wins (he said he could never outrace people in his age group, only outlive them). And the guy that had a heart transplant. Or the guy that had donated a kidney months earlier. Or the guy that just finished chemo 6 weeks earlier. The list goes on and on with people that had every excuse and reason to not race or not finish the race but went on to finish within the maximum time (17 hour cut off).
Inspiring.
Too bad a 3.8km swim thru rough ocean waters is involved (and let's be honest, also a 42.2 km run through scorching lava fields) or I might be just that inspired (I could totally do the 180km bike).
I stole this picture from Jenny's FB (this is how we feel about the whole run through the lava fields {Jenny is so much more dramatic than myself, although it'd be a totally different picture if I HAD to actually run through said lava fields}). I'll post some of mine when I find them.
