Ok guys here is a race report for the Great Floridian Iron Distance race in Clermont Florida last Saturday (Oct 22). I waited to write this report so I could be objective and not write out of emotion.

Pre-Race-Woke up at 3 am and ate a bagel with peanut butter drank some gatorade and went back to sleep. Alarm didn't go off at 5:30am, luckily I had a wake up call with the front desk as a back up. Unfortunately this was a foreshadowing of things to come. Drove about 15 minutes to the race site and met up with some friends to walk down to the transition area. Upon arriving at the transition area at 6am there was mass chaos there as not only were the full iron distance athletes trying to get marked and get their chips, there were 1000 or so half distance athletes there eventhough their race didn't start for 2-2 1/2 hours later. This really pissed me off as I spent most of the time waiting to get marked and chipped behind people who shouldn't have even been there yet! After waiting for what seemed like forever I finally got into the transition area to hang up my gear bags and get my wetsuit on. There was a huge line for the porta potty's of which there were only about 10-15 for 1500 athletes and their families. What made it worse was that their were again all these half distance people who had at least an hour until the first wave started in line and they wouldn't let me in front of them to go to the rest room before my wave started. I never did get to go either.

Warm-up- NONE (Unless you count my mad sprint down to the lake to make it to the start)

Swim- I had a great first lap swimming in about 36 minutes, the second lap was a little slower as I was hit in the face and knocked my goggles off and some jackass kept grabbing at my ankle and tore my chip off ( whether intentional or accidental I don't know). Total Swim time was 1:15 which I was happy with.

T1-Another giant gaggle of people but this was to be expected, tried to get a replacement chip to no avail. After getting my gear bag myself I changed into my bike gear and headed out.

Bike-This is where things went from bad to worse. We had to go up one street and double back through the park to get to the road where the course started. By doing so there was literally a curb that we had no warning was there that had to be jumped. If you have ever had to do this you know that it is not a good thing. One of my bottles ejected from the back and my aero bottle fell off when I hit. The yellow sponge thing in the aero bottle rolled down a storm drain and was gone forever so I had water sloshing all over me the entire time. More disappointments on the bike course, the first two aid stations were manned by one person handing out water bottles. For an Iron Distance race this is unacceptable, especially since it was advertised that the aid stations would have water, gels, and gatorade. The first part of the course was on State Road 19, this is a dangerous road and I am shocked that no one has been hit or injured riding on this road. It was not closed to traffic (none of the roads were) and we had semi trucks whizzing by at 50+mph. The entire race was taking place on the shoulder of the road, not a good thing. The remainder of the course had traffic all over it, not to mention the road kill all over the shoulders (not the RD's fault but unpleasent none the less). Finally the aid station before the Buckhill section of the course had the advertised Gatorade and such (mile 30 or so) this area wasn't too terribly bad. After the hilly section I started to feel queasy and slowed down a bit on the way back in to town. At mile 55 the nausea kicked in full force and I was stopped on the side of the road and barfed my brains out all over myself and my bike. I don't know what caused this, but I had a strep like infection the week before and I was on antibiotics and I think that might have had something to do with it. I decided in light of being sick and the poor support on the bike course that my day was over. Overall I was happy with my bike until I got sick, I felt great and was making good time. 2:50 for 56 miles.

Conclusions- Even giving the RD the benefit of the doubt because of the hurricane coming toward Florida, this was a pathetically supported race. There were way too few volunteers and the ones that were there didn't really know what was going on. This was not their fault , I don't think anyone told them what to do at thier assigned posts. One of my friends who finished told me that on the second loop of the bike that they ran completely out of water, and on the run there were aid stations that were closed up when some of the later finishers were coming around the lake. This is completely unacceptable!! Overall I would not recommend this race to anyone. The townsfolk act like it is a nusiance (the ones that actually know it is going on) and the local motorists are not very friendly either. Contrasting this with IMLP that I did last year and it is not even close. I would pay what ever they are asking for an MDot race where you know that everything is going to be good and all that you have to worry about is yourself. At IMLP the entire region comes out to support the race and there were 4000 volunteers for 2000 athletes. At GFT there might have been 300 volunteers if that. Just a pathetic race all around.