All the love and good vibes from my fellow forum members paid off. I had a fantastic race. I was shooting for anything under 13 hours and ended up finishing at 11:31!

It started off a real bear, though. The wind had whipped up the waves in the gulf to a frenzy and I got trapped right in the middle of scrum. I had heard about how crazy Ironman swims get, but this was far above my wildest imagination. It was so crazy, some guy actually died during the swim (actually, he was taken to intensive care in a coma, but he never regained consciousness). Despite all that, though, I came out of the water at 1:25, which is about 5 minutes before my expected time. (Obviously, the swim is not my best event.)

The bike portion was a blast. Panama City is flat as a pancake, so all I had to do was put my head down and ride. We had a head wind for most of the first 56 miles, but when we made the turn to head back to the beach, we had the sweetest tailwind you can imagine. I rode conservatively to save my legs and still rode a 5:45 bike split averaging 19.4 miles an hour. That was about half an hour better than I expected.

For me, the run was my best effort, I wanted to pace myself and not go out too fast and keep my heart rate low, so I held back to what I felt was a trot, but after I got my splits on the first two miles, I realized I was running a 9:15 pace, and I thought, "hey, I can hold this no problem for at least the first half." I split the first half at just under 2 hours and I still felt pretty good. I was still able to hold around a 9:15 pace until just about mile 22 when all the goos, gatorade, colas, water and everything else turned my stomach into a blubbering mess. At this point I was anticipating a bathroom even more than the finish line! My pace dropped off just a bit, and I ended up finishing the marathon at just over 4 hours.
Overall, though, I am very pleased with my first Ironman - I even went and got the tattoo!

The challenge for me will be to better my time at one of the more challenging races, like Lake Placid or Wisconsin. One thing is for sure, IMFL won't be my last.

IMFL is a fantastic race for a first-timer, though. I highly recommend it.