2009 Ironman China 70.3

I did the 70.3 in China on April 19, 2009- rough race.
Haikou itself is not much of a tourist town, which makes me wonder why they don't move the event to China's most famous resort on the South side of the island- Sanya. We stayed at the event hotel- the Crown Spa Resort. It was nice, though the rooms had a feeling of being "old", despite that the hotel is fairly new. There is a nice pool and private beach, and a full spa. The food was good, although service was so-so, possibly because they were not used to so much traffic at once. They did allow us a very late check-out (8pm), which was nice. The hotel is far away from anything, so a trip to the grocery store or any other store requires a taxi.

On to race day- It was hot at 8am, which was a bad sign. The 70.3 started at 9am, which was late enough to get all the sun's love by mid-afternoon. The swim was tough; the river current was around 2km/h which is equivalent to an average swimmer's swim speed, so at one buoy, people were actually swimming but making no progress at all. I had to give it everything to make that turn, and it was a mass of people all trying to do the same, not a pretty picture. Out of the water, things didn't get much better. The bike course was ok on the highway, but the village had some mean hills. The run was the real breaking point- several people suffered heat stroke, many dropped out. I saw a guy literally fall on his face, possibly breaking his nose in the process...looked like a heart attack but it was heat stroke; I never saw that before. Ambulances up and down the course all day as the temp hit 113F during the run, which of course threw everybody's times off as it became impossible to keep a race pace. I finished in 7 hours, which was good enough to win the age group, but I got disqualified for assistance with a flat on the bike course, which was fair. That flat cost me nearly 45 min.

Chris McCormack won the men's 70.3, and he was quoted at the finish line saying: "That was the hardest thing I've ever done."

The race was pretty poorly organized. Bike course was poorly marked and several people got lost on the bike route including some pros who got lost while following a police car, which they thought was a lead car, but was actually going in another direction. They went 20km down the wrong road, then missed a checkpoint and got disqualified. This year, the event hotel, TA, and finish line were all at different locations, and getting from one to another meant getting through Haikou traffic, which was horrible due to (ironically) the road closures for IM. Post-race gear collection was ridiculous; they took everyone's race bags and threw them in a pile and you had to search for your stuff, which was not sorted by number or anything. There was a lack of security at bike collection as well. Hopefully they can improve a few things next year and also change the course so that the hotel, TA, and finish are all at the same place