Where I become an Ironman

My remarkable journey came to a conclusion September 7th at 9:43 PM. Yes, I finished. It took what felt like forever but I crossed the line and successfully completed a life long dream. Life since then has seemed to speed up dramatically and before I knew it almost 2 months had gone by, and I still hadn't written down my experiences.

The day started early... really early. It started at the horrible hour of 3:30 AM. 3:30 is a stupid, stupid time to wake up. We had laid everything out the night before, but the nerves required another once over of the gear. Luckily nothing seemed to have moved. And again my beautiful wife, mother of my unborn son--seriously could my 30th year on this planet get any greater?--amazed me again by letting me get some breakfast and wash away my nerves in a warm shower while she got my fuel for the day together. Of course nothing ever goes 100% to plan and we couldn't find my ear plugs.

We left Grandma and Grandpa's pretty much on time, closer than I normally am at any rate. On the drive over, each mile that ticked down on our way to Monona Terrace resulted in my nervousness ticking up. A resulting cloud of doubt was circling around me by the time we got to the sight and I worked my way to my bike. I began thinking to myself, "I can't do this," and "What was I thinking." The absolute worst was when I had finished with my prep.; the air was in the tires and fuel was in the bike and my transition bags were stocked. It was between the prep and the start where everything comes into sharp relief. There is nothing to distract you and you are left with your thoughts. It was then that it fully hit what I was about to attempt. I have never swum that distance. I have never run a marathon. I have never tried anything like this ever, I have no idea what to expect. I am not in good enough shape, I didn't train hard enough, I suck at running. I haven't ridden my bike in over a week (don't get me started on tri-bike transport...) and I've never ridden the bike course before.

And I can't find my effing ear plugs.

So, I sit with those thoughts for a while. Attempts to focus on my task at hand were absolutely feeble and I made some half-hearted attempts at stretching. So, mostly I just sat and let my thoughts distill down into one sollitary thought. "I don't want to do this." The thought was a result of all my self-doubt, a lifetime of not thinking of myself as a strong man, and a tremendous fear of failure. I didn't know what would be worse for me starting the race and not being able to complete it or just not starting--turning my timing chip in and joining the 400 other people who had signed up, but didn't show up.

I had kept my cell phone with me so I could call Kristi up and find out where they were so I could drop off my clothes with my family. She called me up and let me know that they had made a trip and had gotten two different kinds of earplugs for me. I asked her to come sit with me. So when she showed up with about a 1/2 hour to race time, I told her, "I don't want to do this." It's really tough to know what she thought then. We had spent a great deal of money in equipment, training, time, and travel to even get me to where I now found myself. Thirty minutes before the start of one long and grueling day of racing.

She didn't need to say much, just "I believe in you." I think she said something more, but honestly that's all I heard. It hit me that, I had a lot of people believing in me. My family, my wife, my coach and my friends. I realized that I really needed to start believing in myself. It's funny to me though, that I had always thought I did believe in myself. It's the whole reason though why I wanted to take this on, you never truly know what you think or what you can achieve until you are actually forced to meet your challenge.

I did need that push of the voice of reason, reminding me that I too believed in me. So I rubbed myself down with Body Glide and pulled my wetsuit on. Of course as soon as I did out popped my earplugs, which had been hiding in the arm of my suit all along. Suddenly, there was one thing less to worry about.

Kristi and I walked hand in hand down the Helix. Spiraling past a steady stream of people with signs, bells, and smiles we made our way down to Lake Menona. I ran into my mom who reiterated how excited and proud she was, and asked me how I was doing. I told her I needed to keep moving or I was going to throw up. I think they might have thought I was joking.

I got into water sooner than I anticipated, about 10 minutes before the pro's went and 20 minutes before the rest of the 1950 people went. So as I sat there treading water I took a second to look around. There was a steady stream of competitors coming into the water and you could watch the line 10 abreast stretch all the way down from the top the Helix to the water. I saw the Terrace, a huge building, absolutely packed with spectators. The were lining the mile long course along the water, on top of the roof and watching from windows. It made me smile, just at the sheer volume of love being shown towards the people competing. And when I turned away from that spectacle to watch the sun rise, it hit me how lucky I was. I stopped and prayed and thanked God for giving me the opportunity to even attempt this. I thanked Him for letting me get to the start line injury free and asked for strength in the coming day. All my nerves, every last one of them just vanished. They were replaced with a feeling of absolute excitement and wonder and joy.

I had positioned myself not too near the front, about 15 yards to the right from the buoy line. As I had a good bit of room around me, I thought to myself, "Gee, this isn't so bad. I was expecting a lot more people from everyone's description of the swim start." But as the time got closer and closer it got more and more crowded... By ten minutes to start when they sent the pro's off there was no where I could go to not be within 1/2 a body length of another human being. It was packed. I loved it, even before we started swimming it was so exciting to see that many people packed together in one area. I had never done a mass start, I didn't know what to expect so I just waiting for the cannon. And when it went off... wow!



In case you were wondering. It felt as crazy as it looked.

I got kicked and I kicked. I was swum into and over; and I did the same. I was hit so hard on the bridge of my goggles that I thought my nose was broken. I had a great swim. My biggest mistake was on the first loop around the red buoy where you turn left about 90 degrees to swim to another red buoy and turn left again for the return trip to the start of the swim (where you get to do it again). I sited what I thought was the buoy but what ended up being a red kayak, it's seriously hard to see anything with that much splashing an water. Unfortunately for the people on my side and those behind me I made my way to the kayak (thinking it was the buoy). I kept running into the person on my left and thought, "Where the hell is this guy going?" Can't he swim in a straight line to the buoy? Of course HE could swim in straight line to the buoy, it was when I pulled my head completely out of the water to see what the heck was going on (it was getting a little rough) that he pointed to the real buoy... whoops.

I felt absolutely great on the swim and in the end it took me 1:18 to get done with the swim course. I was so surprised when I saw my time, it was a full 20 minutes faster than what I was expecting. Hearing all those people cheer throughout the swim course and seeing them as I got out of the water was incredibly motivating. I ran to the peelers (those great volunteers who strip you of your wetsuit) and was up the Helix to my bike.

A brief note on transition areas. They are as textbook example of controlled chaos as you can get. Everyone is full of energy and trying to get in and out as quickly as possible. You sit down grab everything, throw on your cycling shoes and you're off. If you keep your head on right, you remember to stop by the very, very important sun screen station. I did not keep my head on right.

I ran to my bike and was helped out of the rack by a wonderful volunteer. As I began to descend the Helix towards the bike course my uncle Dwayne ran over and waved to me. It was so cool to hear him cheering for me as I set out on the course. After my initial drive of the course I thought that the first 1/2 of the loop would be the most difficult. And while it was difficult, the 2nd half kicked my butt. The 112 mile bike course was beautiful. It weaved through small towns and Wisconsin farmland and was absolutely littered with people who cheered for you as you passed. The volunteers were so friendly and really very helpful.

My difficulty was I had pushed after I got to the top of Mt. Horeb on the first loop. I thought that was the the end of the difficult first half. Unfortunately, for me, Timberlane road was hiding. The road takes a sharp left as it hides itself behind a barn. As soon as you make the turn your are faced with a narrow, steep, curving road that winds it way up. It was positively lined with people and made me feel like I was in the Tour de France.



To be specific, I felt like I was in the Pyrenees in the Tour. I was burned out by the time I was through and I still had another 56 miles to go. To complete the bike course I was going to have to dig deep. What I've come to realize is that in an event like this it's not one time of digging deep, it's multiple times where you have to dig down and push through the pain, then you have to keep doing it again and again.

What does not help when you're digging down is some dude in an easy chair with a beer shouting, "You've got a long way to go." Indeed. Surprisingly the statement didn't phase me too much as I was telling myself something very close to that. At this point I hurt and all I could see in front of me was another healthy 60 miles by bike and then a marathon. Luckily for me a last minute race addition were some compression socks my mom had given me. I didn't know what to expect from the socks or where to wear them so I had put them on before the bike. Except when I started out on the bike I couldn't see another person who was wearing them. So I rolled them down.

As the second lap started my fashion sense gave way to desperation. I was truly nervous about how I'd do on the second lap and decided to roll the socks up. I spent the next 60 miles being called socks by fellow athletes, cheerleaders, and spectators. I might have been offended if my legs didn't feel so darn peppy once those blessed socks were up. Thanks Mom!

I think one of the funniest things that was said to me was by a cyclist I was passing. He said, "you are pretty brave." Me, "what?" Him, "To be wearing those socks like that." Kind of rude, but when the guy telling you that looks to be 40 and has more metal in mouth than the entirety of the Union Pacific Railroad it's pure humor.

The best part of the ride was seeing my family. They chased me around that course so that it seemed that at every nadir in my moral they were there. My wife, father, grandmother, uncle, and cousin shouting my name and lifting my spirit. It was so cool and added so much to the experience. It was a slog toward the end but when you saw the helix and thought ahead to the transition, your spirits can't help but be raised.

I swapped clothes and was glad I had put another set in my transition bag. My riding gear was so salt caked it wouldn't have been very comfortable to run a marathon in. I remembered to get sun screen on the way out of transition and took off. In my mind, I knew I was going to finish. I had plenty of time left and I was 2 out of 3 down in the event count. There could have been another 50 to go and I would have finished. My family greeted me out of the gates and I was off.

Running is not my strong suit. I got a lot better through training but I never got to the point where I enjoyed it. Its difficult and you feel beat up. And here after so much else that happened before, I was just having a great time tearing up pavement.

Until mile 4.

At mile 4 my feet began to hurt. At mile 6 my legs were really starting to burn and at mile 6.5 the race organizers found the one substantial hill in Madison. Really, race organizers? Stupid Observatory Road. It was great seeing my family through this. They were wonderful and it was such a lift to my spirits seeing them. The run itself had some really cool parts. Running through the stadium was a highlight, and the detour through the park felt good after running on the street for so long.

The best though was running by all the inspirational signs. At least a mile of them on either side of the course. All the work, love, and support people had put in and received was evident in that mile. I soaked it all up. It was great too when you saw the digital display come up with a message from your support people.

I made the turn around and managed to do it running, well more jogging... slowly. As I did I thought at least there was no way my feet could hurt anymore. Incidentally, never ever think that your feel can't hurt anymore than they do. Because they always can. And do. At mile 14 I ran into a young guy named Patrick. He was going about as not fast as I was. Something told me to stop, I started a conversation and we decided to run the rest of the race together. It was great. There's something about running with another person that's really motivating. No one wants to be the first to start walking so you keep going. We set goals and ran to them.

Again my family was around every corner. My dad met me and Patrick at the top of Observatory and got to see us looking haggard. As we got closer to the end we could her swells of cheering as people crossed the finish line in front of you. It was one of the most heartening things I've heard in my life. You know that you are going to finish and you know there's only a few miles between you and your goal. Just when I thought that there couldn't possibly be any more adrenaline in my body, by golly, I was proven wrong again.

Patrick and I split up at the last aide station. I needed some fluid and he wanted to push on in. We thanked each other for the motivation to keep running. We were both excited that we were each on track to run an even split. As I made the last right turn I saw my family holding signs and could hear them cheering for me. Strangers picked up the chorus and began cheering for me. And then the line came. The line that I had been dreaming of for a long time. A statement that I had been training for a year and half to hear. It was sweet. I hope everyone gets to hear something so rewarding in their life. You know it.

Jesse Nelson you are an Ironman.


Most importantly. I want to send this out into the webisphere. Thank you Kristi, thank you family. Kristi I couldn't have done this race without you. Your patience, love, and motivation (not to mention your organization skills) brought me through some of hardest times. You never bat an eye at the ridiculous amounts of money I spent on this quest and you never did anything but cheer when I went out on a long run. Thank you family and friends for supporting me. For those that could make it out, see me, and cheer for me you made all the difference in this day. For all those who watched me from afar. Thanks for keeping track of me. I honestly can say I could feel your support.

My immediate goal is fatherhood. I should be meeting my son in a few short months, he's due in March. So I am working hard to get then house ready for his arrival. Far future goals include more triathlons and I'll be seeing IM Wisconsin again (2010?). Someone asked me if I felt a let down after pursuing this dream for so long, I don't. I do feel like something has changed inside me for the better. I think I left a lot of my past and fears on the road behind me.

I don't want to come across as being overly preachy but I do want to end this with a call to action. I hope whoever reads this gets a chance to feel the way I felt that day. If you have a dream to do this or anything else you aren't sure you can accomplish, pursue it. I can guarantee you it will take more effort than you think, it will take more time than you think, it will hurt more than you think. It will also be so much more rewarding than you can imagine. Good luck everyone. May we all live the fool, die the sage!