Dave Slavinski
Wetsuit: Blue Seventy Helix
Bike: Cervelo P2C with Reynolds PowerTap 65mm tubular wheels
Run: Nike Luminair Lite
Clearwater 2009: To fully understand Clearwater this season you have to look back at 2008, my first year of competing at the 70.3 distance. 2008 was a dream year with just about everything going right for me including winning the Best of the US team competition with Sue Huelster and then finishing 2nd at the Ironman 70.3 World Championships in my age group as well as winning every other race I entered with the exception of Ironman Rhode Island 70.3. My goal for 2010 was to qualify for Kona and try to do the same thing there that I did in Clearwater the year before.....but as I discovered it is a totally different story when you move to 140.6!
I was able to qualify for Kona at the St. Croix 70.3 and for Clearwater at Eagleman.
Needless to say, my credit cards are still trying to recover from overuse as is
my body! But I did not feel great in either 70.3 this season. Then came the
training.
Ironman training took a great deal out of me this summer and
by the end of August my body had just about had enough. This became clear when I
passed out on Herbertsville Road in Brick on my way in from a 70 mile hard solo
ride. The next three weeks were just plain bad! My body would not recover and I
went for blood and urine tests to make sure I wasn't doing any damage (like
Ironman training isn't damaging enough).
Kona....what a place! We are already making plans to move there after our
teaching careers as it is just paradise. The race was far less enjoyable then
the rest of the trip. I Suffered all week with sinus issues and spent half the
day in bed on Wednesday before the race. This doesn't build confidence three
days prior to the biggest race of your life. Thanks to a few ill-advised shots
of Afrin throughout the week I was completely dehydrated on the bike by mile 35
and suffered for the remaining 8 hours.
Trust me, this will eventually come to Clearwater, I promise! A week after Kona
I started training again this time shifting gears from long-long, to short-fast.
This was good mentally and physically as the training became fresh again. But
the lingering sinus issues have not fully been resolved. Just last week I
finished off antibiotics, started allergy medication, and had to go to the
doctor twice to remove buildup from my ears that rendered me virtually deaf in
my right ear for the last three weeks. As Carrie can attest, it made me a bit
more irritable then usual. Hopefully with a few good days before Clearwater I
can finally be back to 100%.
With
this disclaimer being laid out, I am looking forward to competing at the Ironman
70.3 World Championships. There are some very tough guys in my age bracket
including Christopher Thomas, the reigning World Champion who has not lost to an
amateur in the past 2-years that I know of. He has been in the top-10 in every
Ironman 70.3 race he has been in lately....as the first amateur and ahead of a
majority of the pros!
With this being said, I think I can beat him. Sounds cocky I know, but he was
only 1:10 ahead of me last year and my swim is better as is my bike. If he is
less then 4 minutes ahead of me off the bike I will beat him, you can count on
it! We should swim about the same and he will out bike me while I should out run
him. Nothing would give me greater pleasure then to catch him in the closing
miles of the run.....well maybe it would be better to pass him in the opening
miles of the run, and to be the World Champion.
Ultimately my goal is to get on the podium again in
Clearwater, more specifically to win the 35-39 age group. Swim 26 minutes or
faster, bike 2:13 or better and run 1:15 or better....under 4-hours would be a
nice day, I would even settle for 2nd again if we could go under the esteemed
4-hour mark.
Thanks for all the well wishes!
Dave Slavinski