Joshua Monda-: Ironman 70.3 World Championships- Clearwater

Well I finally had my "dream race". There is no better feeling than knowing that you gave absolutely 100% of every ounce of energy in your body....and having a result to show for it. Usually after a race I am sitting around wondering what I could have done to go faster. Or would think to myself "if this or that had not happened I would have gone :xx seconds faster". I can proudly say that I maxed myself out last saturday and went as fast as I could possibly go.
The numbers:
7th in the World in the 25-29 Age Group
1st American in my Age Group!!!
37th overall out of 1600

Swim- 30:12 (1:35/100m pace)- This was a 7second PR. I actually had a lot of trouble sighting buoys the first 2/3rds of this swim due to swimming directly into the sun. It appears everyone had this problem though as alot of my close competitors were a minute or so slower than normal. The swim was in the Harbor this year (vs. the Gulf as in previous years) due to rough stormy conditions all week. So it was a "time trial start" swim, with athletes walking across a timing mat one at a time to start the clock before jumping into the narrow harbor two at a time.

T1-2:44- transition was a little bit more of a run (to my advantage) since the swim exit was approx 400m away from transition area. I spotted a wetsuit stripper and pointed at her and said "Hey you! Strip me". LOL. She yanked it off and I got up and ran into transition area to grab my bag. When i got into the tent, I grabbed a volunteer by the arm and dumped my bag with my bike gear out and told the volunteer to stuff my wetsuit in the bag while I got my bib number, helmet and nutrition situated. I thanked him and jetted out to my bike.

Bike- 2:10:45 (25.7mph)- 12minute PR -Rocked it on the bike. Since my wave was the last of the day, I was doing nothing but passing people the whole time. I was keeping my wattage in check, and was just blitzing that flat course.... I was surprised at how clean the race was until somewhere after mile 40. ....a huge HUGE peloton of riders came and swallowed me up. It really pissed me off because I was busting out an incredible time trial performance for myself and I wanted the bike split to be all "my own". I tried to drop the group angrily several times but could not succeed, they just kept reeling me back in and the one lane we had designated for the race was way too narrow for all of us. I looked behind me and there was a line of riders 150 long, WOW. This is what everyone was talking about, I thought to myself. The road was so narrow and there were so many damn riders there was nowhere to go. It was actually quite dangerous. And it so bad that it actually slowed down my overall bike split!

BIKE SPLIT 1	25.2 mi. (59:33)	25.39 mph
BIKE SPLIT 2	17 mi. (37:53)	26.92 mph
BIKE SPLIT 3	13.8 mi. (33:19)	24.85 mph
TOTAL BIKE	56 mi. (2:10:45)	25.70 mph

About 4miles from the end of the bike I finally had worked my way to the front of the peloton and dropped them and rode into transtion SOLO.

T2-1:49- Spotted a "bike catcher" and yelled "hey! take my bike!!! thanks!!" and was off to the tent. A volunteer actually was able to "volunteer" this time for me and approached me helping me empty out my bag and put my helmet away as I put socks on my feet. Dashed out of the tent and high fived Mom, Aunt Linda and Cousin Charlie.

RUN- 1:21:50 (6:14pace) 3min PR
So, I started out moving pretty well the first half of the run. Although at mile 3 I had my usual cramps in my inner quads. I slowed down to 8:00min pace for a few minutes until the went away. The "crampy" feeling stayed in my legs the rest of the day though, they just didnt knot up again. I think some of the massive spikes in wattage from dealing with the peloton on the bike was the cause of this. I really had to "gut it out"on this run. The run course was quite challenging with the going up and down the Causeway
four times. The volunteers were great though with aid stations every few minutes it seemed. and the crowd support was amazing. I also just kept my nose to the Grindstone and just kept looking for more guys in my age group to pass up. That last mile, knowing that I was coming in well under the 4:10:00 mark, made it hard not to smile despite the pain that I was in from pushing my body to the limit.

I am really happy to have ended the season with a 4:07:22
I really really want to thank all my family and friends that have supported me and cheered me on at my races or just kept good thoughts about me from afar.

I gotta thank GU Energy for sticking with me for a second season in a row.

Big thanks to Athletes Lounge and all their employees for taking great care of my bike and any other triathlon related needs.

Summit Performance Coaching- I really gained a ton of confidence from being on this program. I really could not have done this without Coach Dave Ciaverella's guidance.

And thanks to all my other fellow triathletes and runners who have trained with me this year. You all know who you are, and you know how much I appreciate/respect you guys!