Chances are I wont even be able to wear a wet suit at the Louisville Ironman. This year, and last year, the water was just too warm. So chances are it will be too warm next year as well. But I would rather have a wetsuit and not need it, than to need it and not have one. Also I will want to do some open water swims up here in New York. And the water is cooler up here, so I will at least want a wet suit for that. I will probably sign up for some shorter distance triathlons up here,
maybe an Olympic distance or a half-Ironman.
Being at the end of the season, I figured wetsuits might be on sale. Maybe I could pick up a used rental or something. I was going to visit the local triathlon store, so I checked his website for hours. I saw on his site that he was open, and that 2008 wetsuits were on slae for
20% off.
I rode my bike down to his store with my credit card in the back pocket. I had stopped down previously wanting to ask him about wetsuits, but he was slammed. Thankfully, this time he wasn’t so busy.
He got my height (6 foot) and my weight (about 170), and said I took a medium. He showed me different samples of neoprene and said they were the cheaper one, the mid level one, and the high end one. He went to check to see what he had in my size. He had a sleeveless wetsuit in
the mid-level. It was a Nineteen Riptide. I went back into the changing room and carefully put it on. I was afraid of tearing it with my fingernails, so I was very careful. I was a snug, but I was told it
was supposed to be like this. I am sure with work, I could have pulled more neoprene up from the legs to loosed the neoprene around my torso. The tightness around my neck bothered me. It felt a little like it was choking me. I was told this was normal. Again, if I got it more pulled up, I think it would have been looser.
The regular price was $275. He said in a previous season this wetsuit was the higher end model and sold for over $300. He said next season it would probably selling for over $400. 20% off was a good deal. But he ended up giving me 25% off. Way cool! I told him I could pay for it now, but I would need to come back and pick it up since I rode my bike.
Meanwhile I am training in the pool and will probably wait until next Spring to get out and try it in a swim. Maybe I can try it this year in a local lake… who knows.
I am starting my swim lessons in about 3 weeks. After which I am going to try to get into a habit of swimming laps a couple times a week to build my swimming skills and endurance. With my goal of doing an Ironman triathlon next year, I need to be able to swim 2.4 miles. According to the website, the lap swimming part of the pool is 25 yards long. I looked it up and found that I will have to swim 35.2 laps to have swum (swimmed?) a mile. So 2.4 miles would be about 85 laps. There is no way that I would able to keep track of counting those those laps in my head. I decided to by a watch with a counter. What better kind of watch to get for doing Irorman training than a Timex Ironman Triathlon watch? 
I started search the web and found there area bunch of different models. Men’s and women’s styles. 8 laps, 30 laps, 42 laps, 100 laps, etc. There are even models with heart rate monitors and GPS’s! I decided that I wanted a Timex Ironman Triathlon watch that would count up to 100 laps. I figured that would work when I try to swim 2.4 miles in the pool.
Even among the 100 lap models, there were still a variety of styles. As far as reviews about the quality of the watches, pretty much all of the reviews were postive. So I wasn’t too concerned about the quality of any of Timex Ironman triathlon watches. So it came down to style. I wanted a watch that said Ironman Triathlon! I wanted a reminder of what I will be training for.
All of the models had Ironman Triathlon on the face. Some of the models had a simple M-Dot logo on the side. I found one model that actually says Ironman triathlon on the band. It looked really cool. And the reviews were good. That was the one I wanted. I found it on amazon for about $45 plus shipping. I walked over to target, and found a couple 30-lap models on sale for $30. They also had a 100-lap model for $50. But it wasn’t the one I wanted. I searched Walmart’s website and found the watch I wanted for $46. So last night after karate clas, I hit Walmart. They had a small handfull of Timex Ironman watches. I found a 100 lap model that looked different than the one I wanted, but it was only $44. It said Ironman Triathlon of the side and was waterproof to 100 meters. Perfect for swimming and counting my laps. When I got it home, I read through the instructions which are in a dozen languages and kind of hard to follow. I managed to set the time and play with the lap timing stuff. It will work great. After comparing it to the picture of the watch I wanted, I relized it was in fact the same watch. I just looked brighter in the pictures on the net or something. It is a cool watch though!
This is the watch I bought: Timex 100-Lap Ironman Triathlon 66801.
I have decided to try to register for the Lake Placid Ironman (Ironman USA) in 2009. This years event is on July 20th. I am running an ultramarathon over in that area on the 19th, and I heard you could register onsite. I figured I could run the ultra on Saturday, head to Lake Placid on Sunday, watch some of the event on Sunday and sign up. So I started doing some research. I found that people doing this years Ironman could register for next years on the Saturday, the day before the race. Registration for next years event opens on Monday. I have a friend who is going up to watch the event and to register for next years event. She said you have to get into line at 5am. Unfortunatly, I can’t be there on Monday. Registration opens online on Moday as well. It opens at noon, and whatever openings are still available will be there. I have read that it sells out online in minutes. So I guess I will have to be right there, and ready to register online.
If I don’t get into the Lake Placid Ironman, I will try one of the other Ironmans. I was told the Louisville Ironman was easier to get into. At least last year it was. And that is in like August. I’ll have to find out when registration opens for that. But I will have to find out what my wife’s schedule will be. I don’t even know if she will know.
If not Louisville, then there is Wisconsin and maybe Florida. I am bound to get into some Ironman event eventually. I hope it isn’t as frustrating and as big of a PITA as trying to buy a frigging Nintendo Wii!!!!