Would you like to see how my heart was beating, exactly how many kilometers I had to swim/bike through/run, at which speed and on what kind of track configuration on my Ironman path? What was the wind speed, air humidity and many other details? Keep reading. It was all made possible by Navigo-sistem d.o.o., an exclusive sales representative for Garmin type GPS devices in Croatia.

Satellite precision of the Garmin device named Forerunner 405, which I was carrying with me during the race, gave me detailed information about the bike track (we rode two 90-kilometer circles in the race) as well as the marathon track, while the swimming portion of the race wasn’t registered on the device.

Forerunner informed me that the bike track was 178 kilometers long, while the marathon track was 42,192 kilometers long on the dot.

Forerunner 405 has certain bicycle features( you can add a speed/cadence bike sensor to track the speed and distance of your cycling workouts) , and on my run a huge help was it’s pace alert, which always kept me between 3:50 and 4 minutes per kilometer (it triggers an alarm if you vary from preset pace).

In this race, as in many others, I used a heart rate monitor (which I didn’t even notice was on me) to get the information about my heart rate throughout the competition.

I store my training information and share them with the general public on the Motionbased website (Garmin announced changing the domain into Garmin Connect, but I will switch there as early as next year).

In case you were wondering, I will use Garmin Forerunner 405 to record my race and all the additional details in my next big challenge on the legendary triathlone competition, the Ford Ironman World championship, that will take place this fall in Hawaii, USA.

Stay tuned, be informed!

My goal in Ironman Austria 2008, which is only 2 and a half hours away from my residence in Zagreb, Croatia, was to be in the TOP 5 athletes and with that result qualifying for the Hawaii Ironman World Championship 2008.

6 months of preparation that’s behind me paid off. On Sunday July 13, I successfully finished my second Ironman race in a 10-year long career in sports and took the 5th place with a new croatian national Ironman record time of 8 hours, 28 minutes and 4 seconds.

Brothers Brad and Anton Storm, which are widely recognized as very fast in the shorter distance races of triathlone, led the way swimming through the Worthersee lake. After the swimming portion of the race (49 minutes) I was holding an excellent position with the leading group of athletes which consisted of many well-known names, like domestic favorites Norbert Langbrandtner (2nd place Ironman Austria 2002,2005, 2007), Werner Leitner (4th place IM Austria70.3) and Olympics-bound Norbert Dominik (2nd place IM 70.3 Monaco 2006) with only one man ahead of us; the winner of Ironman Austria in 2006 and 2007 and a big favorite to win the race, Mr. Marino Vanhoenacker (5th place IM WC Hawaii 2007).

Bike portion of the race was organized into 2 circles of 90 kilometers each with two more significant hills on the track. The rest of the circuit was faster and technically less demanding, which led to some inappropriate behaviour of some atletes called drafting. It was penalised with a black card, which meant 4 minutes added time to the final result.

After about 40 kilometers on the bike, weather worsened and heavy rain started to interfere with my planned pace for the bike section beacuse of the slippery turns and poor visibility due to evaporation of water up from the asphalt.

Somewhere along the 65th kilometer on the bike I started to experience some technical dificulty with my gear shifter and I had to let go of the first group to fix the problem. By later trying to catch up with the leaders I drove somewhat carelessly through one of the left turns and received a red card, with which they made me wait for 4 long minutes in the transition zone after 180 kilometers on the bike without eating, drinking or getting any kind of useful information about the competitors’ current position and time. I have to say that judges were pretty successful in discouraging drafting within the PRO group of athletes, while they were more relaxed with the EDGE group of athletes.

From what I could tell, I started my marathon run somewhere between 12th and 14th position in the race. In spite heavy rain and slippery track in some places, I managed to run the halfmarathon distance for 1 hour, 22 minutes and 20 seconds, which gave me a boost to finish the race with a 2:48 marathon time, and take the 5th place overall. With that my goal was complete.

Since the race was being held so close to my home base myself and 5 croatian athletes , who competed within the EDGE group, enjoyed a very massive and very recognizable red and white-squared support. Fans and family always represent a huge support and motivation to every Ironman, for which I am eternally deeply grateful.

My next big goal of the season is, of course, Hawaii, before which I will participate in some training-races across Europe.

race results

more about the Race

photos race day 13.07.2008

photos ironman austria 9.07-12.07.2008

video

Nikad prije više profesionalaca na Ironman Austria triatlonu.

Iz 42 zemlje Svijeta nastupa čak 100 profesionalnih triatlonaca. Na startu će se naći dvostruki pobjednik ove utrke, Belgijanac Marino Vanhoenacker (5.mjesto sa IM Hawaii 2007), Britanac Stephen Bayliss (1.mjesto IM J. Afrika 2008), Nijemac Alex Taubert (4.mjesto IM Švicarska 2006), Austrijanac Norbert Langbrandtner (2.mjesto IM Austria 2007), Massimo Cigana (1.mjesto IM70.3 Austria 2008), Britanka Bella Comerford (dvije pobjede u IM seriji u 2008!), Edith Niederfringer (prošlogodišnja pobjednica IM Austria) i mnogi drugi.

Jučer sam prošao uobičajen postupak registracije i uklonio jedan kvar na biciklu (puknuće sajle na prednjem mjenjaču). Startam pod brojem 22, koji je postao moj uobičajeni startni broj na utrkama Ironman serije u Austriji.

Lijep pozdrav iz Klagenfurta iz Media centra!