Two days ahead of the race and very very relaxed. All because I’m still completely undecided about racing. To be clear my brain is decided and my heart is decided but unfortunately they’re not in agreement.

BRAIN SAYS

Absolutely bonkers to race. My back appears to be on the mend so why risk aggravating it when I know I can’t race to the level I aspire to. I should just view this as the start of my preparation for 2016.

The race is going to be painful. When I looked at the training I’ve done in the two months leading in to this it’s average the following per week:

7k swimming, 130k biking and 4k running for a total of 7 hours.

Hardly Ironman training. If I get as far as the run I’m unlikely to complete it and if I do it’s not going to be pretty.

HEART SAYS

It’ll be fun for much of it. No pressure, soak up the atmosphere. You can stop when you want. Race number 118 means there’ll be a lot of shouting and I’ve mum and Rachel come down to support at least give them someone to cheer for a little while.

I’ve spent this week trying to establish what is bad for the back. It’s not an exact science but it was OK after a reasonable solid ride on Wednesday and this morning I swam in rough seas and appears to be ok.

So… assuming I race here are the predictions

SWIM

0:55 — you never know

BIKE

If I want any hope of running this will need to be very conservative so….

6:30

RUN

Do miracles happen ?

4:30 – how hard can it be to do 6:25 Ks…

very !

So adding in some transitions

0:55 - Swim
0:10 - T1
6:30 - Bike
0:05 - T2
4:30 - Run
12:10 - TOTAL

So…. optimistically I’m predicting my slowest Ironman ever.