The Animal in Florida

G'day all back in Oz!

Well we had a massive 30hour journey to finally land here in Panama
city florida.

I went for my 60k ride and run this morning -and - damn its cold early
on the bike. I started at 6am and I reckon it was about 10degrees -
wasn't prepared for that, may have to throw some arm warmers into the
bike bag for the race. It warmed up when the sun came out though, I think
the first hour will be chilly but after that ok as the race starts at
7am. No other bikes out either, nothing happens around here before
midday, I barely saw a car the entire way. When I got to the 6k run off the
bike, it had warmed to about 22d and perfect running conditions - I ran
around the resort golf course on pristine flat soft fairway grass -
awesome!

The course is flat - flat as - like riding from Centennial park out
to Kurnell. The biggest hill is a 2min climb over a bridge that you hit
on the way out and back, exactly the same as the one we go over heading
to Taren Point - I'll definitely be getting out of the saddle and
pumping over that as its the only chance I am going to get over the 180k.
Its pretty fast riding as although I don;t use a speedo - I estimate I
was riding about 37-44k/hr on my 10k e2 hits.

The run is as flat as a pancake - if ever there was a chance to have a
fast run split - this is it. Two laps on the streets along all the
resorts and heads out to a bay and parklands where the turn around is.

The swim is beautiful clean warmish water ,an ocean swim , its going to
suit me down to a tea , glassy conditions. Not as salty as hawaii, so
no probs there.

For those wanting to watch ironmanlive from what I can work out the
race will start Sunday morning 6thNov about 1am Aus time!

All in all everything going smoothly for a good race - no1 aim is get
that hawaii slot so I am trying to remain focused on that for now and
not on partying.

Have fun and I will send another report soon.

Chris