Last year, at the 70.3 Cancun Ironman, I was applauding one of the athletes who also rolled his bottle towards me. A year later, I did my first 70.3, that same event that I sat out and which had been the first triathlon I had ever seen in my life.
Like it or not, I took the deja vu aspect of this coincidence as a sign: this is an event I definitely have to do. Next year.
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The ferry ride out to the island of Cozumel (which means the Island of the Sparrows) was a bit turbulent. People who boarded joyful were a lighter shade of pale green when we arrived to port.
We got to the hotel, installed ourselves and proceeded to search for our friends who were to compete.
First stop: Daniel.
This was to be his first triathlon ever.
He was nervous and didn't look like he wanted to go to sleep. He wanted to stall and make the day, which was already night, longer.
We left him to make his various attempts to sleep.
Next stop: Bernardino (aka Bon Bon).
A short taxi ride at a ridiculously expensive price took us to Berna's hotel. He was calm as we took over his bed to talk shop and about the event. Empty water bottles stood like meercats on top of the mini fridge, leaving very little space for the cans of tuna, which stood in a neat stack on one corner. We took photos. We posed in his well/shower/tub. We made fun of his swim jammers which had a strange combination of autumn colored swirlies on brown, referring to them as his “go go” shorts.
We left Berna in high spirits, excited that the event had finally arrived.
The next morning, I rode out to Chankanaab Reef where the swim start was to take place. Triathletes, family, friends, press and a whole slew of people milled around the entrance. I found out later that the athletes weren't allowed to wear sun block due to the damage it could cause to the reefs and the dolphins.
Other events have fireworks: Cozumel had dolphins. Chankanaab is a dolphin park and the trainers were out early that morning with their flippered friends, almost as if they were trying to teach the competitors how to really swim. They performed their acrobatics with ease and received applause from those waiting on the pier, ready to start.
The elite start was to take place at 6:45 a.m. while the rest of the pack was to have a massive swim start at 7 a.m. One by one, the competitors jumped into the water, hanging on to the posts of the pier, awaiting the moment when the first edition of the Cozumel Ironman would officially start.
The horn.
The elites were already passing the masses when the horn blew. It took those select few about 15 minutes to swim the 1.4 km from the pier to the buoy and back.
It looked like a scene from the end of the world. Hundreds of people swimming and the water was dotted with pink and blue caps.
I reunited with my friends and while they walked, I biked to the nearest aid station on the bike route. I felt such a love in the air and such sportsmanship that a smile couldn't help shine from within. I looked each athlete that zipped by in the eye and smiled.
This was a show of an amazing group of people.
At the aid stations, my friends and I took over one tent and started giving out food and water. The competitors would come shouting into the station, asking for "agua," gels, PowerBars and Gatorade.
"Sunblock!" shouted one woman. Claudia is a woman who can carry a bag that seems too small for all the things she has. Despite this, she had a number of things that the competitors asked for. Sunscreen and lip balm were two of those things. The competitor was from Dallas and as she happily smoothed sunscreen onto her arms and lip balm on to burning lips, she remarked how much it meant to her that the locals had come out to cheer them all on.
"Towel!" shouted another, whose sunglasses were complete drenched with sweat and needed wiping.
"Vaseline!" said yet another.
This was one I had.
I produced from my bike jersey pocket a bar of Body Glide, a necessity for swim burns and running blisters from shoes and wet socks. He looked at the bar rather quizzically. I explained.
"You can glide it on, like a deodorant," I said.
"I'd be a little embarrassed," he replied.
Oh...
A thick scraping of Body Glide was duly applied while my head was turned.
We got another "Vaseline!" who went straight for the small tub that Claudia had. One quick dip into the tub and the next minute, his hand was down his pants.
The five women who were their standing there (me included) looked after him in silence as he rode off. And as if she had been proposed to by Brad Pitt and then promptly rejected him, we all turned on her and scolded her, saying that she should have applied the said Vaseline herself.
“What about me?” asked a tall athlete, with a smile.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Peter.”
A cacophony of sounds, screeches and whoops that sounded vaguely like “Peter” filled the air as Peter’s smile grew broader. He glided away, perhaps with a lighter heart.
It was time to move: Berna and Daniel had been through a second time and we wanted to be at the transition from the bike to the run.
I rode ahead into town and ended up taking a wrong turn, away from the transition. I mention this because had it not been for this detour, I would never have been able to catch up with a lone competitor who just happened to be walking back his bike as I made a turn back onto the main street.
“Do you need help?”
“Another stomach, maybe?”
It turned out that Chris started wretching his guts out at Mile 20 on the bike. By Mile 70, he couldn’t take it anymore and his stomach was fully on strike.
Had he finished, this would have been his fifth Ironman.
“I think I’ll stick to short courses from now on,” he had said.
I told him of my plans to do my first Ironman. About my first half Ironman experience. About nearly falling over when I found out Michellie Jones was in Cancun. About wanting to go to Kona and be in the same Ironman with Lance Armstrong.
“Are you a Lance fan?” he asked.
From the quietness of his tone, I knew he had something negative to say.
I hid my bubbling enthusiasm for the seven-time Tour de France winner.
“Sort of.”
And then it came out, as I suppose I expected it to one day: Lance Armstrong is a competitive diva. The story of a bike race in Colorado where Lance, holding onto first place, was barreling down an incline, screaming at people to get out of his way, most of whom were first timers in a competition. Then another. Then another. Story after story painted the moral integrity of this man that I had admired in a very unaesthetic light.
I reflected on what I heard and turned it over like a ball in a juggler’s hand. The ball stopped as I came to my decision: I’m not doing an Ironman for Lance. The only one I’m doing it for is me.
My mind’s made up: I’m shooting for Kona, with or without Lance.
We finally got back to the transition and I wished Chris and that separate entity which is his stomach good luck.
I hung around, now finding more and more athletes barreling into the T2.
By this time, Bernardino had run through already and Daniel had just entered the changing tent (a lot of completely no-nonsense, strip-it-all-off affair was going on inside) and ran off on his 26-mile “sprint around the park”.
As it were.
On the run, people of all walks of life lined the streets. There was such a festive air as I have only seen on Independence Day in Mexico City, people singing, dancing, high-fiving passing athletes.
At the turn, I saw Daniel run by and was ready for him as he came back. Jogging with him, I told him how absolutely proud I was of him.“You don’t know how that makes me feel,” he had said. “I’m about ready to cry.”
Trying to hold back my own tears, I urged him on, telling him he is so close. And that we’ll be waiting for him.
I stared after him as he ran down the street, in innocent love and admiration, as I wiped my cheek dry.
I proceeded to the finish line to watch the first athlete to clock in to the sound of mariachi guitars. It is probably a bit cynical on my part but as these men and women legged it in, I watched how they were bending over at the waist, feeling the fatigue of having done over eight hours of physical activity, and later, some wobbling in what looked like a drunken stupor and that was really an uncommon mixture of dehydration and elation, and felt relieved. Relieved that those super humans were also mortals. That they did suffer pain. That muscles did hurt, even in them.
That maybe I do have a chance at finishing and with my head held real high.
So I watched human endurance in its maximum expression. One by one, they ran in: sweaty, aching and happy.
A nurse I had met at the bike aid station was there and she came up to talk for a bit. She told me of a competitor who had finished, one who was celebrating that day her six months of being cancer-free, with the Cozumel Ironman.
I wished I had asked what her name was. What the name of that brave woman was who had probably done chemotherapy, lost her hair, vomited on a daily basis the entire content of her stomach and decided that she was going to show the world how alive she really was by doing an Ironman.
I felt the light of her star shine all around us as the nurse and I bit back our tears. How I wish I could be as courageous as she is.
That evening ended with Bernardino coming in at the 13-hour mark and Daniel at the 15. Midnight, when I was biking back to the hotel, people were still running and people were still on the street, rooting those last athletes on.
My hands are black and blue from clapping.
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