Man, that was a great day.
I was living at the Crossland hotel on Sprague in Spokane Valley.
Can't recall precise details about waking up that morning but I have some vague memories of getting ready the night before. I probably ate a big dinner of pasta as that was my usual routine for extreme exercise days. Probably got out of bed around 4 AM. Used to always worry about not being able to get enough sleep the night before a long day of exercise in an event. Back then the event started at 7 AM. Vaguely recall feeling great as I showered and headed out the door to my beloved Jeep Wrangler.
My first precise memory, assuming that was the last time I was in that event and not the first time, was a woman standing at the edge of City Beach Park.
I had parked my Jeep in the free parking of the North Idaho College parking lot and walked towards the changing tents in the park.
In the twilight of the pending sunrise a woman was standing there at the edge of the park with a paper coffee cup in one hand and she asked me where I was headed.
I pointed forward and said "That way."
She scowled at me but didn't say anything else as I continued walking and I went in and suited up in my plain Orca wetsuit.
I wrote here before that my finish time for the swim course was precisely the same in number of minutes the first year and the second year.
I've noted also before that Coeur d'Alene is the site for this event only because of that storm that wrecked the inaugural Ironman Utah event back in 2001. I was probably the only person who had the sense to return to the dock. Well, maybe a lot of other people never got in the water in the first place. I remember I was one of the first to jump into that disgusting mud puddle that was the lake they had us swimming in. After the waves kicked up I went back to the shore and stood on the rocks in neck deep water. One other participant was standing there near me but he soon took off towards the other competitors as they swam off towards the first turn of that single-loop course. The storm raged for a few minutes and they called off the event as probably over a thousand people were out in the middle of that storm, although the jetty wasn't far away for much of the starting part of the course. I remember I was one of the first people to return to the changing tents and walking with my wetsuit pulled down to my waist and through the fenced astroturf corridor spectators cheered me as I sauntered my way back from the lake.
https://www.google.com/maps/@47.674084,-116.7913767,3a,75y,62.89h,85.33t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sjeEk3LwyW_rJmeEgjx3AOQ!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo3.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DjeEk3LwyW_rJmeEgjx3AOQ%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D218.86446%26pitch%3D0!7i13312!8i6656
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W Lakeshore Dr
Coeur d'Alene, Idaho
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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093058/quotes
IMDb
Memorable quotes for
Full Metal Jacket (1987)
Door Gunner: You guys oughta do a story about me sometime!
Private Joker: Why should we do a story about you?
Door Gunner: 'Cuz I'm so fuckin' good!
- posted by H.V.O.M - Kerry Wayne Burgess 4:59 PM Pacific Time Spokane Valley Washington USA Thursday 18 August 2016
