Blog: Project Superman – A Disaster In Lanzarote…Part One (01/06)

Project Superman was supposed to start in earnest at Ironman Lanzarote. However, it ended up in a hospital bed for Peter Lissens. In the first of a two-part blog about Ironman Lanzarote, Peter Lissens reflects on the build-up to a race that ultimately pushed him far too close to the edge.

Photographer: Tony Mussche

By Peter Lissens
“Jeez, you look terrible!” In the opinion of my American table companion, the 4 AM pre-race breakfast at hotel La Geria was neither the place nor the time to be pussyfooting around. Adding insult to injury, though, it would be all but the last in a seemingly endless series of predictions that there was not a chance in hell that my first race of the season, the glorious and notorious Ironman Lanzarote would unfold anywhere near the way I had planned it.

As I got on the plane at Brussels airport at 6 AM on May 19th, I was feeling quite content with myself. I had never left home so well prepared. The house was spic and span, the cats were being taken care of, I had packed less shoes, T’s and shirts then ever and I had personally and extremely conscientiously demounted and packed my bike.

Okay, so I had a slight nervous cough, but nothing to worry about. The first signs of trouble appeared in the queue, while waiting for our hand luggage to be scanned. I was picked out of the line for a personal frisk and search and at the same time my hand luggage was taken somewhere else to check if it contained any uranium or C4, as triathlete’s bags often do. When it was determined that neither me nor my luggage contained any forbidden substances, a proceeded to the boarding gate, only to hear my name announced on the intercom.

Apparently ‘Senor passajero Lissens’ suitcase was taken off the plane and needed to be checked again for CO2 capsules. I insisted that I was 100 % sure that I had not packed any of those darned things given the public ridicule they had already caused me in the past. But scanners don’t lie: it would seem that the CO2 capsule holder that I had bought two days earlier – and was still in its original packaging – contained a pre-loaded capsule. Okay, minor embarrassment, these things happen. The first thing that did make me frown just a teeny bit was the fact that the whole airbus seemed packed with coughing, crying and sneezing toddlers. This flight was a mid-air snotfest and I knew only too well how receptive I am for high-altitude germs. Two years ago, I had to cancel my Ibiza race due to an infection caught on the plane. But that was simply NOT going to happen this year: I was well-trained, perfectly prepared and I simply had too much ring on this first-race-of-the-project.

By the time we reached the hotel, I had a fever, I was coughing continuously, and I had noticed that my laptop somehow hadn’t made it back into my hand luggage. It was 3 o’clock in the afternoon. Not bad.

I spent the whole night coughing my lungs out and keeping my girlfriend awake.

After breakfast we had a doctor come over. The good doctor diagnosed me with an ‘infection on the respiratory ways’, tucked me in and ordered me to come to the hospital two days later to see if he would let me race.

In fact the only good thing that happened to me in the three first days of my stay – besides the uplifting company of my green-eyed soul mate – was the welcome at hotel La Geria. La Geria is my safe haven whenever I come to Lanzarote. I didn’t go to the island last year and upon my arrival, I was welcomed as some kind of a lost son. “Welcome back, Mr. Lissens … good to have you back … too bad you didn’t make it last year …” It sounds corny, I know. But you could really tell that it was genuine. The looks of recognition were real enough. And the fact that Mino and Tomas managed to rustle up breakfast for the two of us even though we arrived way past breakfast time made me forget about all the bad fore signs. For a while at least.

Being a good boy, I stayed in bed for two days. My coach reassured me and insisted that rest was more important than training right now and that I needn’t worry about that. Actually, the only thing I did in those two days was pick up my race number at La Santa. So on the morning of the 22nd, the day of the bike check-in, I presented myself at the hospital to get the green light. The verdict read: “You can race if you feel up to it. And if you feel worse after the race, we’ll start with antibiotics”. Which was green enough for me. All I needed to do now was assemble my bike and check it in. Putting it together was easy enough, prepared as I was. It didn’t even take me 15 minutes to put my shiny, featherweight Plasma together. Than, about half an hour later, as I was putting on my race wear for a short test spin, I heard a loud bang: my rear tyre had exploded. This was a good sign, I thought, still smiling. A bad dress rehearsal usually makes for a good show the next day. While I was replacing that one, the front tyre exploded. Even in that mishap, I kept seeing the opportunity: a chance to train my rapid-tyre-changing skills. But when the brand new out-of-the-box second spare turned out to be already punctured, I started losing my sense of humour. And when I had a final (‘final’ as in ‘this was my very last tyre’) during the 10-minute test ride that I had left, I almost started crying. I was less than an hour away from the bike check-in and at least two inner tubes short of a bike to check in. I was ready to throw in the towel right there and then. It took my girlfriend over 20 minutes of relentless pep-talking to get me into fighting mode again. I put the bike on my shoulder, grabbed the wheel and jogged to the bike shop, which I reached, eventually, 5 minutes before closing time. We changed the inner tube and I bought the very last high-rim inner tube they carried. I would only be allowed one flat tomorrow. Nevertheless, after getting my Plasma checked in on time felt like a victory in itself.

Coming Soon: What Happened On Race Day
Follow Peter Lissens on his journey at www.projectsuperman.be

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