Lake Placid was out.
Two months earlier I had written that I was fucked for Placid. At that point it was training anxiety. I was new at Reonomy, moving, and not getting myself to bike or run enough. There was still time to turn that around.
The back injury changed the calculation. I had hurt it deadlifting, lost most of my mobility, and spent days trying to function through the pain. An Ironman had gone from badly prepared to unlikely.
I sent the transfer request with the least complicated version of the truth: I had injured my back seriously and would not be able to compete at Lake Placid. I hoped the entry could move to a race in Cambridge or be deferred.
It was very unfortunate. That phrase sounds flat for the amount of work and identity wrapped up in a race like this, but there was not much more to negotiate. The swim, bike, and run do not care that work got busy. The start line does not care that one bad deadlift repetition rearranged the summer.
I had completed an Ironman before. I knew what it required, which made pretending less useful. Getting through one is not the same as being ready for one. If walking was still a problem, the answer was already there.
I told a friend the same thing in plainer language: I had been ridden with injury and an Ironman seemed, well, unlikely. The smiley face went on the request to transfer. That was about as upbeat as I could make it.
I still wanted to go to Lake Placid and cheer. Withdrawing from the race did not mean I wanted to hide from everybody doing it. I asked about their plans and started thinking about the weekend as a spectator instead of an athlete.
The transfer was only a request. I did not know whether it would be accepted or whether another race would work. I only knew that this one would not.