Triathlon day!

The day finally arrived, and it dawned very VERY early indeed. I awoke at 5a.m to be greeted by traditional bank holiday weather – wet, windy and cold. I mean really cold. I believe the temperature was hovering around 8-10 degrees this morning. I’m not sure what the weather gods have against runners, boiling sunshine for the London marathon, this today….. anyway, I put on my pirate outfit, ate my porridge and set off across the park on my bike, very grateful to David and Sharon who were bringing the rest of my equipment by car.

At registration I didn’t have to prove who I was, but then quite frankly if anyone gets up at that time on a bank holiday and pretends to be someone else, they deserve to do a triathlon really for sheer dedication! I racked my bike and laid out all my items in transition. Actually that’s a lie, I left them all in a big box as it was raining at this point.

Time seemed to zoom by in a flurry of toilet trips and bike-computer confusion (never did get it working) and before I knew it, it was the race briefing. After which the first swimmer was straight in the pool. The starts are staggered by 15 seconds, starting with race number 1. I was number 123 (I think they were trying to teach me to count) so had about half an hour to wait. I hung around in my jumper and shoes for as long as possible before giving them to one of my support team (more on them later).

I was very glad to finally get in the pool, partly because the waiting around at the start is always the worst part of a race, and partly because it was soooo warm in there! I set off at a less than blistering pace and half way up the first length realised I needed to start my watch….

A few lengths in I felt the inevitable tap on my toes and so duly stopped at the end of the length to be passed. The man who tapped passed me, but then proceeded to swim about an inch in front of my nose, and I realised I was actually slowing down to accomodate him. So I tapped back, but at the end of the length he didn’t stop for me! So I kind of swam under him, got in front again, and the extra adrenalin produced by this little escapade helped me overtake 2 or 3 others as well.

At the end of the swim I felt fine, and not too cold (very glad I decided to wear a swim hat). I ran to my bike put on socks, shoes, helmet and 2 tops and got on with the cycling.

I knew this was going to be my least favourite part of the event. Firstly, I am rubbish at cycling! I am sooooo slow no matter how hard I try. Secondly it’s long, lonely and boring compared to the rest of the event.  Nevertheless I got on with it as best I could. The real route turned out to be far more pleasant than mine and David’s alternative one, and it was nice seeing Suze and David zooming back the other way. However I found it quite demoralising to be constantly overtaken by people so much better than me, I kind of felt like I was in the wrong race for this section. Also it was very windy, that annoying kind that is always in your face. My hands and feet especially got really cold but the rest of me was fine. I didn’t regret the 2 tops though.

Eventually I got back and enjoyed the 7 minute time out. Then it was back into transition where I got momentarily confused about where to go, but soon set off running. As I started I discovered an interesting phenomena – it is possible to run despite having no feeling in your feet whatsoever! They were so cold and numb from the bike ride it took a whole km to warm them up.

Obviously the run was the ‘easy’ bit for me and I felt I kept up a reasonable pace, except for the third km where I was confronted with another strong headwind. I even manged a bit of a sprint finish, despite being beaten to the line by Peter, a bptter who started about a hundred places behind me!

There I was met by my fabulous support team, plus David and Suze who had finished ages ago, and we went back to the pool for the loveliest hot shower I have ever experienced, tea, sausage baguettes and flapjacks.

Through the power of Mctinternet, I can tell you I wasn’t last! My overall time was 1.41.28 and I was 217th out of 233 finishers. In the swim I was 212th (14.37) and in the run I was 131st (26.30). Only 3 people biked slower than me – I am very grateful to those 3 people! My bike time was 1.00.21. Those splits include transition times too, these are not timed seperately.

Did I enjoy it – yes! I feel like I achieved something and would do it again. I quite liked being an honorary pirate for the day too! However I think I could get more excited about aquathlon – like a triathlon but without all that silly cold cycling! Watch this space……

Two huge thank yous – firstly to my awesome support team, I am truly overwhelmed that so many of you lovely people were willing to get up at a ridiculous time and then hang around in the cold and wet for hours, cheering, yelling, taking photos, looking after my stuff and generally being massively supportive. Massive thank yous go to Sharon, Danny, Mike, Nicola, Stuart, Keiran, Wayne and Jo; thank you and well done to my team mates David and Suze.

My second thank you goes to the Thames Turbo Triathlon club – the event was fantastically well organised and every single marshall, who must have been absolutely freezing, not only did their bit to keep me safe and on track but was unfailingly supportive and cheerful. I hope they realise how much the competitors appreciate this.

Can I go back to bed now?

Bike Ride

Yesterday David and I arranged to meet up after work and cycle the bike route of the TTT triathlon, all part of our meticulous research for our race in 2 weeks time. Obviously normal people spend Friday evening in the pub getting wasted, but no, we know better apparantly.

We met up in good time at 7pm, there was still plenty of daylight and the rain was a mere drizzle for a nice cooling effect on the bike, it was quite warm at this point. David was wearing his trisuit (and a t shirt to protect his modesty) being a girly I put on a jacket over my bike shorts and stragglist top. David was in charge of map, haribo, phone etc, I had been instructed to bring myself (could just about manage that).

We set off across Bushy Park to the start point, although we didn’t bother to backtrack 10 metres down the road to the official  bike-mount point. While we were debating whether this was necessary or not, a passing man gave me a funny look when I used the words ‘mounting area’. Obviously not a triafferlete.

The first part of the ride went very smoothly. Along the road to Hampton Court, round the roundabout, back again and heading in the direction of Sunbury. Four or five miles in I was thinking it was actually quite a pleasant way to spend Friday evening, David hadn’t dropped me too much, the route was pleasant enough if a bit trafficky (but it was rush hour)……. then we unexpectedly arrived at Sunbury Cross and almost cycled on to the M3.

We decided this couldn’t be right due to the sudden lack of correlation between anything whatsoever on the map and in real life. This map I speak of was printed off the TTT website and stuffed down David’s top. We couldn’t make head nor tail of it, and the rain was getting heavier, so decided to venture into the giant Tescos for a minute where we would be sure to find an A to Z. We couldn’t find one.

When we came out of Tescos (where David’s trisuit had attracted some ‘looks’) we decided to walk back up the road to Sunbury Cross roundabout to see if we had taken the wrong turning. Again nothing seemed to match the map, so we took the opportunity to eat the haribo. Across the road was a handy police station – shut. Not that we were lost I hasten to add, we knew exactly where we were, we just didn’t know where we were supposed to be. The police station did have a handy dry porch (it was REALLY raining by now) which we sheltered under as David had suddenly remembered his mobile phone could do  google maps. We found out we had gone wrong within the first mile or so and missed a left turn, which was not AT ALL clear on the stoopid map.

It was now pouring with rain, a bit dark, quite cold and we had one front light between us. First good decision of the evening – we decided to go home! By the time we got back to Bushy Park (where we bumped into Stuart out running – he could have told us the route if we had seen him earlier!) it had stopped raining and was really light again, but we were cold and wet.

After a shower and meeeting the others for a pizza we decided it hadn’t been so bad after all – at least we now knew which way not to go, and we had done a 10-11 mile training ride in far worse traffic and hopefully worse weather than we will get on the day of the race!

Thames Turbo Triathlon

The Isle of Man has the TT races, well Hampton Pool has the TTT races. This morning David, Danny and I went along to observe the proceedings so we would have some idea of what to do if we wanted to have a go ourselves later in the summer.

Much as we all enjoy an early start and getting up earlier on a bank holiday than a work day; we didn’t quite make it in time for the pre-race briefing at 6.45am. We arrived shortly after 8am, which handily coincided with some of the slower swimmers doing their 12 lengths (it’s a long pool, 12 lengths is 400 metres). From our excellent view point on the balcony we tried hard to spot people who are equally  bad at swimming as ourselves. Hard to judge but there were plenty of breaststrokers out there and some people even took a very quick breather at the end of each length.

We also had a great view over the transition area and the exit point for the bike section, where we spotted all manner of bikes and lots of people not wearing clippy-cloppy bike shoes but bog-standard trainers. No one seemed to be participating on a Brompton though…

The next wave of swimmers then began their swim. Each competitor is given an allotted time to start their swim according to their time prediction, and within each wave swimmers start at 15 second intervals. If you want to overtake in the pool, the etiquette is to tap the feet of the person ahead of you, who will then let you pass at the end of the lane. However not everyone bothers with this and we saw sevaral near collisions. Oh well, at least people don’t actually swim over the top of you, apparently that happens in open water swims.

On watching these swimmers we were very glad we’d seen the previous lot. These guys were proper swimmers, all front crawling and tumble turning like anything.

We then went out on to the road to watch the start and end of the bike section. (This is 21 k and heads towards Sunbury and back). Due to the long staggered start of these races there is plenty to watch at all times. Gerry (a fellow Straggler (we saw many other Stragglers and bptters throughout the morning)) was in charge of the bike mount. You have to get on your bike (and off it again) at a specific spot or risk disqualification. It’s all very complicated this triathloning. Across the road was the bike dismount area. The roads are not closed for the event, so to avoid people getting run over there is a seven minute ‘time out’ during which you slow down and cross over when the marshalls tell you. Gives you a little breather before the run too… The whole event seemed incredibly well organised, marshalled and signposted throughout. It had a really friendly feel to it too.

We then walked through to Bushy Park to see the end of the run section (5k – none of us are worried about this bit!) and the overall finish. Strangely this seemed the most low-key part of the entire course – because of the staggered start no-one knows who is winning or how well any one is doing. It clearly requires lots of concentration and focus to keep yourself going at a good pace.

We then headed back to the pool and were forced to sit around in the sun chatting for half an hour or so – watching sport is exhausting. Some results were up but we couldn’t make head or tail of them and left before the prize giving.

David took some photos of the event which you can see here http://www.davidrowe.co.uk/photos/72157600058236477/

In order to take some of these shots he had to enter the ‘no spectators allowed’ section. However when he told them he was with swimkirsty.com they let him through no problem :o)

A very enjoyable morning that’s all done and dusted by 10.30!

Oh yes….. I’d better mention it…… David and I have both entered race 3 on 28th May……