I did an ironman distance triathlon called Challenge Wanaka in New Zealand.  It was an amazing race.  It was hard work.  I think I did pretty well.  The end.

The long report…

Before I get on with it I wrote a number of posts in the week leading up to the race which may (or may not) be of interest.

Race start was set for 6:30am and as we like to be well prepared in advance the alarm was set for 3:30am. As we woke the van was moving around with the breeze outside. Damn it. Today could just be a tough one. Just after 4am we arrived at the race site in the campervan and found a car parking space literally 3 minutes walk from the main race marquee.

Coffee, suncream, and half a bowl of porridge (I'd already eaten a bowful and was just 'tidying up')!!!

Breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee and a big bowl of porridge, although actually probably no bigger than I’d have at home on a normal day! Sharon and I headed off to the transition area where I made final preparations to the bike – this involved filling up the little ‘storage box’ on the top tube of the bike with energy gels and then filling up both drinks bottles with some Powerade drink that we bought in a supermarket a few days ago. Once the bike computer was turned on everything was ready.

The flags close to transition were blowing frantically in the wind and almost directly onshore. This meant that it would be a choppy swim when daylight arrived.

5:15am and a little apprehensive about the day that lies ahead

Shortly after 6am I put my wetsuit on, had a couple of Immodium tablets (to keep ‘things’ at bay!) and an energy gel. Then it was time to head off to the swim start.

The Swim

The race starts on the beach where we run into the water and after about 30-40 metres in it is deep enough to start swimming.

Returning to the beach after a short 'warm-up' in the lake

Before the start most of the competitors (there were 238 finishers in the full ‘iron distance’ event myself included had a little swim to try and get acclimatised to the water temperature (16 degrees). A few minutes before the start a helicopter appeared overhead and we were all called back to shore. A few handshakes and ‘good luck’ messages and suddenly the race began. I rushed into the water, took a few leaping steps (handy when you’ve got long legs) and then got straight into front crawl.

I started near the far right of the field on the outside as I’m really not a big fan of a crazy swim melee that takes place and especially so with the water being rough. Although the water was rough it actually wasn’t as bad as it had been the last few days when I did practice swims (on Wednesday and Friday). It still was choppy but not horrifically so.

The first leg of each of the two swim laps was going to be the worst as we headed directly into the waves. It was very bumpy and being able to bi-lateral breath (breathe either side) whilst swimming was a great benefit as most of the out I had to breathe to the left to minimise the chance of getting a gallon of water in my mouth each breath.

The lake was cold but with my neoprene swim hat and the adrenaline of the race I didn’t feel the cold one bit. There wasn’t a great deal of contact between myself and other swimmers – the occasional contact of arms, legs and feet but nothing excessive. Everyone just seemed well behaved.

Although the lake was choppy the visibility underwater was still a few meters, which meant on much of the course you could see the sandy bottom of the lake. I saw a couple of other competitors swim caps on the bottom during the swim. One was an elite woman’s cap so perhaps whoever it was had got involved in some feisty action with someone else out there!

Sighting was nigh on impossible on parts of the course as you were heading directly into the sun, which was coming up over a clear blue sky. You just had to try your best and keep an eye out for the marker buoys every 50m apart.

I spent a fair bit of the swim very close to a female racer – she must had been tiny as her wetsuit didn’t stop half way down her legs (like mine) and she had these little neoprene booties on. I tried my best to stay close to get some sort of a draft but towards the end we drifted apart.

Exiting the lake and reaching for the wetsuit zipper

Coming to shore was a welcome relief – as soon as I stood up when the water was quite shallow I glanced at my watch which said 1 hour 11. That’ll do nicely all things considering.

Coming out of the water there was a good crowd of supporters on the beach (including Sharon) which was great and as I ran past her I said something like ‘that wasn’t too bad at all.’

Transition is actually quite big – I got my wetsuit unzipped to my waist (swim cap and goggles still on my head as there’s no point me holding them at this point), ran to collect my swim-to-bike bag and then you have to run about 100m or so across some grass, head up over a temporary bridge that crosses the main road, go back down and then run into the changing tent. Wetsuit off, socks and bike shoes on, arm warmers on (it’s pretty cold at 7:45am), sunglasses on and then run to my bike.

The first pirate 'sighting' of the day! Arrgggghhhh!!

Total swim time was 1 hour 12 minutes and 3 seconds. This was 82nd fastest, 64th male and 26th in my age group (30-39).

Transition one time was 3 minutes 56. This was 39th fastest, 30th male and 9th in my age group.

I think the nature of the entire day was a case of JFDI (just f**king do it), or just get on with it, or HTFU (harden the f**k up). This theme continued all day…

The Bike

Getting on the bike was a welcome relief. I had a plan which was just to push to a power output hopefully in the region of 230-235 watts. On the uphills I’d not get out the saddle and push like hell or anything like that. The idea is to put a constant and steady effort in throughout and not have any extreme ‘spikes’ of effort, as these will haunt me later!

Bike training has been reasonable lately although I’d not managed to get in all the rides I wanted to for a variety of reasons. I put in some good miles before Christmas but from 30 December to 17 January I didn’t ride a single mile on my road bike. Far from ideal but those were the facts and I had to deal with it. Maybe the ‘extended’ taper would help me feel fresh on the day.

Heading out of town I immediately overtook one of the female ‘pro’ racers. Perhaps she had a bad swim or is a great biker/runner (I don’t think I saw her again all day). I find that it’s so easy to get carried away early on in the bike (and run) and I really wanted to avoid this.

Bizarrely after about 40 minutes as I approached an incline I changed down from the big ring at the front to the small one and my chain came off. I cannot remember the last time my chain came off like this and typical it happens mid-race. Well, I tried about two of three times shifting back and forth to get it back on and it was having none of it. I was just about to slow down and get off the bike after one last attempt to re-engage the chain and lo and behold it clicked in place. Lovely. 30 seconds saved works for me.

There were a few other cyclists around me and in the first 15-20 miles I overtook a handful of other riders. After about 22 miles you head back through the centre of Wanaka and got some good cheers from the crowds. For the remaining 90 miles there’s very little support – just a few people here and there – and the aid stations. It’s just you, the bumpy roads and some other cyclist a quarter of a mile up the road that you’re chasing down (or trying not to lose sight of!).

When you get to about 70 miles you reach the town of Cromwell – which is where it has been said that this is where the race begins. This is often because of the headwind you normally face all the way back to Wanaka (oh, only 40 or so miles then!!). The wind on the first part coming back was mostly side-on so not too much of a problem but then later on from about 85 miles in you make a left turn heading back towards Wanaka and that’s when the headwind hit you. The wind had been increasing throughout the morning and oh my, it was howling at times. Everyone was in the same boat and you just get on with it but I have to say it wasn’t very pleasant!

One thing I like about this size of field is that it is pretty much a 112 mile solo time trial on the bike. There are no packs of riders like you get at a big Ironman event (which you can spend time and effort trying to avoid so you don’t get penalised for drafting). You just spend time on your own pushing the pace and doing what you can to stay fast and powerful. I didn’t see any drafting at all and everyone I went past dropped back out of the ‘draft zone’ that’s specified in the race handbook and likewise I dropped back whenever anyone overtook me. It was a fair race all round from what I could see.

As for myself, I started fast and powerful and then it got tougher. Early on in the ride I was comfortably pushing above 230 watts and then watched the number slowly decrease! I just found it difficult to keep the effort up. Perhaps I over-estimated what I would be able to do after a 2.4 mile swim and not the ideal taper (about three weeks!). Anyway, as the ride went on I think most people around me were in the same sort of position as my actual position in the field didn’t change much at all. After 34km I was 38th fastest on the bike, I then moved to 32nd, 28th, 29th and then 30th and by the end of the 180km bike (112 miles) I was 31st fastest rider.

Regarding on the bike nutrition – I had about eight PowerBar gels that I’d brought from home and then took High Five gels that were given out at the aid stations. I took one gel approximately every 20 minutes during the bike. After you’ve ridden for a few hours the time flies by and you look at your cycle computer and say “Oh no, surely its not 20 minutes already.” You just have to get on with it even though they’re not the most delightful things to ‘eat.’ I will have had around 15 gels on the bike, together with the one before the start making it 16 so far! Drink wise I took regular refills of the High Five electrolyte drink that was available and also took two or three bottles of water to help wash down the gels.

I set my GPS to give me a bike split every 10 miles. Not for any real reason other than to get a feel for how the headwind/tailwinds were helping (or not!). The first 40 miles I was very close to 30 minutes for each 10 miles. Then I did a super fast 23:45, 26:39 and then 26:21. This was the lovely tailwind down towards Cromwell. The splits then ‘fell apart’ because of the headwind back to Wanaka. The splits then went 30:02, 33:08, 36:19 and 35:51. It just got tougher and tougher as we headed back to transition.

It was lovely to return to Wanaka and my bike computer had the distance down as 111.72 miles. Spot on I’d say.

Total ride time was 5 hours 37 minutes and 23 seconds. This was the 31st fastest of the day, 25th male and 9th in my age group. Clearly I’m a better cyclist than swimmer!

After finishing the bike you run into the transition area and rack your bike. Cycle helmet comes off and then you pick up your run bag and head to the changing tent. I put clean socks on (my bike socks seemed to be a little, er, wet ;), running shoes, grabbed a bit of Vaseline to put on where I thought there may be rubbing, got my GPS turned on and away I went. Much like in Transition 1 you have to run up and over the little bridge that goes across the main road. Sharon was cheering me on and no doubt pleased to see that I was off the bike and onto what I enjoy the most.

Transition two time was 2 minutes 30. This was 35th fastest, 31st male and 8th in my age group.

The Run

Heading out onto the run I got my usual cheer from Sharon who’d been patiently hanging around the main race/transition area as this was the best chance to see me during the day. The run is two laps – of 13.1 miles…

Weather wise at this point it was quite warm (low to mid 20′s I believe), the sun was blazing but the wind was truly howling. It must have been getting close to gale force in the gusts – it really was that windy.

After a slight climb away from the main ‘high street’ you head onto the gravel off-road ‘outlet track’ which goes on for around seven miles (11km). Earlier in the week both Sharon and I had separately run the first few miles of the course and we both agreed that it was ‘a bit like Richmond Park.’ Little did we know…

Before long the gravel turned into sand and you were running very close to a beach. I’ve no idea how the bikes that follow the race leaders got through that section at any speed. It was actually only sandy for about a minute or so but this pretty much marked the start of a whole new section of the run course…  In addition to the ‘terrain’ it was hot, sunny and blowing a gale in exposed parts of the course.  I had to pull my visor down slightly over my ears to try and stop it from being blown off of my head.

About 2/3rds along the outlet track the path narrowed (just wide enough for two people to pass – not run together side by side) and entered a densely wooded area. It went up, down, left, right, all of those together at the same time and was frequently covered with large tree roots (and trees) as obstacles. I wasn’t expected this at all!! It was tough. You couldn’t get any sort of steady pace going in this section. There was even a narrow wooden ‘bridge’ to run across (obviously without any sort of handrails). This was more like a cross-country running race than an iron-distance marathon!

On a couple of occasions during this segment of the course (seemingly in the middle of nowhere) you’d come round a corner and be ‘met’ by one of the official photographers! Bizarre.

Some crazy looking trees out on the run course

There were aid stations dotted around the run course offering a selection of items – water, electrolyte drink, coke (for the caffeine and sugar), high-five gels, bananas and some little chewy sweets. Additionally at the ‘start’ of each aid station was someone with a dustbin full of water and big sponges.

At every aid station I took a sponge and squeezed it over the top of my head to try and get some cool water over me. I then took an energy gel and then water and electrolyte drink. After the first couple of aid stations I got into a more efficient system – when I saw an aid station approaching have a gel (as I’d try and keep at least one or two in the back pocket of my top) and then use the aid station liquids to wash it down and get a new gel.

Coming out of the wooded section at around seven miles you then reach a road called ‘Gunn Road’ – this is a nasty incline that gets steeper and steeper are you reach the summit.

It is about half a mile long and was guaranteed to sap every bit of your energy and slow you to walking pace no matter how prepared you were for it! At the top was a (very welcome) aid station and then you were back on more gravel for the return to Wanaka. On my first ‘ascent’ it took five minutes.

After a while you head into a residential area and are running either close to the edge of the road or pavements. There were a couple more hills (most unwelcome!) and then about 2.5 miles from the end of the lap you look over Wanaka from above. You see the race marquee. You see the main road. You see the finish line. You are so close (probably about half a mile direct) and then the bloody course makes you turn right and head away!

I’m not being negative in any way about the course – much of the scenery and surroundings were beautiful. It was just hard work to run and even harder to enjoy the view!

During this section I could hear a helicopter overhead meaning that the race leader was closing in on me (him of course on his second lap). A few minutes later I was overtaken by the eventual winner (who crossed the line in 8 hours 41 minutes and 53 seconds).

Hard work heading back into town for the turnaround and another 13.1 miles!

You eventually head back towards the start/finish/turnaround area and it’s slightly downhill. I passed Sharon who was about 500m from the turnaround point and I said something like ‘it’s f**king tough’ as I ran past her.

As there was a half-iron distance race taking place at the same time there were many runners of that event on the course and as you head to the finish area on Ardmore Street you head left if you’re finishing or right if you’re one your first lap of the marathon. Unfortunately I headed right as I had another lap to go. My first lap took me approximately 1 hour 48 minutes 32 seconds. An even split second half would mean a 3:37 marathon time. Hmn, quite unlikely as I’ve never even splitted in a marathon! Not least an ironman where it really gets tougher as the day goes on. Maybe I should try and even/negative split it one day…

Heading back out of town when I ran past Sharon she said to me ‘I know it’s shit but keep strong’ or something very similar. After running the first of two laps I knew exactly what I’d be up against for the next 13.1 miles and I knew it would be tough.

Every aid station on the second lap I walked (rather than ran) through (I started this practice towards the end of the first lap) and followed the same routine – have a gel, grab a sponge and squeeze it over me, take a cup of water, electrolyte and coke and briskly keep walking (with the three cups). Drink them all (in any old order!) and then discard the cups and continue running.

Beautiful scenery on the Lake Wanaka Outlet Track

Three iron-distance races in and I firmly believe that (at least for myself) a nutrition strategy consisting of gels and no solid food seems to work and not cause me any real stomach problems. I’ve always tried to avoid coke on the course (although I do remember having I think one cup at Challenge Roth in 2010) but I had no problems with it at all this time and was happy mixing up coke/water/electrolyte drinks! Sharon does say that I have a ‘stomach of iron’ which I think is pretty handy. I’m of the opinion that if it’s good for me then I just have it and get on with it – no matter how it tastes.

About half way through the second lap I remember being overtaken by two men – I thought that it was likely that they were in my age group although the only way to tell is from their race number – which on the run is worn to the front.

From here on I tried to keep them in my sights. I had no plan to ‘race’ them as such but didn’t want to lose them. The run was very quiet (competitor wise) and it made a change to have someone close by running at a similar pace. Second time up ‘Gunn Road’ one of the guys walked it whilst I was about 20 metres behind I mentally didn’t want to walk so kept running/jogging. It wasn’t fast and was in fact pretty much the same speed as the chap walking ahead of me but I wanted to not walk the hill. I kept running. It took about 5 minutes 30 or so to get to the top.

I look like I'm having fun here. Oh how the pictures hides a whole world of hurt!

Although there was not a great deal of support on the run course it was really good to receive. I got a few pirate related comments and ‘aaarrrgghhh’ sounds from people and it really provided a welcome boost. I recall seeing outside one house a family had put a sofa and a couple of chairs out in the road and were cheering runners along from a very comfortable setting! On two or three occasions during the run course local residents had put garden water sprinklers in the road to give us a spray. This was most welcome. I also recall a couple of children with binoculars who were looking at you from a distance to see your name (which is printed on your race number) when then personally cheering you on when you passed them.

I’d been doing all sorts of calculations about finishing times during the run and I remember hoping that a sub-11 hour race was my ‘public’ goal (to be honest, it was my only goal!). Well, it looked like I was safe for sub-11 hours and then I was thinking about the possibility of going sub 10:45. I was thinking things like, ‘If I can get my last three miles under 9 minute miling it’s on.’ For someone who’s run all their long runs normally under 7:30 milling this should be a ridiculously easy but I tell you, after 10 hours of constant exercise, the heat, the hills and the wind things are very very different. However, it seemed I could just do it…

Heading into the final 4k (the bit where you see the finish but are nowhere near it!) I decided it was time to make my move and dig really deep. It’s only 4k – less than a parkrun!

At the last aid station I took my usual cocktail of drinks but didn’t walk through – I ran through trying to balance three drinks at the same time! I just didn’t want to slow down at all – I was on a mission!

I didn’t take a gel at this point as it was so close to the finish (and quite frankly I’d had enough of them during the day already!). I’d say my gel count probably totalled around 25 for the day!

I dug in hard and slowly made progress against the men who’d previously overtaken me – and before long I slowly edged past each of them. I now just had to hope that they’d got nothing left in them and that my move was decisive.

Thankfully it was, and they were both in my age group.

Heading towards the finish on Ardmore Street was fantastic. The hard work was done and all I had to do was try and savour the moment. My watch was on 10 hours 39 minutes and I knew I wouldn’t get to the finish before it hit 10:40 but that wasn’t a problem – I was well inside of 10:45.

It was 5:10pm and there were lots of people out and about. The finish line looked busy (ok, nowhere near as busy as a race like Challenge Roth or an Ironman branded event) and loud music was playing and a guy was welcoming home the runners. I headed left this time (I’d probably die if I tried a third lap!) and ran straight for the line. I saw Sharon near the finish which was great and as I ran past the MC he said something like ‘this guy’s tall – he could be a basketball player.’ The man then raised his hand to high-five me and I jumped in the air. Mid-air I thought ‘this could all go wrong!’ but somehow I landed on both feet and kept going without any sort of embarrassing tumble!

Seconds later I crossed the line. What a f***ing relief! That was tough. My GPS has recorded the run as 26.19 miles and everyone of them being tough. My run time was 3 hours 44 minutes and 22 seconds. I’m really happy with that seeing as though my time on the much flatter course at Challenge Roth two years ago was 3 hours 35 (and I didn’t measure 26.2 miles there either although you should never fully trust these GPS devices). In Switzerland in 2009 I ran 3:47:26 on a very very flat course. For info my second half split was 1:55:50 (1st half was 1:48:32).

So… overall my time was 10 hours 40 minutes and 15 seconds. I was 30th overall, 23rd male and 7th in my age group. These numbers (overall and male) include all the ‘pro’ athletes who raced as well. Had I not have got past those two other chaps in the last few km’s I would have been 32nd (and 9th in my age group). Digging in that bit extra was in my opinion well worth the effort. If I could have swim, biked or run 15 minutes faster that would have made an even bigger difference and put me 3rd in my age group!

Straight after the finish you are presented with your medal (ah, lovely) and then you head to the ‘recovery tent’ – what this means is you get weighed, get fed, get massaged and get a finishers t-shirt.

First stop… the weigh in. I’ve not had this at a race before and they promptly told me that I’d lost about 7kg during the race. I think it must have been slightly less as when I was weighed at race registration a couple of days before I’d just eaten lunch and had more clothes on. Either way, around a 5kg weight loss it not ideal! I sat down, drunk a few cups of electrolyte drink and then headed back out of the tent to see Sharon who I knew would be waiting for me. After meeting up and trying to describe the day in about 30 seconds I decided to lie on the ground to rest my legs. Sharon suggested that I was looking a little pale and should probably head back to the recovery tent for more drink and some food.

We headed back and spent about 30 minutes near the St. John Ambulance staff who kept an eye on me and told me to keep drinking. Sharon fed me with hot soup and plenty of other drinks and before long I was feeling much better. The post race food was sponsored by Subway, so it was sandwiches all round!

'Coach' John from the IM Talk podcast (he's tiny compared to me) and, er, me, wearing my awesome cycle jersey that I paid good money for to help support his excellent podcast!

A few minutes later we saw ‘Coach John Newsom’ from the wonderful New Zealand based IM Talk podcast which I’ve been listening to for a few years now. He’d run the marathon as part of a relay team and I just had to introduce myself. He sat down with us and had a chat about my race and his (which didn’t, er, quite go to plan). A lovely chap, and compared to me, a rather short chap! Meeting him was a highlight of the day and in the podcast they (he records the show with a chap called Bevan) recorded a few days later Sharon and I got a nice mention.

I then moved from the food/drink area for a massage, and really it was just an excuse to lie down for 20 minutes and have some lass rub oil on your legs and back. Lovely!

Returning to our van which was all of 400 metres from the finish line!

After leaving the recovery area Sharon and I watched a few finishers come in, had a little walk and then headed the whole two minutes stroll to the van and I had a shower. It really was great to have the van right by the finish. After cleaning myself up we had a takeaway pizza and then headed back to the finish line area to watch and cheer the rest of the finishers in. If you’re able to walk and talk after a race like this then I think it’s only fair to go back to the finish and support and celebrate those who finish after you. We had a great time at the finish area chatting to locals and other racers and also joking around with the two MC’s who were great at getting the crowd going – especially in a small race like this where there aren’t many finishers coming in later on in the day. The last ‘official’ finisher (before the 17 hour cut-off) was greeted by a great fireworks display. The end of an Ironman (or ‘iron-distance’ race) is really enjoyable and well worth staying around for and getting involved.

After leaving our campervan site at about 4am we returned back shortly after midnight. Long day! The following day we were back at the race marquee at 10:30am for the prize giving and breakfast buffet – which was superb. I ate like a horse and had two huge platefuls of breakfast. It was lovely! Easily pleased I am… especially when it comes to food.

In summary…. Challenge Wanaka – a fantastic race, a fantastic venue, well organised and far from easy. What a day.

Ironman race finish line 'party' fireworks for the final 'official' finisher. Superb.

We took the campervan straight down to the beach this morning. Sharon had her breakfast whilst I sorted out getting myself ready for a swim. Conditions were marginally better than on Thursday. It was still quite rough but the wind wasn’t blowing a gale! There were quite a few groups of swimmers on the course.

Self portrait during Sharon's long run checking out the Challenge Wanaka marathon course

Sharon headed off for a long run – taking in the first five miles or so of the Challenge Wanaka run course that I’ll be doing tomorrow whilst I jumped back into the lake. The first few minutes were once again pretty horrible – I think its mostly just getting acclimatised to the cold water and the chop. On race morning I will try and get in the water for a bit of a splash around/warm-up prior to the 6:30am start. I met up with a couple of other swimmers – from Christchurch (the one in New Zealand that is!) and we had a good chat whilst swimming gently to the first main turn buoy.

After getting back from the swim it was off to the race briefing in the main marquee. When the Run Course Director came on to talk about the course she let us know that they currently had people out on the course picking up ‘road-kill’ and that they’ve been quite busy! One thing we’ve noticed from driving around the island is that there are a large number of squashed animals on the road. It’ll be nice not to have to swerve round them tomorrow!

Sharon finished her run (pleased to have managed her planned 10 miles) and we headed back ‘home’ for me to sort out my transition bags (the bag I pick up after the swim which contains my bike gear and the one when I transition from bike to run containing my shoes and GPS) and get everything ready for tomorrow.

At around 5pm after a little snooze we headed back to the race site as I had to rack my bike and hand some bags in. One of the bags was the compulsory ‘Special Needs’ bag which will be available at about 90km into the bike course. This has to contain a long sleeve thermal top to wear on the bike if it gets cold (which can happen very quickly in an alpine environment – even with the forecast set to be in the low 20′s on race day.

It’s now gone 7pm. I’ve had a pile of pasta for dinner and am washing it down with some ‘lovely’ Gatorade sports drink! We’ll then have an early night before an even earlier start tomorrow.

If you’ve nothing better to do on a Friday evening then you should be able to follow my progress via this link. My race number is 358 and I’m doing the ‘Challenge Wanaka Individual’ event (there’s a half-ironman distance race taking place the same day). The race starts at 5:30pm UK time on Friday evening (6:30am Saturday morning in NZ). If that link doesn’t work here’s the main link to the results section of the site – http://www.challengewanaka.com/challenge-wanaka-live

The weather forecast for tomorrow is for hopefully a slightly less choppy sea, but increasing westerly winds during the day. The later they increase the better as I’d much rather them affect me on the run than during the bike leg.

I’d like to swim around 1 hour 15 minutes and anything quicker would be a bonus. In silky smooth lake Zurich 2.5 years ago I swam 1:08 and in Germany in 2010 I swum 1:04. This time if I’m close to 1:10 I’d be chuffed to bits. It all depends on the conditions in the morning.

Bike time is much more of an unknown. I’ve turned off the speedo display on my bike GPS as it makes no difference to me. I’m going to try and go purely by my power meter and try my best to not push too hard or too easy. Constant effort throughout is the plan. I hope to push about 230-235 watts during the bike leg. I’m not so sure how long it will take but lets just say something close to 6 hours is what I’m anticipating.

As for the run, a sub 4 hour marathon is what I should be capable of. A 3:45 would be nicer though.

So… ignoring transition times something around the 11 hour mark is my current estimate. In events of this length anything can happen on the day so I just have to play it by ear and hope for the best.

Stay tuned for a later update or feel free to keep an eye on Sharon’s twitter account as she hopes to post some updates during the day.

We then headed back to the beachfront so that I could register for the race. The registration tent was empty and I was done in less than five minutes after arriving. This compares slightly differently to the 45 minutes+ at the Challenge Roth in 2010.

Sharon and I then walked round the expo (which consisted of about 10 stands) and whilst chatting to a nice guy at the K-Swiss shoe stand (after buying a pair of shoes) I helped him and his colleague hold the gazebo thingy down as the wind had strengthened even more and was threatening to blow the expo stands away! It really was that windy!

Back to the van and I spent close to an hour watching a couple of people out windsurfing. Nobody was out swimming.

Lake Wanaka - Thursday

Later in the afternoon I rode a gentle ten miles on the bike and then went along to the event pasta party in the main race marquee where I ate a huge plate-load of food before heading back to the van to top up with a chicken curry that Sharon had made. I believe my carbo-loading is pretty much complete – but then again I did start ‘loading’ about six months ago!!

On Friday I plan to swim (again) and then go to the compulsory race briefing at 10am. Sharon’s planning a long run and then in the afternoon I need to take by bike and get it racked and ready in the transition area.

Finally… here’s a photo of what the lake looked like on Tuesday afternoon.  Quite different from today don’t you think?

Lake Wanaka - Tuesday

The weather has fine with some cloud but the strong winds we had last night had made the lake quite choppy. When I say ‘lake’ it really is quite a large lake – its New Zealand’s 4th largest lake (192 km2), 45.5km long and 311 metres deep. We were told that the water temperature was 16 degrees celcius so this convinced me to put my new neoprene swim cap on.

It’s a two lap course (each lap about 1.9km) and my plan was to swim a single lap. The last time I swum was a few days before Christmas so lets just say that my swim training hasn’t been that great! I won’t keep trying to think of excuses. I just need to get on with it. Once I’m out of the water on race day I’ll be happy to just get onto the bike. Then I can start to enjoy myself!

I got into my wetsuit – which I last wore at the Vitruvian Triathlon in 2010 (yes, about 16 months ago) and it still fits just fine. It’s not the perfect racing wetsuit (it’s a bottom of the range 2XU suit that cost 100 pounds new a few years ago but its good enough for now) and after registering (so they could check that the same number of swimmers getting into the lake got out later!) headed to the briefing close to the waters edge.

After the briefing we headed to the water and set off at our own pace towards the first turn buoy – about 625 metres offshore.

It was bloody horrible. There was a lot of chop in the water and it was hard to get used to the cold water. On the plus side the visibility was great and the water was lovely to drink! I really didn’t enjoy the swim to the first marker buoy.

Once we reached the buoy and swam side on to the waves it got a lot better. I was in a much happier place, it wasn’t too busy and from here I just got on with it. Round the next couple of turn buoys and then I headed back in towards the beach.

I got to the beach in a little under 35 minutes which I considering the conditions I was quite happy with. If the weather is the same on race day I’d hope to complete the swim in around 1 hour 10 and anything quicker would be a big bonus. A lovely calm lake is what I’d love to be greeted by on Saturday but sods law means a storm will come over the lake on Friday night just to make things tough!

After getting out my wetsuit I had time to relax over breakfast. Sharon then headed off to volunteer at the main race HQ area whilst I started this blog entry and will shortly head out on my bike to check out another part of the course, before stopping in to see Sharon.

After the crazy amounts of driving we’ve done over the past week it is lovely to just kick back and try and relax a little as we head towards the weekend.

Late afternoon update – I rode another 20 miles of the course and it’s all looking good – I believe I rode up one of the steeper climbs as well and it wasn’t too bad either.  I think a lot of how Saturday pans out will be due to the weather, which right now is looking like it might be fairly alright.

I rode out for 30 minutes then turned back and headed for town. I’d say none of the route I rode was at all flat but then not again too hilly. Just general undulations all the time.

It was great to get back out on the bike again and remind my legs of what they need to do for 112 miles on Saturday morning.

On the way back I took my bike to the local bike shop for the mandatory pre-race check-over which it passed and I got a sticker to say that I can rack my bike in the transition area on Friday.

Back to the campervan site for lunch and then Sharon and I took a stroll into town (which is about 1.5 miles away). We had a wander, bought a postcard and then strolled back. Later on I headed out for a one hour run along part of the run route. This could be interesting. I had an idea of what to expect but much like the bike route it’s very undulating. The surface of the run is 75% gravel paths and 25% road. My hour run was mostly on the gravel paths and for those who live in London I’d say its similar to the path around Richmond Park but much more twisty. Settling into a steady pace on the run isn’t going to be easy. On the plus side the scenery was superb.

We then headed to the volunteers briefing (as Sharon is volunteering with some of the pre-race preparation on Wednesday) and then back to the van. Wednesday has more fun in store…

Wanaka as a town is lovely. Not too big, not too small, situated right on a stunning lake with mountain ranges all around. It truly is a stunning location and I can believe it when it is referred to as “The World’s Most Scenic Iron Distance Triathlon.”

After tons of driving/sightseeing and a good dose of rain (i.e., about 48 hours worth of the stuff – non-stop!) training opportunities have been rather limited (my running mileage for last week was about ten miles in total!). My bike has only just been put back together after flying it round the world (which only cost £35 when we checked in at London – bargain!) but first things first, the Radio Wanaka 5km Fun Run on Monday evening.

It’s amazing that the whole town is fully behind Challenge Wanaka. Event flags are flying on lamp posts all down the high street – the regional newspaper had a 12 page event ‘pull-out’ in it a few days ago with details of the race and a full entry list – my race number is 358. The local radio station is always talking about the race and what’s going on in town this week. It really is something special and amazing to be a small part of it all.

Sharon and I arrived in Wanaka on Monday afternoon to be met by blazing sunshine and a very light breeze. Going out for an evening run was meant to be refreshing!

Recycling is big in NZ - So much so that they're re-using last years sign

We jogged down to the lakefront and paid our 10 dollars each (about £9.50 pounds or so) for the two of us to register. The money all goes to a local cause so that’s good. Well over 200 people signed up for the run (or 5k walk) and it was really really warm.

When I went off for a warm-up Sharon kept an eye out for any serious looking athletes and she spotted a few out there. We had a race briefing where we were told that the course had changed slightly to make it a more accurate 5k and before long we were lined up.

Right in front of me were a group of young lads (early teens I’d say) and one of them had a Triathlon New Zealand Squad vest on! Hmn, this could be interesting!

So… the hooter sounded and away we went. A group of four pushed hard from the start and I thought I should try and stick onto them. After about a quarter of a mile I noticed that I was running about 5 minute 15 second milling, which is something like low 16 minute 5k pace. Not bloody likely I’d say!

I eased off slightly and dropped back to sixth place at a pace I was more comfortable with.

About a minute or two later a shout from behind us said “You’re going the wrong way!” – oops! We all turned around, then followed this chap (who was going mighty fast) as he led us back to the ‘real’ course. Sharon had run the correct course all along and it was only a large group of us at the front of the race (I mean fun run) that didn’t turn off at the correct place (the lack of a marshal or sign didn’t help!).

Anyway, back onto the course and before long the positions had re-established themselves and I was in sixth place and the fast guys were back at the front. At this point there were plenty of marshals in place and we were led in the direction of a golf course. We literally ran up a grass bank and across the middle of the course – including one of the putting greens from a hole. I was probably 15 feet away from a golfer as he just watched us all (whilst waiting to take his shot) run across his lovely course!! From here we headed off onto a lakeside path and into the grounds of a local vineyard.

Vineyards like to be positioned on hills. Oh dear. Next thing we were directed up a dusty path and it was hard going. The weather was baking hot – the sun was out and there was nothing ‘fun’ about this run! Well, it was fun but in a painful kind of way!

Eventually we headed back onto the path close to Lake Wanaka and back in the direction of the finish. I spent much of the race running close to the chap in 5th place and in the final km I edged ahead of him and pushed on to take 5th spot. The slight course ‘directional issue’ didn’t make a difference to the overall placings so that’s good.

My GPS measured 3.39 miles and a time of 20:36. Had I had run 5k my time would have been 19:03 which I think is not bad going on the hilly course.

It was a great fun event, lots of people at the finish supporting and spot prizes for a number of the runners (sadly Sharon and I didn’t win).

Sharon finished in 29:19 and her GPS said it was 5k spot on. Lovely. Her first words after finishing when I asked how it was were “Hot, it was hot.”

We then jogged (very) gently back to the campervan site, had dinner and watched the sunset. Lovely.

So, after a slight lack of tapering (meaning a 17:33 ‘one second away from my PB’ at Bushy parkrun on Saturday) I got my bike ready for a very early start. A 5am wake up call on a Sunday is never a good thing but sometimes you just need to get on with things.

I left home just after 5:40am for the 55 mile or so ride to the start of the Bedford Harriers Half Marathon. Although it was cold on the plus-side there was a slight tailwind which I wasn’t complaining about. With sunrise not until just before 8am it was going to be a dark ride for a couple of hours.

The roads around west London were lovely and quiet – even the North Circular up to Hanger-Lane. You rarely get to say that! The route I chose avoided most big roads and I headed up through Harrow and up to Elstree. After crossing the M1 motorway there was a stretch of about 3 miles or so with no street lighting at all so it was pretty damn dark and I had to rely on my (reasonable but not great) bike lights for visibility.

I next headed up to St. Albans, Harpenden, Luton, Clophill and then across to the start in Wooton. I arrived shortly before 9am having ridden for 3 hours 1 minute of cycling at an NP of 237 (TSS 218). Sharon had the car conveniently parked nearby so I packed the bike away and got changed into my running gear. A couple of energy gels before the start and away we went at 10am.

The run was pretty uneventful. I enjoyed it and it was nice to be in such a large race.

I hoped to run close to 1 hour 30 and I think I did myself pretty proud! Going through half way in around 45:10 I crossed the finish line in 1:29:57. Close enough I’d say. I can’t say it was particularly easy. Well, the first half was pretty steady but towards the end I had to concentrate pretty hard to stay on pace and not get dropped by any groups.  I didn’t want to kill myself out on the course today so did hold back a little as this is just one piece of a much bigger picture.

My finishing position (at least in the provisional results) was 173rd out of 1,523 finishers.

Job done.

Within a week I had flights booked and I was going to stay as the third person in their apartment.  My work is much more flexible than Sharon’s so I was heading away without her.  The other trusty love of my life who enjoys a good ri…, er… What I mean to say is I also booked my road bike on the fight as well so I can train on that (although there’s well over a hundred bikes at the resort it’s always good to train on what you’ll race on).  40 quid return for the bike on the plane.  Good work Thomas Cook Airlines.  Just sort out the legroom and I’ll be happy (I ended up paying extra for decent legroom seats – although lets not mention that ‘large’ lass sat next to me on the way home who needed a seat belt extension!).

Club La Santa…. If you’re after a beach holiday with endless cocktails by the pool then I’d strongly suggest going somewhere else.  If you want to stay in an environment where you can train to your hearts content and know that there are others doing the same then you’re in the right place.

The days mostly had a general routine to them – a morning warm up (known as ‘morning gymnastics’ in the programme) with about 75 other guests and then a 3, 4 or 5km run. Followed by a bike ride and maybe a swim somewhere in there as well.

The overall aim of this week away was to get some good bike mileage in and also some more swimming.  I’m not a fan of swimming and just see it as something that needs to be done in order to get me onto the bike and run!  I’m a middle of the pack swimmer off of limited training so would just be happy to get a few regular sessions in this week.

My running is in a strange place right now as I have recently got a pain close to my right shin.  Running doesn’t seem to make it worse, or better and prior to going away I had 10 days of zero running and it wasn’t feeling any much better.  I decided to play it by ear (or feel) with regard to my running this week.

So this is what I got up to – partly to show that it wasn’t really a holiday in the lazing-by-the-pool-all-day look of things.

Friday

A 4k easy run followed by my first ride on the island.  Just getting out on my own bike felt fantastic. So much happier than using one of the club bikes here.  I know my bike, I know how to ride it and I am responsible for the brakes, gears, whatever.  It’s also got my lovely power meter on it so I can train better and get some great data out of it at the end when I load my cycle computer data onto a computer.

I had downloaded some bike routes in advance of going away as well as getting a detailed map of the island onto my GPS.  This was a great help if ever I decided to go off of a planned route.

So back to Friday – a solid ride up to the North of the island following part of the Ironman bike course.

Actually it’s pretty difficult not to come across parts of the Ironman course as there aren’t that many main roads on the island.  The climb on the way to Haria was pretty much never ending.  I’d say that it started at Famara beach and just goes on and on (there’s one very small downhill but generally its all up up up).  Looking at my GPS logs the climb took me about an hour and was over 14.5 miles long!  The view at the top is great, but even better than that is the ride down complete with multiple switch-backs on the road (which unfortunately do force you to slow down).  The nearest you get to switchbacks back home is Box Hill in Surrey and this climb eats Box Hill for breakfast!

I then continued riding up to the North of the island which had another climb – a simply stunning one all the way up to Mirador del Rio.  Once at the top (having taken a few photos) the descent to Arrieta was awesome and I clocked over 45mph on the descent. A right turn then takes you onto a long long climb through Tabayesco and then ends up just before the switchbacks outside of Haria which you then have to climb back up.  Nowhere near as much fun as coming down them but plenty of time to enjoy the scenery.  The ride back had plenty of descending which was lovely and I got back to base mid afternoon in time for a swim.  For the power geeks out there my NP for this ride was 247 watts with over 8,700 feet of climbing.  TSS was 310 (VI 1.09).

3km in the pool and I was done!  That’s probably the furthest that I have swum in a long time and although I could go further if I had to, I didn’t and was knackered.  I’ll just do little and often with the swimming this week.

• Totals: 2.5m run, 64.5m bike, 3k swim

Saturday

Saturday started with a parkrun – well, not a real parkrun but a 5km run.  I then took myself back out on the bike for 51 miles which took me down to the south of the island (lovely view and very steep downhill section from Femes), a lovely coastal road through lava fields and then and then back up through the volcanic Timanfaya National Park. Lovely scenery all round.  As soon as I got back to the apartment Ray and Ann were heading out for a little bike ride on their own so I decided to join them.

A couple of easy runs of 4 and 5km on the first two days and I felt happy to get a few more miles in.  We got back to the apartment at about 4:30pm so this gave me 45 minutes to decide whether to run in the 5 or 10k running races that were taking place at 5:15pm. What the heck.  It would make a reasonable brick session, even after a little break.

Race time… I had no plans to really race as I’m just being cautious about my leg at the moment so the plan was to run 5k and if all felt ok then run the second lap and make it 10k.  The course is set that you run a 5k lap (including going across the finish line) and if you want to run the 10k race you just keep going and run a second lap.  I set off and before long found myself comfortably in third place.  Positions don’t mean much here as the standard from week to week varies widely but either way I was running well and pretty comfortably.  It was very windy and as I came onto the running track for the end of the 5k I saw the two chaps who were ahead of me cross the line and stop.  This meant that I had a choice… I could take third place in the 5k or hopefully take first in the 10k.  I think that was an easy decision to make.   The first 5k took 19:22 and I felt very comfortable running this pace.  I then just carried on running with me now in the lead.

Another steady lap and there was no sign of anyone close behind me.  I came back into the stadium with plenty of support from other runners and spectators and crossed the line in a time of 38:50 (just looking back in my records from when I came here in 2007 – we called it a holiday and not a training camp back then – I finished in 39:28).

• Totals: 3.1m run, 66m bike, 6.2m run (10k race)

Sunday

I skipped the morning run and went straight to the pool and did 2k. My shoulders aren’t used to swimming more than once a month!!!

Sunday is market day in Lanzarote so I upped on the bike and rode to the old capital of Teguise to walk round the market and then rode back to La Santa via Famara.

Later in the day I went out for a little mountain bike ride with Ray and Ann and covered about 7 miles.

• Totals: 2k swim, 34m bike

Monday

After the morning warm-up by the pool I decided to join the organised 5k running group.  The group leader lady said to us “I shall run at 5 minutes per kilometre pace. If you all run faster then I shall run faster.”

We set off and after about 2k I had drifted off of the front together with another chap.  We pushed on and had a good little bit of back and forth between us.  An easy run turned into a bit of a speed session!  Oops.

I wanted to get a long ride in today so after breakfast (Alpen rules!) I headed out.  Once again it was very windy but that didn’t matter as I was trying to ride to a fairly constant power output whether into or being followed by the wind.  Back up to the north of the island and then down into the wine growing region of La Geria and back through the volcanic national park to La Santa.

On the way back I managed to come across Ray and Ann who were on a group bike ride so I tagged along for the last 6 or 7 miles (which was at a much gentler pace than the pace that I’d been riding all day).  As we came into the final descent from Tinajo to La Santa the headwind was fierce.  You really had to push hard to get any sort of speed (and it’s all downhill) and the group of riders with me at the front were pushing hard.

I immediately noticed that one of the riders wasn’t keeping a clear gap between himself and the rider in front – his front wheel was overlapping the ride leaders rear wheel.  This is a big no-no in group riding.  I planned to tell the ride leader about this once we’d finished the ride (it was too windy and dangerous to start making hand gestures at this point) so I just pulled right away from the other riders and kept my distance.  I found out later that the riders had been told not to overlap wheels at the pre-ride briefing.

Within less than a minute there was an almighty crash as the man who’d been causing the overlap went tumbling to the ground.  We all stopped as quickly as we could and ran up to him.  He was lying on his back and there was blood all over his head.  He didn’t look good at all.  It turned out that one of the riders in the group was a paramedic (I think) and she took control of the situation whilst calls were made to the emergency services and a few cars pulled up.  Ray and Ann appeared a few moments later and then one of the ride leaders rode back to La Santa with about half of the ride group.

This was one hell of a frightening thing to be so close to (I was probably about 10-15m away from it when it happened) and it reminded me for the most part I am much happier riding solo rather than in groups.  Two days later I heard that the man had been flown to Gran Canaria with spinal injuries and was in intensive care in an induced coma.  Poor sod. Really not good news.

• Totals: 3.1m run, 86.5m bike

For the power geeks out there my NP for the ride was 235 watts with over 8,100 feet of climbing.  TSS was 382 (VI 1.1).

Tuesday

Tuesday is half marathon race at Club La Santa do I thought I could use it as a hilly long-ish run (I’m meant to be running 19 miles in training right now but this will have to do).  I set off at a steady pace at the early start time of 7:45am and had a good solid and comfortable run.  Once again it was blowing a gale on the top of the hills but this make a good workout.  I finished in 1:37:24 (much slower than in 2007) but then I was racing hard then and hadn’t ridden nearly 90 miles the day before.  I came third.  The winner did a great time of just over 73 minutes which considering the windy conditions was pretty damn good indeed.

Another visit to the pool for a 2k swim and after a steady 27 miles on the bike the most important sport of all – a game of ‘compact golf.’

• Totals: 13.1m run (race), 27m bike, 2k swim

Wednesday

My legs were really starting to feel tired at this point and my right knee was hurting (I believe all the hill climbing on the bike) but I really wanted to get out on the bike to enjoy the weather and scenery once more. After a gentle (25 min) morning 5k I headed out and rode just over 16 miles, came back to base and then went out with Ray on the bike for a further 27.5 miles.

I nearly went for a swim later in day but didn’t quite make it.  I’ll count that as a ‘half session’ as I did have my swimming shorts on, but just didn’t make it to the pool. I almost went windsurfing in the afternoon but instead just watched and supported the windsurf race.  Much drier on land.

Early evening it was time to pack the bike for the journey home tomorrow.

• Totals: 3.1m run, 43.5m bike, intent-to-swim-but-not-quite

Thursday

I went for a bit of a hilly off road run – headed in the direction of Famara close to the coast.  I got to Caletta de Caballo and then headed inland and uphill to Soo, then back on the road home making it 5 lumpy miles.

I followed this with a breakfast and a 2k swim and then it was time to head back to the airport for the flight home.

• Totals: 5m run, 2k swim

Summary

• 321′ish miles on the bike over 6 days. That’s an average of just over 53.5 miles each day. Nice.
• 36 miles running (not bad when I would have been happy with just 3!)
• 9k swimming. No comment.

The cycling is fantastic in Lanzarote.  The roads are for the most part lovely and smooth (ignoring 100m in Famara and the part of the Ironman course after Arrecife when you turn left just before Nazaret).  I really liked having maps of Lanzarote on my bike GPS so I could see exactly where I was at any moment.  It’s windy, warm, hilly and there’s often other cyclists out there who nod hello to you.  Cars give you tons of distance and there’s actually not very many of them.  A bit of a bikers paradise.  I just wanted a few more cafes and bakeries to get supplies from but I had plenty of food and water on my rides to be completely self sufficient anyway.

Running is great with off road tracks if you want them.  Be prepared for hills though.

As for swimming, the 50m heated outdoor pool at Club La Santa is superb.  I just wished that I actually enjoyed swimming.  The first couple of lengths of each session is good but then I just want it over with.  I see swimming as a means to getting on the bike.  Maybe that’ll change one day but right now that’s how it is.

Two months out from my third Ironman distance triathlon and think the timing was ideal.  I’ve never cycled so much in my life and I really enjoyed it.  I think the weather back home will take some getting used to in late November and December but I just need to man-up for these rides.

Running is still a concern with my leg but if I can keep ticking over and get some good physio in over the coming weeks I’ll be happy.

As for swimming – lets just not go there.  I’ll go to the pool and get plenty more swims in but that’s all I have to say on the matter.

At the outset I said this would be a training camp and not a holiday.  Over the week I have probably read about 10 pages of a book and came home with more magazines (there was a copy of Triathlon Plus in the room on arrival) that I came out with – all of them unread!

Finally I must mention the evenings as it wasn’t all training.  The entertainment laid on by Club La Santa was very good, although we never made it up past 10pm.  Food wise we ate on site every night and I was happy with what was available.  A couple of beers with dinner together with the lovely company of Ray and Ann made it a lovely little break.

I just need to recover now!

The past weekend Sharon and I went along to watch, support, shout and take a few photos at the Catford and Bec hill climb events in Kent.  I’ve posted a blog about the events over at our photography website so take a look and then see the gallery of photos that’s linked to near the end of the blog.

Anyway, following this blog post my good friend Richard suggested on facebook that I should give one of the hill climbs a go.  Having watched these events I’ve wondered what it would be like to be the one fighting their way up a steep hill with crowds all around.  The nearest I’ve got to this has been climbing the (much less steep) Solera Berg during the Challenge Roth iron-distance event a couple of years ago.

Following Richards suggestion to me I decided that todays long bike ride should head south-east towards Yorks Hill, the home of the Catford Hill Climb.  I planned a route using the excellent Running Free Online website, loaded it into my bike GPS and off I set.  About 40 miles later (and lots of short – and long – climbs and descents) I found myself at the bottom of Yorks Hill.

I didn’t know where the start of the climb was (as it was almost too steep to walk down on Sunday!) so as I was cycling along the lane the road levelled out and with an incline just ahead I hit the lap button on the GPS and dug deep.

Two minutes later the road levelled out (again) and I saw a painted white line on the road!  Bugger.  That’s the start of the climb and I’d just expended two minutes hard effort (and two and a half hours cycling) to just get there.

I pulled over, got myself down to race weight (meaning, I had a pee in the bushes) and prepared myself.  My bike clearly wasn’t ready for a steep climb as it was laden with tool kits, bike pump, spare inner tubes, water bottles, energy bars, etc. etc.

I stood on the line, clipped into the pedals and hit the start button.  My heart rate was at 121 (much much higher than resting) and away I went.  Within a few seconds the incline ramped up and I had those thoughts of ‘you’ve gone off too hard.’  Too late to worry about these things now.  I was in my easiest gear (and remained in it the whole way up).

This incline then flattens out a little before the real fun begins.  A lung bursting 20+ percent-er which was painful to say the least.  Out of the saddle, gasping for air, convincing myself that this is good for me and pushing up the hill as quickly as possible.

I’m sure my style wasn’t great but when I saw an opening in the trees up ahead I knew the end was near.  At the top of the climb just before the entrance to a small car park there was another white line painted on the road.  I pushed to the line, hit the stop button again and then unclipped and came to a standstill as quick as I would be if I were about to ride off of a cliff edge!  Bugger me that was tough.  My heart rate peaked at 174.

Shortly after the finish. Looking a little worn out!

Looking at the clock my time was 3 minutes 11 seconds.  This would have put me in 88th position (out of *cough* 102 finishers) in the 2011 Catford Hill Climb.  Surely with an easier warm-up, less ‘crap’ on the bike and screaming crowds I could go under 3 minutes…?

Looking through my cycling logs I’ve got my heart rate higher than 174 before so clearly I wasn’t trying hard enough.  Finally, here’s a little summary graph of the effort from my GPS/power meter for those who like this kind of thing.  Click for a larger version.

This means I need to go back sometime and ride it again!  Watch this space….

As for the overall bike ride, I rode just over 77 miles, around 5,300 feet of climbing, 4 hours 51 minutes of riding (5:09 total ride time – which includes stops for traffic lights/junctions/getting lost).  Normalised power was 235 watts.

I’d planned to kick start my swimming a few weeks ago but whilst doing some maintenance work on my brothers mountain bike I somehow smacked my ribcage against his bike, which caused a great deal of pain for a good 2+ weeks.  Coughing, turning in bed, sneezing – all really painful.  The pain started to get less and less and this meant I had to go swimming again.  I managed three swim sessions (in just over a week) prior to this race which is pretty good for me!

From a self-timed 400m time trial swim at the pool at the start of the week I swam a steady 6:50 which was the same as I’d estimated for the previous race – so it looks like my 400m time hasn’t changed in the past few months.  That helped no end with my swim confidence going into this one.

Once again I was in the second swim wave but I’ve decided that apart from the long wait from signing in to the actual start I’m happy to go in the busier second wave. It’s not busy as such in the pool, but there are lots more cyclists around my speed to work with (or against).

Happily I had a good uneventful swim. I felt comfortable throughout and didn’t get overtaken. I did catch up with one swimmer ahead of me and rather than overtake him (he was very similar speed to me so it would have taken quite some effort) I conserved some energy and just swam right behind him for the final two lengths.

Transition 1 was fast and efficient, with the only pause being when I turned on my ‘on-board’ video camera! More on that later.. I also didn’t wear socks this time round as I have some triathlon specific cycling shoes (and running shoes) that don’t seem to rub when not wearing socks.  My swim time (including transition to the bike) was 8:40 (53rd fastest).  Looking back… May 2011 (9:06), August 2010 (8:50), May 2010 (9:17).  These previous times did involve me sitting down and putting on a pair of socks – which because of the times there show that my August 2010 swim was very good indeed (I’d estimated 6:40 for 400m for that race).  Note to self… must swim faster – or give myself a faster swim estimate so that I can really push hard to keep up with the people around me.

Putting my cycling shoes on in Transition 1

As I got onto the bike I found myself in lot of traffic heading down the main road from the pool. It was not safe to try and overtake the cars so I just pedalled steadily alongside them until I got onto Hampton Court Road. At the roundabout by Hampton Court I then had to slow down as there were people at the pedestrian crossing! Very frustrating.

Before long it was back to full speed and racing towards the dreaded traffic lights at the turning to Lower Sunbury. As I neared the lights there was a large van ahead that slowed down as the lights were red.  I eased off the speed knowing that the lights would be green before long but I then was shocked that the flippin’ van was also turning left. I and two other riders were then stuck behind the van for what seemed like ages.  I think I only lost about 20 seconds during that segment but it was long enough!

Once the van had turned off into another road it was back to full steam ahead. There was a bit of back-and-forth between myself and another rider but when I saw him slow to have some drink I pushed hard past him and gained some valuable time. I didn’t see him again.

It was just a case of head down and push hard all the way to the turnaround point. This first half of the bike route was into a slight headwind and I knew that it would feel easier on the way back – well, I’d be pushing just as hard but hopefully going a little quicker with the wind behind me. It wouldn’t ‘really’ be easier. As I did the 180 turn at the roundabout I saw Dean, a fellow competitor who I seem to race close-by at these races quite often. He took a tight inside line and got ahead of me.

I chased hard behind for a couple of miles or so. As he overtook one chap ahead of him the guy being overtaken changed gear quickly, pushed hard and sat right on Deans back wheel – big time drafting. I didn’t want to be anywhere near such activity (!!) so dug in and got past them both. I then kept pushing all the way to the finish.

At the end of the bike leg you get 7 minutes to return to transition 2, where the run begins. I rode gently back to transition ready to give it some in the 5k.  The best sight of all was when I ran in with my bike to put it on the rack and there were no other bikes around!  This ‘never’ happens with me – so clearly I had a pretty good bike leg!  Transition was nice and quick and it was off on the run I went.  My bike split was 34:48 and 15th fastest.

The view coming into T2

Here’s a bike split table showing my bike form in this race together with some power data (a link to the full power data is towards the end of this report)…

My increase in speed certainly is related to the increase in cycling that I’ve been doing the past few months and also (at least I hope) related to the new ‘go-faster’ wheels that I recently bought.  One thing I do know is that because of the traffic on the course I did lose probably in the region of 30-60 seconds on the bike.  Give me a traffic-free route and I’ll smash my time (hopefully!).

Onto the run… Normally there’s quite a few runners around during the run (one of the things I like about being in the ‘second wave’ of starters) but today it seemed really quiet.  I overtook a few (much slower people from the back of the first wave) but there was nobody close to me that was anywhere near my pace.  I just had to get on with it and run as best I could, overtaking (and giving support if I had a spare breath) to other runners.

On each lap I had some fantastic screams and shouts of support from family and friends that were really appreciated.  The final push came to the finish and I crossed the line with a run time (including transition) of 18:57 – 12th fastest of the day.

I felt that conditions on the day were ideal and on top of a great bike split I also put in an awesome run…

• May 2007 – 21:06
• August 2007 – 20:08
• August 2008 – 20:00
• May 2010 – 19:18 (slightly shorter course)
• August 2010 – 19:56
• May 2011 – 19:33
• August 2011 – 18:57

The results came out later in the day (all times are from the provisional results) and my overall time was 1:02:25, 15th overall and 9th in my age group.

Here’s how my times have improved over the four years that I’ve taken part in these races…

• 08/05/07 – 1:20:27 (using my mountain bike)
• 27/08/07 – 1:07:51 (on a borrowed road bike)
• 25/08/08 – 1:06:33 (using my recently purchased road bike)
• 31/05/10 – 1:04:55
• 30/08/10 – 1:04:37
• 02/05/11 – 1:03:59
• 29/08/11 – 1:02:25 (same bike, new wheels)

I’m really happy with how the race went and as this is really the start of my triathlon season (I’ll be training during the winter for a big race in January) this is a great boost for me.

Finally, for anyone who’s interested – here’s my full power data from the bike – viewable at the TrainingPeaks.com website.

Finally I mentioned something earlier about a video – well, here’s the video I took during the bike using a camera fixed to the aero-bars at the front of the bike (or click here to view it at YouTube.com).

I got a last minute entry and shortly before registration was dragged into a bit of a ‘smackdown’ with some friends (James, Danny and Stefan). Excuses were flowing strongly amongst us (Danny: “I can’t swim” — David: “I’ve not swum for weeks” — James: “My knee hurts”) but (multiple Ironman Lanzarote finisher) Stefan was keeping quiet.

The four of us registered in a pre-arranged order as this dictated your starting time (everyone was set of at 15 second intervals). Stefan, James, myself and then Danny, the fastest runner.  This would hopefully ensure that there’s a bit of overtaking of one another during the run – and as for the swim… this is anyone’s guess!

After the race briefing we headed to Bushy Park for the run start. The race was set to start at 7:30pm and based on our running numbers we’d be starting just before 7:40pm. Danny requested a final toilet stop so I followed went with him for a bit of a warm up and thought I may as well go to the toilet as well. We jogged across to the toilets at the cafe in Bushy Park hoping they’d be open – thankfully they were. We both scrambled in, struggled out of our one-piece triathlon suits and did what grown men do in public toilets!

As we left Danny said we had 10 minutes to get to the start line. Plenty of time. We started jogging through the park and then I saw some of the runners who had started. Perhaps the race had started a few minutes early. Either way we needed to get to the start quickly as we were starting in positions 38 and 39 (with Stefan and James 36 and 37). We certainly pushed a bit to get to the start to find that we were almost late! Danny said we had plenty of time and showed me his watch that said 7:33pm. I then checked mine that said 7:38. We were off within a minute of arriving at the start, much to the amusement of some of the competitors behind us.

So… after a quick team (smackdown) photo we were off, in the planned order.

After about 1km I had caught up with James (who started 15 seconds ahead of me) and at the same time Danny (who started 15 seconds behind me) came past – in what is known officially (at least if you listen to Marathon Talk) as a ‘three way pass’ – albeit we were all going in the same direction.

A little hurling of encouragement abuse at one another we pushed on… and were running a little too quickly for comfort!  About 1.25 miles in I caught up with Stefan and slowly edged ahead.  I needed to gain as much as possible on Stefan and James as they’re better swimmers than I am.

I pushed pretty much as hard as I could all the way to the end of the run leg.  I had my goggles stuffed down the top of my tri-suit about 30 seconds before the end of the run I got them out and put them on ready for the swim.  At the end of the run it was just a case of quickly getting my shoes and socks off and getting in the water for the 12 lengths of Hampton Open Air swimming pool.  My 5k time (including ‘transition’) was 18:45 and was 6th fastest.  The fastest run was 18:03 (by Danny).

I had a very uneventful swim.  I passed Danny before not too long and only caught up with one other swimmer.  During the second half the swim it got tough.  I also had the added distraction of knowing that I was being chased down by James and Stefan.  In fact I could see the blue of James’ triathlon suit in the lane beside me.  This spurred me on to push even harder and I happily got to the end of the 12 lengths (and thus the race) before them (actually I could have lost 15 seconds to Stefan or 30 to James because of our staggered starting times).

Within about two minutes of me finishing we were all out of the pool absolutely shattered from a great little race.  With the final results in my overall times were 18:45 for the run (6th fastest) and 7:51 for the swim (17th fastest).  My overall finishing time was 26:36 which was 6th overall out of 70 finishers.

I’m happy with this performance and may well have another go next year.  The added challenge of the ‘smackdown’ with friends made it even more enjoyable.

As I’m not racing an Ironman distance race this year I chose not to do the full 100+ miles (which is now 111 miles due to a change of race HQ) but instead opted for the ‘medio’ route – a mere 75 hilly miles! This would be my longest ride since Challenge Roth (112 miles) from July last year (I’ve ridden no more than 60 miles in one ride since then) so was sure to be a good little endurance test.  Although I’d been cycling a lot on my mountain/commuting bike into London for about 6 months or so – endurance was the main thing I don’t think I have – so this would be a good test.

Sharon and I arrived at the event HQ with plenty of time to spare before the start of the ‘medio’ ride which gave me time to realise that my clothing choice was very wrong for the conditions! I had opted for shorts and my triathlon racing top (no sleeves) and with the moderate winds and cool air, this certainly didn’t seem ideal.  My only choice was to go back to the car and grab a cotton t-shirt out of the back and wear this on top.

I believe I was the only person wearing a cotton tee during the event and I bet many people thought I just didn’t have a clue about proper cycling gear! At least I wasn’t head-to-toe in ‘pro team’ kit (Sky, Liquigas, etc.)!

OK, from here on in I’m going to be spouting out a few numbers. Not the usual heart rate stuff (especially not in this post as I left the heart rate monitor at home!) but more related to cycling power output. There’s going to be plenty more of this over the coming months so if you’ve no interest in this kind of data then feel free to skip the cycling posts in future.

After a 55 mile ride to my parents a couple of weeks before which I found really tough for the last few miles I decided to try and ride as much as I could to a steady power (215 watts – around 70% of my FTP) as this was similar to my 55 miler. I was prepared to slow right down on the uphills in order to keep the power as low as possible. The plan was that people could happily ride past me at these points and in the latter stages I’d still be able to maintain power and pass them all again :)

So… I set off and the job was just to concentrate on power. Out on the road it’s tough to stay steady because of all the different variables at play (wind, traffic, junctions, hills, etc.) but I tried my best. When it came to the climbs it was pretty much impossible to stick to 215 watts without slowing to about 2 mph and falling off (which I didn’t) – I just rode as slowly as I could to stay upright! Because of the number of hills (the race pack says 1760m of climbing) this pushed my average wattage up and looking at my data for the first four hours of riding (I’ll tell you why in a minute!) I had an NP of 224 watts.

I chatted to a couple of other riders on some of the tougher climbs (as I was riding ‘easy’) – one nice chap who chatted about Ironman racing and another guy who shouted to all around him at one point that ‘this is just like climbing the Zoncolan‘ – which almost made me fall off my bike with laughter!

On another hill I saw Sharon supporting by the side of the road so gave a quick flash of my ‘pirate’ top from underneath my ‘I don’t know how to ride a bike’ disguise t-shirt!

At the four hour point (after stopping very briefly for a quick toilet break and drink refill which will have cost a few minutes) I was just over 64 miles in (so 10 miles to go) and in the back of my mind I had my first thoughts about my overall time. Sportive events normally provide some timing ‘standards’….

“Although Sportives are non-competitive, riders often like to set themselves targets to aim for. The table below shows the time and average speed required to achieve either the Gold, Silver or Bronze standard at this event.”

The gold standard for the medio route was 4 hours 40 minutes. With 10 miles to go I thought I could have a good chance of getting this – however, with the refuelling stop I wasn’t sure exactly how much time I had and I also wasn’t sure about the hills in the final 10 miles.

I had a quick think and thought – ‘sod it, lets give it a go – I’m only 10 miles from the finish.’ So at this point I put the hammer down and started pushing hard. I was constantly overtaking people in the last 10 miles although it did seem that quite a few people were starting to put some extra effort in.

In the last 2 or 3 miles there were a couple of guys ahead of me who were pushing real hard and trying to work together. I’d ridden the entire ride on my own without any drafting whatsoever and had to push really hard to get near to them.

With under a mile to go I caught up with the two guys just as the one on the back shouted to himself something along the lines of ‘keep going’ – or something just as motivational! A few seconds later he stepped off the gas and I was beside him. I said ‘come on, less than a mile to go’ and his response was ‘I just cannot do it!’ so I pushed on and tried to get close to the guy ahead.

We ‘hammered on’ till the finish and as we crossed the line we stopped, shook hands and congratulated ourselves for a job well done – and a ‘gold standard’ time.

My finish time was 4:34:55 which was safely inside of the gold standard time of ’4:40:00′. Looking at the results (after getting them into Excel) I was the 13th fastest out of 241. Very happy with that.

Looking at the data from the final 10 miles my NP was 276 watts (up from 224 in the first four hours). Overall my NP was 232 watts – understandably more than my original plan to go for 215. Once I understand more about the figures and the graphs that I can get out of these sessions I’ll be able to pinpoint things I’m not doing right in order to get better.

So in summary, I rode much better than expected. If I can keep this fitness up (and build upon it) over the next few months then I hope to put in a good Ironman bike split next year. Only time will tell…

I’d not planned to be racing today but earlier in the week I managed to ‘win’ a place through the good people at For Goodness Shakes.  The trouble was that I’d run a 5k on Friday, one on Saturday, ran a 10k PB (personal best) on Sunday and here I was today, er, slightly non-rested for a triathlon!

It was windy – very windy today (the Met Office observations had the wind speed at 17mph but gusting to 31mph) so the bike was going to be fun, with the entire second half of the ride (as its an out-and-back course) being directly into the wind!  What joy.

I was up at 5:20 having my coffee and porridge and shortly after 6 cycled the 4.5 miles down to the pool.  I got everything set up in transition and awaited my start (which was at about 8:25am).  This gave me a chance to catch up with friends and watch the first ‘wave’ of swimmers start the race.

Photo by Grant Russell

I must say I wasn’t particularly prepared for the swim – the last time I went swimming was on 25 February and all I did was float around and chat with Danny for an hour.  Well, I did manage about 10 or 12 lengths but that was it!

So… my plan for the race was to just get through the swim, ride my little heart out (even though my legs had taken a right punishment over the past few days of running) and as for the 5k run – just treat it like a parkrun – I can do those with my eyes closed!

The swim was uneventful – which I was happy about.  No carnage whatsoever.  The only trouble I had was getting water in my right goggle about four times.  Once out of the water it was a quick transition and then onto the bike.  My swim time including transition to bike was 9:06 (8:50 in August 2010 and 9:17 in May 2010).

Photo by Grant Russell

I knew the bike was going to be tough but it made no difference to my strategy – push hard – and when it gets tough push harder (incidentally this is probably what Sharon says to her pregnant women at work when they’re giving birth!).  Heading to Hampton Court roundabout I got a feel for the headwind.  Bloody horrible.  After turning 180 it was the long (fast) run to the far end of the course (about 8.2 miles into the 13.4 mile(ish) route.  At the traffic lights into Lower Sunbury I saw the lights in the distance had just turned red.  I eased off ever so slightly and by the time I got to the lights they’d gone green again.  The marshal on the corner shouted out ‘good timing’ to me :)

As I turned at the lights I went past a man who’d previously sped past me (and had been caught at the lights).  Once he got back up to speed he came past me again.  He slowly raced off ahead of me and I couldn’t keep up with his pace.  Nobody else caught me up on the bike and I overtook a good 5-10 or so other cyclists who were ahead of me.

The last few miles of the bike were into the strong headwind which at times really pushed you all over the road.  It was hard hard going but I knew there would be the ’7 minute non-compete zone’ at the end of the bike which would give me a chance to relax and prepare for the 5k run.

My final bike split was 35:20, which I was really impressed with considering the windy conditions.  This was the 22nd fastest bike split of the day (or 21st if you discount the one relay team that was faster).

Comparing some stats for the bike leg…

For the geeks out there… finally, I have some actual power data from todays ride.  I need to continue reading this power training book to make full sense of all of the data but the overall stats are that my normalized power (NP) for the bike leg was 310 watts.  My peak 20 minutes gives an NP of 313 and peak 30 minutes is NP 311.  My average speed was 23 miles per hour.  Getting there…

After getting to the end of the bike you have seven minutes to fight the traffic and traffic lights to get back to the transition area.  It was an easy ride back where I took on some sports drink and got ready for the run.  As you head back into transition the clock starts ticking again and its back to full effort.  A quick change into my running shoes and I was off!

About 750m into the run I could hear footsteps closing in behind me.  I had to dig deep to keep the chap at bay and was happy to be able to maintain my pace throughout (and not get overtaken).  I now think that being in the second wave of starters at the Thames Turbo races appeals to me as I get to see (and overtake) many people on the run – which is great for motivation.

Photo by Grant Russell

The run was hard work and I clocked a time of 19:33 for the 5k run including transition.  This was the 15th fastest run split of the day.  In August last year my time was 19:56.  Heart rate wise my average was 170 and the max was 179.  In August last year the numbers were 167 and 177.

As I crossed the line the clock stopped and my time was 1:03:59.  Somehow in these challenging conditions I pulled out a 38 second personal best!  Result.  I was 20th overall (19th if you discard relay teams) and 9th in my age group (Male 30-39).

Here’s how my times have improved over the four years that I’ve taken part in these races…

• 8/05/07 – 1:20:27 (using my mountain bike)
• 27/08/07 – 1:07:51 (on a borrowed road bike)
• 25/08/08 – 1:06:33 (using my recently purchased road bike)
• 31/05/10 – 1:04:55
• 30/08/10 – 1:04:37
• 02/05/11 – 1:03:59

I firmly believe that my recent regular bike commute into central London has really helped me with my cycling and my recent marathon training helped with my running.  My lack of swimming hasn’t held me back too much, but with the news that my local pool has just re-opened after being closed for over a year this means I can get a few more swim sessions in for the triathlon season ahead.

Finally I will quickly thank all the marshals and supporters who were out on the course today, especially Danny, Kirsty, Roger, Gill, Nicola, Stuart, Grant and Guy.

After finding myself on the injured bench at the end of 2009 I desperately wanted to start 2010 with a parkrun. So, the start of the year began on the 1st January with Bushy parkrun. I finished in 24:24 and logged the following…

“First run since 28 November. Almost stopped after 1k but wasn’t sure if foot pain or just bloody freezing!”

My next run was at Black Park parkrun on the 23rd and then again in mid-February. My left foot was starting to get better but I decided to get back into things but not rush it.

As part of my Ironman training I was getting time in on my bike (and did the brilliant ‘Hell of the Ashdown’ cycle sportive at the end of January in the ice!).

• January mileage – 6.22.
• February mileage – 29.
• March mileage – 86.

So, things were picking up again but I needed to not rush things.

• April mileage – 93.5

In May I was back at the Bognor Regis 10k for my seventh year in succession. All I wanted to do was get under 40 minutes. I’d run a 40 minute 10k on a treadmill a few days before so felt good and with a steady run (although in a strong wind) I finished in 39:53. That’ll do nicely.

At the end of May I was in the pool for my first triathlon of the season (Thames Turbo Race 3) and finished 17th out of 330 finishers.

• May mileage – 147

In May I also started cycle-commuting into London a couple of days a week on my mountain bike. This was a great opportunity to get some extra easy miles in on the bike – especially on ‘recovery’ days when I wanted just an easy session.

I was going to write about the ‘National Family Week 5k’ that was held at Twickenham Stadium at the start of June but the event was such an (expected) shambles that I won’t. You can read about it if you want to…

Mid-June we were in Wales for the Bala Middle Distance triathlon. This is a great event on a tough course and I had a great race. Finishing in 4 hours 48 (nearly 4 minutes faster than in 2009) and 120th out of 629 finishers.

• June mileage – 143

A month later we popped over to Richmond Park to run the Ranelagh Harriers Coad Cup Handicap Race and then jumped straight in the car and headed to Dover to catch an overnight ferry. Five days later I was on the start line at the Challenge Roth Ironman Distance race. What a day! You can read all about it in my race report but my highlights were a 64 minute swim (for 2.4 miles) and a 3 hour 35 marathon!

• July mileage – 110

Post Ironman I seem to have plenty of 5k speed in my legs (no idea how!) so decided to run one of my favourite 5k’s – the annual ‘Wedding Day 7k’. What I hear you ask? Well…. you run it like a 5k race, then hang on for the final 2k. It’s torture, but enjoyable at the same time.  So, 12 days after my Ironman and I got a 19 second PB on the course. Nice.

At the end of August I raced hard at the Thames Turbo triathlon and finished 20th out of 357 finishers with a time of 1 hour, 4 minutes 37 seconds – a few seconds faster than earlier in the year. This was the warm-up for the Vitruvian…

• August mileage – 77

The beginning of September saw us at The Vitruvian half-Ironman distance triathlon – and what a race. I had a blinder of a race and finished in 4 hours 28 – just under 33 minutes faster than I was in 2008!

“What I like about this the most is that I have the same wetsuit and same bike… I am just stronger overall – especially on the bike and run. This is great to know, especially when I know that I can do better with more (and more structured) training.”

This marked the end of the ‘triathlon season’ and I’ve not seen my wetsuit since. Now it was time to concentrate on other things…

• September mileage – 122

I’d been asked if I ‘fancied running a marathon before the end of the year’ some time ago and decided it would be a good idea. The next couple of months were concentrating on marathon training and getting those long runs in. I took part in a few races but didn’t run them hard – I ran these more as controlled training runs.

• October mileage – 180
• November mileage – 184

At the start of December when all my training was banked and ready to deposit on the streets of Luton for their marathon the race was cancelled due to snow.  Very frustrating but something that can happen with a race held in December.  I got my first ever ‘podium’ placing at Bushy parkrun instead!

After missing out on the snow running earlier in the year through injury I got to enjoy what everyone had been raving about many months ago.  I also learnt that cross country spikes are awesome for running on ice covered paths.

In between some of the snow I found myself getting a 5k personal best of 17:51 at Bushy parkrun. It was hard work (as 5k always is) but very satisfying considering the cancellation of the marathon.

A few more parkruns (they’ve been going on all year, I’ve just not mentioned them above) and a couple of small mob-match/races completed the year.

• December mileage – 101 (before I go out for a few miles later today!)

My total run mileage for 2010 was around 1285 (1311 in 2009, 1028 in 2008, 1320 in 2007) so I’m ticking over again and have no complaints after a slow start to the year.  Here’s my monthly run mileage for the past four years where you can see trends for 2010 such as my mileage increasing for my summer Ironman and then again in my October/November marathon run focus.

Here’s a summary of the running races I took part in (ignoring parkruns) during 2010:

• 20 Feb: Ranelagh Harriers ‘mob match’ against Blackheath & Bromley
• 27 Mar: Ranelagh Harriers Baker Cup
• 16 May: Bognor Prom 10k – 39:53
• 31 May: Thames Turbo Triathlon – 17th overall
• 13 Jun: Bala Middle Distance Triathlon – 4:48:15
• 13 Jul: Ranelagh Harriers Coad Cup
• 18 Jul: Challenge Roth – 10:10:58
• 30 Jul: Wedding Day 7k – 26:25
• 30 Aug: Thames Turbo Triathlon
• 04 Sep: Vitruvian Triathlon – 4:28:01
• 09 Oct: Surrey League Cross Country
• 17 Oct: Cabbage Patch 10
• 23 Oct: Ranelagh Harriers ‘mob match’ against SLH
• 20 Nov: Ranelagh Harriers ‘mob match’ against TH&H
• 12 Dec: Stragglers/26.2 ‘mob match’
• 26 Dec: Stragglers Cabbage Patch 4

So, what’s in store for 2011. The cancellation of the Luton Marathon means that I will be going for my London Marathon ‘Good For Age’ time at Brighton in April and we’ll see what happens then. I’m going to be busy at work for at least the first few months of 2010 so I’m currently not planning another Ironman. I will however continue to swim/bike/run train and will do a couple of Half Ironman races in 2010.

Oh, I also seem to have got myself one of my running club ‘ballot’ places in the London Marathon so right now I plan to run the Brighton Marathon and then seven days later the London Marathon. Could be interesting!

Looking back at what I wrote in my Challenge Roth race report at the end of July – six months later and everything remains the same…

“So, what next…. the trouble with most of these Ironman distance races is that you have to enter them a year in advance and I’m not sure I want to commit to one next summer. What I’m currently thinking is concentrating on getting a better standalone marathon time under my belt and also getting some good cycle training in next year. If I don’t do something like the Outlaw Iron distance race in the UK in August 2011 then my next big race will be in 2012, and it could be any of them…possibly even Challenge Wanaka in New Zealand.”

Breakfast time

Sharon and I camped on site this year – it was lovely being so close to the race area.  At 4:15am on race morning I was up in the dark and boiling the kettle for my coffee and porridge.

It had been a clear night and was fairly cool and when we arrived at transition to rack my bike there was a mist over the reservoir (Rutland Water).

Down on the beach at around 6:30am I was able to watch the first couple of swim waves start.  Because of the mist/fog it looked fantastic – even if you couldn’t see more than about 50 feet in front of you!

I was in the adult male 35-39 age group and around 150 of us set off into the mist shortly after 6:50am.  I started close to one end of the line and did very well to stay out of trouble during the swim.  Sighting the buoys was impossible so you just had to follow the mass of people ahead of you.

At the start of the second lap of the swim (after coming out the water, running along a short section of beach) I dived back into the water and managed to scrape my does on my right foot against the ground.  Ouch, it really hurt.  A few seconds later I did stop, turn round and look at my foot to see if it was bleeding – as from the pain I really thought it should be!  It wasn’t.  I turned back round and continued the swim.

After about 32 minutes I finished the swim and ran up to T1.  I didn’t have a towel with me in transition to dry my feet (I’d not used one in the last couple of triathlons I’d done) but this was a big mistake today – not because my feet were wet, but because of all the gravel I managed to pick up all over my feet on the run up from the water.  I brushed as much as possible off before putting on my socks and running out with my bike.

Swim time: 32:28 (32nd in age group, 116th overall).

Transition 1: 1:55 (38th in age group)

It was incredibly misty out on the bike.  My plan was to try and pace things steadily (as always) and not hammer the hills – this is something that my power meter has told me – it hasn’t told me much yet as I’m still slowly setting it up and calibrating my zones – but I do know how easy it is to push too hard on the hills.  I do have to remember to push a little harder on the flat/downhills though.

There’s a couple of hills on the route, including one what is known as the ‘Rutland Ripple’ – well, because of the fog I couldn’t see how long they went on for so you were never demoralised by the sight of a long climb!

I took a PowerBar gel around every 20-22 minutes during the bike, whether I wanted one or not.  Drink wise I had two 500ml bottles of Lucozade Sport and at the half-way point I took a bottle of High-5 from the feed station.

My first lap was slightly quick (1 hour 10) compared with the second (1 hour 13) and certainly during the second lap it felt tougher.  I think I paced things pretty well, but not quite as good as I’d like as I certainly started to tire during the second lap.  For the 85k (just over 50 miles) I averaged 21.2 mph.

Bike time: 2:23:40 (29th in age group, 81st overall).

Coming in off of the bike I lost a handful of seconds trying to make sure I found the right racking spot for my bike – this is very important as my run shoes were there!  Once I found the spot, it was a case of just getting my run shoes on and picking up my ‘supplies bag’ – which consisted of three gels and my Garmin.

Transition 2: 00:56 (18th in age group)

I always run well straight off of the bike – actually a little too well most of the time.  During the first km of the run I sorted out my gels, got my watch on and settled in to a comfortable pace.  The trouble was, when I got to the 1km marker I’d run through it at about 3:46.  This is sub 1:20 half marathon pace.  This wouldn’t last – that’s for sure – especially as my standalone half marathon best time is 1:27:40!

I eased off the pace and just settled down to a strong but controllable run.  From a morale point of view I love the run – as I’m a lot quicker than most of the people around me.  In fact, during the entire 21k run I was overtaken by one person.  I overtook plenty of runners myself.  The run is just over 5km out, then back – twice.  It’s a good course for spectators and also for the runners as you get to see lots of people around you and can give each other support.

Pushing hard during the final km of the half marathon

Time wise I was looking like a 1 hour 30+ half marathon was achievable and at the final turnaround I remembered what I did in Challenge Roth during the Summer – dug in deep and pushed as hard as possible – make or break time!  I only had 5km to go, and it was touch and go whether I could break 4 hours 30 for the race.  There was no point getting to the end and regretting not trying my best so I just got on with it.

Sharon and Kirsty gave me a cheer about about 600m to go and I just put my head down (not literally though, as that would be bad running form!) and pushed on to the finish.  There was no sprint finish – I didn’t have anything left in me at this point but I was chuffed to bits to finish in an overall time of 4 hours 28 and 1 second.

My half marathon time was 1 hour 29 minutes exactly.  This was great considering I ran the same course in 1 hour 38 two years ago.  Unfortunately I don’t have any heart rate data for the run as my GPS decided to play up on me – big time.  It worked fine during the run but decided not to save any data.  Ho hum.  Nutrition wise I had maybe 4 gels on the run and sipped High-5 energy drink at most of the aid stations.  I didn’t have any water at all during the entire race (other than the reservoir water I accidentally drunk during the swim!).

Run time: 1:29:00 (12th in age group, 43rd overall).

Back to my overall finishing time I was just under 33 minutes faster than two years ago.  My finishing position reflected this as well as two years ago I finished 200th out of 699 finishers.  This year I was 46th out of 790 finishers.  What I like about this the most is that I have the same wetsuit and same bike (the only change being that I no longer have a compact chainset but that shouldn’t make any difference).  I am just stronger overall – especially on the bike and run.  This is great to know, especially when I know that I can do better with more (and more structured) training.

Overall time: 4:28:01 (16th out of 147 in age group, 46th overall).

Looking at the winners time, he finished in 3:45:51 with a swim of 26:39, bike of 2:04:13 and a 1:12:58 run.  Superb.

Putting in a race of this length a few weeks after an Ironman seems to work well and the Vitruvian is a great final triathlon of the season for me.  It was good to come back to the race after a years absence and its highly likely that I’ll be back there again in 2011 – not just for the great racing but the excellent support and socialising with the ‘pirates.’

The other thing I love about this race is that I’m finished by lunchtime so I don’t miss any meals!  Result!

So, who’s is this Jarrod chap?  He was in the US team at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, was the 2009 ITU World Duathlon Champion and is currently 7th in the overall ITU World Championship Rankings for 2010.  Not a bad pedigree.  As for me, I’m a 10 hour 10 Ironman fresh from a sub 4h30m half-Ironman (or there abouts) race at the weekend (which I will blog about soon!) and sub 18 minute 5k runner.  Not quite the same, but there you go.

Well, I would be around on Tuesday and after reading about a chap (smernicki on twitter) who had a once in a lifetime experience on Monday running with Ironman Chris McCormack in London I had to go along.

I did however need to clarify something…

The response I got was as hoped, 5 miles easy running.  Of course one mans easy is not necessarily anothers…

Monday night it rained, and it rained some more, however by 6am on Tuesday when I woke up it was looking good.  Shortly after 7am I jumped on my bike and rode to Bushy Park.  At about 7:30am the gates were opened and I was expecting to meet up with a few other people but turned out it was just me.

Jarrod arrived, introductions were made and a few minutes later we set off for a little run.

Well, what a lovely chap.  Can I just say that.  Yes, I can, and I have.  Moving on…

We chatted about all sorts of things on the run, the weekly 5k parkrun running events that are held in the park – which Jarrod stumbled across at the weekend when nearly 800 runners were heading towards him during a training run!

We talked power meters on the bike (a subject I have a growing interest in), local pools and lakes, open water swimming, cycling and running round Richmond Park, people who go long instead of fast, and how I’d love to do a 1:45 olympic distance triathlon (er, in my dreams!).  We saw his wife Jenna out training as well.

Before long we’d finished the planned session – we ran a little over 7 minute miling pace which isn’t quite easy for me – something more like 7:30-7:45 is more my long run pace but I’m not complaining.  These opportunities don’t happen often (if at all) so I feel really luck to have been there – and thankfully he did his speed session the day before (and I was busy!)

All in all a great little morning, which he was happy to tell the world about.

So here we are, Bank Holiday Monday and I’m up at 5:30 with my porridge in the microwave.  Shortly after 6 with a bit of panic when my bike computer decided to not turn on I cycled to Hampton Pool to register and rack my bike.

For these pool based swims there are two waves of racers – in May I was in the first wave and spent much of the race entirely on my own – although you do get the benefit of very little traffic on the roads at 7:15am.  This time I was in the second wave – and started at about 8:20am.  In the end there were actually no traffic problems and I quite enjoyed watching the first wave of swimmers.

Pre race I once again I estimated my 400m swim to be 6 minutes 40 (which is what they base your start time on) and the (426m) swim was pretty uneventful.  There was a lady who started ahead of me and after four lengths I tapped her toes to request to get ahead.  She let me past her and I swam in clear water for the rest of the swim, although I did feel her tap my toes a few times – which was more from nice close drafting as opposed to wanting to overtake (as we’d end up just swapping places with one another each length).  My swim time including transition was 8:50 (9:17 last time).

Transition 1 was fairly quick and before long I was onto the bike for the 21k ride.  The weather was bright and sunny, about 12 degrees c and a 9/10mph NNW wind.

I was overtaken by one person (Matthew) on the bike as he raced past with his fancy TT bike and disc wheel (I’ll have a decent bike set-up one day!)  Him racing past gave me someone to aim for and for the rest of the big leg I tried to keep him in sight.  We overtook a few people from the second wave and quite a few of the slower riders from the earlier first wave.  It’s great to see people of all abilities out on the course taking part in these races and if you ever want to give triathlon a try, then I’d strongly recommend the Thames Turbo races.

After the race in May I looked at my bike stats and wrote the following:

Looking at the bike leg data on my GPS I averaged 22.2 mph for the 36 minutes or so.  Interestingly (well, for me!) my cadence averaged 102 – all of my other rides this year have averaged about 91 rpm cadence.  Is this indication of me ‘spinning’ faster related to miles already in my legs [as I'd ridden 60 miles the previous day], or is it just how things are when you bust a gut and race hard for short distances.

In my recent rides I’ve started to slow my cadence down a little.  This may be partly because I’m no longer riding a ‘compact’ chainset on the bike but is also as a result of me moving into the world of training with a power meter (which I will post about one day!).  I currently seem to be getting better wattage from a slightly bigger gear.

Today was no exception and I chose gearing to slow my cadence down – today it averaged at 93 RPM.  Similar to the race in May, on the previous day (that’ll be yesterday) I did a longish ride (50 miles) so my legs were not completely ‘fresh.’  My official bike time was 35:51 (36:20 last time) and 23rd fastest (out of 362).  I’d love to know how many of the faster riders had aero helmets and time trial bikes – maybe I’ll take a look at the official photos and have a look.

From my GPS my average speed was 22.6mph (22.2 in May) and I don’t think I was anywhere near as exhausted at the end of todays ride as last time.  My heart rate averaged 161 and maxed at 167.  I didn’t have an HRM on in May.

Power wise I averaged 329 watts for the 35:32 which I clocked on my watch (the 19 second discrepancy to the official time will be because the official time starts a little way before the bike mount point).  Unfortunately I don’t have second-by-second power data for the ride so just have an overall average…. and there I was looking forward to spending hours trying to analyse it all in detail.

After the bike finishes you have a few minutes ‘non-compete time’ to get back to transition 2.  This was pretty quick and then I was out onto the run.  I didn’t plan to run this all out as I want to not put my right calf under too much pressure, but having said that, once I get racing I do get a little carried away with it all!  I soon overtook Matthew (who once again – see my run notes from 2008 – wanted to ‘hang onto the back of me’ – sorry… maybe next time?) and from here on in everyone I overtook I was moving up a position (at least, as they all started ahead of me) in the overall results.  In my eyes that’s encouragement to push on…

I overtook a few people, had some great pirate aarrrgghhh support on both laps and nearly got overtaken about 3.5k when I went past someone and he sat right on me.  I soon made sure that wasn’t going to last long and pushed on ahead to the finish.  My 5k time (including transition from bike to run) was 19:56, which was 11th fastest overall.

In May my time was 19:18, although it turns out that this was on a slightly shorter course – about 20 seconds quicker by my calculations.  The course change was because of a wasps nest that we were not aloud to run right past! The official run course is also measured as being about 70m long as well (thanks to a clarification post by TTTC at tritalk.co.uk) so that’s another few seconds in my favour :)

My run was comfortable throughout and I could have pushed harder if I had wanted to, but I kept things under control (just about).  My average heart rate was 167 and max was 177.  Funnily enough my Bushy parkrun from the past weekend had the same HR figures for exactly the same time.

Once again a cracking race at the Thames Turbo Triathlon.  Overall time/position wise in the provisional results my time is 1:04:37 (compared with 1:04:55 last time) and my position was 20th out of 357 finishers.

After getting packed up it was off to a local cafe for a late breakfast with Danny, Kirsty, Heather, Kath and Mr and Mrs Wilson.  Lovely.

This weekend we had a couple of friends (Tom and Helen) staying over, both Ironman athletes with Tom being third place male overall at the Outlaw triathlon race last weekend (I’ll be writing about this race in the coming days).  His 5k best is 18:17 from a couple of years ago.  He was impressed that I came back from Challenge Roth a few weeks ago and ran just over 18:30 a week later and he (and I) wondered if he too could pull out a great performance.

Friday night was off to a local Italian restaurant.  I’m not sure that the beers were ideal preparation but Bushy parkrun is never really an ‘A’ race – it’s just that if you drink the night before you’re unlikely to be on top form at 9am on Saturday.

David and Tom (Williams) on the start line

As Tom and I lined up on the startline he asked me what I was going to aim for – I said about 18:30 and agreed that would be fine.  After a few award presentations (Paul, the founder of parkrun had completed 50 runs so was presented with a t-shirt) we all set off – and were honoured by the presence of 5000m Sydney 2000 olympic silver medalist Sonia O’Sullivan running alongside us.

To run 18:30 we need to be running 3:42 per km.  Tom planned to sit right behind me for as long as possible and at 1k we went through it in about 3:35.  The second km was in 3:33.  Oops.

Somewhere close to 3km Tom pulled up beside me.  I said something like ‘I think we’ve gone off a little too quick!’  His response was along the lines of ‘we’ve done 3k, no way we’re giving up now.’

We worked together and encouraged each other along from 3-4.5k.  It was really hard work and my heart rate was sat at about 185bpm.

Coming round the tree near Hampton Court Gate there was another runner right in front of me.  Tom was just starting to fall back at this point and I heard a shout of ‘Go Dave’ to which the guy in front of me put his foot down!  He was pretty tall and I’m always a fan of getting a good draft off of someone so I tried to sit behind him.  That didn’t last long.

Before long I was in the final straight – I wasn’t sure how close to 18 minutes I was going to be (as we were still both running much faster than originally planned) and as I crossed the line my watch flashed 18 minutes, 0 seconds.  Result.  HR averaged at 180 and maxed at 190.

This is my best Bushy parkrun time since October 2009 and I’m really pleased that I was able to get this time – especially after a solid 60 miles on the bike the previous day.

Tom couldn’t quite stick with me (fair dues though, he did podium the week before) but came through with a time of 18:14, which is a new personal best (PB).  Smiles all round.

That was the extent of my exercise for Saturday, and then Sunday morning it was off to Richmond Park for a 13.5 miler which I pushed pretty hard for the second half.

So, right now training is going well.  Lets see how long I can keep it up for as consistency is the key.

“Of the 52 Pirate finishers I finished 6 minutes ahead of the next placed Pirate – so was presented with a lovely wooden shield which I shall treasure for the next 12 months.  I felt honoured to have won this – especially with some of the other names on the trophy and I had to make an acceptance speech when I was called up to collect it.”

'Fastest Finisher (even though it says Novice) 145' Shield

So, 12 months is up and a couple of weeks ago I had to hand the shield back in readyness to be re-distributed at the prize-giving post Challenge Roth.  Unfortunately I wasn’t the fastest finisher at Roth so the shield has gone to a new owner.  I’ll hope to get it back in my possession again one day… ;)

You’ll see a photo of the shield here on the blog but I’m not going to explain what the strange engravings are beneath the names/races (oh, and the meaning of ’145′ on the shield).  To find out more I’d suggest trawling the forums at Runners World or coming along to the big pirate race in 2011 and asking someone.

In addition to getting the shield I am now slowly building up my pirate ‘ranking!’  This is a virtual hall of fame that was devised by Candy – one of the original pirates back in 2005.   Back in December 2005 he wrote…

Obviously we need a hall of fame, and I was sufficiently bored on my long ride last saturday to come up with a pirate rank system based upon experience.

The Rank system.
On a points basis, where only IM distance or longer counts for points. Its not a knitting club. 1 point per IM finish. 1 bonus point for doing the extra hard ones (norseman, lanzarote and [but only if you get in by the honourable route, qualification] hawaii). 2 points for double IM finish. 3 points for Triple, 5 points for Deca. 1 bonus point for every time you win a shield or set a record (above). 1 bonus point for becoming “reasonably competent” (i.e. the first time you crack 12 hours). 1 bonus point for becoming “outstanding” (i.e. the first time you crack 10 hours). -1 point for a DNF (its not a quitting club). Note that if you miss cut off but still finish the course (even if it takes 20 hours) then you still get the point.

There are a number of ‘ranks’ that you can get to over your Ironman career, which are as follows:

Ranks

-2 tritalker
-1 plank
0 landlubber
1 scurvey dog
2 seaman
3 junior pirate
4 pirate
5 2nd mate
6 1st mate
7 commander
8 captain
9 admiral
10 admiral (2 parrots)
11 admiral (3 parrots) etc
15 pirate king blackbeard

So, two years into my Ironman career and I’m doing alright having got myself four points and now at ‘pirate’ status:

1. Ironman Switzerland 2009 = 1 point
2. Breaking 12 hours = 1 point
3. Winning a shield = 1 point
4. Challenge Roth 2010 = 1 point

This is all a bit of fun, nobody really knows how many points anyone else has, and nobody is keeping scores.

The Roth adventure began last year when I knew full well that David would enter another iron-distance race, despite saying originally that he was only doing one! Training went reasonably well for him (besides the broken metatarsal!) and before we knew it we were off to Germany.

I have to confess to feeling apprehensive – after such an awesome debut performance last year, I could sense that D was feeling pressure regarding what his finishing time would be this year. I don’t think this in intentional from anyone but it must make it tough. I was also feeling apprehensive about how I would be able to support him as the Roth course takes a different form to Ironman Switzerland in that it has split transitions. If I was a more confident cyclist, I would have taken my mountain bike and ridden around, as lots of people did, but I am not, so I couldn’t. If I had known what the day would bring, I would have done bike training myself!

Race morning dawned, cooler than it had promised and once more I was stood watching people prepare for the off. There is the most bizarre atmosphere in transition – it’s full of anticipation, yet calm and eerily quiet, especially in the half-light. You can see athletes lending each other things like pumps and goggles, not talking, just “being there”, some going off for quiet time, some with friends and family.

David did his prep, I took a few things back to the car, chatted to a few pirates and pirate supporters. Before I knew it, he was half in his wetsuit and it was about 30 minutes before the start. We decided it would be good for him to be away from people, to go and get himself ready. It’s hard, all those months of training for one day. There was no way I wanted him not to be in the right place in his head. As he left me, I was suddenly terrified. I haven’t been like that before, I have been nervous for him but this felt different. Little did I know that perhaps I felt like that because my day was not going to go according to plan! When he went off into transition to get ready for the start of his wave, I must confess to shedding a tear. Never done pre-race crying either. Oh dear.

I went and hovered around a bit, tried to get by the canal for a few photos, another trip to the car to drop off more of David’s kit, then I was back to transition. I heard David’s swim wave start and gave a little cheer and went to wait. His race times are detailed in his blog so I won’t go into that, suffice to say I was so pleased when I saw him come out of the water faster than we expected. I screamed at him in T1, but he didn’t hear me. Shouted at a lot more Pirates too, mixed bag of swimming fortunes I would say. Also did a bit of tweeting to update the Home Support Crew with how the Pirates were getting on.

After all Pirates were off on the bike, I headed off with Gill and Rick to the Solarer Berg and literally as we arrived I saw the back of David go through. I screamed and shouted and almost wondered if he heard as there was a little turn of his head. Apparently he hadn’t heard. We found a comfy spot and made camp, ready for the shouting. I have to say it was difficult for the 3 of us to be heard, some Pirates heard the shouts, some didn’t. I tried to get photos but they are not my best work and I knew at the time I would be disappointed. I was getting text message alerts about David’s progress on the bike, which showed he was going well.

The first Pirate we saw on their second lap was Melli who was looking really strong. I knew David should be fairly soon behind and I had received the 153km text alert. We waited, and waited, and waited. Terrible thoughts were going through my head. Had he come off? Where was he? Tried to keep myself under control, difficult to be honest. Still no sign of him. Started to see other Pirates. Oh feck. Where was he? My heart was beating like mad. Suddenly my phone bleeped, another text message: “David Rowe is out on the run”. What. The. Feck. How did we miss him? It’s not like Pirate kit is subtle is it. I was gutted I hadn’t been able to cheer him. I was worried he would notice I wasn’t around – of course in sensible mode I know that wouldn’t be on his mind, the race was on his mind – but I was being irrational!

Shortly afterwards, things started to go a little awry. Not for David, for one of our other Pirates. I shall not detail it here, suffice to say all is well but it’s bloody scary being the wife of someone when all is going, shall we say, not to plan. We needed to get to T2, or the finish, to check out what was going on. It was a nightmare. We ended up going about 35 km to go 6! I was worrying for our Pirate, and his wife and (at the back of my mind as I knew D was OK from the text alerts) I was worrying that I hadn’t seen David. I just wanted to cheer him on.

We got to the finish and found out all was well with our Pirate (thank goodness for that!!) and by that point I was weighing up whether I could get out on the run course and back to the finish. To be honest, I was panicking that if I went out, I wouldn’t get back. I know it’s ridiculous. I was not at my most rational by this point in the day. I decided I was going to find a spot and stick to it and await David’s arrival.

I had about an hour to wait, I busied myself cheering people in. I was getting the text alerts still, he was running so well! I was starting to get excited, trying to work out possible finish times. Soon enough, I saw a flash of yellow! I was absolutely screaming my head off as he looked so focused, I was worried he wouldn’t even see me there if I didn’t. After what seemed an age, he locked eyes with me. We had seen each other! Finally! After the whole bloody day! I watched him run under the gantry and almost immediately I got my text alert with his finish time. 10:10:58. Wow! I believe my tweet was something like, “David is fucking awesome”. He is.

This time he appeared out of the finishers area really quickly. I saw him, ran over and gave him a massive hug. It was the kind of hug that you don’t want to end and then once again the tears flowed. It did of course end and before we knew it, it was the finish party :)

I am so proud of him. I really am. He is so motivated and determined and strong of mind. Once David sets his mind to something, you know he will give it his all. To say I am proud doesn’t seem enough – it’s a massive understatement. He knows how I feel though. I am also so proud of our Pirates, they demonstrate the very same qualities. They are seriously tough to be out there for more than half a day. It’s an honour to be standing on that finish line cheering them on. Joy and pain, all in one day, who could ask for more?

After running a steady 5 mile race for my running club on Tuesday evening we raced home, quick shower and some food and then jumped in the car for the drive to Dover. We caught a ferry to Calais shortly after midnight and the plan was for Sharon and I to just drive and drive, swapping over whenever the driver felt like a snooze! This continued on and on and after a couple of short breaks and plenty of driving we made it to our campsite in Roth. The weather was boiling with the temperature measurement on the car reading over 35 degrees centigrade. We were hoping it wouldn’t last until race day on Sunday. That night we had a huge thunderstorm which cleared the air a little – Thursday was much more pleasant.

Transition bags at registration

Thursday lunchtime we headed to the ‘race village’ and registered. I picked up my goodie bag, timing chip and transition bags. A stroll round the town centre and then back to the campsite. I then went out on the bike for just over an hour to get my bearings and test out a couple of the hills. The roads were silky smooth and it was lovely. Bring on race day!

At the canal for a test swim

Friday morning started with an early swim in the canal where the swim was taking place. This gave me a chance to get a feel for what it was like (visibility was very very poor, but the water was lovely and warm) and also to understand where everything was in transition. It was another very hot sunny day today so at lunchtime I went out for a three mile run to get a feel for how hot it could be. The short answer is… VERY! In the evening a large group of us headed into town to watch one of our younger fellow ‘pirates’ taking part in a smaller triathlon. It was great to support Jack in the race and he did really well.

Saturday was a day mostly of rest. I sorted out my bike and also my transition bags, as the run bag (containing shoes, socks, suncream, gels and a running visor) needed to be handed in today when I racked the bike in transition. At lunchtime we took the bike to the swim start/transition one to get everything racked.

Challenge Roth doesn’t have a mass swim start – we all go in waves. The pro’s start at 6am and then there’s regular groups setting off for a good couple of hours or so. My start was at 6:50am.

The alarm was set for 3am and soon afterwards I was enjoying a hot cup of coffee. Shortly before 4 I had a big bowl of porridge and then we set off to the start, following the advice to get there early. The weather was cloudy, hardly any wind. Result.

At the race site I made the final preparations to the bike – pumping up my tyres, attaching the saddle bag and ensuring I had plenty of energy gels attached to the bike. I had 10 gels attached to the bike and I planned to get a few more from the aid stations on the course.

Breakfast

At about 6:15am I got into my wetsuit and had the first of many energy gels. I gave Sharon a kiss (with a tear in my eye) and headed off for a final toilet stop. I then went over to the swim start area about 10 minutes before my ‘wave’ was to start. Its a really strange feeling waiting with hundreds of other people minutes before a very long day that we’ve all been training months for is about to start. A strange old feeling.

As soon as the previous wave began (five minutes before mine) about 250 of us headed into the water and had a couple of minutes or so to get accustomed to the canal and to get to the start. I deliberately chose to start about three people back from the front row as I didn’t want any (or much) kicking and punching early on in the swim. In the minute before the start most of the swimmers were saying good luck to one another and then there was a round of applause. At approximately 6:50am the gun went and that was it – we were off.

Competitors nearing the end of the 2.4 mile swim

The swim is a single lap 2.4 mile course, so no getting out of the water briefly at the half way point as in Ironman Switzerland last year. Because of the poor visibility I found it really hard to draft off of anyone and pretty much swam the entire swim on my own. I had no idea if I was swimming well – I just got on with it and kept reminding myself to concentrate on good technique.

Coming into the race I was expecting a slower swim than last year because I’d only been swimming once a week this year compared with at least twice a week last year. I’d also only swum over the 2.4 mile Ironman distance once this year, whereas in 2009 I’d done it eight times in training. Swimming in the canal was really cool as every time you breath you can see people cheering at the edge of the canal. Also, as you head nearer to the start/finish part of the swim course it gets really noisy from all the supporters – there were thousands of them out there.

As I came out of the swim I glanced at my watch – it said 1:04:09 – flippin’ ‘eck I thought – that was good. My swim last year was 1:08. I’ve no idea where that came from but I wasn’t complaining. I was expecting it to be more like 1:10-1:15. I ran up to the transition tent collecting my bag on the way.

I was 508th in the swim (out of 2,828 who completed the swim). The fastest swim time was 46:51 by Pete Jacobs of Australia.

The transition tent is a funny old place. I’ve never competed in a race with one before (normally my transition gear is all by my bike) but I really liked it. You run in, find somewhere to sit and get your wetsuit off and your bike shoes/socks on. I put my wetsuit into the bag and left it for the volunteers to look after it ‘til after the race.

Heading out of transition 1 to begin the 112 mile bike leg

I ran out to my bike, and knew exactly where it was amongst the hundreds of bikes in the transition area. One thing you really should do before the race is rehearse transition – tracing the steps from the tent to your bike – and noting anything that will help you find the bike quickly – like trees, waste bins, etc.

I got to the bike, put my helmet and sunglasses on and ran to the mount point. There was a big cheer of ‘Go Pirates’ from somewhere in the crowd which really cheered me up. I jumped on the bike and headed off for 112 miles miles of fun/torture (delete as applicable!)….

Transition 1 time was 3 minutes 10 seconds.

At the start of the bike its a relief to be doing something different for a change and after lying horizontally in the water for over an hour its good to be ‘upright’ again. My heart-rate was high at the start of the bike (averaged 162 for the first mile) but this was to be expected and I knew/hoped that I could bring it back down and under control soon after. After a few twists and turns on the course I settled into the ride ahead of me. About half an hour into the bike leg I overtook my first pirate – Lou. We gave each other a little encouragement and continued on our way. Because of the wave starts people are on the course at all different times and it’s really difficult to determine how you’re doing compared to other competitors.

I’d say that there are two main hills on the bike course, the first main one at Kalvarienberg, just outside of Greding at the southernmost tip of the course. This is about 22 miles in and has a short sharp climb early on and then just goes on and on. The race pack describes it as follows:

“At the southernmost point of the bike course this hill stretches the athletes to the limit. The ascent, which is about 1.5 km long and up to 10 % steep, must be passed twice. But don’t be afraid: The crowds of cheering spectators almost carry the athletes up the road. So even this steep hill feels as if it was flat.”

Once you get to the top of the hill, it seemed to keep on going. There was a bit of a headwind and the road just remained undulating upwards until the peak at about 27 miles. There then followed a fast little descent with a few hairpin turns as we headed towards Obermassing and then it was back to normal with some gentle undulations.

There were plenty of other cyclists nearby, and we were all doing a pretty good job to avoid drafting (which is not allowed – it’s meant to be an individual effort). On the first lap of the bike course I saw lots of motorcycles go by who were looking for and penalising offenders (they get shown a card and have to stop at a penalty station further up the course).

Although the bike course is fast, its certainly not flat. The roads are beautiful and smooth but its continually up/down/up/down throughout. I thought there were few long flat sections out there. Looking at the profile of the course and what my GPS measured, it said there was 1,504m of climbing on the overall route (both laps). Looking at my data for Ironman Switzerland it says 1,457m of climbing. I can’t vouch for the accuracy of the comparison (last year it was recorded on a Garmin 305 and this year a 705) but I’d rate the courses as being very similar overall in terms of climbing.

Course Profiles - Challenge Roth (top), Ironman Switzerland (bottom)

The next big climb is the one that everyone who’s ever raced at Roth remembers – the Solarer Berg. This is shortly after 43 miles and is something I don’t think I’ll ever forget. After a little incline a few hundred metres before you race down into Hilpolstein and take a right hand turn. This is where it begins. The climb is described in the race pack as follows:

“It’s Franconia’s most famous hill and also a synonym for the fascination of triathlon in Roth. Every athlete who has ever climbed that hill only once during the Challenge Roth, and has made his way through the crowds of enthusiastic spectators, is inadvertently infected with the triathlon virus! This is something you just have to experience!”

Solerer Berg

There are literally thousands of people here cheering and supporting. Before the climb begins proper there are barriers at the side of the road. They then suddenly disappear and the crowds are everywhere. You can’t see where you’re going for all the people – you can only see the wheels of the person in front of you. Without riding Le Tour de France this has to be the closest you’ll ever get to the kind of support these guys get on the mountains. It was amazing. As you get to the top there’s another aid station (they’re very frequent on the course) so you can refill drinks/gels etc.

A few miles later you go past the bike start area and begin your second lap. Looking at my first lap I measured it at slightly over 52 miles, an average HR of 18, a max HR of 170 and an average speed of 20.3 MPH. Cadence was 96 RPM. I’d planned to keep keep my heart rate around about 140 BPM and it was all going to plan. I also wanted to ensure I kept my cadence comfortably over 90 RPM (don’t worry, I have a cadence sensor to do the counting!).

Shortly into the second lap as I went through Eckersmuhlen and the “Beer Mile” was in full swing. This is an area in the centre of the village where local bars put tables right up beside the road and there are a few hundred people sat there drinking, eating and shouting support right beside the road. It’s really uplifting and you can’t help but smile.

During the second lap I saw a few more ‘pirates’ on the course. I cycled past Grant, who was sat at the side of the road with a mechanical failure that unfortunately messed up his entire race and then shortly after the hill at Greding I saw John (who was on his first lap of the bike having started in a much later swim wave). This was his first (and planned last) Ironman event and the thing that amazed me was that he’d never ridden further than about 60 miles in one go before! I’m not sure I’m a fan of his preparation but he was getting on with it. He’d recently suffered a puncture and had to walk up the hill to the mechanical aid station for assistance, but he was back on the bike and working hard.

One of the highlights of the bike course had to be a sight that made me chuckle. A man by the side of the road, in full view of everyone, squatting (to have a, er, number two), with his cycle shorts round his ankles and his long pointy ‘aero’ cycle helmet on. What a sight!

I could see my heart rate dropping a bit during the second lap so I really had to work hard to get it back up to where I wanted it to be, which in turn kept my speed up where I wanted it to be. Towards the end of the second lap I crept past Emma who said I was the first pirate she’d seen all day. This wave start business is really strange. Lap wise, I kept my average HR at 138 (max was 153) and my average speed for the lap was 20 MPH.

After heading through Eckersmuhlen for a third time I turned off to do the final few miles to the bike finish and transition two. There was a group of pirate supporters here who gave me a great big cheer.

The rest of the bike was uneventful as I cruised along to transition. As I got to transition I unfastened the velcro and took my feet out of my shoes, and then as I came to a stop I handed my bike to one of the volunteer helpers and then ran (in some sort of zig-zag i-have-not-walked-for-5-and-a-half-hours type running motion) to the transition tent where I was handed my run bag.

Total bike time was 5 hours 25 minutes and 50 seconds with an average speed of 20.2 MPH for the 109.8 miles that my GPS measured. Heart rate was 138 average and 170 max with an average cadence of 95.

I was 909th overall on the bike. This is OK, but I think I should be quicker. I don’t have fancy race wheels or a time trial bike, and I know my riding position could be improved but I can’t complain at cycling over 20 miles per hour non stop for nearly five and a half hours straight!

Nutrition wise I drunk energy drink probably 90% of the time (water the other 10%) and had about 14 or 15 gels (last year I had 7 gels but a few more flapjacks/powerbars). Half a banana was had at one of the early feed stations and I ate a very small piece of flapjack that I’d put on the bike (I threw the rest away). Although I didn’t feel hungry I was ensuring that I had a gel every 20-25 minutes whether I wanted one or not. It is these kind of nutritional plans that help to ensure you don’t have a bad run later in the day. Things you do/eat at 9am make a difference to how you run 7 hours or more later. I also had three or four electrolyte capsules.

Before I talk about the run I will say that I cycled the bike leg with a power meter. I’ve only recently bought it and do not yet have it set up to alert me to zones etc. I had it on the bike today just to record data. I turned off all power related screens on my bike computer so I couldn’t get confused or try and ride to power – I just wanted to record the data for later analysis. When I eventually get around to doing it I’ll post some more information about how I rode the Roth course from a power perspective and whether I paced myself well or not. Stay tuned….

Transition two consisted of changing socks to a nice clean pair and also putting on my running shoes (I’m using Asics 2150’s at present). I grabbed my running GPS, visor and a bag of ‘goodies’ to sort through during the first few minutes of the run rather than when in transition (my transition time from bike to run was 2 minutes 50 seconds). The bag consisted of the following:

• four caffeinated energy gels. All the gels prior to this were ‘normal’ ones. I had these four with me to give myself an energy ‘boost.’
• suncream.
• vaseline.

I managed to drop one of the gels but got the other three stuffed up my shorts (which is a great storage place!). I put some suncream on my shoulders and arms as the sun was really starting to come through and also put a little vaseline on to stop my top from rubbing.

My plan for the run was to aim for a 3:45 marathon. This would be running 8:30 miling pace. I’d also keep an eye on my heart rate as well and make adjustments as necessary.

I seem to have a habit of flying during the early part of the run and although I tried to ease back I went through the first (slightly uphill) mile in 7:46 (heart rate 145). I needed to ease off some more and eventually I did with the following miles being 8:06, 8:13, 8:26, 8:24. I wanted to keep my heart rate around 145 and I was running very comfortably at this point.

The run consists of mostly running along the ‘towpath’ of the canal along with some tarmac roads/paths and a little grass/mud by a forest. It’s a single lap run mostly as an ‘out and back’ so you can see other runners coming the other way almost all of the time.

About 3 miles in it felt like my sock was folded or something in my right foot. It didn’t feel right and I knew at some point I’d need to get my shoe off to sort it out. Every bench I ran past had people sat on it and I eventually found somewhere reasonable to sort myself out at about 10km (6.2 miles). I took my shoe off and noticed that my sock was fine – it was probably just a blister on its way! I can deal with that.

At this point you head off of the canal path and through the village of Schwand. Running through the town (about 1:15pm) there were people everywhere supporting, eating, drinking and enjoying the carnival atmosphere. The smell of BBQ food at one point was really quite strong (and tempting!).

At 9.4 miles it was back onto the canal path for just over six long miles. It seemed never ending. The weather was really getting quite hot and the aid stations every two kilometers were the main thing that kept me going. Knowing that I could get some sports drink, an energy gel and some water soaked sponges to cool myself down with was a great way to break the run into smaller segments.

At 15.7 miles you head off the canal, through a small forest area and onto a road that climbed slightly uphill to get you up and onto a bridge that goes over the canal. Once you get to the turnaround just after 17.5 miles I knew that I was on my way back. At this point my average pace so far (after about 2 hours 25 running) was 8:21 minute miling with an average heart rate of 146. Everything was on track. Heading back to the canal path I stopped briefly for a very quick wee. This, the turnaround point and when I had to take my shoe off were the only times that I stopped/walked during the run.

Once I got back onto the towpath I started doing a few maths in my head. I knew that I was on time for a sub 10 hour 30 Ironman and if I could increase my pace I could maybe just get very close to 10 hours 15. This would be unbelievable if I could but I had to give it a go. In an Ironman distance event some say the race doesn’t start until 20 miles into the run, and at this point I started to race proper.

At Ironman Switzerland last year although I was knackered after crossing the finish line I knew there was more in me. This time I wanted to make sure that I used every bit of energy in me to get to the line and anything less meant that I wasn’t trying hard enough. I’d trained through the winter and spring for this event, spent a lot of money on entry/travel/nutrition etc. and wanted to ensure that by the time I finished I’d given it everything I could.

Less than a mile to the finish and pushing as hard as I could

So, shortly after 20 miles or so I started to pick it up. My heart rate moved up to 150, then 152, 153, 156, 157….

Throughout the run I worked on a nutrition strategy similar to the bike – gels every 20-25 minutes and I also took a caffeinated gel on the hour, each hour. They tasted disgusting (just as bad as they did last year) but I know they do me good, so I just had to HTFU (harden the f**k up) and deal with it!

At about 22 miles you leave the canal path for the last time and head back towards Roth. At this point I was giving it everything I could. There was every possibility that I’d blow up from the effort involved and end up finishing in similar style to the famous Ironman Hawaii finish by Sian Welch and Wendy Ingraham in 1997. There was only one way to find out…

As I headed into the town centre I was overtaking quite a few people, my pace during the last few miles had gone from 8:20 miling to 7:35!!! I was running as fast as I could and giving it everything I had. It wasn’t pretty but I didn’t care – I just wanted to get to the finish as quickly as I could.

Through the town centre there’s a few cobbled streets to run on which I barely noticed. There was a couple of sharp turns in the town square and there were people everywhere supporting. The atmosphere (from what I could gather from outside of my own ‘hurt zone’) was electric.

I then saw another km marker in the distance. From my watch I was expecting it to be the 40km marker but I was hoping to see 41km. Thankfully it did! A couple of turns later (and a grunt at the pirate support from one of the town centre cafes) and I was at the triathlon park and the finish area. The blue carpet was ahead of me and I was going to smash 10 hours 15 out of the ball-park. As I ran down the ‘chute’ I caught a glimpse of Sharon screaming and cheering, I believe I high-fived her and just carried on. It was the first time I’d seen her all day since about 6:15am this morning. I wasn’t planning on any showboating or anything – I just wanted to get the best time that I could.

Straight after the finish, and smiling again!

As I crossed the finish line I raised my arms in joy. My official time was 10 hours 10 minutes and 58 seconds. I was ecstatic. I was given my finishers medal, then as I walked away someone else came to me and asked if I was OK. I replied that I was ‘fine, thank you for asking’ and continued on (some people collapse at this point!). I had my photo taken by one of the official photographers and was then given an alcohol free beer. It was bliss!

My marathon time was 3 hours 35 dead. This was 11 minutes faster than at Switzerland. Awesome. This is only just over 15 minutes slower than my standalone marathon time (London 2009) which I think I need to address!

Run wise I was 354th fastest out of just under 2,700 finishers. The quickest run was 2:39:43 by overall race winner Rasmus Henning of Denmark (who finished overall in 7:52:36).

Looking at the results I was 436th overall (out of just under 2,700 finishers, and over 2,830 who finished the swim but not the bike/run). I was 413th male and 110th in my age category (male 35-39). In Switzerland last year I was 572nd out of 1979, so much much better this time.

With beer in hand I found my way back to Sharon and the pirate supporters for a big hug. I was in shock at how good my time was (so was Sharon) and was just grinning away. She’d been getting official SMS text updates all day long and then other text messages and twitter/facebook messages were coming in on my mobile from friends back home watching online.

A while later I headed back to the ‘athletes village’ area, had some food (not much though, as I find it hard to eat straight after a big session) and then went off in search of a shower.

I got to the shower area, stripped off (there was nudity everywhere to be seen in this area – and to be honest I couldn’t care less) and got in a queue. The heat from the steam in the shower area didn’t help and I started to feel really faint. After a couple of minutes or so I gave up, stumbled away and just lay on the grass for about 10 minutes. I eventually got some composure, made it back to the showers and when one became available I had the quickest ever rinse/wash that I think I’ve ever had. I just had to get clean before I would pass out. I made it out of the showers just in time and sat back on the grass and dried under the early evening sunshine. After getting changed I stocked up on food/drink/beer and headed back to the supporting area.

From here until the very end (about 11pm) I watched, cheered, screamed, shouted, took lots of photos and generally had an absolute blast. The finish line party at an Ironman event is something special and you have to be there to experience it. Watching people come in to finish with either smiles on their faces or signs of pain is unforgettable.

As darkness fell and the official timing and end of the race neared race winners Rasmus Henning, Chrissie Wellington and the other top end professional athletes were by the finish handing out medals. A huge (and I mean huge) firework display took place and as the last finishers came through the athletes made a human ‘arch’ at the finish line.

I found myself conveniently right in the middle of the area about 10 feet from the finish line (having a camera with a big lens makes you look rather professional so security seem to turn a blind eye to you) and got a few great photos of the finish area.

After 11pm we all slowly drifted away from the finish area. Sharon and I headed to the car and headed back to transition 2 to find my bike and my swim/bike bags with all my gear in. We then drove back to the camp site, had a drink and retired for the night.

Roth is an amazing race and one that I’d love to do again one day. If you’re a supporter you’d do well to get yourself a bike and move around to support that way as going by car is really tough because of the road closures that are in place.

So, what next…. the trouble with most of these Ironman distance races is that you have to enter them a year in advance and I’m not sure I want to commit to one next summer. What I’m currently thinking is concentrating on getting a better standalone marathon time under my belt and also getting some good cycle training in next year. If I don’t do something like the Outlaw Iron distance race in the UK in August 2011 then my next big race will be in 2012, and it could be any of them…possibly even Challenge Wanaka in New Zealand.

Sharon and I left for North Wales mid-morning on Friday and after a leisurely drive we arrived at the camp site late afternoon.  The weather was lovely and there were a few other ‘pirates’ already set up and relaxing so they were able to watch Sharon and I put up our tent in this highly pressured situation!

On Saturday I went for an easy spin of part of the bike course, partly to test out the fancy deep rim HED race wheels that Andy had let me borrow for the event.  About 18 miles done and all seems well with the bike.

LLyn Celyn

Sharon and I then did a little sight-seeing and had a watch of some of the action at the National White Water Centre.  One day I think we’ll have to get a bunch of us out on one of the rafts.

After a quick spot of lunch it was time to register for the race.  I jogged the 2.75 miles from the campsite to the sports centre whilst Sharon cycled alongside.  After registration we met up with many of the other pirates for the traditional Saturday afternoon swim in the lake.  The water was cold, and certainly refreshing.  The weather was stunning so we spent probably a couple of hours or so relaxing by the lake.  After running back to the campsite Sharon and I then headed out to get our pre-race meal….. In the past I’ve tried pasta, rice, etc. but thought we’d go for an altogether different option – fish’n'chips.  Actually I had a large sausage and chips but you know what I mean.  There were certainly plenty of carbs to be had from the chips.  I’d soon find out if it was a good decision or not!

Bike, race wheels and tent.

Sunday morning and an easy ride to the start.  Sharon followed in the car with my transition gear.  Got myself body marked with my race number and then setup in transition – including walking the route from the swim exit to my bike to make sure I knew where to go.

Swim – 2km

I do this everytime – that is, get myself into a bit of ruff’n'tumble in the swim.  I normally do this on purpose so it will make me more confident when it happens again.  I think I’m getting better at dealing with the kicks and punches but it’s really not my idea of fun!

Swim start.

The water at the start was as always very shallow – not much more than waist deep.  So much so that a few seconds after the start Sharon saw people walking rather than swimming through the melee!  The water was fairly smooth (nothing like in 2009) although there was a bit of a breeze coming in.

I decided to start near the middle of the start line and right on the front row – expecting a bit of action from the go.  The plan was to swim hard for the first 50 meters or so and then find a fast swimmer to draft off of for the next 1,950 meters.  A great theory!  I swam hard, and then a couple of seconds after easing off I started feeling arms and legs and people starting to swim all over the top of me.  At one point I went to breath and got pushed underwater so ended up taking on board about a pint of lake water!  A few seconds later I decided that this wasn’t for me so I swam to the outside edge of the pack and swam on my own.  In fact I had clear water until the first turning buoy.  The rest of the swim was uneventful.  I didn’t enjoy the first few minutes of the swim and it took me a while to get settled.

My swim time was 36:04, my quickest ever swim at Bala, although two years ago I hadn’t done much open water swimming before and last year the conditions were rough, but I’ll take this time quite happily.  I was 234th out of 626 (including relay teams) in the swim.

Swim: 36:04 (2009 time: 38:22, 2008 time: 37:37)

My swim position was 234th out of 626.

Transition 1 was pretty quick – 1 minute 58 compared with 2:25 last year.  No complaints.

Bike – 78.5k

The bike is always a tough one and there was a bit of a breeze this year to make matters worse.  The weather wasn’t hot sunshine like in previous years but it wasn’t too cold for just my tri shorts and top.  Nutrition wise something wasn’t right.  I had a bit of a stomach ache during a good part of the bike.  I don’t know why (surely not last nights dinner) but this made it harder for me to take my gels onboard and I gave up on my PowerBar bars after a single bite.  I drunk plenty of sports drink so at least that was good, but my stomach wasn’t right and I hoped it wasn’t going to give me trouble during the run.

On the bike...together with tan-lines from the day before!

Other than that I think I had a good solid ride to the turnaround point at 25.6 miles.  I got there in 1 hour 18.  Last year I got to the same point in 1:17:32.  Pretty similar.

Shortly before the turnaround the lead female (Louise Collins) flew past me on the way to a 2:24:45 bike split.  The women started a few minutes after the men and she was absolutely flying.  I’m not surprised after only a few weeks before she finished 2nd female overall at Ironman Lanzarote.

During the second half I battled on.  I had trouble getting my heart rate up and being able to push hard but I did what I could.  Once I’d past about 39 miles (and the biggest climb of the day) it’s all downhill back to Bala so I pushed harder and had an enjoyable end to the bike.  Maximum speed on the bike was 40.8 mp/h.

Bike: 2:37:39 Average/Max HR: 142/167 (2009 time: 2:36:50 HR:147/170, 2008 time: 3:05:13).

My bike position was 173rd out of 627.

Transition 2 took me 1 minute 14.  In 2009 it was 1:33.

Run – 20k

I’m not sure if I really enjoy the run or not at Bala.  I love running but this is a tough old course.  It’s relentless and never ending up/down/up/down.  About 1k into the run I was getting plenty of pirate ‘aaarrrgghhh’ support from people on the early part of the course.  As I’m strong on the run and have more of a background in this sport I enjoyed it when I went past a chap who moved over slightly to let me pass and said to me “I read your blog and there’s no way I’ll be able to keep up with you.”  I thanked him (whoever you are) and continued on.

The first half of the run was mostly into a headwind and also has most of the climbing in it.  It was tough.  I overtook quite a few people in the first half and very few people went past me.  This is how I like it :)

After the turnaround I knew I was on the ‘home straight’ so was able to push on with it.  A veteran competitor from Oxford Tri club came past me and I decided to stick with him as much as possible.  I kept close for as long as possible but during the final mile or two he drifted away.  I think only one other person overtook me during the second half of the run.

The final 100m of the run.

The pirate support was great during the run and I was able to cheer ‘Go Pirates’ every few minutes to people running the other way.  Now that I’ve done it (three years in a row) I really wouldn’t want to do this event not dressed in the ‘classic’ yellow/black pirate combo!  It rocks.

Run: 1:31:18 Average/Max HR: 159/173 (2009 time 1:32:45 HR:162/181, 2008 time: 1:40:58).

My run position was 94th out of 624 runners – clearly my best discipline.

It was a relief to be headed to the finish after a very tough race and when I crossed the line I was very pleased to find that my overall time was once again sub 5 hours.  I was happy with how the run turned out – with it being my fastest time here at Bala.  Next year I’d like to dip under 90 minutes for the run.

Overall: 4:48:15 (2009 time: 4:51:58, 2008 time: 5:23:28).  120th out of 629 finishers.

Race wise I would have liked to have been quicker on the bike.  My cycling has gone pretty well so far this year and I thought the race wheels I’d borrowed would have made a big difference.  Well, maybe they did (it was windy out there so made things tough).  I guess I’d need to ride the same course in similar conditions again for a time comparison to be more measureable.

After the prizegiving Sharon and I bought some food in a local shop and headed back to the campsite to relax and have a beer with many of the others who were staying over on Sunday night.  It was a lovely relaxing end to a good weekend – well, when it wasn’t raining and we all had to squeeze into our tent whilst we waited for the weather to clear!

On Monday we took a very leisurely drive home.  We drove down through Wales and then across to Ross-on-Wye for lunch followed by a walk at the top of Symonds Yat – where we saw some peregrine falcons nesting on the cliff site.  We arrived back home at about 6pm ready to unpack and prepare for the week ahead at work :(

A small group of us set off at about 8:25am for this 105 or so mile hilly ride.  The weather was great – cloudy, a light breeze and not too hot.

Within about five miles my legs were telling me that there were tired and aching.  Hmn, not a great start.  After a while they started to feel better – I guess they just weren’t warmed up for cycling.

There were a few groups of people chain-ganging their way round the route but as I’ve said before this isn’t really for me as it won’t reflect how I ride on race day.

I found this a pretty tough ride.  Sharon was armed with her camera at the top of Whiteleaf Hill (at around 60 miles) and when I got to her she asked “Are you alright D?” – I said I was but Sharon thought I looked terrible and really cold.  I wasn’t cold but could have quite happily jacked in the ride about 10 miles ago.  However, if I did take the easy option and drop out I’d feel bad and like I’d wasted an opportunity for some good training.  Deep down I knew that this is one of the most important rides of my training year and it will make me stronger.  Hill wise, race day will be much easier than today – that’s for sure.

After the second feed station at 75 miles I started feeling much better.  All was going well until 90 miles.  Half way up a short sharp hill the bike just didn’t feel right.  I knew I had a rear puncture and hoped I could get to the top of the hill before having to change it.  Within about 30 seconds I could feel the wheel rim on the road so it was time to get straight off and fix it.

According to my GPS it took my 9 minutes to replace my inner tube.  I need to make this quicker.  One thing that slowed me down was unscrewing the CO2 cannister from the holder on the bike.  Next time in a sportive/race I’ll have them in my saddle bag instead.

It’s always demoralising watching people cycle past you as you’re at the edge of the road making repairs but once back on the bike you want to reclaim as much lost time as possible.  In an Ironman when there’s a marathon to run at the end it would stupid to do that but here I knew I could push a little harder – and I’d just had about 10 minutes rest!

The final 15 miles were great.  There were very few hills and I felt strong.

Before long I was back in Great Missenden and through to the finish.  105.9 miles in 6:33:58 chip time and according to my GPS it was 6:19:12 of riding time.  My average speed (when moving!) was 16.7mph.  This earned me a ‘silver’ standard for the ride.  HR wise I was 138 average with 165 max.  Average cadence was 89.

Looking at my 2009 time my average speed then was 16.2mph with a ride time of 6:35:38.  Because of missing a turning this includes 6 minutes extra time, so an accurate ride time for 2009 would be around 6:29:38.  HR wise I was 132 average with 162 max.

So, all in all coming off the back of a big few days of training I was 10 minutes faster in ride time than in 2009.  I even managed run of just under a mile back to the car after I’d finished.

Will I be back next year…. If I’m Ironman training then almost certainly.

The Thames Turbo races are held on bank holiday Mondays so it wouldn’t interfere with my normal training.  I chose not to taper for this race and just treat it like a good hard workout to help back-up a solid weekend of training.  The weekends training consisted of an 18.5 mile run on Saturday, culminating with a 21 minute 5k just to finish me off.  Sunday I was up early for a 2.5 mile lake swim and then a hilly 60 miles on the bike to my parents for a BBQ and family birthday party.

Monday morning dawned and at 5:20am I was busy having my breakfast of porridge and coffee.  After an easy cycle to Hampton Pool I got ready for the start – I was in the first wave of swimmers in the pool and was the 13th person to set off.  I’d not swum in a pool for about a month (having only been swimming once a week in a lake) so didn’t really know what to expect, but thankfully I had a solid clean swim with nobody overtaking me (or me overtaking people).

I came out of the water feeling good (and more hydrated than when I entered the water!) and ran to transition.  Socks, bike shoes, helmet, glasses, race number belt and away I went.  My time for the 426m and transition to the bike was 9 minutes 17, which was 64th overall (22nd in my age group – male 30-39).  Although I was 13th in and out of the water in my wave, there must have been lots of faster swimmers in the second wave, and also people with faster swim-bike transition times than I (my T1 time is always going to be slower as I’m putting on socks and bike shoes here – whereas many others don’t wear socks and have shoes already clipped into their bikes).

The bike was fairly uneventful.  I overtook about four people over the course of the 21km bike leg and straight from the start pushed as hard as I could.  It was giving it my all and no doubt my legs were feeling it from the weekends training but I did as best as I could.  My bike time was 36:20 (26th fastest and 9th in my age group).  Of the people in the first wave of competitors I was 4th to finish the bike.

Looking at the bike leg data on my GPS I averaged 22.2 mph for the 36 minutes or so.  Interestingly (well, for me!) my cadence averaged 102 – all of my other rides this year have averaged about 91 rpm cadence.  Is this indication of me ‘spinning’ faster related to miles already in my legs, or is it just how things are when you bust a gut and race hard for short distances.

After the bike you have a seven minute ‘non-compete zone’ to get back to the transition area and head off to the run.  This transition was pretty quick – throw the bike on the rack, helmet off, slip my running shoes on (elastic laces make this super-easy) and away I go.

After about 1k I met up with Danny and Kirsty who were on the course supporting.  Danny was on his bike and gave me some good words of encouragement for a couple of hundred metres of so (and again at about 3.5k).

Being in the first wave of runners meant that there were very few people on the run course so it was a lonely run with nobody in sight to chase down.  I got some great support from the marshals throughout – especially the children at the drinks station at about 2k and 4k during the run.

By the time I got to the finish I was absolutely spent but very happy with how things went.  After a lovely late breakfast in Hampton Hill I headed home and awaited the final results.

My 5k run time (including transition) was 19:18 (8th fastest and 3rd in my age group) which after the pounding my legs took on the bike I was chuffed to bits with.  Run wise the first km was run at 3:57 pace (although I went past the 1k sign in about 4:30 according to my watch!) and then my GPS splits were 3:39, 3:45, 3:45 and 3:42.  This gives a time of 18:48 (GPS logged 3.1 miles) – one of my fastest 5k’s in months!  The extra time that makes up to my ‘official’ time includes bike-to-run transition and running through the car park onto the pavement (which is when I started my watch).

Overall my finishing time was 1 hour 4 minutes and 55 seconds and I finished 15th overall (out of 330 finishers) and 5th in my age group.  Looking back at the same race in August 2008 I finished 20th overall in a time of 1:06:33.  Update: final results were posted a week later and my position dropped to 17th.

Overall for a race I’d not planned to enter I really enjoyed doing a short incredibly tough workout (similar effort to a 10 mile running race) on what would normally be an easy training day.

The last few weeks I’ve decided to make amends (starting with some better tyres for the horrific road surfaces I’ve been riding on – not getting punctures every ride really does help with morale!).

Looking at my long bike rides over the past two months, things are starting to look consistent…

• 30 April – 86 miles
• 24 April – 86.5 miles
• 17 April – 90 miles
• 10 April – 65 miles (including a 5km time trial run in the middle)
• 2 April – 76 miles
• 27 March – 76 miles
• 15 March – 15 miles :(
• 13 March – 74.5 miles

This past weekend I planned a big load of cycling. I’m not following any kind of training plan other than cycle a lot, build up running as if I’m marathon training (i.e., build up to some 20 mile runs) and swim in between all of that!  I’d entered an 85 miles sportive bike ride in West Sussex, not too far from my parents house.  As Sharon was working all weekend my plan was as follows…

• Saturday – open water swim (first of the season for me), 5km parkrun, 60 mile cycle to my parents house
• Sunday – 85 mile sportive bike ride

Saturday started with a visit to Princes Club – where I did most of my swimming last year.  Lets just say the water was very, er, ‘fresh’, at 7:30am on a cold rainy morning.  I swam about 2km and it wasn’t great.  I’m clearly slower than last year but I’m sure it’ll come back to me in a few weeks time.

At the end of the first lap. Credit: Kath

After the swim I headed over the road to the Bedfont Lakes parkrun.  I’ve not run this since June last year and it was good to be back there.  After a little warm up a large group of us set off.  I found myself in about fifth place early on and by about 2.5km I was in third.  I ran hard and hung on and finished in 18:58, which is my fastest parkrun time in six months.  Things seem to be getting back on track again with the running (even if I’m heavier than I was this time last year – a downside of months living in a hotel during the week!).

Jumped in the car, headed home and got the bike ready for an easy ride to my parents.  60 miles later and a lovely tailwind the whole way (averaged 17.9 mph) I arrived by the seaside at about 2pm.  I got the bike ready for Sunday and that was pretty much it for the day.

Come Sunday morning I wasn’t overly in the mood for another long bike ride but sometimes you just have to get on with these things.  My father drove me to the start of the sportive (the Duncton Sunday Sportive) and shortly after 8:30am I set off.  The condition of some of the roads was pretty horrific, and there was very little flat riding – it was all up, down, up, down throughout.  Although there was plenty of opportunities to get into ‘chain gangs’ of riders – which would allow the workload to be shared amongst a group of riders through drafting I purposely avoided these groups.  Come race day I will be doing an individual 112 mile time trial with no drafting – so I didn’t want to have an easy ride of it today.

The final climb - less than 50m to the finish.

There were a few really nasty hills and after about 50 miles I was really feeling tired and worn out from the past few days of exercise.  The last 7 miles or so I cycled mostly alongside another chap and it was good to have some company near by.  We both pushed each other which got us to the finish sooner.  As I headed up the final short climb to the finish it was great to be met by my parents who gave me a lift home.  If I had to I could have ridden the final 20 miles home but boy I was glad to finish at this point.

The total distance clocked on was 86.49 miles with an average speed of 16.7mph.  Ride time was 5 hours 10 minutes according to my GPS and the total duration was 5 hours 17.  These seven minutes consisted of two fuel-stops and a ‘comfort’ break.

I’ve been doing a few calculations on the published results and after removing the 10 riders who somehow rode at around 40-50 mp/h for the last 20 miles (i.e., impossible) of the 163 finishers I was 40th fastest.  To see how I progressed throughout the ride in comparison to others I worked out my position at each of the feed stations.  At the first one (after 34.5 miles) I was 42nd.  Looking solely at the second segment (from 34.5 to 65 miles) I was 43rd, and in the final 20 miles I was 34th – so although I was finding it incredibly tough, there were plenty of others who found it tougher!  This is all good reading for me, especially when I know that I rode every mile on my own and not in any of the groups of riders who worked together.  Remember…. Iron rusts… Ironmen don’t!

Adding things up, the past seven days I’ve ridden 172 miles on the bike, a record amount for me by some way, and during the weekend I rode just shy of 147 miles.  That, in my eyes, is a big bike weekend.

I now plan a few easier days as I prepare for a 10k run this coming Sunday.  I’ll get another 60/70 miles on the bike before then though.