Race Report: Swashbuckler Middle Distance

Being woken up at 2am by the howling wind outside the tent did not put me in a great frame of mind for doing a half ironman triathlon in a few hours.  I dozed and shivered until my 3am alarm, sat up and ate the pre-milked museli that I'd conveniently placed to hand the night before.  On my headtorch lit walk to the camp loos, it started to drizzle.  By the time Dan and I left the campsite, it was more than a drizzle.  The weather forecast had predicted overnight rain but it hadn't occurred to me that I'd, in fact, be up 'overnight'!

Arriving at race HQ at Buckler's Hard at around 4am, it was distinctly dark. There didn't seem to be floodlights and all you could see were weary, weather-beaten triathletes in the headlights, pushing their bikes somewhere. 

We found transistion fairly quickly but thank goodness for the headtorch.  There was no lighting and daylight had only just started to make itself known so goodness knows how torchless people coped with the faff of setting up transistion!  Before you knew it, however, it got light, the rain stopped and the wind seemed to die down a bit.  I squeezed myself into my shiny new wetsuit, downed a Torq Guarana gel (it tasted like Calpol and there was NO coffee stall) and huddled together with the other BADTri ladies. 

I'd been worrying about the swim.  The race organisers had sent out warnings about the strength of the tide in the river and how it was 'unsuitable for weaker swimmers', hmmm.  The hooter went and off we all went.  There was plenty of space so there wasn't the usual washing machine and limbs everywhere scenario.  I settled into a nice rhythm and the outward leg of the 2 lap out & back was with the flow.  On the way back, against the flow, you could definitely feel it, but it wasn't too bad.  By the second lap, the field had really spread out and I found myself more or less alone in the water except for this one lady who was swimming alongside me, but about 30m to my right.  The home straight leg was pretty tough and I had to give myself a talking to a few times.  I could see the high-viz jacket of the race director standing at the swim exit from quite far out but it seemed like an eternity before he properly came into view and I dizzily made my way out of the river.  I looked at my watch.  47 minutes, hmm not bad, considering the tide.  Here I am exiting the river, complete with weird grin and face.

I trotted up to tranisition where most of the bikes had already gone.  My wetsuit came off pretty easily but getting socks, arm warmers and gloves on proved less so.  I only half pulled on my arm warmers and decided to sort them out on the bike.  The sun was shining by now but it took a while to warm up on the bike.  I immediately starting getting a pain in my stomach which I hoped would pass.  3 miles in, my chain came off whilst changing gear.  Hmm, that's never happened before.  So I had to stop, get my hands dirty and remount on a hill.  It happened again 2 miles later.  I was getting annoyed by now and losing some places!  Eventually the gears and I settled and I started concentrating on nutrition.  The pain in my stomach hadn't gone away but I could manage to eat my energy bars and drink.  I didn't fancy any gel though so I concentrated on drinking often.  I eventually caught up with Gill and we had a brief but bizarre conversation about wind, bad stomachs, farting, immodium and burping.  This is the norm in triathlon.

I was going at a good pace but it seemed to be getting windier.  At one point I was riding on aero bars, peddaling down a hill at 10mph.  I was soon approaching T2 and I was happy to come in a few minutes under 3 hours with an average of 17mph! 


Aero on the bike.

Cycling shoes, helmet, gloves and arm warmers off. Trainers and visor on.  My first priority was finding a loo and thankfully there were 2 portaloos in transistion.  Heading out of transistion I saw Dan, probably mumbled something and set about shuffling.  My legs felt ok and the pain in my stomach was gone.  All those brick runs had been worth it.  Being at the slower end of the spectrum and on loop one of two, the first loop was busy with the speedies overtaking me all the way round.  I enjoyed this as I love to people and kit watch.  Gill caught up with me, we ran together for a while, but then she left me to it.  Loop one (7 miles) seemed to pass fairly easily and quickly.  Running back into race HQ, the support was great but it was pretty depressing to see so many people had finished already.  Ah well, on I went.  Clouds had gathered again by now and it was even windier.  On a lonely stretch of exposed road, I found myself shouting "F~*k off!" at the wind as I got buffeted and blown all over the place.  There were much less people out on the second loop but I did manage to overtake some.  I felt ok, kept the pace very steady and made sure I drank at each aid station.  I ate some shot blocks and finished my energy bar (from the bike!).  The last section of the run involved a very long and straight path through some woods.  This seemed to go on forever.  I homed in on a guy in front of me and eventually caught him.  Much to my amusement, he had a hole in the back of his shorts.


Struggling up the hill.

Finally I was nearing the finish but not before having to run the final few 100 meters up a hill.  Dan and all the BADTri lot were there doing some great cheering.  Crossing the line I don't think I did my usual arms aloft thing. I was just glad to have finished.  Check out the medal, one of the best on my hook.

On reflection, this was a great day's training.  I shouldn't compare it to last year's Vitruvian Middle Distance (which I did 13 minutes faster) as the course and weather were so different.  I also haven't been specifically training for this distance.  I was definitely pleased with my bike leg and amazed by the 17mph average!  I felt calm and fairly strong on the swim and probably had some left on the run (bike and run nutrition needs work though).  Next day, I felt tired from the 3am wake up call but had no aches or pains.

So onwards from here.  I'm hoping to do 90 miles on the bike this Saturday then the countdown to the Pyrenees training camp begins!

The Return of the Lake, Swim-Run & the Old Specialized Saddle

It's been a funny old week. 

I found it quite a drag heading from recovery week (where I banked a grand total of 4h23 training!) back to full training, especially after my sister's hectic hen weekend in London.  It felt good to be back in full flow though.  I could eat without worrying about how I was going to burn it off again!

Notes from the week:

• My first open water swim of the year in my new wetsuit.  The water was pretty cold but the wetsuit fits like a glove and is incredibaly buoyant.  Great purchase!
• BAD Tri Swim-Run started up again on Wednesday.  I'd been looking forward to this and the main objective was to see if my 400m swim time had improved.  Despite being in a chaotic lane, the swim went well and I managed to shave almost 10 seconds off last year's best.  I reckon I could've gone sub 8 minutes, without the lane carnage.  The 5k run was quite uncomfortable but I was fairly pleased with my total time - 35m08.
• More carange at swimming on Friday.  I was rammed head on by a guy trying to overtake ahead of me.  This made me say the F word very loud in an echoey pool. There was a bit of a scene. I have a little lump on my head. It hurts a bit.
• Latest on the saddle fiasco - I have now gone back to my first bike's Specialized saddle......and after a 63 mile ride on Saturday I think I'm going to stick with it for now.  Tut. 

Andrea and I headed out towards Tintern bright and early on Saturday  morning.  It was sunny and even a bit warm first thing:

I felt good on the ride so Andrea left me at Chepstow and I went back down to Tintern so that I could do the nice 3 mile ascent again.  I do love long gradual climbs!  At Tintern, you get awarded with this view:

Another 63 bike miles in the bag.  The length of these rides are starting to feel very normal now.

I rounded the week off with another swim in the lake this morning (again, in my lovely new wetsuit!) and a surprisingly pleasant one and half hour run around Clifton, the Downs and Henleaze.

Swashbuckler is next Sunday.  I feel ready but I'm absolutely dreading the 5.15 am start.  Is there any point going to bed at all?

Another 'block' done...Recovery!

Another 3 week block of big training (first 'build' phase) came to an end over the weekend and I'm now looking forward to a bit of R&R this week. 


Swimming has been a bit hit and miss over the last few weeks.  Some sessions leave me absolutely hating swimming but then I did have one or two (or three...) where I feel quite 'glidey'.  When I feel glidey, I do like, nay, ENJOY swimming.  Andy the coach is still trying to get me to do something with my left arm, which I have been trying but the arm seems to have a mind of its own.


I started my one of many, I'm sure, hill reps up the infamous and slightly torturous Belmont Hill on Wednesday evening.  Last year, I'd done all of my hill rep sessions on my own so it was a real treat to have my club mate Andrea come over to the hill with me.  I managed 4 reps (it was supposed to be 5 but I had someone coming for dinner!) and the hill didn't seem so bad at all.  Progress, surely?


The week's highlights were my BIG ride and BIG run. 


I was going to do a Friday morning Cheddar ride (Bank Holiday - thank you Will & Kate) on my own but I put an email out there mid-week to see if anyone fancied coming along (thinking there'd be no uptake).  In the end there were 3 of us and it was lovely to have some company.  Although the pace was a bit slower than what I would've liked, it was great to catch up and find some new roads and routes.  We did go up Cheddar Gorge but I was horrified to find that a new Costa Coffee shop had opened at the bottom of the hill.  Ok, they do nice-ish coffee, but Cheddar is no place for chain cafes!  Anyway, it was a lovely ascent and of course I had to get out of the saddle at THAT bit where my eyes always seem to almost bulge out of my head.  This ride, like most recent others however, was spoilt by my ongoing saddle issues.  3 hours in I had started to whinge and was lifting myself out the saddle to get some relief from the quite acute discomfort!  I am still on my mission to find THE saddle.  Selle Italia Ldy Gel Flow and the Cobb Saddle have been no good, so the hunt goes on.  Next stop, hopefully a test Fizik saddle.


Saturday I took part in the Red Kite Challenge which started and finished at the beautiful Nant yr Arian Forest visitor centre.  I was a bit apprehensive about this one after reading some scare story reviews.  Tales of horror hills but stunning scenery gave me mixed feelings about entering...but enter I did so I made my way up towards Aberystwyth on what was a hot and windy day.  11ish miles, multi-terrain race through woods, over moors and past lakes closely watched by the red kites hovering above.  Most of the path was slate scree and I quickly concluded that wearing my Inov8 Oroc was a mistake (they have little metal spikes - ideal for mud and ice but torture on hard surfaces!).  There were indeed horror hills but it was all worth it for the views and I took pride in knowing half my family was from this area.  Here's the best view of the day:

Looking at the results, I came 5th from bottom (ha!) although I was pleased with my time of 2h21.  The best bit about the race was receiving a rosette at the end, instead of a medal.  A nice change.

I didn't seem to become as fatigued during this block of training as previous blocks so I'm hoping my body's got over the shock by now.  What is shocking, however, is that my 'training' race The Swashbuckler Half Ironman is less than 3 weeks away!  3 weeks!  It's odd to think that I spent the whole of last summer training for such an event and this year the same distance is merely a 'training' race.