Before I started, I had all these big ideas about how I should be in with a shout for the bike prime of €250 but in reality, I had no idea how I would feel in the race - a lot of me just wanted to get round in a respectable fashion. When the claxon sounded and we all headed off, it was definitely a much more relaxed environment, either that, or my swim start position was too far out. I basically cruised to the first buoy with hardly any contact and then just decided to keep pushing at about the same pace for the rest of the race. I felt strong all the way round in the swim, I should probably kick some more in the wetsuit, but I suppose there is always the trade-off with tiring the legs. In the end, I exited the water feeling really fresh and I was pleased to see that I had swam about 26:30, so that was roughly where I wanted to be, I certainly did not feel tired anyway and I was ready for the bike.
The bike course had been extended by about 5km this year so that we were now going to ride pretty much the correct distance. Out on the bike though, I very quickly decided that I was not going to go hell for leather and try and catch as many of the pros as possible. By just cruising along, I had caught a fair few of them and made up a good few places but it was not long before I was pretty much maintaining my position within the field. I could see at the turn points that the pros were not exactly putting much time into me, so I just decided to stay steady for the rest of the ride.
Thankfully, I found that averaging just under 40kph (it was a pretty windy day) was not hard really and my Garmin shows that I maintained about 15bpm lower than I would if that had just been a bike ride. I did however take a tumble on one of the roundabouts going out of Oriente. For some reason, it was the only wet place on the course and I am not sure how it happened, but before I knew it, I was on the deck, sliding across the floor. A scar on the shin, ankle and bum - but, at least the bike seemed okay and I was able to get back on and continue with the race.
The main reason behind the energy conservation strategy was that I did not want to make a fool of myself on the run. My running has been no where near as structured and regular as I would have liked recently, largely because I have been focusing on the bike. My last run of more than 12k was when I did Milton Keynes Half - so a long time ago and hence running a half off the bike was not going to be too much fun. I had decided to try and get to 15kph as quickly as possible and then try and maintain that for as long as possible.
In the end, I managed to hold it for about 10k and then I definitely started to slow down quite a bit as my lack of running took hold of the legs. Still, the 4 lap layout of the run helped a lot as it was easy to break the race up into manageable chunks. In the end, I managed to go under 1:25 for the run, albeit, it was about 800m short - so, about a 1:30 half I think.
Finally, some 4:13:47 after starting off, the race was over. I had managed to complete my first middle distance race and, all in all, I was pretty pleased with how it had gone. I finished 16th overall and of those that were in front of me, 12 of them did triathlon as their full time jobs - well, they were entered as pros anyway. So, I was 4th of the Age Groupers so not a bad out at all. The next middle distance race is Antwerp in August. I am planning to concentrate pretty much entirely on my running for about a month before then though as I really need to make some big improvements if I plan to race well there. Thankfully, the National 25 and Team Time Trial will be out of the way by then.
Garmin Output is HERE
1 comment:
hey rich, i saw your result on tri247. great performance, you must be well happy. all the best with the time trials. iainm
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