Training for a shorter Tri

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  • Pete, you should get a PB on your run with those wild dogs chasing youimage
  • LollipopLollipop ✭✭✭

    Thanks everyone!  I had a glass of wine (or possibly two) and ordered a new tri suit anyway.  It fits loads better and although it's still not the most flattering thing I've ever worn, it's more comfortable than the other one.  And most importantly - they put a bag of haribo in the parcel with it!  Just making lists now.

    Good luck for tomorrow DB, looking forward to hearing all about it.

  • Sat in the pub having a few beers in preparation. Also wishing I was in Lanza.
  • Back home from the Lakes and got the car unloaded and the tents hanging up to dry. Cup of coffee to hand so it's time to write up a bit of a report. Not got the results yet or photos, and my GPS watch a) doesn't do OW swims and b) got a couple of miles round the bike course before picking up signal, so it's not going to be a definitive report. Once I've got everything I need there will be another write-up on my blog which I'll post a link to.

    Build Up

    Rush home from work on Friday, gather up all the kit and load the car up to dash over to Keswick. Got to Castlerigg Hall campsite around 8pm and pitched our tents, got the sleeping gear set up and then straight to the pub to meet the rest of our merry crew. There were 5 of us racing, myself and Mixed Grill, our mate Jon who did his first tri with us last year (the Long triathlon at last year's Mountain Festival), and then 2 newbies, Jon's sister Katie, and another friend Justin. Beer was consumed, laughs were had, more beer was consumed, other people in the bar realised what a bunch of nutters we were and joined us. This had the unfortunate effect of double shots of whisky being consumed, followed by more. I wandered off back to my tent, opened a bottle of Banana Bread Beer, drank half and then fell asleep, spilling the rest all over my sleeping bag, sleeping mat and tent.

    Race Day

    My alarm went off at 5:30am, I turned it off and went back to sleep. "I'm not doing this stupid triathlon" was my train of thought at that point, and would have remained so if the extremely cheerful Katie hadn't started shaking my tent insisting I got up. Coffee was consumed, and my hangover wasn't too bad, but I think that's because I was actually still a bit drunk. Chucked a couple of cereal bars down my throat as I couldn't be bothered making porridge, then got into my tri kit, made sure everything I needed was in my backpack, jumped on my bike and rolled down the hill to the festival village.

    Got registered and then went and racked the bike and got everything laid out, then back into the festival village for the briefing. We were told the water temperature was about 11 degrees (it wasn't, it was warmer) and then sent down to the water in our waves. Myself, Jon and Justin were in the first wave, though we lost Jon before we even got into the water. Helen and Katie were going to be in the second wave, setting off about 10 minutes after us. So we got into the water and headed to the start point, enjoying the pleasant water temperature, and got ready for the day to start.

  • Swim

    Last year my swim in the Long Triathlon here was terrible. It was colder last year, but I don't think that was the only factor. So this time I did what I had done at Outlaw last year and gave myself a bit of talking to in the water. "Calm down, relax and get comfortable. Breath steadily and settle into it.". It seemed to do the trick again and we set off towards the first buoy. I pulled ahead of Justin as he discovered swimming in OW in a wetsuit is a lot different to pool swimming and he switched to breast stroke. Fairly chaotic around the turn buoys, and it got quite choppy here too so breathing became a gamble on whether you'd get a mouthful of air or water. I soon got to the second buoy and turned back for the shore. As I got closer to the exit ramp I caught sight of Jon up ahead, and knowing on a good day he's stronger on the bike than me, and certainly a stronger runner, I knew I had my work cut out if I was going to win our little 3-way rivalry. After a run through the festival village I was in T1 and had Jon in sight, one eye on him whilst getting ready myself, but he still got out of T1 just ahead of me. I had decided not to bother with a cycling jersey or jacket despite the dodgy forecast, so I just had to get my helmet on, arm warmers and gloves on, socks, shoes then grab the bike and off.

  • Bike

    Out to the mount line, and I could still see Jon ahead heading for the main road. I got on my bike and started spinning, finding a gear I was happy with and immediately started passing riders in front of me. I noticed I was closing the gap to Jon despite not feeling like I was working too hard, so upped the pace a bit more and passed him on the way down to the town centre. I had to say something so went with "I thought this was a race, mate?" and off I went. Negotiated a couple of tight turns through the town centre without incident, then time to start opening up, although was nearly taken out by a van who pulled out infront and then speed up very much. Out onto the A66 for a couple of hundred metres before turning back onto quieter roads, a couple of short rises that were put in their place by staying in the big ring and getting out of the saddle, which also put me another couple of riders ahead. Got to look the part if you're going to wear the yellow and black in a sprint...

    The route undulates it's way over towards Catbells, with a bit of a steep but not overly long climb. As I reached the high point I looked back and saw Jon not far behind, so once again time to kick it up another gear and push on. This section of road is simply stunning. Downhill overall, with a few shorts ups to keep you working for it, with views out over Derwentwater and twists and turns to keep you on your toes. Through a village, over a bridge to get to the other side of the lake for the return to Keswick, where a van driver kindly flashed me over. I love this section of road, it's fast and you know you're on the way back. Again it's undulating but you can usually carry a fair bit of momentum and stay in the big ring. This is a section also where traffic tends to get held up as it's a windy road with poor visibility so it's awkward to pass cyclists, which leads to another aspect of racing here I love: overtaking cars. Getting out of the saddle and pushing a large gear to overtake cars stuck behind slower cyclists ahead is a marvelous, smug sensation.

    As I drew closer to Keswick I dropped the gears down and got my legs spinning quicker in prep for the run. Back down to the festival village and into T2. Helmet off, bike shoes off, trail shoes on, pirate cap on and off out on the run. No messing about as I knew Jon wouldn't be too far behind.

  • Run

    It was at about the time I headed out on the run that my hangover decided to kick in with a vengeance. This was not going to be a pleasant 5k. My legs were feeling quite good, my head however was not, and I also had the sneaking suspicion that throwing my guts up was going to feature in my near future. A couple of lads infront of me were going at a fairly comfortable, steady 10:00/mile pace, so I focused on staying with them. The trail took us along the road where cyclists were heading into T2, and a few of them gave shouts of encouragement was they passed, which was cool. The trail was undulating and the short uphills were proving tough with the way I was feeling. A few quicker runners passed on the narrow section of trail, so I was keeping an eye behind to make sure I could make room for them. At around the 1 mile mark I became aware of someone who had caught up, but then seemed to slow. I turned to tell him to pass, and then realised who it was: Jon. Bastard. We matched pace for a while and then he pulled ahead slightly and opened up a lead. He did what I should have done at that point: I should have burried myself briefly to pull ahead, giving me a mental boost and him a mental kick in the bollocks. Over the rest of the run he remained in sight but may as well have been a mile ahead, he was out of reach. I did manage to start reeling him back in but then we hit a short but tough climb and I resorted to walking it. Muppet. Then it was downhill, and passing runners just heading out. Saw Helen and Katie ahead so gave them a high five and then on to the finish. The finish straight (well not very straight) went right through the heart of the festival village, with loads of support. The announcer saw me coming and announced I was the first Pirate to finish and I got a big "Yarrrrrr!" from a few people. Medal and tshirt collected, shook hands with someone who finished just ahead of me who I'd run with briefly, and then found Jon. We shook hands, he consoled me with the fact I wasn't far behind him, and then we waited for Justin. He came in 15 to 20 minutes after us, proud to have done it having realised how much tougher it is when you put the 3 disciplines together (he's a speedy runner compared to me).

    We then hung around to see Helen and Katie finish. Helen had decided to stick with Katie to make sure she got round so we knew they'd finish together. They ran down to the finish with Katie grinning like mad, and then the highlight of the entire weekend. When Jon had entered her, he sneakily entered her under the name "Dipshit", and the announcer's mouth was obviously on autopilot as he read out "And here comes Dipshit Lawton and Helen Brown across the finish".

    Think my final time was around 1:30:00, maybe quicker. 400m swim, 18km bike and 5k trail run. Good event, and in future I'd happily do this one on the Saturday followed by the longer tri on Sunday. Justin and Katie seem to want to do more triathlons, but currently no plans to go any longer than sprint. I'll keep working on that as I reckon they're just the right sort of people to don the yellow and black...

  • mathschickmathschick ✭✭✭

    brilliant report DB, well done! Bet Katie will remember that finish line for ever image

  • Found the results. Total time 1:28:08.

    Swim: 00:08:27
    T1: 00:06:41
    Bike: 00:40:42
    T2: 00:02:16
    Run: 00:30:02

    My lead on Jon after the bike was about 2 minutes. His T2 was only 37 seconds as he had flat pedals so no changing of anything, and his run was 45 seconds quicker. So close.

  • SteadyCJSteadyCJ ✭✭✭

    Well done and great report DB.

    I did a cycle ride this morning and covered 42 miles, with a decent average of 12.6 mph.

    Now I just need a speedy recovery to cook Roast Beef dinner. although I am already cheating as doing new potatoes not roasties.

  • mathschickmathschick ✭✭✭

    well done DB - what were you doing in T1?? My transition times are always rubbish though

    steady - great ride, well done. I intended doing a 12 mile run, but ended up taking my MTB for a 25 mile ride along the trails, stopping for an ice cream half way image

  • T1 involved a fair trek from the lake up to transition, T2 I struggled getting my bike shoes off and trail shoes on
  • mathschickmathschick ✭✭✭

    for ow my T1 is always dreadful - I am rubbish at getting the wetsuit off!

     

  • LollipopLollipop ✭✭✭

    Well done DB and great report!  It sounds like a good time was had by all.

    I have now completed my first triathlon - and loved it!  I had a goal in mind to get under 2 hours, and my official time is 1:52:13, so happy happy happy!  Looking for the next one now...

    Will be back tomorrow with a race report.

  • Well done Mrs! Look forward to the report
  • DB,   Great report and a great time.

    Went out on the bike for an hour this morning, first time on it since Outlaw last year, my arse is killing me ,nuff said.  image

    Mrs L, well done you are now a triafferlete  image

  • Well done DB, nice work

  • Hey DB, that's the most pirate triathlon ever.  Wake up in a pool of stale beer, still gets to the start line and finishes the race.  I hope your rehydrating drink was a bottle of beer!

    well done!

    Come on Mrs L...race report!

  • mathschickmathschick ✭✭✭

    well done MrsLimage

  • Cheers folks, it was an interesting and enjoyable weekend! Written my full report with pictures on my blog here if anyone fancies another read

  • LollipopLollipop ✭✭✭

    I wrote a race report, then forgot to post it, oops!  Here it is:

    The night before the race – I’d had grand ideas that I would be totally prepared and packed at this point and have an early night.  Obviously this didn’t go quite to plan and I went to bed after midnight having had a curry, a few vodka and cokes and the only thing I had achieved was painting my nails port-a-loo blue to match my trisuit.

    Up at 5.30 the next morning (my start time wasn’t until 11, but my kids are early risers), so plenty of time to sort everything out.  Dithered a bit over what to wear, what to take, what time to have breakfast.  Had a few goes of taking the front wheel of my bike off and fixing it back on again before realising that the back seats actually come out of the car so I didn’t need to take the wheel off.  Dithered a bit more, then packed the entire contents of my house into the car and set off.

    Arrived at the race car park 2 hours before my start time and met up with my sister, who did the race too, and her boyfriend, who was our official supporter and photographer.  We tried on a variety of outfits and shoes, then went to registration, where we were given a drawstring bag with a sachet of porridge oats, 2 gels, an energy bar, hundreds of stickers with instructions on where to stick them and some leaflets.  Not a very impressive goody bag with no sweets or anything, but no matter – I’d packed jelly babies in the car!

    I was starting to panic slightly at this point as it all seemed too complicated and although I’d packed way too much stuff (and may have stopped at a shop on the way to buy tissues, talc, etc), I’d completely failed to bring any sort of puncture repair kit!  We sorted all of the stickers, race numbers and temporary tattoos out (are there always that many?!) and headed off to rack our bikes.  At that point we realised that we were at T2, so headed off to T1, which was a surprisingly long way away!

  • LollipopLollipop ✭✭✭

    Racked our bikes and arrived at the swim just in time to hear the instructions and pick up swim caps.  The swim was in an outdoor brine pool which was freezing and I must have estimated my swim time wrong as I was with slower swimmers.  It was a bit frustrating as I would swim front crawl for half a length, catch up to the person in front and then just bob around and do a bit of slow breaststroke for the rest of the length.  I didn’t really feel confident enough to overtake and there was someone swimming up and down the middle of the lane anyway, so I just carried on like that until the end.  As I learnt to swim for the triathlon (from complete non-swimmer), I was just pleased to be able to finish it.

    Ran to T1 and dried my feet and put trainers on and set off on the bike.  I thought I’d been super quick but later discovered I’d been over 4 minutes in T1!  I really enjoyed the bike course and even enjoyed the little climbs.  I’ve never seen so many potholes though and at one point my back light flew off and smashed all over the road so I had to stop and go back to pick it up!  Was kind of glad to be on my massive hybrid/mountain bike so I didn’t have to bother dodging the holes!  The bike seemed to be over really quickly and arrived at T2 just as it started raining.

    Set off on the run which was four laps on grass.  I actually still felt really good and thought I might even be able to sneak under 30 minutes for the run, especially as it was pouring down with rain at this point which was cooling me down.  On the second lap I caught sight of my sister who’d just started running so I sped up a bit.  I started struggling a little bit on the last lap as it was raining so hard I couldn’t see out of my sunglasses (never occurred to me to take them off!) and the grass was getting really muddy.  I managed to speed up at the end for a sprint finish though and as I crossed the line a woman came and gave me my medal and a big hug!

    I really enjoyed it and have already started looking for another one – maybe with a lake swim this time.  I wanted to beat my sister, which I did, and get under 2 hours.  Official time:  swim (500m): 17:32, T1: 4:04, bike (20km): 58:10, T2: 1:57, run (5km): 30:30, overall: 1:52:13.

  • Mrs Lollipop wrote (see)

    ...and the only thing I had achieved was painting my nails port-a-loo blue to match my trisuit.

    .....  We tried on a variety of outfits and shoes, .....(and may have stopped at a shop on the way to buy tissues, talc, etc), ....


     this could be my favourite race report ever!

    Well done!

  • Top reporting, top racing and both your targets smashed! Get another one booked!

  • Well done Mrs L, great report.
  • SteadyCJSteadyCJ ✭✭✭

    Great report Mrs L. I must admit that I tend to end up painting my toe nails the day before a race.

    I went out for a bike ride this morning. Just over 24 miles on a flat route (less than 1000ft of climbing), with an amazing average of 13.8mph, it was just over 14 at one point but the last 3 miles seemed to be into a headwind and I was getting tired so it dropped down a bit.

     

     

  • Well done, keep it up!

    Loading up ready to head down to Nottingham tomorrow to support at the Outlaw Half on Sunday, then I'm off to Manchester for a week. The bike is already packed so I can get some riding in, also packing running gear. I will train whilst I'm away...

  • Nice one DB, Let us know when your in Manc, maybe get out for a ride or run.

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