Ironman Mark

So the scores on the doors for the weekend:

Friday:

- 4k wetsuit swim in pool, including a new PB of 5:22 for 400m

- 40 min negative split run

Saturday:

- 6hr 50 bike (plus some time working out how to get un-lost)

- followed by a 40 min run

Sunday:

- New Forest Triathlon (2hrs 14 mins)

One interesting thing was that I weighed myself before and after Saturday’s bike/run.  I lost 3.8lbs.  But between weigh-ins I drunk around 3.5 litres of water and had a load of powerbars, gels and a couple of mars bars.  So, I lost around4. 5kgs of fluids on my ride.  Wow! 

Part of the reason for this is that I left early in the morning in my full winter gear.  I froze on the first part of the ride, especially in the fog.  But it warmed up and turned into a beautiful sunshiny day.  And then it got quite hot.  And I felt like a boil in a bag.

This makes for interesting thoughts about Lanza though.  I need to make sure I drink when thirsty on the bike.  That should be easy.  The difficulty is going to be on the run. In short triathlons/runs, I don’t normally take any water.  However, I had ago today in the New Forest and found it very hard to drink from a cup on the run.  I think I need to bring my fuel belt to Lanza.

So I did the race today and am now shattered. The race was great. Well organized and well marshalled, a lovely scenic course. Great.

The water was cold, very cold. I started near the front with the ambition of drafting as much as possible around the course. The first person I tried to draft from swam away from me. After 100m I gave up on him, slowed down and drafted off of the person swimming next to me. I followed him easily for the next three buoys until he slowed down too much. I went around him for 50m or so and then tucked into someone else. I stayed with him really well but had to do three or four harder strokes to catch him every now and then. This bloke then helped me swim to the exit. I couldn’t see much as it was straight into the sun.

I think I came out of the water in about 18 mins.

T1 was not as quick as I wanted. Two issues: I stood up to put my bike shoes on. This made my calf seize up, nearly cramping. This was probably because of yesterdays bike and run. The second issue was that I spent ages trying to get my bike jacket on a wet me.

The bike was ok. It felt like I was trying to work really hard but not getting anywhere. I got overtaken by lots of people but the numbers gradually reduced. I didn’t see any drafting but I had to be careful with other people around me. For example, one person sprinted up a hill but then slowed on the downhill and it wasn’t easy to get past him without drafting.

I am guessing that my power was down by nearly 20 per cent. I found it hard to keep the intensity up, especially towards the end. That’s normal though.

In T2 I put my socks on so that took a little time. I was also a little slow, getting an extra drink.

The run was hard all the way around. I don’t think I was going particularly fast but I was going hard. The course was flat for the first 5 mins, then went up hill for the next 15! Then the route stayed reasonably hilly, with a couple of steep bits. At one of the hills, I seriously thought about walking but fortunately pursuaded myself that that would be silly.

I was glad to see the finish. I think I finished about 10 mins quicker that two years ago. The t-shirt was great. Best I have received in any race.

I’ve decided to enter:

- The New Forest Triathlon.  This is nearly an Olympic distance race on 3 May 2009.  I’ve entered it because I want to do a race before Lanzarotte and there are not many to choose from.  It has a 1,100m lake swim and so will be really, really cold.  I did it in 2007 and the lake swim caused me problems because (1) I wasn’t in the lake until a couple of seconds before it started and (2) my goggles kept leaking.  I was disappointed with the bike because it was the first time I had put clip on tri bars on to it for a long time and I wasn’t used to the position.  The run is mostly off road and I wasn’t used to that sort of thing then either.  Hopefully, I’ll do better this year.

- The British Triathlon National Club Relay Championship in Nottingham.  This is on 22 August 2009.  I am doing this with people at work and we are planning on entering three teams of four people.  I haven’t a clue what the distance is:  The swim is either 400m, 500m or 750m, the bike is either 15k or 20k and the run is 5k.  Different bits of the website say different things!