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 Run
Comments: Supposed to be 3km but garmin measured it at 2.75km, may have been because of the switch back at the turnaround. Felt like 1.5km out, but 3 km back with that wind. Plus the sand was softer under foot than expected due to the sand still being wet. Plus we had to dodge loads of seaweed/driftwood. Really difficult to pick my way through the crowd at the beginning, a lot of bunching going on due to lack of space to run. What would you do differently?: Not expect anything different with a gimpy foot.  Transition 1
Comments: 69th overall. Not too bad, could be quicker if my foot didn't hurt getting in/out of shoes. I've tried attaching the shoes to the pedals and getting in them whilst on the bike, but still haven't mastered that. Fastest T1 time was 23s, like, Fachmie. What would you do differently?: I dunno  Bike
Comments: FFS big time. This is where it all went Pete Tong. Jumped on the bike at mount line, free wheeled down the hill a bit to get clipped in, clipped in easy enough. Took the 1st left hand 90 deg bend onto the main road where we'd travel for 50-100m before doing a U-turn to go on the 1st lap. Disaster, started pedaling and chain came of the front ring. Unclipped and stopped, put chain back on, noticed my front derailleur had been bent in. I tried to bend it out a bit and set off again. Chain came off the front and had jammed in the back cog. The front derailleur had completely snapped and had become tangled in amongst the rear cogs. AAAAAHHHHHHHH. I hoisted the bike onto my shoulder and carried it in toward T1 to inform that I'm gonna DNF for the 1st time :( Felt like crying. By this time a crowd had gathered around, I guess in the hope of seeing some blood :) Me and a marshal assessed the damage and we managed to free the metal. Someone suggested that if I could split the chain and remover the piece I could slap the chain on the big ring and crack on :) Genius, why didn't I think of that, oh yeah, 'cos my brain was frazzled with race jitters. Took another few minutes to do that, thank Fachmie I had a chain splitter and power links on me :) The marshal then asked if I was gonna have a little test ride around to check it out? Um, nope, bets get on with the race. I had a lot of ground to gain, I was now last out of T1 by a long way. It would take me nearly 6 km in order to catch up with the person who was last but one. This was on the 10-11% gradient hill we had to climb up at the mid point of each of the two laps. That hill wasn't nice stuck in the big ring. Basically I had to get up out of the saddle and grind my way up both times. This was not nice to my poor little quads (have a little look at the group photo afterwards to see the shape of my quads lol) but at least I was passing people and gaining positions. On the 2nd time I was coming down the hill we climbed I was about 10 meters behind someone else. They were free wheeling and I was in the big ring/gear pedaling like crazy and was just keeping up, perhaps gaining a bit of ground. This makes me wonder if something is seriously wrong with my bike. Most probably my wheels need a major service, or hubs/wheels need upgrading?? Any ideas. It was nice doing the two loop course because at the end of the laps we rode through Pendine where I got a big cheer off everyone that saw the drama at T1 with my bike. Made me suck it in and push harder. The only problem with the course was the chip and seal surface, the potholes, the speed bumps FFS, and the cars I got stuck behind who wouldn't over take a girl free wheeling down at 10mph the 1st time I went back down the hill. Oh, and the relentless wind, meh. What would you do differently?: Buy a brand new bike each time I race and have a crack team of pygmy bike mechanics on hand to service it hourly. I don't think there was much I could do, I ran through the gears when I oiled up the bike whilst setting up. The only thing I could think of that caused it was the wind blowing the bikes racked up in transition and the derailleur getting bumped. Transition 2
Comments: 79 overall, not too bad but room for improvement. What would you do differently?: Search me?!? Run
Comments: Still gimping along on foot, but not too bad. Main prob now was my legs were wasted from the bike catch up. Really don't like the out and back courses because that 2.5 km turnaround point looks mighty far in the distance. Also, the field was pretty spread out by the time I got there. One good thing, I didn't get passed by anyone on either the run or bike, and just kept picking off people. The wind was relentless on the return journey and my pace dropped considerably after doing the 1st 2.55 km in 12:20. Bit confusing to find out where the finish was when getting back because of people milling around near it. I feel I gave whatever I had and had to swallow a little bit of sick down right at the end, Eurgghhh. What would you do differently?: Grow a pair? Foot transplant. Post race
Warm down: Got my tech shirt, banana and water for finishing, sheez, thanks. Hid from the hailstones until realizing that there wasn't gonna be an award ceremony. Went back to the campsite, showered, straight to the bar and drank until x o'clock in the morning :) What limited your ability to perform faster: Crap bike, crap body. Profile Album Last updated: 2012-12-31 12:00 AM
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United Kingdom
Healthy Life Activities
14C / 57F
Overcast
Overall Rank = 92/149
Age Group = 18-39
Age Group Rank = 44/50
Arrived at Laugharne (Lanrn) on the Friday afternoon. A beautiful place on the South West coast of Wales. The camp site we stayed at was right next door to a pretty little church yard, whose two most famous residents are Dylan Thomas and his wife Caitlin (Dylan used to stay at the boat house in Laughatne and this is where he wrote Under Milkwood). Set up the tent at the camp site, then went to meet up with friends and family at a local bar.
There was a fair bit of conversation going on about the triathlon and whether or not the swim would go ahead because there was crazy wind going on and that rain that somehow manages to fall sideways!?!
To cut a long story short, I had a bout 7 pints of beer/lager and went to bed ( I had been up for 37 hours by this time because I had worked the previous night). After 4.5 hours of glorious sleep, I/we were woken by my DS, whom, after being woken by the storm that was trying to take our tent away, decided it was bright enough to want to play. Another 3 hours of trying to get DS back to sleep, and failing miserably, I resigned to the fact that I had to get up and get ready. It was now 07:00am. Registration took place at 09:00am.
Managed to get down to a car park near the event and fought the wind (20 mph but felt stronger) to reach transition/registration. Usual business of setting up etc. Swim was due to start 10:45 am, just before high tide. We just stood around watching the organisers failing to manage to get past the 100 meters of breakers in order to take the buoys out to their locations. After 1.5 hours of the trying, lol, the RD made a call and deemed it too dangerous for the swim, so it would be changed to 3kmR, 24kmB, 5kmR. Stripped out of wetsuit and put some warm clothing on as we now had to wait an hour or so for the tide to go back out to give us room to run on the beach. Humph... I wasn't too happy about the change, as I'm still nursing a gimpy foot and wanted the swim in order to freeze the foot a bit so I'd get rid of the pain. Hey Ho, suck it up.