Strathclyde Standard Triathlon - TriathlonOlympic

This swim was the absolute worst of any competitive swim I've ever done - bar none!

I didn't swim enough before the start to loosen up in the cold water.
I started badly, too far down the pack and got bogged down in the scrum. I then panicked a bit (the guy that has played water polo in the past - eejit!) and took a short dog leg to get out the way. I then plodded away until 1; my goggle lens started to fill and, 2; my timing chip started to slip off about 500m from the start.

After that, I realised what a tube I was being and got the finger out - I spent the next lap and a bit overtaking people in a rage at myself for being such a dumb-ass!

1. WARMUP on shore properly!
2. WARMUP in the water properly!
3. Start at the front - looking at my age group results I should have been 3rd out the water, so have some confidence!

Unfortunately I was in such a rage by the end of the swim, I barely had wind to get out of the water so I had a staggery style walk through transition whilst I pissed about trying to get out of my suit!

Ease off on the last 200m of swim, gather together some proper gumption and shift my ass thru transition!
The fastest T1 on the day was 31secs - that's the target for next time!

I found it really hard to gauge where I was in the race because my swim was so crap - I had expected to be ahead of everyone and be taken by the fast boys, but I was catching people that I should have never had ahead of me and the fast boys were long gone - a bit weird!

What was nice was that the roady types who can't actually ride their fancy bits of carbon were really suffering on the downhill in the wet and the tight double corner at the North of the loch was killing them - XC mountain biking does have it's uses! (bunch of chicken-shits! :)

My nutrition was a bit off - the loch is reknowned for dirty water and tradition is to drink a can of Coca-cola as u leave it, to kill off the nasties! I had mine on the bike - next time I'll take my chances and have a stronger strength carb drink and an isotonic drink available instead - I was definitely flagging towards the end (although the hail storm in the face on lap 5 probably didn't help that!)

I counciously took my time on T2 - I had a proper leg stretch whilst I shoved on my shoes and apart from leaving a gel behind I was happy.

Don't put the gel down! (Stuff it in the shorts!)

The plan was to start slow and ramp it up through the course. I probably started too fast and bruised my ankles in the first 1km - they hurt like hell for the next 2 then it was fine (they hurt now tho!) I sensibly grabbed water at half way, but i should probably have dived into Transition and grabbed my missing gel as well - I needed it - everything was going tingly at the 3/4 mark - not nice!

Ace time tho!

DON'T DROP THE DAMN GEL!

Would have liked to have run/walked the course the day before as well - hard mentally not knowing landmarks.

wandered about a lot - had a For Goodness Shake - stretched for a while and watched some more people coming in - tried to stay warm!


The Swim and then not putting my mistakes in the swim behind me, dropping the gel in T2 and setting off a bit quick on the run (I wonder if some ankle rotations on the last 200m of the bike would help?)


This was my first proper Tri - and the organisation was shit-hot (the only mistake was the race director not having a microphone at the briefing)

I didn't hang about cos my family were all at home, so I missed any post-race doings...

I'll do it next year (1st out the water then tho!)