As the last race of this series, it seemed a lot of people elected to do the Oly, where they combine the men's and women's races into a single start. This made for a pretty packed course. For the first lap I felt like I couldn't move at all to get around people, because I was too tighly boxed in, which lead to reasonable frustration as I was stuck behind a row of slower people I couldn't get through. After the first lap things got a bit better but it was still difficult to manouvre. I think I swam reasonably well though, and the swim seemed to go quite quickly.

Not sure what I could've done, perhaps started wide on the outside so I could swim with a bit less impediment, but not sure if it would've been faster

Smoothest T1 yet. My suit stuck on the ankle where I had the timing chip, but otherwise it was a nice speedy affair. Had my best mount and foot-insertion into the shoes yet (kicked a shoe off in the last one). Had liberally applied petroleum jelly inside my shoes which stopped the tongue sticking to the top of my foot as has happened in the past. I do wish they'd publish transition times rather than including them in the bike and run times

Nothing, smooth as silk.

I knew this was going to be a dirty draft-fest, but again decided to refrain and just ride my own race. There were MASSIVE packs, and I'd say 90% of people were riding in large groups. This hurt me in the AG placing, but I didn't let it bother me. The ride went really well, I stayed in aero the whole time apart from the turns, maintained a pace that was comfortable but still had me feeling tired by the end. I took 2 gel shots during the ride - one was right at the start (I forgot to take one before the race start), then another toward the end. Drank regularly and was happy with my hydration levels.

I possibly could've pushed a bit harder, but I don't know if I would've gained more time on the bike than I would lose on the run if I did

Went very smoothly. Because my rack was near the transition entry I just carried my bike as I ran. This was my first triathlon in my Kinvaras and the tongue on them is quite flimsy and I had to spend a couple of seconds making it sit right so it wouldn't cause discomfort on the run

A bit of lubricant in the shoes might've helped a little

The run went brilliantly. My legs felt fine, no post-bike jelly legs, and I was able to hit a good pace immediately. I overtook a LOT of people here - my guess is that my bike was relatively slow due to not joining any draft packs which put me behind a number of people of a lower fitness level. I ran the first 6-7km at a comfortable pace, HR around 158, then decided I could pick it up and ran to a 165-170 HR for the final few kms. I was only overtaken by one person on the run, a woman who was probably in the 40-49AG, running at a very impressive pace!

I possibly could've hit a harder pace from the beginning. I was weary about going too hard and running out of puff at the end. I finished feeling pretty exhausted so I don't know if I had much left in me

Didn't do a proper warm down of any type, but thanks to the brilliant location of the race I was able to go across the road and enjoy half a litre of a delicious Hoegaarden beer and some waffles at De Fontaine, a Belgium Beer Cafe. Then made my way to the pool I swim at for a session in the spa


I still feel like there's low-hanging fruit to be picked with my swimming. My pool times are consistently faster than my wetsuit OWS times, which doesn't seem right. Otherwise I performed at or very close to what my fitness level would allow, so it's really just a matter of building more muscular endurance I think.


It's a good race in a great location, but they basically state the emphasis is participation rather than rules compliance which is a little bit of a pain.