As it was only my second Tri (I've done a couple of sprint Aquathlons as well) I'm still pretty poor at picking the right spot to enter. I know I am about MOP ability wise but hate both shortfalls of picking the wrong starting spot... swimming into slower swimmers / breaststrokers or getting swum over/pummelled by quicker people carry roughly similar levels of enjoyment for me! I decided as the field was a bit smaller than the OD race I did here in May I would go about 6 rows back on the wide (right) side of the course.
Worked out very well with literally only 2 nervous people to pass in the first 200m on the wide side against the ropes and then I was into a rhythm and found some feet. After about 600m I realised one of the people I was drafting was a woman from the same Tri training group as me, and as she's known as a good swimmer and recently podiumed in the Singapore Sprint series, if I could stay put it was a good thing! I was managing that pretty fine for the majority of the time, and the occasional toe tickling I was getting from behind told me we had a nice little line going. Unfortunately out of nowhere a guy from the left hand side swam across us almost at a right angle to the direction the pack was heading in, literally T-boning the line. The woman I was drafting nearly took his head off I think as it was impossible to have seen him coming, and that shook things up for a few strokes for all of us. As we got back into shape T-bone man (who had veered sharply off to the left again) came sliding back across, this time into the side of me as I'd moved up to alongside my draft-donor. We swam in an ever-diminishing wedge with the woman on my right conceding no quarter in a straight line and the directionally challenged dude on my left slowly inching across despite a couple of gentle nudges to make it obvious I was there. The sandwich got quite uncomfortable and T-bone guy clearly had no intention of getting with the program at all, so I hammered out 10 very hard strokes and gapped him a few metres. To my amusement the woman on my right chose the same moment to do the same and we regrouped with me in draftee position almost directly afterwards. After the second buoy turn we had to double back on ourselves a short way before swinging round another buoy towards the beach and it was at this point that I realised just how many of us were bunched together. Where did all these people come from I remember thinking! As people put the afterburners on with mega-kicking galore going on I was slightly gapped in the last 150 or so, and trotted onto the beach about 15 seconds behind the woman I'd drafted for most of the swim. Only niggle other than the directionally challenged guy was that something on my trisuit was chafing my underarm / inner bicep on my right side and I'd rubbed it pretty raw over the course of the swim. I thought I'd used the world's largest dose of Body Glide known to man before the race (I'd chafed my hamstrings badly during my OD race and in swim/run bricks in this suit), but had not ever encountered this before. I know for next time!

Was delighted to see Mrs P and a couple of the kids screaming go daddy go from RIGHT next to my swim exit. Such a lifting moment and I knew from my wife's comments that I must have gone ok swim wise before I looked at the watch. I'd got 40-48 mins in mind for the swim so 44 on the beach felt pretty good for starters and I felt pretty comfortable to boot.

Body glide my under/inner arm where it can catch on the seam of my tri suit (or perhaps get a swim stroke analysis 'cos I'm not sure it should be rubbing that much anyway!). Put in more training and go faster of course!

I made darned sure I wasn't dropping or forgetting anything in my T1 bag here, and made sure the sunscreeners got my shoulders again. I put on socks and gloves for the ride here as I felt the extra minute lost would benefit me comfortwise going through the bike leg. It's hot, humid and hilly here and I feel more confident having gloves on the brake hoods / aerobars and hoped this would translate to time gains on the downhills etc.

Drop the socks and gloves I guess is an obvious one, so get comfortable training without them, perhaps add some grippy tape to my aerobars etc. In the context of a race this length spending 4 mins compared to 1.5 doesn't bother me hugely at the moment - but if I was aiming for a specific time and missed it by 2 mins it most certainly would!

Woah, they lied about the course! Flat they said! Fast bike leg like Roth they said! Pah! I've done the queen stage of the Tour de Bintan bike race before and therefore knew that Bintan has a lot of rollers in very frequent sequences, but the pre-race intel from the organisers was that the course was much flatter than the Tour (they organise that too) and included some really fast flat sections. Well, there WERE some flat parts with a nice chance to get into a rhythm, but sadly for me they came after I was already feeling pretty cooked!
I realise now that I was well under-prepped for the bike leg of a race this distance, regardless of the hills, and I'm also niggled by the thought that my bike fit is probably not optimal. I've been fitted and measured by the local bike shop who *seem* to know what they;re doing, but I felt like I had little 'oomph' in my legs from quite an early stage and I was suffering from lower back ache (not so much traditional backache as muscle fatigue in the back muscles you recruit whilst seated climbing...) literally from km10 or so. Dark thoughts clouded my mind at this stage ("how am I gonna finish this bike leg with my back like this? What state will I be in come run time if I'm this fried after 10 clicks? I'm gonna be last on the bike leg I know it!" etc etc), not helped by a SILLY fuelling decision. How many guides say it - DON'T CHANGE your eating plans or fuel in a race, so muggins here decided that it would be better to use a PowerBar (Banana flavour) as my first fuel on the bike after settling down etc. Urgh. I felt like Alex the lion on Madagascar after he lands face first in the beach and cops a mouthful of sand. (See before - 3 small kids equals many viewings of Madagascar per month!)
Having NEVER eaten a PowerBar before I was peturbed to have a gritty, grainy mush in my mouth that also seemed to prevent easy chewing or swallowing. Why I felt this was a good shout, given I had been using GU gels without any problems whatsoever during training, is beyond me. I think the "Cramp busting Electrolytes" flashline on the pack hooked me. Darned advertising gurus had me there. Anyway, this added to my dark mood after 10km as I was feeling a bit sick from that and wondering if I had messed up my nutrition for the rest of the race.
Thankfully the hills abated somewhat after the first 20 clicks and I began to feel a bit more comfortable, albeit still a bit empty power wise whenever the road was anything other than pancake flat or downhill. The nausea passed though and I was managing to get hydrated relatively well. First aid station at 30km was a small shock though in that the water was not cold? Another mistake was keeping my snazzy insulated bottles on the bike, meaning there was no way I was chucking/replacing them with the event ones, so I had to quickly stop and refill. Pouring tepid water into insulated bottles seemed quite a waste and it wasn't a super taste experience either! I've not downloaded my Garmin data yet as I've been too busy at home (see 3 kids, above!) and am cheekily doing this from work, but I am guessing 30-55 were about my best kms on the ride as the roads were flattest here and I was feeling ok. I stuck to GU gels for the rest of the ride and they worked fine, and the aid station at 60 clicks had nice ice cold water. I refilled both bottles and kept one in my back pocket for a few km which went over my head when the sun came out to play (we'd thankfully had quite a bit of cloud cover to this point, even a few fat but isolated rain drops).
At about 55km I found a guy sitting by the roadside with his head in his hands and his bike on the floor. I pulled over and checked if he'd crashed but he said he was just having a hunger knock and needed to sit down. I offered him any of my gels or chomp chews, electrolyte drink etc. but he declined and said he just needed a few minutes. I didn't catch his race number but I do hope he made it in the end. I left him with a promise to see him on the run in a bit, and began feeling marginally better (as despite the tired back muscles and ever-slowing average speed I was not feeling all *that* bad).
One of the Tri group coaches was draft marshalling around 60km and his "two thirds of it is done Mark go go go!" did lift my spirits. People are unfailingly supportive at these events I notice and it really does make a difference, to me at least. I try to return the favour and when a couple of women ripped past at km65 I gave them both a "great job! looking really good!" whilst silently cursing my back and legs to myself of course :)
Another lady from my Tri club pulled alongside at one point along the way, told me to keep up the good work, and then ploughed on ahead, disappearing pretty fast, and I began to wonder who WOULDN'T overtake me on the bike leg at this stage! (She went on to win her AG, nice one Kim...)
I had guessed I had come out of the swim around MOP, and I was thinking there couldn't be too many behind me any more, when a few guys came past in quick succession. One said "nearly there, c'mon mate!" and I was thinking... buddy, I AM trying to c'mon here! But appreciated the gesture anyway of course.
I recognised one of the other guys from the Tri club too and knew he'd come out of the swim at exactly the same time as me as we'd said hi in T1 - the first heartening thing about the bike at this stage then was that I'd stayed in front of him for 75km and he was now only coming past me when I felt like I was crawling, and I reckoned / hoped I would be able to take something back on the run, if I ever got there....
One slightly strange moment when we were 7 or 8 clicks out, well two strange moments actually. I kept a couple of guys in sight that had overtaken me and then it happened - I OVERTOOK someone else, for the first time in like 75km! (not including the guy who'd bonked obviously). I had to double check this dude had a race number on and wasn't a tourist out for a spin, but no, he was one of us and I'd really just gone past him. Bizarre, especially as by this point the "hills" (they're only rollers really!) had reduced me to a small chainring, biggest sprocket 9-12kmh wobble. Anyway, the other strange thing occured at a potential turn point. Up until this stage, at every single road junction, turn, oddly shaped tree or just about anything which could confuse or cause you to veer off course, there were marshalls and officials and massive signs showing the way. The course was signposted to the point of excessive clarity throughout (which I like, a lot!), but suddenly 7km from goal, at our most tired and possibly confused if you're like me, we had a piece which was far from clear, with no marshalls or support or signs! The road *appeared* to go straight on to me but the two lads in front took a slip road to the left instead. I did the obvious and followed them ('cos they know the way, right?) and thankfully this turned out to be the case (the main road part that continued to the right actually dead-ends shortly afterwards, I found out the next day on the bus to the ferry), but it was confusing to me that we suddenly has this potential pain in the backside junction unmanned so close to goal.
Once inside the resort grounds the draw of T2 was giving my legs a bit more juice, and I was really hoping I'd see the kids (although I knew it might be tricky, they can't be expected to wait around for hours waiting for Daddy to finally roll in!). I went past Belinda Granger, who was leading the women's full IM run at that point, gave her a big GO BELINDA shout and she gave me the most massive smile and thumbs up imagineable. Legend she is. Anyway, with all this going on and only 88 clicks showing on the Garmin and bike speedo I nearly missed the sharpish turn into T2, spotting it when I was almost past it. I'd expected a 1km "distance-make-up-loop" past T2 or something, given they'd used the tactic at the OD race in May, and I was surprised to see the course come up 2km short.So, a rather over zealous handful of brake saw me locking up the rear end and going sideways (that brief moment where you *know* you're about to test the tarmac/hip interface thankfully didn't come though) and having survived that I saw my little lad and my wife. Never have I felt such a rush of joy replacing tired and aching muscles all over in a flash! I cycled at walking pace whilst he ran alongside me screaming go daddy go excitedly, and missus told me I looked great (I didn't feel it, aside from the happy juice that was suddenly flowing). I got off the bike, wincing at the two spots inside my trisuit that also got missed in my Body Glide-athon earlier (yep, the contact points to the chamois seam, DOH!) and ran down the slope into T2. Got a massive "SUPER JOB MARK" from one of my club coaches who was running past on one of his run loops at an unfeasibly good pace.

Not change nutrition plan on race day, silly sod! Not bother taking flashy insulated bottles... yes they keep your fluids cool but make refuelling a much slower affair than needs be.
Lot more bike training needed. More Mount Faber and Rifle Range Road hill loops (we don't have a lot of hills in Singapore otherwise). Get some longer rides in, focus on seated climbing.
Get another bike fitting done, by a specialist, and see if my position is right given I'm as flexible as a doorpost and quite vertically challenged. Consider fitting small engine to the bike :)

A volunteer grabbed my bike to rack it, and another one sprang up with my T2 bag. I got a massive shout of "go Mr P!" from Trudy one of the Tri club running coaches (I train with the Tri group that organised this event, i.e Metasport), and another one from coach Dillon as I sat on a chair and got my shoes changed. Dillon had recently towed me round 60km of a Round The Island Sunday ride in Singapore after the rest of the group dropped me, and I think therefore knew I might have found the bike a challange here!
I changed socks here too as I felt dry ones would be a good starting point (read a few articles which mention blisters from wet socks!), and just remembered to take my gloves off as I was about to set off. Not very smooth!

Not a lot. I definitely don't think I can run without socks for this distance, although looking at the splits of some of the fast people I guess that is the done thing.

Loved the run course, with three loops allowing me to see my wife and little cheering section several times along the way! Support from all around the resort was superb and the aid stations were well spaced, well stocked and well staffed. The volunteers were great all around the course but it's definitely a help when they're particularly cheerful and helpful at this stage of the race.
The first couple of clicks were a bit surreal really. My mind was a bit numb not to mention my legs, and the Garmin flashed me a couple of pretty alarming splits for those first couple of kms (8.15 and 7.45 from memory). Alarming purely as I'd hoped to do ~6min pace and this was clearly not on the cards given my fatigue from the bike so I just decided to try and get into a rhythm and see how much I could pick it up. Now as mentioned I've not downloaded the Garmin data yet but I definitely saw a few 6.05 and 6.10 kind of kms click past and I felt good about that. Bastian, another coach from Metasport (who went on to place 3rd overall, massive congrats to him!) made a big effort to encourage me when he went past me in the opposite direction, clapping and shouting me along with some complimentary comments on my form and pace (on his way to a 1.39 run split no less!). This kind of stuff shouldn't make much difference I guess but at those moments the small things do matter to me!
An American couple saw me three times on the course in various spots and the woman was particularly great at shouting ("go bib 317, great job, great cadence, don't forget some fuel, EAT that banana you're carring buddy!").
I was slowing to a walk for every aid station (6 times per 7km lap) and taking cola (not flat, not great...) and water plus sponges from each one. I guarded my feet judiciously, avoiding getting them wet because at least three Tri guru articles I'd read said that blisters would follow. Naturally a guy slipped with his water at km 5 and sploshed a whole cup right over both of my feet anyway! Despite sounding like I had a frog in my left shoe and a cricket in the right, I didn't get any blisters anyway :)
I was trying to take the small sweet mini bananas at almost every station (I read somewhere they were good for helping avoid cramp as well?) and was happily munching them on the run in the main... until about km 15 when I started to feel like.. that's it, no more of these now... I took a slice of banana cake, and a salty biscuit but kept running with one mini banana clenched in my left mitt for the last 6km. It became my lucky mascot banana to an extent... I kept it there as my guardian banana until 20.8km and the chute was in sight. Never has one little yellow fruit lent such support to a person. I feel a bit bad for chucking it before the finish now :)
I saw Mrs P and my younger daughter waiting for me just before the chute... as there's no strict rules about being unaccompanied in the chute here I took the littler lady by the hand and we ran up the carpet... she was absolutely delighted despite getting the finish banner right in the face as we crossed the line. She had apparently just done the iron race just like Daddy and was rightly proud of herself :) The announcer gave us a big shout as he had been for everyone all day... another great element among the generally very good organisation side of things.

Not much; perhaps ignore the Garmin a bit for the first few KM and just settle down after a tough bike ride. Worrying about splits being a minute or two too slow at that stage doesn't help much!
Not abandon my lucky fruit mascot 200 metres from home.

Sweaty cuddles and kisses with the kids and Mrs P. Picked up finisher tshirt and walked the bike back to our room. Congratulated a few people on great efforts and that was it for my warm down! Oh and a cold Tiger beer in the pool by the villa sometime later :)


Clearly not done enough bike work, in terms of base miles or in terms of strength work. I'll be working on this first and foremost, because it will surely help my run if I can arrive in T2 without being totally shredded by the bike.


I give the race itself a great rating because the organisation, crowds, location were all superb. The course is beautiful and when you live in Singapore it's easy to take Bintan for granted (its less than an hour away by ferry) but the place is very picturesque. The screaming cheering crowds in every village and by every school on the bike run are both humbling and uplifting.
My own conditioning not being up to it in the manner I'd have preferred is not worthy of marking the race down, it's a great course!
I can't express how much the support all round the course meant, and how enjoyable it made it even though it hurt!