Tuesday, 9 September 2014

Three races in three weekends

23.08.14 National Club Relays, Nottingham, 3rd team
31.08.14 Skipton 2 Sprint Triathlon, Skipton, 1st woman
06.09.14 Sundowner Sprint Triathlon, Allerthorpe, 1st woman

First up was the National Club Relays. I was competing for RedVenom.co.uk along with Doug Roberts, Phil Wolfe and Grace Hobbs. I'd never done the club relays before so I didn't really know what to expect, but lots of people had told me that it's a great event. They were right. It was absolute chaos at the same time though with hundreds of people taking part, 5 different transition locations, 4 people on each team, 3 disciplines each, 2 laps of the bike course and 1 rubber band per team to act as the relay baton. But somehow, we managed to get our rubber band from start to finish without any dramas and finished  3rd in the open category, beaten by 2 all male teams. I don't quite understand why as a mixed team we were competing against all male teams, but others seemed to be confused as well, so hopefully the rules will be ironed out for next year as I'd love to do it again. Results here (SAT AM RESULTS)

The following weekend I drove over to Skipton for the second Skipton Triathlon of 2014. I also competed at Skipton earlier in the year so I had a target to aim for. In April I was 1st woman and 19th overall in a time of 1.08.19. This time I was 1st woman and 6th overall in a time of 1.09.11. I was disappointed to be a bit slower than I was earlier in the year, but happy to be first woman again and finish higher up the field against the men. The weather was great on race day, I didn't feel great on the swim or run but I enjoyed the hilly bike course and the friendly atmosphere at the event. Results here

At Skipton I won a free entry into another Freebird event so I decided to enter the very next one which took place the following weekend at Allerthorpe, the Sundowner Sprint Triathlon. This was again a course I had done before. The last time I competed there though was back in 2011. I remember overhearing someone commenting on my result "Look this girl must have got a puncture, she had the fastest run and swim but was almost last on the bike". Actually I didn't have any mechanical problems I just hadn't done much cycling. This time my cycling matched my running and swimming so a bit of an improvement from three years ago!
The weather was a complete contrast from the previous weekend, it was damp and drizzly all day but the atmosphere was just as good if not better. I had a good swim and was sitting on the lead man's feet by the end of the first of two swim laps. A fast exit from the water and smooth transition meant I went out on to bike course with a 35s lead over the next person and it was quite a strange feeling for me to be leading the whole race for the first 2/3 of the first bike lap. In total four men passed me on the bike course, so I came into T2 in 5th. I felt good on the run and passed one man early on to move into 4th, I then set about chasing down the man in 3rd but I ran out of road and finished 7 seconds behind him but 1st woman. Results here

My next triathlon and my final one for 2014 will be a European Cup race in Madrid on the 21st September.

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