6th at London Triathlon 2011

Most of the events I do are for a personal challenge and to try out something new. London Triathlon, however, was different. Since Mark talked me into it, on the basis of having a fast bike course, I set it in my head as an event where I wanted a PB.

I hadn’t realised the London Triathlon was the largest in the world with some 10,000 plus competitors. The scale of the setup at the Excel Center was quite something.

My age group was so large that the swim was broken into two waves but even then the start was crowded punch up. Swiming in the dock was a far nicer experience than I’d expected. I couldn’t taste gasoline from City Airport and the salinity helped buoyancy.

My goggles fogged up from the off and I couldn’t see more than 10 meters. I’m pretty sure spectators must have had a laugh watching me zigzag until I found the marker rope. Once I found that I hardly had to look up and focused on my technique. I felt like I was swimming well but the course seemed to go on forever. I later found out there is some debates about the length of the course.

Transition one involved running with your bag in a wetsuit, up a flight of stairs and through the hall. Thankfully no one had wiped away my talk marker and I found my bike quickly.

This was my first race wearing an aero helment. My recently purchased Giro Advantage, fitted with a visor, fitted well and I didn’t over heat. The only thing I noticed was the extra noise from my breathing. I felt in my own world with the race going on inside my helmet.

I was expecting a flat course but, although there wasn’t a hill in sight, the undulations of overpasses and tunnel exits made keeping the power down hard work. By the end of the first lap I was in a tussle with another rider. He got me on the slopes but I caught and broke away on the flats. The helmet made a difference, be it aero dynamically or psychologically I don’t care. Racing through Limehouse tunnel at 50+ kph in fully tuck was every bit as good as Mark had led me believe.

I narrowly beat my competitor into T2 and pulled away with a faster transition time. The thought of 4 laps in the heat got to me as I struggled to settle into my first lap. The tight course with sharp turns didn’t help either. For such a large event a track wider than a single carriageway would have been nice. There were people everywhere and dodging the walkers took some effort.

My second lap felt worse with my chest tightening. I knew I wasn’t going as fast as I could but I just couldn’t push. On the third lap I caught sight of Mark so had something to aim for. It brought back memories of Nice as we high-fived on the double back.

I finished with reserves and now my challenge is to convert the speed I have in track running to the 10k post bike.

Based on this and my Windsor result I’m starting to delude myself into thinking I might have found something I’m actually good at. We’ll see how Bala standard goes!