It happened! I did it! I didn’t drown, fall off my bike or run in the wrong direction… hooray!!
Back when I stupidly agreed to do Cardiff triathlon (Velindre you’re persuasive… but worth it!) I had the following preconceptions…
Swim: my strongest discipline in theory, and will most likely be my favourite part.
Bike: me and my road bike don’t get on. I’ll be terrified throughout and just have to try and stay upright.
Run: it’s a run. It’ll hurt after the rest of it, but I’m not too bad at one foot in front of the other.
Oh how different reality would be!!
Training for this threw up some additional challenges with 6 months of frankly quite inconvenient health issues that have seen me whack on an extra stone in weight. (I feel like a walrus!) Looking on the bright side that would make me more buoyant and well padded for any bike falls!
The first plan was to get used to open water swimming in a wetsuit. I’ve always been a pool swimmer and my speedy days were as a breaststroke swimmer…. back to the drawing board I went! After a few sessions in the great outdoors and an attempt to re-learn front crawl I was reasonably confident that I could nail the swim at least.
The bike training was just comical. I’ve covered this in previous blog posts, but in the final week I had a confidence break through that left me hopeful I could at least stay upright.
For the run I dusted off my road shoes and pounded the pavements via as much wildlife as possible so I didn’t bore myself to tears.
The evening before the big event saw me setting up a mini transition in the lounge and timing myself whilst Elvis.T.Dog stared at me, confused! I also studied the diagram explaining how not to “draft” as if it was the map to Atlantis (it might as well have been!). I was expecting to be penalised for rule breaking by accident!
Following a registration nightmare (it was a close call, admin errors did not make me smile!) the nerves really kicked in and hit me harder than they ever have before! Cardiff tri is held in Cardiff Bay. The last sporting event I started and finished here was Dragonrun1027, and whilst time may have altered my memory I don’t remember being even close to as nervous for that as I was for this!
At 4am, I was wide awake, unable to eat breakfast and alternating between being snappy and shedding tears! Meeting the lovely men who were parked next to me in transition helped to calm the nerves (triathlon people are really lovely!) but the nerves soon returned on entry to the water. I won’t go into full detail of the race (let’s face it, details can be really dull!), so here are my notable bits…
Swim: I hated every second! The water was like a warm bath, but as the wind picked up and we all started, it turned into a washing machine! I’ve never been in a mass open water swim before, so that was a shock to the system! I survived it, but for the first time ever my confidence in the water was knocked!
Transition 1: soggy! My transition neighbours were there at the same time and after helping one with a stuck wetsuit zip and exchanging good lucks it was bike time!
Bike: I bloody loved the bike section! (Ha! You didn’t expect that did you!) Closed roads helped (even if I did stop at a red traffic light….I’m a fool!). It was raining fairly hard by this point, so the wet roads and tight u turns meant that my language was colourful and I must have looked like a kid riding without stabilisers for the first time! I felt like my bike was my comfort blanket during unfamiliar experience though, we shared a moment and are now friends I think!
Transition 2: even soggier… no transition neighbours present, but I remembered to take off my helmet (one of my fears!) Yey me!
Run: I expected this to feel like hell after the bike, but actually whilst I was pretty much reduced to a slow plod it was ok. It just felt like an inconvenience between me and the finish line! 5 K is a weird distance for me because it takes me that long to warm into a run so by the time I got to the end I was ready to speed up and go off on an adventure! I didn’t though, I got my medal and almost cried with happiness at having done it!
So that’s it, my first triathlon is over and it couldn’t have been much further from my expectations! I’m quite glad the weather was crap and that I did an open water one for my first. I feel like I’ll be a bit less daunted if the memories numb by the end of the week and I backtrack on saying “never again!”.
Massive thanks to the following:
My personal cheerleader… Mr Arry! My superhero! He appeared at what felt like every turn and made me grin like a Cheshire Cat most of the way!
Every single marshal/volunteer and person who yelled support! (It was soggy, but you persevered!)
Lowri: for the good luck fright before I started! It was a little boost that I needed!
Nic Spear: my training buddy, who tackled open water training with me and took me on the bike ride that found my confidence!
Everyone who has supported, humoured and sponsored me in aid of the wonderful Velindre Cancer Centre!
Dragon Run 1027 