World Duathlon Championships

World Duathlon Championships
Nancy, 23rd September 2012


Preparation

The lead up to this race was probably more physically and mentally draining than any other race I'd prepared for.  Peaking in April for Israel was tough enough but to have a long slog through May, June, July and August to peak again in September made the season feel like a very long one! Since qualifying for this race back in March so much has changed: I have moved house, had 2 new jobs, joined a new triathlon club, sold my bike and bought a new one, fallen off my bike (twice), developed a phobia of running that results in stomach cramps whenever I try to push myself, lost a bit of form and a lot of confidence oh....and I hadn't completed another duathlon since!  I had pretty much ruled out doing this race but then the night before the deadline I suddenly thought, "what if I never get another chance to race at this level ever again" and "I've done so well to even qualify for the race, I should just go and enjoy it regardless of result or position."  So in a mad panic on the day of the registration deadline I paid my £135 race entry fee (!!!!) and decided I was going to become a world duathlete!

TEAM GB!!!

Nancy

The race itself was in Place Stainslas in Nancy, France which was perfect for a duathlon!  With its golden gates and an architectural ensemble so unique, it was listed by UNESCO as early as 1983.  The square was the perfect place for transition and on the final stretch of each lap of the run you could see the transition (and finish) from ages away.  We arrived in Nancy on Friday evening about 9pm, much later than expected.  The journey had been long and tiring and so it meant a quick dinner for us with the lovely Sarah Rhodes and her mum Caroline before trying to get as much sleep as possible (with a 6am alarm clock ring!)

What our Mums do for us! Caroline & Nina at some unearthly time in the morning!

The next morning was spent frantically registering, checking kit, building bikes, practising the run course, doing a recce of the bike course (which was an absolute disaster after getting completely lost and cycling the wrong way down many a one-way street!) and going to a race briefing.  Amongst the hustle and bustle and rush we did manage to watch the elite racing and I have never been more inspired! In the women's race a pack of 4, including GBR athlete Katie Hewison broke away early on.  They looked so strong and I was in complete awe of them.  On the bike 3 broke away even further, Katie still amongst them and they began to lap the field.  In elite racing if you get lapped you have to drop out so one by one the elite field started to dwindle as these 3 athletes showed they were in a class of their own.  On the final run it was anybody's race to win but the Australian athlete had more than the others and ran incredibly to put a massive gap between her and silver medallist Katie.

Elite women's run

As we saw Katie running down the finishing stretch I felt really emotional, rather than feel disheatened to have come so close to gold she was beaming, waving to the crowd, full of joy and happiness with a massive smile on her face.  To see her so proud and enjoying it (despite the fact she was probably absolutely dead on her feet) was inspirational! What's more was she saw Mum waving our flag and took it off us to run through the finish waving the GB flag high.  I told myself that if nothing went wrong tomorrow and I made it round my race in one piece, I too would wave the flag high and be smiling and thankful.  We also used this opportunity to have our picture with Katie (thank you!!!) and later we spoke to elite athlete Phil Wiley who is just as lovely and we spoke to him about our training.  He came in as the highest placed Brit in 6th place (massive well done!)

With Katie Hewison - what a star!

The night before the race I have never been more nervous!  I have struggled this year with putting pressure on myself, it's like the better I've got the more I've expected of myself and I didn't want to let anyone down. Mum and I went out for dinner and talked about anything and everything other than the race!

Out for dinner

The race

On race day I was surprisingly calm.  I suppose everything has been done by then and you're just relieved ot get on with it!  I knew the girls would go off quick so I started off a bit more conservatively and found fellow GBR athlete Sarah Mackness to pace myself off.  I tucked in just behind her and we started off steady before beginning to pick the other athletes off one by one.  The route was a 4 lap run out to a gorgeous park, around it, before coming back into transition and turning around for your next lap.  For some reason they had made our runs longer, adding a dog-leg into each lap which they needn't have done as the run was at least 2 minutes long and was closer to 11k than 10k.  Anyway, Sarah was running incredibly strongly and began to pick up the pace and I was conscious that I hadn't been running too well recently (well, all season!) so I stuck to my own pace and came in off the 1st run in about 9th or 10th.

Just keep running!

I had a quick transition before heading out on the bike.  I'm normally so happy on the bike and use it as a real opportunity to make up lost time on the run but I'm definitely a power cyclist; I do best on long drags or out and back courses whereas this was a 5 lap route with so many corners and was (in my opinion) incredibly technical.  Having had a nasty fall off my bike just 2 weeks before that led to a hospital trip I was incredibly cautious on the corners (literally coming to  a dead stop) before absolutely blasting it as hard as I could again to pick up the pace.  It felt a bit like fartlek training or sprints and I tried as best as I could to go as quick as I could when I felt safe, and then erred on the side of caution on the technical bits as the last thing I wanted was to fall off (again!!) When I got the official results I was massively disappointed with my bike split but that said, at the time I was mega happy to finish the course in one piece and not lose too much time so that's the feeling I'll choose to take forward with me.

Giving it my all on the bike

The second run was 2 laps of the first run and having been too scared to take my hands off the bike to have a drink or gel (sorry Boss!) I was really struggling energy wise to find any sort of form.  My whole body felt like it had siezed up and I had completely forgotten how hard duathlons are!!! That said, I had started the second run in 6th place and held my position throughout.  As I came towards the finish I felt really emotional.  Sometimes it's the hardest races that show you who you are and I felt so proud to have done it and given it my best shot.  I got the GB flag from mum and ran through the finish with it held high! I was hoping for a top 10 finish but anything can happen in racing and so I was just over the moon with 6th, especially as I'm a much stronger triathlete than I am duathlete.

Thanks for the flag Mum!

Review

It was so nice to meet so many of the other age group athletes; Suzie, Sarah, Becky, Kate, Bex, Sam etc.  I was so proud too of my close friends Sarah and Stu who also put in fantastic performances (thanks for the support!).  I am so glad that I decided to do this race after so much deliberating and not being sure if I was really good enough to go and do it but I read something recently that struck a cord with me: "Why seek out the tried and true, instead of experiences that will stretch you?" For any of you that read this; I'd like to say a massive thank you to all my friends at Northbrook who helped me to get fit enough and strong enough to qualify for the GB Team in the first place! Thanks for your support, help, advise and belief!  A big thanks of course to Boss and Boss's boss, Steve Casson for contstantly reminding me to believe in myself, and Mum - for travelling here there and everywhere with me, getting up at the crack of dawn and even staying in hotels where there are no kettles or tea bags; and Chris for putting up with me!!! It's been such a long season for me and I'm so ready for a rest (AND PARTY SEASON!) but until then there's one more race next weekend to go......in the sunny location of Malta!

Proud to be British!

Forest of Dean - DNF

I ventured off to the Forest of Dean Duathlon today to defend my title that I won last year. It was meant to be a good warm up for the Worlds in 2 weeks time and a chance to test out the new Road Bike that I had bought after selling my Kuota.  To say the race didn't go to plan is a bit of an understatement! The run was turned from a 10k to an 11.5k run and was all up hill! The sun came out just in time to make it feel like really hard work and I went off a bit too hard which I soon regretted! I've also had a bit of a bug for a few days (must be Chris's dodgy cooking!) so had to take a toilet stop at 6k but still managed to enter T1 in 3rd place.

My lovely new bike

Out of T1 in 2nd place

I was out onto the bike 2nd female thanks to a quick transition.  I was confident that I could catch the leader who was about a minute ahead and was majorly excited to eat up the tarmac on the new pinarello. Unfortunately, I had been on the bike less than 5 minutes before I was in a heap on the middle of the road! The ride out from T1 was over shales, gravel and loose chippings and was lethal! That with a cattle grid, a loose board, men zooming past in a 'non-overtaking zone', a sharp left turn with gravel galore under my wheels, a car speeding towards me and a marshal who could have done with informing us of the hazards was too much information for my brain to process and as I tried to brake the bike went from beneath me.

I lay there for what seemed like ages but probably wasn't that long.  The marshal then tried to help and pull my handbars back into place and get my chain back on.  I thought I can either go back to transition and seize up or chase the 3 girls that had since overtaken me and get back into a podium position.  I chose the latter.  However, after a little tootle up the road I was soon turning back to ride to the marshal to ask him to help me with my brakes (which he did).  I then set off again - this time remembering Amy Forshaw's inspiring performance to come back at the British Middle Distance Championships following cramp and a puncture (and although she just missed out, I was in total awe of her efforts).  Back on the bike and heading in the right direction I was now in 5th but unfortunately my bike didn't want to play ball.  The brakes weren't responding and I had lost my nerve for cornering.  I tried to carry on as much as possible but when I got to a 17% descent I didn't want to risk it and ran down it instead (a good bit of brick training I thought! Haha!) It was a long cycle/walk back as there was not one single marshal on route and not one cyclist offered to help which was a shame given what a friendly sport this usuall is.

When I saw Mum back in transition I couldn't help but cry, more relieved to be back I think.  There were no first aiders so it was a long drive home to get cleaned up.  The negatives of this race are clearly apparent but the positives are that I gave it a really good effort to get myself back in the race and at least it happened now and not in 2 weeks time in France.  Chris (my hero) has cleaned the bike up and fixed the brakes and gears and it looks as good as new now.

So there's 2 races left for my 2012 season.  I'm looking forward to bouncing back from this and moving on to bigger and better things.

"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person's determination".
- Tommy Lasorda

National Club Relays

Back in 2010 I raced with an all girls Rugby Tri Team and we finished an excellent 10th overall, last year I raced for my sponsored Linebreak mixed Team and we also finished an excellent 10th overall......but this was my first year in a mixed Rugby Tri Team 'Goodwin's Glory Hunters' along with Josie, Tom and Adam and it was brilliant! The club put out an impressive 14 teams (participation at it's best!!!) and the inter-club banter was fantastic!  I think we finished 3rd or 4th Rugby Tri Team which was excellent and it was an honour to race with the ever so laid back Tom, the always smiling Josie and the soldiering on Adam who had a sore calf.

James & Neil sneaking a cheeky run in

It was also so nice to see lovely supporters and old friends: Christa and Anne Marie and their respective other halves who must have been bitten by the sporting bug as I caught them out running before the races started!  My new buddies from Triks were also there with a spring in their step as usual and provided much support, love and banter!!  It's always nice to see my GB Age Group athlete girls from around the circuit too (sorry I didn't find you Helen for that toasted marshmellow!) and I must say a huge well done to the Absolute Tri Girls who finished 2nd overall, Jenny Latham for finishing 2nd overall in the mixed category and Danielle Stewart for finishing 3rd overall in the mixed category.  The talent of athletes was phenomenal.

Chris and I

I didn't race too hard at the relays as it was more of a good training tempo day out in the middle of a hard block of training for me and with the weather being so horrific at times the bike was a case of better to be safe than sorry so that proved to be more of a nice tootle than a hardcore effort (I felt so bad for Adam who was out on the bike when the heavens opened!).  Nevertheless it's always interesting to look at times to see if I'm heading in the right direction, and with a good run (finally!!) I can safely say that I am:

	Swim 500m	Bike 9ish miles	Run 5k	Total
2010	8:17 (old course)	25:13	21:41	55:10
2011	9:26	23:38	21:12	54:16
2012	8:34	23:40	19:28	51:52

I hope everyone else enjoyed it as much as me :-)

Midland Time Trial Series

Good news! The results have been confirmed for the Women's Midland Time Trial Series and with a first, a second, a third (and a course record!) I managed to finish 3rd overall! This has been a great series to be a part of and it's been a nice feeling to know I can give the cyclists a run for their money.  I also finished 2nd in the improvements table and many people have commented on how much I've improved this season......I just hope it continues!



This pic was taken at Mums back in Feb to help get a good TT position, all the hours on the turbo paid off (not sure about the socks though!)


In the Midland Sporting Courses Series, depsite being unbeaten, I am likely to finish 2nd overall as I can't fit anymore races into the season! With 7 events to score, it was always going to be tough to squeeze enough races in but again, I've loved being a part of the series and raced well over the 5 races that I've completed.

Time Trialling back in March

One thing I have definitely learnt about time trialling is that my preparation to detail is uselss! For example, the last race of the series I drove into Birmingham City Centre before realising I was definitely not in the right place for a time trial! A mad panic and a crazy rush to the correct location meant no warm up, feeling slightly frazzled, all my drink had gone in the way-too-long car journey and to top it all off, no skinsuit! I'd like to say this was the only race that this has happened, but this sort of preparation seemed to be a regular feature for my TTs! In this race, where I placed third, I was 5 seconds off 2nd.....something that's definitely achievable with better preparation!  If I do the series again next year, I hope to be much smarter in my approach.  Oh and my efforts got a little newspaper mention (despite the heading being about Bedford where I actually didn't race very well at all!). Now.....time to work on my running!

Anglian Water Tri

Anglian Water Tri
12th August 2012

I have no idea why I entered this race, in fact I didn't even realised I had entered this race (I thought I had entered Cambridge Triathlon) but luckily this race was just 20 mins outside cambridge so the B &B I booked didn't go to waste! Mum and I went over on the Saturday morning to have a lovely girly day together in the sun.  Over lunch we read the race information, how I missed the message before hand I don't know but apparently the lake was infested with killer shrimps and before we could leave transition our wetsuits would have to go in a special solution:

Killer shrimp infestation

This race was without a doubt the FRIENDLIEST race I have ever been to.  People wore sandwich boards saying "how can I help?".  The marshals and volunteers cheered so enthusiastically that I actually thought they were my best buddies! The whole atmosphere of the other competitiors was just lovely too, in fact it turns out I'd already met the race organiser on the GB scene, I saw an old friend from uni, met Barry who I'd raced at Bala, Will who I recognised from Budapest and made a new friend in the form of Sander who jumped out of his Eurocar van beating his chest and singing "It's a glorious day!" What a bunch!

Enjoying the glorious day!

We all started out  of the water for the swim and had a little run and dive in....how exciting! It reminded me of Israel (although I wasn't quite as nervous haha!).  I got clear water straight away and felt like I had a great swim, I felt strong and relaxed and had good form.  Needless to say with a time of 28 minutes I am CONVINCED it was long, especially as I was out the water first female and in the top 10 overall. It was definitely a stronger swim than Northampton and I did that in 24 mins.

I'm on the left of the buoy, just gettin dropped from the leaders but a good gap on pack 2

Anyway I took my time in transition and put socks on to protect my not-quite-yet-healed blisters from Bedford.  Off on the bike and it looked like a really fast course BUT I just couldn't get going.  I definitely still had Thursday's uplanned TT in my legs. I think a bit of complacency creeped in and I never quite got 'on it' but I still returned into T2 in the lead. I got an absolutely massive cheer from the crowd for being 1st lady, it was so overwhelming, I couldn't believe it.



Returning to T2 with quite a big lead

Having lost so much run form this year the one aim of this part of the race was to stay relaxed! However the heat, the terrain and the deceptively hard hills didn't make that easy! I ran the first 2 miles in around 7:15 pace before starting to dramatically deteroriate.  I knew I had a massive lead on 2nd place and found it hard to push on knowing this.  The run was more like 11k than 10k, and a hard 11k at that. Quite a lot of guys went past me but I tried to just enjoy the run and held on to be the first girl across the line!  What a great feeling! This is my second overall olympic distance victory this year.  I am lucky that I'm beginning to master the swim and bike as my run left a lot to be desired! The second placed female athlete, a fellow GB triathlete in my age group, finished just over a minute behind, I'm glad it didn't come down to a sprint finish as my running legs didn't feel like joining me!

Fading on the run

Positives of the race = I really enjoyed it!!!! And that's what it's all about!

Negatives of the race = my running form has completely deserted me.  However, I saw a quote on Twitter last week though, someone wrote "Lucy Hall can't run yet, but watch out when she can!!" I'm not quite (!!!) Lucy Hall, but if I can keep confident about my running, one day it'll come back to me :-)

A lovely prize for my efforts!

Bedford Olympic

Not quite the race I wanted.....

I was very excited to be racing at Bedford, the first of 3 European Qualifiers for the Standard Distance event in Turkey next year.  I had been going really well in training but was really nervous for this. The race itself was in a really nice location with a river swim out to a bridge and back (that ended up being about 200m too far), a nice one lap flat cycle (that was also a mile or so long) and a three lap run along each side of the river and over the bridge. This meant it was great for spectators too and with my Mum and Chris in tow, and Jacqui, Mark, Mark & Rob from TRIKs the support and encouragement would be ace.

When the race got underway I didn't pick my spot on the start of the swim so well and ended up getting completely swum over and cut up.  Girls can be pretty brutal and the older men were just as bad, using sheer brute force to charge their way through.  Later in the swim a woman in the wave 10 minutes ahead had completely forgotten to sight and swum straight into me on her way back to T1! God it hurt! It made me panic more than anything. I think she came off a bit worse than me as Chris said he saw someone getting out with a bloody nose! The swim felt really long and I was out the water in  a disappointing 27.04, about 4 minutes down on what I was expecting, but when I got into T1 I still saw quite a lot of bikes around me.

Out on the bike is where I'm happiest and after some really ace time trial results I was confident I would catch a few people.  The bike was flat and took in some nice countryside lanes.  I felt really comfortable and strong on the bike but didn't really get going like I do in the TTs, I think the thought of the 10k run is always in the back of my mind and I probably hold back more on the bike than I should.  Maybe one race I'll go all out for it and see if I can still run afterwards? Anyway, I posted one of the fastest bike splits and came into T2 feeling good.

I was looking forward to the run as I have been running much better in training lately and have not had recent tummy cramps since giving up gels.  However, on the run I had the most awful cramps.  It's not really a stitch, more an actual spasm that leaves me heaving and wretching.  It would come in starts and fits and then settle a bit so I tried to pick it up during the times when it settled and then was forced to slow down when it came back.  This has been a real pain (quite literally) throughout the whole of this season and something I'm going to read up on and experiment with nutrition-wise until I get it back on track.  A terrible run of 43:57  saw me gradually drift down the field, just clinching the last 4th place slot for the European Championships in Turkey next year. 

I was so disappointed after the race, mainly because I went from an age group win contender to 4 minutes off the pace all in the last 2 laps of the run.  My age group was won by the lovely Ellie Barnes who had a storming run to clinch the victory by 6 seconds, good on her! I was really quite hard on myself after the race and probably a bit of a misery to be around (sorry!) but actually I have a lot of positives to take from it:

• Cycling is becoming a real strength
• Swimming is getting there all the time
• I'm starting the run in a good position
• I saw lots of lovely friends from Eilat and from up north and from old clubs and new clubs, and had a nice catch up with fellow blogger Kerry who had an amazing race to win the shorter distance event, check out her blog:    www.kerryroughtri.blogspot.co.uk
• My old Cov Godiva friend Jenny has made an awesome come back from an injury plagued 2011 to win her age group and come third overall in a brilliant 2 hours 14.
• My wonderful friends Emily & Caroline both qualified for the GB Team next year too (this was Caroline's first ever attempt and both her and Emily are going to kick ass next year!)
• I have finally seen the best way to pack all your kit for triathlons and set up in T1 courtesy of Emily's gorgeous polka dot trolly! Haha!

So there's no time to dwell on the negatives but instead relish in the Olympic Fever and watch how it's really done at the Women's Olympic Triathlon in London this Saturday....can't wait!

Fast and Frantic Fun

After the half-iron I was on such a high, it was great! I felt fit and rearing to go, so much so that 4 days later I was on the M6 on my way to event 3 of the Midland's Women TT Series.  My journey and preparation was pretty horrendous:  As the earlier good weather deteriorated into rather cool and drizzly conditions so too did the traffic on the M6.  4 of the women's series riders got caught up in the chaos, spending over 2 hours stuck in the jams.  Fortunately I arrived with enough time to sign on, get my bike out the car, and start the race! I was looking forward to an 'eye balls out' event following the more controlled, paced event the previous weekend.  Anyway, I set off like a bull in a china shop and didn't seem to fade, which was a great feeling! In fact, when the finish line came it was a bit too soon as I still had a bit more 'fight' in me! I won the event overall and set a new women's course record which I was delighted with. I was closely followed by Liz & Sue who are not far behind me in the overall series standings:

Pos	Name	Club	Time
1	Samantha Anderson	Team Jewson	0:23:12
2	Liz Powell	Mike Vaughn Cycles	0:23:47
3	Susan Semple	Stafford Cycle Club	0:23:50

3 days after that it was back to my roots in Coventry for my running club's 10k.  My sister was doing it too, and Chris randomly decided on the morning that he too wanted to run, Mum and my niece Issy were coming to watch, so it was a real family day out! Despite knowing the route like the back of my hand, the hills seemed a lot harder when you were trying to run up them quickly! I felt tired pretty much the whole way round but it was a good tempo run and the support, marshalling and organisation of the race was fantastic! My fellow club-mate Amanda Deavy had a fantastic run to finish in a podium position....oh to be able to run that fast! My time didn't even place me in the top 10 women but it was still a very enjoyable morning:

Runner	Club	Time
Kim Fawke	Telford AC	35:56
Eleanor Fowler	Nuneaton Harriers	37:06
Amanda Deavy	Northbrook AC	38:14
Juliette Minter	Olney Runners	38:31
Nardia Poole	Kenilworth Runners	38:55
Amie Fithern	Unattached	39:49
Riina Kuuselo	Knowle & Dorridge	40:15
Carolyn Wilkinson	Spa Strides	40:37
Louise Collins	Stourbridge Runners	40:44
Amanda O’Leary	Knowle & Dorridge	41:03
Dawn Compton	Stratford AC	42:41
Sarah Wheeler	Stratford AC	42:44
Samantha Anderson	Northbrook AC	43:06

My sister ran a great race (despite being hungover) in just over 50 minutes and Chris had a great 10k debut in 46:06 which given how hilly (&hot) the course is was brilliant! Following the morning's efforts, some lovely people of Allesley Village had opened up their gardens for a nice afternoon of garden walking, wine tasting and cake eating (that's more like it!).

After these 2 races I was getting a taste for single sport racing again - they're much cheaper and involve much less kit! So on Sunday it was back to another Women's Series 10 TT and this time it was to also count as the Midlands Championships! I didn't come as high up as I would have liked but did work really hard and am racing much more consistently across these time trials.  I always have a little too much left at the finish - which I'm sure will come with time as I get better at pacing.  I thought I had finished 5th overall but the results this morning confirm I was 6th in 24:23 and was the 4th ladies series rider back. 

 

1	Helen Boatman	Team Milton Keynes	00:23:10
2	Rosie Armitage	Team Echelon - Rotor	00:23:24
3	Claire Sadler	Baines racing	00:24:09
4	Suzy Patience	Banbury Star CC	00:24:13
5	Tori Plant	Rugby RCC	00:24:22
6	Sam Anderson	Team Jewson - MI Racing - CNP	00:24:23
7	Liz Powell	MikeVaughan.co.uk	00:24:26
8	Emily Whitmore	Loughborough Uni cycling club	00:24:28
9	Sue Semple	Stafford RC	00:24:46
10	Libby McLaren	Coventry RC	00:24:50

Rosie Armitage now wins the series overall with an unbeaten record. I'm coming 2nd with a first, a second and a fourth but both Claire & Suzy are not far behind with an event in hand.  It looks like it may come down to the final events to determine the final 3.   I've tried to work out points to date, so unofficially top of the standings league looks something like this:

Name		Club	Event 1	Event 2	Event 3	Event 4	Event 5	Event 6	Event 7	Total of best 3
Rosie	Armitage	Team Echelon-Rotor	100	100		100				300
Samantha	Anderson	Team Jewson-MI Racing	94		100	79				282
Susan	Semple	Stafford RC	75	79	86	63				240
Liz	Powell	Mike Vaughan Cycles	50	71	93	71				240
Claire	Sadler	Baines Racing Silverstone		93		93				187
Suzy	Patience	Banbury Star CC		86		86				161

All in all, 3 fast, frantic and furious races that have been great fun. (Oh & I better just boost Chris's ego a little more and say that him & Phil won the tandem event at the Midland's Champs in 20:23, although I think if Emily Whitmore & I had a tandem we'd give them a run (or ride!) for their money!)