Triathlon Europe

Simple pleasures

I’m sat on the sofa watching it pour with rain (again) and feeling smug that I got my long bike and transition run in before the downpour started: simple pleasures! Saying that, I’m not feeling so smug about my decision to spend a week training at home, rather than somewhere hotter and drier, before I start a new job in March – I was convinced this cold ‘snap’ couldn’t last...

So I have a week off, and seemingly either a very long, a very intense, or a brick, session scheduled for every day. Luckily I have a freezer full of cake too :o) Hopefully it will all pay dividends at the Dambuster Duathlon on 20^th March which I am using as a warm up race before the tri season starts in May.

My ‘Big 3’ races of the season will kick off with the Swashbuckler middle distance race at the end of May in the New Forest. Then I’ll tackle the Cowman middle distance race in July, and then finish off the season, as I did last year, at the Vitruvian in September. The difference this year is that my elbow is no longer held together by pins (so I am in an infinitely better position now than in Feb 09) and my most loyal supporter, Stuart, will instead be my biggest rival having entered all of the ‘Big 3’ despite never having raced the distance before.

So, aims for the season: 3 top ten finishes (ideally a podium place) and to maintain my unbeaten record against my hubby, Stuart.

Vitruvian (and and unexpected ride at Cheddar)

I did it! Sub 5hr and a top 10 finish :o)

I had a very solid race from the start. Despite a freezing cold early morning lake start I managed to exit the water in 7^thplace after a steady 2 lap affair. I almost got lost in transition as the guy in front of me headed to the portaloos rather than his bike (after only 30 mins of swimming ?!!?) T1 seemed to be going well, that is until I tried to jump onto my bike...which ended up taking 3 attempts as I simply had no control over my frozen legs and feet. Comedy, there I was with my fully bling’d up Di2-laden Trek, shoes on pedals and I almost hit the deck trying to get on er-hmmm....

 

Luckily once I finally got on my baby, she rode like a dream for the next two and half hours keeping me on target for my top 10 finish. I think I came off the bike in 9^th position and basically stayed there during the run. Despite it being my weakest discipline, I am chuffed with my 1h44 ½ marathon split. I came off the bike having pushed it far more than I did at Bala and my back and legs could feel it. For the first mile I swore I was going to take 2hrs to do the run and was never going to come in on 5hrs (I had 1hr47 to do so), but with some words (ha!) of encouragements from Stu I settled into a steady 8 min mile pace which amazingly I managed to keep up for the whole run. Stuart cruelly told me I had less time than I actually did to finish so as not to let me drop of the pace, which turned out to be a good thing as some cheeky girl tried to overtake me in the last 100m. I didn’t know she was there but luckily she got the finish line wrong so I had an opportunity to take back the lead with a full on sprint to the line. A harsh way to finish a half ironman, but needs must!!

 

Brillant. I’ll definitely be racing this distance again next year. Hopefully with a full winter’s training I’ll be able to challenge for top 5 or even podium finishes next year :o)

 

I was supposed to only have one little sprint MTB tri left at the end of Sept, but my recovery week post Vitruvian was interrupted by the Cheddar Bike Fest in which Stu was racing the team 10h endurance event. Unfortunately a friend had to drop out at the last minute, so I took pity on the boys and did 4 laps for them to give them a bit more rest. Tough and technical...despite being in pretty good shape post-Vitruvian, there was far too much walking both up and down the hill...I’m not technically good enough up twisty hills and a complete scaredicat down them. I definitely need to work on my MTB technique this winter!

Tamsyn

 

All images on this page are copyright of Stuart Clark

Bala Middle distance Triathlon

Sunday 14th June 2009

One week on and I am still on a high. A couple of weeks ago when I was starting to feel a little nervous about the race, my sister tactfully asked ‘so why are you doing this to yourself?’ and at the time I didn’t have much of an answer, but the answer was clear last Sunday when I crossed the line with an enormous grin (come grimace) on my face and a feeling of self achievement that I have never felt at the end of an Olympic distance race. I loved it from start to finish.
 
That’s not to day it wasn’t the toughest race I have ever done. Luckily the ‘heavy rain’ weather forecast did not come to fruition and instead we had a day of glorious sunshine. The lake was apparently ‘warm’ for Wales, but a tad chilly at 14 degrees for us soft southerners. The ladies were the last wave off at a very sociable time of 9.50am, so after a comedy rendition of ‘Oggy Oggy Oggy’ we were off. I only managed to stay with the leading ladies for about 400m at which point I dropped off their feet into no man’s lands and battled the small waves on my own. By the turn around point I was feeling a bit tired (2000m is a long way in a wetsuit for me!) but appreciated the surfing effect of having the wind on your side. By 1500m Fi had pulled alongside me (some how we both recognised each other just from stroke/wetsuit) and I hitched a ride on her feet back to shore where she, like a pro, managed to get out of the water quick smart whereas I got stuck in a queue behind some of the men that we had caught up (must ask how you did that Fi)!
 
T1 was a quick affair and I headed out on the bike with the aim of catching up Moffs who was in the wave in front of me. A brief pedal through town lead to the first short sharp climb of the day, my heart rate hit 195 and I momentarily wondered whether I would get round the first mile let alone the 52 mile bike route. I struggled with cold legs for about 40 mins of the bike then a disgruntled voice shouted ‘unsociable git, you could at least say hello’ – I had just gone past Moffs without realising it. I told him to catch me up when we got to the flat and headed off with renewed vigour to build my lead on the hills. About 15 minutes later, as predicted, he whizzed passed on the downhill and so it was over to me again. I lost sight of him on the long down hill to the turn point and vowed to catch him coming back up... but despite my increasing effort he was nowhere in sight and by the time Bala was in sight I had resigned myself to having to catch him on the run (and to putting some serious effort into my training on the flats and down hills post-Bala).
 
So keen was I to get into T2 that I managed to drop my chain with a stupid gear change about 400m from the dismount line so I had to get off and put it back on just to get there. Socks and calf guards later and I was on the run. Felt ok and for the first couple of miles I had a nice chatty chap from Nottingham keeping my company, but I was still on the look-out for Moffs so when he stopped for a drink I carried on and never saw him again. The run at Bala is quite evil; it climbs steadily for 4.5miles then goes up steeply to the turn-point. My aim was to get to the top in one piece then negative split on the way back down. Simple - or so I thought. I felt ok going past the 4 mile marker where Stuart and Rob had stationed themselves.... deliberately so as just round the corner the road kicked up and the long, slow crawl to the top began.
 
I started the descent feeling confident that I could now up the pace. After all I had managed 6.5 miles up hill, now I could just relax and run down hill to the finish. How naive! I enjoyed about 2 miles of carefree running, by 9 miles most of my body was starting to go into shut down. By 10 miles I realised that this was actually as far as I had managed to run in my 3 months training, and by 10.5 miles I was robotically managing to hold on to 9 min miling and counting down the minutes to the finish line. At 11 miles I finally passed Moffs who was walking because he felt unwell. By 12 miles I could see the finish line and a big grin was starting to form on my face, and by 12.5 miles I was seriously attempting a sprint (sub-9min miling ;o) finish. I crossed the line in 5hr21.
 
It was only about an hour after finishing that Stuart told me that I had actually passed Moffs on the bike shortly after the turn point and he never saw me again. He had unfortunately felt unwell on the run so had turned around early on and started walking back. Happily, it made him chuckle when he found out that I had spent the rest of the race chasing someone who was behind me!
 
I wasn’t fast, but it was simply fantastic to be back out there racing and pushing myself to the limit. I missed that last year. I’m now super-motivated and aiming to break 5 hours at Vitruvian in September. A tall order, but I’ll give it my best shot. Over to you Coach, do your worst...

On the mend...

Stu declined my challenge so as to concentrate on passing his final CFA exam this summer; but, being the supportive hubby that he is, he has now become my resident pacemaker on the run and bike and has even asked a mad German scientist to build me a power meter crank....so I will shortly have a new training toy to play with :o)

It’s now 3 months since I broke my elbow and scarily less than 3 months until my first foray into middle distance racing at Bala. EEK! Training is going well though – after surprisingly good bike and run tests last week, I went one better at the weekend, not only managing my first full swim set but also my first hill run session in over a year. Thanks Fi for a great one day training camp. The highlight of course was our hour of functional flexibility which all seemed so simple under Bruce’s instruction... not so this morning when I entertained several bus drivers, dustbin men and a few pedestrians trying to replicate it all using a park bench and a bus stop before my interval session! Hey ho, I’m a triathlete – I am immune to funny looks ;o)

So I’m on the mend and training hard again. The aim for the next month is simply to keep as much momentum as possible over a busy few weeks attending weddings in Malta, Texas and a hen do in Jersey. Then I’m having my pins removed mid-April (they’re a bit annoying on the aerobars), and after that the countdown to Bala begins. I’ve lined up a sprint tri on 3^rd May, followed by an Olympic at Merchant Taylor on 24^th May. I have a couple of local 10km road races thrown in for good measure, and no doubt a 10 mile TT or two. D-day is 14^th June and I’ll be happy just to cross the finish line. After that the real hard work begins as I’ll have just under 3 months to get into shape to properly race a half ironman at Vitruvian in September.

That’s all for now. Ride safe..

 

Throwing down the Gauntlet...over to you, Mr Clark

OK, here goes my first ever blog...I’ve been promising to do this for about 6 months but sadly my ‘I don’t have a spare moment’ excuses are falling on deaf ears now that I’m stuck at home recovering from my accident (hopefully I’ll get brownie points for managing to blog left-handed...)

If you read between the lines in Fiona’s intro you basically have an uber cyclist (Stuart likes this description so I’ll humour him) who can’t swim with a somewhat broken wife who is a typically obsessive, competitive triathlete. Now Stuart, although quite new to triathlon, has been fairly miffed since my dad pointed out in his wedding speech that he has yet to beat me at a standard distance race (some would even say that he pushed me off my bike on Boxing Day...'honest honey - it was the car's fault' hmmm). So I thought it would be apt to start the year with a challenge :o)   Having been side-lined most of last year, my aim for this year is to be on the start line for Bala middle distance triathlon and then the Vitruvian in September; I’d also like an Olympic distance pb in between (told you, competitive). So hubby, your mission should you choose to accept it is to beat me at an Olympic or Middle distance triathlon this summer. (ps. MTB tris don’t count – I make the rules!)

Madness perhaps considering that Stuart can bike and run circles round me, not to mention my current inability to put my hair in a ponytail, let alone do any form of training, but I’m a strong believer in positive thinking so I’m sticking to my pre-accident goals despite the set-back. If my first year being coached Fiona taught me anything it was that a good coach can get you through major set-backs with minimal loss of form. When Fiona started coaching me in January 2008 I had already been out of action with a back injury for 3 months, unfortunately I then developed a knee issue and after surgery in June I finally accepted that the 2008 season wasn’t happening. However, despite a year of injury and huge restrictions on my training forcing me to take up unfamiliar activities such as aqua-jogging and cross training, come September I had still managed a 10 mile club TT PB, raced my first MBT tri (5^th lady) and won my club champs with my fastest ever bike split. OK, we couldn’t do anything about my loss of running speed but to have improved my bike speed/power is a testament to a coach who really knows how to manage injury. Thanks Fi!

I’m off to see the Consultant tonight, hopefully to be cleared to turbo in a sling :o) then the fun can begin. I doubt I’ll be in the pool for a while, but Jonno and Stu still think I’ll beat them out of the water at Bala even if I only use one arm...perhaps that can be my next challenge...!

 

Mr and Mrs Clark

Well they were still Miss and Mr when this photo was taken, back in Summer 2006. We had ridden up from the valley near Lake Passy, France to the top of the Col des Aravis. Yes, the altitude is 1400- something metres.... Stu was riding like Lance that day if I remember rightly, and was a speck in the distance as we climbed the many corners and hairpin turns through the farmland and villages to the summit. He had his feet up in the cafe, with a hot chocolate when we arrived ;-) (hence he looks a little colder than us in the pic)

  Seriously - Stu is an uber biker. And is morphing into a triathlete this season, identifying his swimming for some extra focus and improvement at the moment. He's a natural runner, with a big engine and great power to weight ratio. So he'll have some fun and success racing this season in 2009!

Tamsyn has been in triathlon for a number of years, from a strong swimming background so she is always at the sharp end of races! She overcame many (chronic) injury niggles last year, managing a varied cross-training program with strength training to be almost pain-free. This was a huge breakthrough! After the wedding in November and a few weeks off honeymooning in NZ, they returned to base training before Christmas. A serious road accident before New Year has put Tamsyn's training a little off the pace while she mends a broken elbow. She bravely came through her operation this week to have it pinned and plated. So there'll be more from Tamsyn very soon, as she's suddenly found herself with a little more free time than usual!

End of little intro blog ;-) more to follow from Tamsyn & Stu