How I became to be a triathlete.
My plan for 2012 is to train and race full time at middle distance triathlon.
I am quite a newcomer to the tri scene and realise there are aspects I need to improve on, mainly the swim!!!
To date I've raced 5 duathlons. The biggest which was my first race was the London Duathlon in Richmond park, this being the worlds largest duathlon. Having only owned a bike for 5 months, I set about my training and went to the event with a hope of finishing in the top 100.
When I read the official results and found I had finished 16th overall, I was seriously shocked.
This result got me thinking...... And so over the winter I spent many long hours out on the bike and running trying to improve my transition times and off the bike run times.
When the new year arrived I signed up to the Winter Duathlon series at Dorney lake. These races consisted of 5k run 20k bike 5k run.
My results were:
First round 8th overall.
Second round 7th overall.
Third round 6th overall.
As the year progressed I decided that I was getting fitter and faster by breaking my training down into 3 disciplines being - running, cycling and swimming. This gave me another plan....Triathlon....
I entered my first sprint distance Tri and after a hopeless swim managed to pull a large amount of time back on the bike and set a blisteringly fast 5k run time. This got me my first Tri finish of 25th.
Next on my list was a Mass start open water swim, here once again I didn't exit the water with any fast times but once again showed that my bike and run skills could carry me to the finish in a respectable time. I finished this race 12th overall.
So as you can see I've now got the Bug and am enjoying this kind of racing.
During February I was lucky enough to meet 2 X Iron man Lanzarote winner Estonian born Ain-Alar Juhanson, I worked with him at the TCR show at Sandown race course. He invited me to his home town to race the Tri-Star Estonia111 middle distance Triathlon.
I took this offer very seriously and begun my 6 month training plan. I will be honest - it had its up's and down's but overall I enjoyed the longer rides and runs.
On the Friday 5th August my 29th birthday there was a charity 5k race which I decided to enter as it was for many great causes. To my shock I crossed the line first, feeling 100% fresh and ready for my first long distance Tri.
As Sunday approached I began getting all my kit ready, with lots of help from a good friend Ben Ward, who has done this long distance racing for many years. He helped to calm my nerves, get me ready and reassure me I would be fine.
As I'm sure you will know by now my swim wasn't the best but I was far from last. The race for me begun when I exited the water in a little over 20 minutes. T1 went very smoothly in little over a minute and I was out on the rolling roads of Estonia, the bike course was far from flat but I enjoyed the 100k loop and entered T2 with a bike time of 2:41. As I left T2 I followed the advice my friend and coach had given me: start slow and finish strong.
The run was a 10k which was also far from flat, but I managed a time of 40:40, very impressive after 101k of racing.
Its wasn't until the awards evening and my name being called did it actually sink in that my first race went very well, I managed 40th overall and 3rd in my Age group claiming Bronze.
