The is weekend saw me giving a little back to the sport and volunteering to be Race Director as the 6th Beccles Triathlon, based at the Beccles Open Water Lido and surrounding areas. In fairness this “volunteering” started way back in 2017 after a few new members of the Beccles Triathlon Committee were needed.
With my Bike Race organisation over the years this seemed to be natural transition (see what I did there!). With the bike racing everything was left to me to organise – the marshals, the venue, the race officials, the catering, the paperwork and all the details in between – sometimes I wonder how the events ever got off the ground!
Triathlons are multi-disciplined and as such needs a team of people to get these events going. With that Suzy, Marcus, Iggy, Shaun, Roly and I have been meeting every month since December to get things in place before the big day. Every two weeks since March just to ensure everything has been ticked off. With only a couple of minor handful stressful moments I think the management team nailed it to be fair!
The Lido Management Team were communicated with, a separate medical plan was drawn (just in case), Risk Assessments were drawn up based on previous learnings, local highways agencies were informed, all friends and family of Beccles Triathlon Club were involved – from either competing to marhsalling on what turned out to be a pretty hot day. The event went well on the day with only a couple of hitches and competitor infringments but no-one was disqualified and everyone who competed walked away with a positive/safe experience which is the main thing. British Triathlon officials rated us as “excellent” so all-in-all a good day was had.
Feeling quite proud of all the guys who helped yesterday to be fair – and also to Suzy who managed not only to be one of the main organisational aspects of this event but to also compete and pick up a 6-minute Personal Best on this event and take 3rd place in the Female’s event! (I lent her my Zipp 404’s so i’ll claim the result! lol).
All this has been a welcome distraction what is fast approaching my first 70.3 event next Sunday. Challenge Geraardsbergen is my first attempt at this distance and i’m failry sure it’ll be a steep learning curve both physically and mentally. One part of me is looking forwards to it but the other wants me to go & hide under a rock for the next fortnight and let it all blow over!
This morning before work I read the Athlete’s Pack that Challenge send out to everyone and all of a sudden this is real. I know alot of the details as I have a photographic memory and can remember alot of what Suzy went through at Paguera in Majorca last October. There’s a few details I didn’t know that are specific to the event but I think i’ve absorbed it all in now.
Back to the training…..
Monday saw me fresh (joke) back from The Alps, so in my infinite wisdom I decided to enter a fast 10 on Bank Holiday Monday! This was on a revised course I did several years ago when I started out in cycling, so I was keen to try and see what I could do.
With good weather I rode to the start which was 3.5 miles from the Village Hall, Suzy came with me as we wanted to go to Stevenage afterwards and watch the Tour Series where all the country’s big boys were racing.
I started well, holding onto a fairly good cadence considering my legs were like two concrete posts after the previous weeks’ exertions. I got to the turn at 5.4 miles and then tried to turn things up a bit on the way home into the cross/headwind but my luck ran out when I got a puncture with two miles to go. This left me nursing a 19mm tubular tyre on a dual carriageway at some sort of speed to avoid looking absolutely crap on the results board! My mate Titch had put some gunk in the tyre two weeks beforehand as I punctured at the Triathlon in Bury St. Edmunds but it eventually gave out. I still managed a 23:02 which earned me a top-30 placing and a new power PB for this year in a 10-mile event so on the whole I was pretty chuffed considering.
Tuesday saw me try & take on a V02 session on the wattbike after work and fail miserably, some parts I felt ok but after yesterday’s race I had nothing to give towards the end of the session and reduced the target power by 5% to just finish it.
Following that I went to Fritton Lake to try and at least swim a few times in the lake to gain a bit of confidence before Geraardsbergen. I only swam 800 metres but the new ear-plugs and swimming goggles seeemed to work well and I experienced no dizziness whatsoever – result!
Adding to this, earlier that day at work I had just tipped a 40ft container box-by-box, over 25 tonnes of product, onto 40 pallets so I was a little tired!
Wednesday was a steady run at dinnertime and a steady 75-minute bike session and although nothing negative to report I was still apprehensive about the 1900m swim next week.
Thursday saw a 90-minute 85-90% tempo set on the wattbike fly by with no issue on performance at all – what a contrast to Tuesday’s epic fail. Afterwards a progressive 3km run on the treadmill to act as my brick session for the week. Again – no issues.
Concerned with my lake swimming I then went to Fritton Lake again and did the full 1900m course in just over 43 minutes. Considering I was fatugued from the brick session I think I did alright – that’s a monkey off my back. At least I know I can complete that distance in open water now.
Friday was an easy run at dinnertime again with a couple of fast bits – again nothing to report.
Saturday was Parkrun with my boy, a steady warm-up running out to Lowestoft seafront, thepark run itself at a steady pace to finish in 26.09 although I forgot my Parkrun tag so I’l just have to be registered as “unknown” this week. I ran back down the course to meet Willliam and run the last few hundred metres with him for encouragement – he did it in 32:40 – not bad for no running at all since his last Parkrun over a fortnight ago.
After helping putting all the bike course signs out in Beccles for tomorrow’s triathlon we went home to chill. I still had to do a progressive turbo session – 10 minutes at 60, 70, 80, 90 & 100% of FTP and after a quick 15 minute nap and a bit of procrastinating I ventured upstairs and did it. I really didn’t know what I was afraid of as I nailed it with an extra 20-30w in the tank at the end – seems like the training seems to be working!
Sunday – day off as I was Triathlon Race Director.
Training Peaks Geeks:
105 Fitness. 112 Fatigue. -5 Form.
687 TSS. 10hrs training. 3400m swimming. 29km running. 260km cycling.
This week – TAPER WEEK! Yay!