=
Last weekend I raced Ironman UK 70.3 in Exmoor, coming third. This is a race which describes itself as the ‘world’s toughest half ironman’, constituting a 1.9km swim in Wimbleball lake, a 56 mile bike incorporating 52 hills and a mainly off-road, hilly, twisty half marathon. I’d labelled it as my early season ‘A’ race, felt my preparation in the preceding weeks had been good and was really looking forward to pitching myself against the strong field of ‘proper pros’ on the start list.
So I was pretty excited driving down to Somerset on the Friday night after work. The Saturday was cold and wet and at times it felt a bit more like Glastonbury than a triathlon, wading through mud in wellies to register, rack my bike and attend the briefing.
I felt a bit of a fraud racking my bike on the pro rack, even more so when a film crew from Channel 4 grabbed me to ask some questions! Up until 6pm on Saturday I was raring to go – until I had a pretty nasty bout of what I can only think must have been food poisoning, which with hindsight may have been caused by drinking hot chocolate out of a mouldy thermos flask (I didn’t realise it was mouldy but thought it tasted funny at the time and can’t think what else would have caused it). Eventually I managed to force some dinner and Nuun electrolyte drink down and went to bed keeping my fingers crossed it would settle down overnight.
Race day dawned and I was still not 100% right. Physically I felt great but was still feeling sick and forcing rice pudding and banana down was a real effort. However I was psyched for the race and there was no way I wasn’t going to start or finish, so despite that I was pretty excited walking down to the swim start. I was somewhat nervous about the swim anyway – the pros were started 10m ahead of the main field and I knew that meant I would be trampled by the masses big time! So when the inevitable happened I wasn’t surprised by it and just tried to keep my rhythm and avoid swallowing too much lake water which was just making me feel even more sick. I actually finished the swim further up the field than I realised at the time.
The bike course is quite incredible; there is literally nothing flat and it is all either up or down. There is no chance of drafting which makes it such a fair race. No-one can hide and it’s a true test of your strength. I have to admit the first lap of the bike was hard. I was sick on the bike (not an experience I want to repeat!), being overtaken by the fast age group men and not passing the girls who I assumed would have finished the swim before me (it turned out that I cycled past them without realising it).
When Eimear Mullan went past with a massive attack on a climb I simply couldn’t stay with her. How much of that was physical, how much psychological I don’t know, probably a combination of the two. It did cross my mind that not getting nutrition in would make the rest of the race very tricky but thankfully that seemed to settle down on the second lap and I tried to focus on working hard and turning my brain around to think as positively as possible. I was very glad of the clear lenses in my white BLOC Shadows when the drizzle started on one of the steep descents!
So after believing I was way down the pro field it was a very pleasant surprise to be told I was 4th at the start of the run, the discipline that is characteristically my strength. Sadly, my run legs just weren’t 100% and although I wasn’t running badly, I was a bit disappointed with the way I was going. Three pit stops at the side of the road didn’t help my rhythm and I think at one point I settled for fourth place, knowing there was a long time gap between me, 3rd and 5th. So when my friends told me I had made up time to the girl in 3rd with 1.5 miles to go, I didn’t believe them.
Running out to the final out and back, I think if I’m honest a little bit of me was hoping I wasn’t catching her, wondering if I had the mental strength for a sprint finish. When I realised I was, and had about 1km to make up a minute, of course I had to try, and ended up passing her in the last 500m of the run. First sprint finish ever and I was pretty elated to have achieved that as I crossed the line and fell on the floor exhausted!
2So, all in all, an up and down day. Not perhaps the dream race I had hoped for but I certainly couldn’t have gone any harder on the day and would describe it as one of my most gutsy performances. A* for effort, A- for performance… and if someone had told me a week before the race that I would finish third I would have been over the moon. Lots of lessons learnt and a really fun weekend. Here’s hoping I’ll get that elusive dream race out of me before the end of the season!
