Nice early start ruined by a flat rear tyre; it didn’t take long to repair but it was something not in schedule. I had enough pent up nervous energy to run a small village and the tyre issue didn’t help much. After the staple had been extracted from the tyre and everything returned to where it should be, the patch seemed to hold.

There had been a lot of discussion Facebook about this event, two old school friends were taking part in the triathlon: one in the Sprint event and one in the Novice event. I’d caught up with Andy a couple of years ago but hadn’t seen Kate since we left school in 1988. Facebook and this cycling lark have been good for meeting up with old friends.

I found out about this event from a colleague at work who had completed the Sprint Triathlon, he mentioned that there was an event for people with rubbish knees called the SWICLE (Swim/Bike), this sounded a great alternative so I signed up early last year. I had spent a lot of time swimming as a child but it took a while to remember what I was supposed to do in training. I have been training for this one event since October last year but the preparation was hampered by a dodgy back in November and a chest infection at the beginning of March; I wasn’t as fit as I had wanted when I lined up in the pool.

The whole day was excellent but as a total newbie to multi events I was overwhelmed by all the things to remember. The race information e-mailed prior to the event did actually make sense but I wasn’t reading it properly. The race brief was good and I had time to look around to clock all the transition exits and how the pool was set up etc. I saw folks with all their gear in plastic storage boxes, neatly folder for a quick transition; mine was stuffed into a rucksack. I had worked on an order for getting my stuff on at transition but made a last minute change around my top.  The plan had been to expect seasonal weather and not have to worry about winter gloves, socks and a top; the weather had other plans and started the day at 0 degrees warming up to a massive 4 degrees by the time my race left.

I chose my cycling jacket as the insulation, purely to keep a cool wind chill on the outside. It was a toss-up between this and a micro-fleece; in the end I was happy with the choice.  I left the jacket poolside for transition and lined up with the others for our wave to start. I attached the timing chip to my ankle, worrying that it would fall off and then promptly forgetting it was there.  I grabbed a 10 minute warm up in the diving pool followed by a quick stretch, going well so far.

Due to the low numbers in the SWICLE, there was only me and another person in my lane so I was confident of a straight swim with no holdups; I was first off followed by my goggled friend 10 seconds later. I pushed off for 16 of the best lengths I could put in, a total of 400m which I planned to swim smoothly for the first 200m and then gradually increase the effort for the last 200m. Once again, I had gained wisdom from Simon about the best way to swim efficiently and had been practicing this in my training sessions. I had swum timed 400m’s in the pool but it was usually after swimming 1,500m or so during a training session. Today, the lack of fatigue was liberating, I had to concentrate to make sure I counted the lengths correctly and followed my plan instead of going out too hard. All good but then I caught up with the other person in the lane and had to get around her. This took a reasonable amount of energy and wasn’t in the plan but there is not a lot you can do. It happened a second time and this time I had to put my feet down in the shallow end which felt like the seconds flying out the window. I finished strongly and was first out of the pool by 30 seconds, struggled to get my jacket on because it stuck to my skin and then hit the outside air to get to my bike. It was a touch chilly as I crossed the timing mat ending the swim time.

I had practiced transition at home, tried to focus on speed and efficiency to avoid panic and lost seconds. Socks, shoes, glasses, lid, tri-belt (holds race number) and gloves (which stuck to my skin and wasted seconds), un-rack bike and go!

Steve was lurking with his camera and snapped this during the dash to my racked bike. Notice how he expertly captures the expanding bald bit.

My cycling shoes weren’t that great for running in; I went out at pace and soon regretted that show of bravado!  By the time I had negotiated the gas works and milling people who all seem to go into moron mode I was running out of oxygen!

Part 2 coming soon!