7th September 2014
This weekend I completed in my first every triathlon. It went great and I'm totally hooked. Looking to do more next year and gradually work up to the longer distances (once my swimming has improved).
Overview
Newbury Triathlon is a super-sprint event based at Northcroft Leisure Centre in Newbury, West Berkshire, UK. It consists of a 300 yard pool swim, 22km bike ride and 5km run. It is organsied by Team Kennet, the local athletics and triathlon club, and has an entry limit of 450 competitors.
Result
Overall position 39th out of 440. In the V40 male age group 13th out of 175.
| Swim | 6:16 |
|---|---|
| T1 | 0:43 |
| Cycle | 42:23 |
| T2 | 0:40 |
| Run | 19:44 |
| Total | 1:09:47 |
Organisation and Atmosphere
The event was incredibly well organised and ran extremely smoothly from a competitor's point of view. Everything ran nicely to schedule. Registration was very smooth with no queueing.
The transition area was very relaxed but still managed to remain very organised. The staggered nature of the swim starts means that there's a small continual flow of people through transition rather than large groups of people, which keeps things pleasant. Being allow to access transition at any point when you are not racing was also very helpful.
The marshals did a great job and were very friendly and clear with their instructions. Marshals were stationed at all the correct places for bike and run so it was pretty much impossible to go wrong and the signage was good and clear. Particular thanks to the bike marshals on the roundabouts and junctions who did a great job of keeping riders safe and the race flowing.
Possibly the only slight criticism I could raise is the delay in publishing the results. However, I understand they had to change timing suppliers at short notice, so this can be forgiven.
The overall atmosphere for the day was great. The triathlon had a nice mix of serious triathletes, athletes attempting their first triathlon (me for example) and plenty of people participating for a personal challenge or to raise money for charity. The arrangement of the course meant good support at the pool side, at the end of the bike leg and at the run finish – just what was required to keep you pushing hard.
The Swim
The swim leg takes place in Newbury's lovely outdoor heated lido pool, which originally dates from 1870 (redeveloped in 1937). The pool is a very unusual 75 yards long and a maximum depth of 2.8m. It's a high sided pool, so can be quite choppy when full of people.
The swim is four lengths of the pool, with two competitors being started every 30 seconds. This means that it takes nearly two hours to get through the entire field, but that does have the advantage of spreading out the transition, bike and run stages.
There were plenty of competitors swimming breast-stroke and even a couple doing the whole thing backstroke. This meant some overtaking was required, but fortunately the pool and lanes were wide enough that this wasn't a problem.
My swim went pretty well and I was able to complete the four lengths in 6:16, which was slightly better than expected.
T1
Jumping out the pool, a short run out into the car park for transition. Found my bike easily and things went pretty smoothly. I did find that I underestimated just how wobbly I'd be after the swim. I'd elected to wear socks, as I know running without gives me blisters, and trying to balance on one foot to put them on was somewhat tricky!
A quick run out of transition and then on to the bike and away. My numerous practices at mounting the bike with shoes pre-attached and held in place with rubber bands proved well worth the effort.
A T1 time of 0:43 was most acceptable for my first time ever doing this under race conditions.
Bike
The bike leg starts with a short up-hill section, so important to get into the shoes and get them tight as soon as possible. Then it was up to a bigger gear and off. The roads were pretty quiet and I managed to complete the whole bike without needing to give way to any traffic, helped by excellent marshals making sure riders knew the junctions were clear.
The first half of the 22km bike ride is net up-hill, through Boxford, Welford and Wickham, with a steep climb just after half way. Managed to get down on the drops for a large part of this and overtook a few riders. Only one rider (in full streamline kit) came past me.
The second part is a lovely straight and mostly downhill section all the way home. Down on the drops again and cruising along was very pleasant. Felt a slight cramp twinge in my left calf but luckily it didn't come to anything. Picked up a few more riders along the way, polished off a 33shake chia energy gel and entered the final section feeling really strong.
Dropped down to a low gear to get the legs spinning fast ready for the run. I'd also been doing loads of practice at slipping out of shoes while still on the pedals for a quick bike dismount. That worked pretty well, but still room for improvement, and I was off the bike with my family cheering loudly behind me.
Total bike leg time of 42:23, which was significantly better than I had hoped for.
T2
Second transition went as well as I hoped. Jelly legs off the bike is still quite new to me (despite a number of brick training sessions) but it didn't slow me down too much. Run shoes on quickly (elastic laces are a superb invention) and off.
A T2 time of 0:40, which again I was reasonably pleased with considering it was my first ever attempt under race conditions.
Run
The run part is a nice course, mostly on footpath or the canal tow-path. A couple of small slopes, but mostly flat all the way. Initially the run was feeling really tough, but after the bike legs wore off I managed to get into my running flow. Gradually started to pick off other runners, although overtaking was sometimes difficult due to the narrow paths.
At the end of the tow-path you have to cross a canal bridge, which is a bit tough on tired legs. Then it's into the field, which you have to run round once to the finish. Loads of support and cheering family around the field was a welcome boost and despite having to run on grass I was able to pick up speed for the last couple of hundred meters.
A run time of 19:44 for a total time of 1:09:47. A very pleasing result and bit ahead of what I expected my best achievable time might be.
Conclusion
A great event, very well organised and very enjoyable. I'm now hooked on triathlon and will be doing some more events next year. Hope to step up to a full-length sprint with open water next time providing I can continue developing my swimming over the winter.
Another bonus is that the kids (nearly 8 and just turned 9) are now really excited about triathlon as well, so chances are they will want to enter some junior triathlon events next year as well.
