First race of 2013

Pembroke duathlon (5k run/22k bike/2.5k run) marked the start of my 2013 season. Due to the distance and my parents coming to watch we stayed the night in a local travelodge on saturday and enjoyed a cracking game of rugby with Wales annihilating the english to win the 6 nations :) i was screaming and bouncing around like a kid :) After a pleasant meal in a tiny little pub/restaurant that you wouldn't find by chance, we had a chilled evening and a decent sleep before a 6am wake. The day was perfect racing weather, sunny, no wind, a little chilly, but otherwise you couldn't grumble. This race was the first one the season to count towards the club championships but it was also the welsh duathlon championships. Surprisingly enough though there was no chip timing system which led to a cock up with the results, which definitely put a dampener of an otherwise cracking day because the fiasco of the presentations just made you doubt the results that little bit.

As this was a club race there was a very healthy turn out and our club kit was everywhere to be seen. it's always nice to have people to say hello to out on the course, to give a little bit of encouragement to/from etc. and having rose, now my coach, and my parents there to cheer and take pictures and give feedback is always nice as well after you have finished.

So with this being the first race of the season i wanted to use it to try a few things out and to just see where i was at. I entered the 3 duathlons as warm ups for the tri season, but i placed no importance on them. I had wanted to use my garmin during a race for the first time and practised on the saturday transitioning between having the garmin on my wrist, then onto the bike, and then back onto my wrist. I had found the garmin useful during the 5k run to keep my run pace up, but not too high as i wanted to pace myself right given that this was my first duathlon and i wanted to be sure i still had stuff in my legs for the bike and the final 2.5k run. The run felt OK, getting into transition at about 22:30. Unfortunately the garmin failed soon into the bike but i don't know why as i couldn't read the message that came up, with my garmin fitted onto my bike sideways on to ensure a secure fitting. Not to worry, i'm used to racing on feel so i switched it off and got on with putting some guts into the bike leg. I was really pleased with how the bike felt as i was flying past a lot of blokes and i certainly got a few second glances as i powered past them :) the bike course was fast, with one long drag of a hill to begin with, and then some ups and down during the repeated section on the freeway. By this time sunday traffic was starting out and there were a few tractors slowing traffic down which meant i actually had to break a lot to stop going into the back of a car, which was frustrating but i reasoned that by drafting off it at least i was saving energy. Nobody overtook me from having slowed so nothing lost here which was good. Flying back down into transition 2 and i was feeling good. I had made a decision to slip my feet out of my bike shoes whilst riding up to transition and then run down the steep little hill into transition in my socks. This was the first time i had actually done this on a moving bike, having only practised it on the turbo before, but for a first attempt it was OK, just need to not loose as much speed next time, and try and catch my feet straight on top of the shoes rather than them spinning round. What it did mean though was that i was able to run right through transition and i was speedy racking my bike and getting the trainers back on.

The final 2.5k run was definitely tough on the legs and without my garmin to know what pace i was i had to keep pushing myself to keep my pace up, even though i was tired and they were getting very heavy. Thankfully no sprint finish was called for this time but i was pleased with how it had all gone pace wise, and the fact that only a handful of men overtook me from start to finish. All in all a great first race especially given my run training has been hampered by the calf injury all winter so i knew sustained speed wasn't going to be there. As it was i placed 5th female overall, and after some corrections of the final results i also placed 3rd female in the open age group category for the welsh championships - result! Although the important result is the 5th, as the only reason i was 3rd in my age-group is because the women who beat me were veterans so they podiumed in the vets category of the welsh champs. Looking at the times they had much better runs than me by 2 minutes or more on the first 5k, and 1 minute on the bike by two of the women so still work to be done but as we're in march and my season goes through until september then i can't peak too soon can i!

What was also extremely pleasing was that there was no tightness in my calf at all, during the race, or after, and given i had run 29k in the past week, which is the most i have ran in a week for many a long month, then that is extremely good news :) I still have tenderness and a slight lump under the skin where the physio brutalised me, but the few sessions i have had with Mike Griffiths, osteopath, have gotten me right, combined with increased stretching, compressport calf guards/full legs, and cold water at the end of a shower, brrrrr!!!!! Happy days :)