Back on English soil on Thursday and feeling pretty jet lagged. Friday was a case of finishing work, loading the car and getting to Liverpool before registration closes at 8pm. The time allowed seemed possible until the M6 closed at Stoke and we were diverted. Slight panic but we arrived with 8 mins to spare #turnertime. Checked into the hotel located 400m from the start on Albert Dock and then went out for some food. Found a place to eat which seemed the shortest wait time, but after a nightmare wait and a few stern words with the manager dinner finally arrived at 10:15pm. We dread to think what they may have done to our food for complaining! We inhaled the food and back to the room to get ready for the 5am wake up call. Still jet lagged and struggling to get to sleep my daughter woke feeling unwell at 1:30am. Jessica was able to return to bed around 2:30am, only to be woken by my son hoping he hadn’t missed anything and was first up for the day ahead. I delivered the bad news and finally we all got to sleep, albeit for a couple of hours until our alarm went off.
Down for breakfast and chatted away with fellow triathlete’s competing in my wave. This is the point I first heard that the dock was occupied by numerous amounts of small jelly fish. After my experience in Llandudno that is not something I wanted to hear or looked forward too.
Got my stuff together and cycled down to transition. Bumped into a few familiar faces and made my way to the water. Jumped in, checked out the jelly fish under water which there seemed to be thousands of them. Splashed around a bit and waited for the race to start. The swim started well and I got myself into a nice group. Made it around the first 2 right hand turn buoys and things were going to plan. Went under the bridge and made it out of the next left and right turn buoys without taking on too much water or panicking too much. I was thinking to myself things were going well until I peeled off the group and made a sharp turn around the next buoy on route, only to find that no one was following me! Big mistake on my part as i had actually turned at the sighting buoy, the turn buoy was still quite away ahead. Went back on route, made the further 2 turns on my own and headed home. I was able to catch a swimmer and sat on his shoulder until the final buoy. Made another mistake here and swam to the left of the buoy towards the exit instead of around it. Made a rapid u turn and headed into transition. Overall I enjoyed the swim although not a great time. Need a lot of work on sighting and remembering the course. Also need to find race pace effort as never seem to push myself hard enough. Maybe it’s the fear of not being able to finish if i go too hard or just confidence? Anyhow, these are things i will definitely work on in the swim sessions.
Transition was pretty straight forward. Took a bit of time to get the pedals turning over but settled in and was making up some good time.
Off the bike and out for the run. By now the weather was heating up a bit, I was feeling ok for the first kilometre and then my pace dropped dramatically and I couldn’t do anything about it. It definitely wasn’t nutrition or the heat it was just sear lack of conditioning. Every time someone went passed I tried to respond by couldn’t, I felt helpless and was happy to see the finish.
So, top 100 (97th) finish, just! An enjoyable swim, a good bike split and a very disappointing run. Overall 21st in age group and no chance of London qualification in Standard distance. The event was good and really enjoyed the weekend around Liverpool with my family. Kids enjoyed watching and Ben’s even thinking about giving a triathlon a go!! #happydays
Results
Next race: National Relay Championships – I have an awesome team!!!
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