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Wow what a whirlwind of a weekend, that is the only way to describe it! As some of you may have seen on my Instagram, I had a big ol’ palaver the day before the race regarding the ‘intention to qualify’ form. This is mandatory from British Triathlon if you are racing a World or European qualifier with the intention to qualify, kind of what it says on the tin aha. In summary of a long story my name was not on the intention to qualify page which sent me into overdrive, and I was very emotional. I sent out lots of emails and called lots of numbers trying to reach someone to get to the bottom of it. Many hours later… I decided (with the help of friends and family) to just race because I enjoy it (and I had paid for race entry - races are damn expensive these days ahaha). I would prove to myself that I could qualify no matter what the outcome would be with BTF. RACE DAY 0400: Ooooof that was an early alarm! For some reason this season, none of my races had been super early so this was a bit of a shock. Personally, I really struggle to eat before races (something I need to work on) as I get such an anxious tummy. Surprisingly I managed to eat 4 Weetabix and a banana on this morning, a big win already! 0445: Bike in the car, time to set off. It was nice to be at home before the race rather than a hotel or Airbnb. Luckily it was just over an hour drive meaning we arrived at 6am, giving me a solid 1h15 to sort myself out before the race start. 0700: Registration done. Transition set up and a quick catch up with my triathlon girlies which was so lovely. There was a 500m (at least) zig zag hill from transition down to the beach so it was time to head down to the beach for the swim start. 0715: Quick dip in the sea to acclimatise done. Time to wait patiently on the start line, there was such an awesome atmosphere and the commentator was actually super motivational and supportive, I was loving it! 0720: The gun goes, and a crowd of powerful women run into the sea! The start of the swim was carnage but I feel so much more confident in the sea compared to lake swims (Side note: I would say my order of preference for triathlon swims would be sea > lake > pool). The first half of the swim I was trying to find my rhythm, I had no idea where I was in the group but I just focussed on pushing through the water to propel forward. I began to settle into the swim just after half way and then I started to really push the last 300m after a bit of a funny route (some of the course was anticlockwise and some was clockwise and it was definitely longer than 750m). The beach was now in sight, I just kept pushing until I felt the sand in my hands, that’s when I jumped up and ran to the zig zags. Yes, you remember the zig zags I mentioned earlier, we had to run up those to transition. It was carnage as there were spectators and competitors trying to come down to the beach, so as you can imagine it was a bit stressful! I was and am aware my swim is not my strongest component so I worked on overtaking some of the ladies up the zig zags into transition. 0730ish: Wetsuit off, helmet and race number on… zooommmm to the mount line. Another go at flying mounts and damn I couldn’t get my foot into one of my shoes so had to keep adjusting it until I was in, then we could pounce! Wow that bike course was dangerous AF! It was on a dual carriage way with open roads, we had to go on slip roads etc and it just didn’t feel right. The first roundabout came around pretty fast and I was going too quick so had a very near miss with the kerb, I saw my life flash before my eyes in that moment which wobbled me a bit but I just focused on powering up the hills and recover a little on the downhills. I was super grateful to be working with my lovely friend Millie on the bike, it was a non-drafting race which obviously we obeyed but it was nice to take it in turns on the front and help each other navigate the slip roads (thank Mils, you really got me through that bike course). 18km into the bike course we arrived back at the seafront and having not driven the course before I was a little confused until there was a marshal sending us up this big hill. My stomach dropped a little, it felt like a mountain after powering back along the dual carriageway. Up this hill we went, all huffing and puffing, and then there was another one!!!! Eventually we came back to transition and unlike Hamburg I had a successful flying dismount and all shoes stayed on the bike aha. 0820: Onto the run we go. I was a little worried about this as I had been nursing an ankle niggle but spoiler, I actually got a season 5km PB which I was super chuffed with despite everything!
Out of transition was a long downhill section to the promenade, I actually really appreciated this section as it got my legs moving fast ready for the rest of the run (I was also super grateful we didn’t have to run back up it). I started to overtake a lot of athletes and was feeling super strong but was still cautious of my ankle, I didn’t want to overdo it. With 1km to go I just went for it but the finish line was on the sand so you weren’t catching me doing a sprint finish like usual. 0840ish: BOOM I finished it in one piece and was proud of my performance! I managed to place 2nd in my age category and 5th female overall so I was chuffed. In summary I was really pleased that I decided to race because I really enjoyed it. Sometimes it is so easy to focus on the big goals and forget why you are doing it all in the first place.
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August 2023
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