DGTri Athlete Report - Johanna Calleja

British Universities Standard Distance Triathlon Championships

Having looked forward to the BUCS Olympic Triathlon Championships for a while (in between working on assignments and my dissertation!), the nerves only started to set in slightly the night before. This was when I realised that I hadn’t taken part in such a long race for over two years! Of course speaking to Dermot about it, who has completed five Ironmans, it seemed a bit silly to be worrying and I knew that I was well-prepared for the race thanks to Dermot’s programme and the swim sessions with Barry.

As we made our way to the race venue in the morning, I was really pleased that it had turned into a nice, warm day and that the wind had died down. At least I could stop worrying about having frozen feet throughout the race, as had happened at the Full Boar race in May!

As I finished my run warm-up, Ide (my training partner and the only other triathlete from Chester Uni in the race) came running to tell me that my back wheel was flat. I started to think that this must be the end of my race, as there wasn’t too much time left before the briefing and race start. But as soon as I saw Dermot and told him what had happened, he grabbed his bike and headed back to the hotel to get a new tyre (he had been considering changing the back tyre as it wasn’t in the best shape, but didn’t wish to do it so soon before the race). Big thanks to Dermot for racing back to the hotel and quickly changing the tyre for me and thanks to Ide for remaining calm and preparing the wheel while Dermot was gone (while I just panicked!!).

So my bike was sorted with a really nice new pink tyre (thanks Bill and Pam!!) and luckily the race started a bit late, so we had time to recover from the stress and hear the briefing. Into the cold water (well at least cold for someone used to warm water in Malta) and without too much time to think about what lay ahead, we were off. There were some very fast swimmers in the race and quite a lot of chaos in the water in the beginning. I was swallowing a lot of water and getting into a bit of a panic, but I eventually got into quite a good rhythm.

I finished the swim in 12th place, got onto the bike and started to worry again as my feet were so cold that they were really painful! But thankfully as I got moving on the bike, they soon recovered. The bike segment consisted of four laps, which included two steep hills, one very long one and one a bit shorter and several sharp turns. Since the roads were open to traffic, it was difficult to get into a steady rhythm without having to slow down because of cars, the hills or another sharp turn!

I passed one girl on the bike and started the run in 11th place. I was quite tired and the run was far from being easy. It was two laps and also included two steep hills. But I managed to get into a decent pace and passed two girls on the second lap to finish in 9th place overall in a new p.b. of 2h 33min 31s.

I was really pleased with the result, especially since the bike course wasn’t fast at all and I was told that both the swim and run were longer than they were supposed to be. It was really nice to beat the time of my first Olympic distance triathlon, which I thought for so long would never happen. Big thanks to Dermot for his coaching and constant support and for helping me to keep going, even when I was so close to giving up (at least now we know why ). Big thanks also to Barry for the great swim sessions and for all his support, encouragement and enthusiasm, even at 6 in the morning when most of us are still half asleep!!

Johanna