Having participated in the British Universities & Colleges Sport (BUCS) Duathlon Championships in November, Dermot and I knew that the level of the field for the BUCS Sprint Triathlon Championships on Sunday 1st May would be very high. However, we decided to represent our universities again (University of Chester in my case) and our aim was to perform well and try to improve on our position in the duathlon (I had finished 34th out of 62 females and 188th overall out of 246 participants).We combined the race with a three-day visit to my uncle Louie and his partner John in Cheltenham, who had booked a really nice room for us in a beautiful, luxurious hotel and who spoilt us all the while we were in Cheltenham! Having arrived in Cheltenham on Saturday afternoon, on Sunday morning we made our way to Calne, Wiltshire where the race was going to be held. Getting there included 9 miles of cycling to Gloucester, 2 train rides to Bristol and Chippenham and finally another 6 mile bike ride to Calne, which was mainly uphill! I had never cycled so much before a race and wondered whether I was going to be tired before even starting!
After registration and a short run warm-up, I made my way to the pool for the start of the 750m swim time trial. I was the first to start in my lane, with three other triathletes starting at 10 second intervals after me. Two of the guys behind me overtook me and I exited the pool just after them, having completed the swim in 12:54, 51st out of 95 females. Although I felt strong in the pool, I had hoped to swim slightly faster. But I tried not to let it bother me as I made my way to transition, where Dermot was cheering me on before starting his swim.
I headed out to begin the 25km cycle and immediately realised it was going to be hard as the wind was really strong. The first half of the cycle was all against the wind and the speeds on my speedometer were disappointingly low. I was also being very cautious as we had heard that a few athletes had been disqualified or given penalties for disregarding regulations. As I reached halfway and started heading back towards transition, the wind was behind me and I kept working hard to try to make up for all the lost time in the previous half. I finished the cycle in 49:52, 26th out of the 95 female participants.
After what turned into a frustratingly slow second transition, I made my way onto the run course. Since it was a much flatter course than the one in Chirk two weeks before, I was hoping for a good time. I felt good from the start of the run. At one point I almost took a wrong turning, but the athlete behind me who I had just overtaken called out to tell me which way to turn (I thought that was true sportsmanship and really thanked her for it!). I finished the run in 22:20. Although I expected to be slightly faster as this was slower than my run in Chirk, everyone seemed to have slower times than normal and someone said that the route was longer than 5km. In fact, I was 19th in the run segment and was very pleased with that.
I finished the race 25th out of 95 females and 138th overall out of 280 participants. I was very happy as this was substantially better than my result in the duathlon. After the race, Dermot and I started to head back to Cheltenham where a delicious plate of pasta cooked by Uncle Louie awaited us. But the journey back was quite eventful with an attempted (but failed due to my tired legs) two-team time trial to the Chippenham train station, which resulted in us missing our train by a minute! After thinking we had to wait an hour, Mum saved the day by telling us we could get an earlier train, but this was delayed so we then had to sprint from one platform to another to avoid missing the next train! The coach driver kindly found no objection to our bikes on the coach so we were back at Louie and John’s flat much earlier than we thought, for another lovely evening with them.
I would firstly like to thank Louie and John for making the weekend so special, Barry and Craig at the Chester Academy for their encouragement and Dermot for his constant help and support.
Johanna
