Some more help thanks to Saucony...

After my finish at Windsor, I have been fortunate enough to have Saucony offer to help me out until the end of the year. Considering all I spend my money on is nutritional products, bike parts and running shoes, this will help me massively.

I would just like to say thanks to Helen @ Saucony for sorting this out for me.

If you get the chance, check out their website for both shoes and apparel. The Omni 8 has also just been released, definitely a great shoe at a great price, only £84.99. Also my shoe of choice =)

Other results...

Not such a long winded report on these ones as they served more as training than an aim for the season.

Most recently was the Dorney Lake midweek Tri on the June 24th. I had a few hard days coming into this one after starting back from my 24 hour bug caught the day after Windsor. I lost alot of my strength overnight along with 3Kg's of my body weight taking me down just under 61Kg's, not a safe weight for me. I spent the next week regaining this body weight and began training again the Friday after Windsor feeling very weak.

The Monday saw me complete 5.5 hours of training in the form of swimming and a brick session, but I really felt this on the Tuesday. Another tough swim session that evening coupled with a long run left me feeling quite flat. I decided to swim on the morning of the race to spin the arms out, but this really didn't work. I completed a short run with some strides in preparation for the race that evening and thought I may just be ok.

After 2.5 hours in the car I arrived and had 15 minutes to set everything up, oops. I had also forgotten my helmet but a kind spectator allowed me to borrow his, thanks again Mr Man. I set up my transition and proceeded to put on my wetsuit in a hurry, putting my finger nails through the top layer of neoprene, boo.

Race briefing started and ended, we jumped in the lake and the hooter went. I sprinted away with a constant burn in my arms and just put up with it. I led out the swim, putting about 90 seconds into the next competitor. I kept my head down and TT'd the bike trying not to get caught and came into T2 still in first place. I ran out of transition and just pushed hard but felt sick the entire run. I posted an ok run split of 18 min's and 8 seconds, and thought this was ok considering.

I finished in 1st place overall and drove home feeling even flatter. I continued on with the training for the rest of the week and since then I have returned to my pre-Windsor condition.

Prior to Windsor was the Blenheim Triathlon. Very little shall be said about this due to rather disappointing race. Here is a description in not many words. Swim, wrong place, poor spotting, turn buoy, miles down, exit water, run up hill, hit bike, pack are lazy, shivering due to cold, off bike, run, still cold, cross line, rubbish. Is Windsor really nxt week?

The only other result I really had, posting a very disappointing time whilst messing up the swim, was at the Thames Turbo Sprint Race 3. Basically, I got in, moved into the next lane too soon and got shouted at. After another couple of mess ups I was back on course. Hit the bike, got stuck at the traffic lights that you do have to stop at (and always should, of course) got caught and had about 4 minutes put into me over 21k, I have concluded time trialing is not my forte. I came into transition, racked my bike, went out on the run and wasn't really thinking about it too much. I went a bit too easy and posted a disappointing run split.

I placed 1st in my category, but 9th overall. Not good and a real wake up as this was only 4 weeks before Windsor. This served well as it made me aware it was time to get my butt in gear.

Windsor Tri

Well, I haven't really posted too much of how things are going in terms of results so here goes...

So far my best result this season came at the Windsor Triathlon, where I placed 11th overall in the Elite wave (after corrected results). The race itself went ok but there is still lots of work to be done. I started off the swim pretty well, but after about 300m had the lovely experience of being pushed under the water and having my goggles hit off on the right hand side. I don't remember the last time I felt so miserable in a swim but just accepted it and got down to business.

I exited about 50 seconds down of the front pack with a small group of other athletes. I didn't panic too much as I knew there were a number of other athletes behind and a pack would form. After about 15k a big second pack had formed and we were motoring along, although the work being done was quite infrequent, but a few of us took our turns. Heading towards the turn point on the bike, we caught sight of the front pack and knew we would catch them in a few k's. With about 10k's to go, the two packs had merged and a few attacks went off of the front. I was sitting a little too far back in the pack though and learnt this was not the place to be. I came into T2 at the back of the front pack but had lost about 30 seconds on the front runners, a tough deficit to pull back.

I threw my running shoes on and headed out of T2 ready for the 10k ahead, by now the conditions had heated up significantly. It took a little while to find my legs and when they arrived they really didn't feel that great. I realised I was not going to get close to the top guys and decided to run my own race. I think dropping my gel on the bike didn't really help too much.

Three laps later it was time to head towards the finish line. With a little sprint finish I crossed the line with a final time of 1.57. After looking at the run splits, I noted I had run 37 mins which is miles off of what I should be running. As such, some tough brick sessions have been put into the programme to increase my run strength. Hopefully this will bring me closer to the 33 minutes I expect to run this season. All I can say is bring on Athlone on July 18th.