The Vitruvian

Well, this weekend I raced my last triathlon of the season, it was the Vitruvian triathlon which is a middle distance race with a 1.9km swim, a 85km bike followed by a half marathon. The day started with a 4:30am alarm wake-up call, a quick bit of breakfast and then down to transition to rack my bike. After a bit of faffing around I was all sorted and this then left me with an hour or so to get changed and pay a visit (or two) to the little boys room!

Before I knew it it was time for the race brief and then down to the lake for the race start. It was a bit chilly and after dipping my toes into the lake I decided it was very chilly! The hooter sounded and we were off, I swam a little wide to stay out of the melee and didn’t have any major issues all the way round the swim route. Out of the lake and into T1, no drama’s here and was off on the bike in no time. I’ve raced the Vitruvian before so was aware of the route and the infamous Rutland Ripple (one of the “minor” hills on the course) and was waiting for it to arrive. In the mean time I was a little concerned about a scrapping noise coming from my bike, I looked down and my front mech was rubbing on my chain! I changed up the gears and down the gears, but it was still rubbing, I wasn’t about to stop and try to fix it on the roadside so just left it and hoped it wouldn’t get any worse. I’m not sure if it was slowing me down, but it was bloody annoying!

I continued on the bike course. The first lap wasn’t too bad, but the wind picked up on the second lap and I was starting to feel the fatigue on the hills. I continued on and I arrived in T2 safe and sound. I put my long (Paula Radcliff style) compression socks on and was off on the run. Looking at my watch I realised I had to run a 1hr40 half marathon to achieve my goal of a sub 5 hour race; this concerned me slightly as I ran a 1hr44 half marathon last year and was not convinced I could knock 4 minutes off that time.

The run was a killer! The first 10km went smoothly enough but I was continually doing the maths in my head and wondering if I was on the right pace or not. I got to the 16km point (5km to go) and wasn’t feeling great, I was passing loads of people still but I felt like I was shuffling around instead of running around. I got to the 18km point and realised that if I was able to pick up the pace a little bit then a sub 5 hour race was within my reach. It would take me about 15 minutes to cover 3km at my current speed and decided that 15 minutes of pain wasn’t too much to ask, so I gritted my teeth and sped up. I was hurting now, but as I passed more and more tired runners my belief grew that sub 5 was possible. There is a short sharp climb about half a km from the finish, once this was tackled I knew I could pick up the pace a tiny bit more and “sprint” for the line.

I put my little spurt on and had a little race with another competitor for the line (he didn’t last long!); I crossed in 4hr57! I was knackered…….but so pleased. I had run the half marathon in 1hr38, a 6 minute PB on last year. All in all, the result was a very pleasant one, I had hoped to go under 5 hours and I had achieved my goal. My swim and bike splits were similar to last year whilst my run was quicker which enabled me to set a new PB on that course. Happy days! Time to relax now, well for a week at least!