I am a triathlete!

You might want to get yourself a cuppa now, before you start!

Today is a rest day (apart from the two netball matches I'm playing tonight, but, er, that doesn't count, right?) Yesterday was race day.  It started like a completely normal Sunday for me - I got up, went to church, busked my way through a few hymns, downed a cup of tea and then headed to Harringay Market for lunch.  Luckily, the pasta stall was there, so that sorted us.  Then it was home to make our final preparations and to book a taxi to Hyde Park (yes, I know, a taxi, but with the amount of stuff we had to carry, including wetsuits and extra pairs of shoes, cycling or public transport weren't really options).

Once we got to the park (in our MPV with blacked out windows!) we wandered down to the event area and on the way a chap asked us if we were doing the triathlon and, when we said we were, he wished us the best of luck. We stopped for a minute to put all the various stickers on our bikes, helmets and bags - we'd had to wait until we got there as it wasn't abundantly clear from the instructions which stickers went where, so we wanted someone else to copy or someone to ask.  While we were stopped, three people came up to us to ask us directions to the registration area, which made us very glad that we had done all of that bit on Saturday.

With all the stickers stuck, we made our way to the transition area and checked in.  We were allocated row I of the bike racks and told to find the next available space.  We were with other people who were in the same wave as us and, as it turned out, the people next to us had consecutive race numbers to ours.  We all got talking about why we were doing the race and whether it was our first and so on - it was really great to make some friends right at the start and that set all our pre-race nerves at ease a little.

Suited, but not booted!

Once we'd set out all our kit underneath our bikes, I had a realisation of something I hadn't quite bargained for - doing this triathlon was going to involve me going through the agonies of putting on a wetsuit in public. James pointed out that at least everyone was in the same boat, but I'm not sure if I'll ever get over it.  At this point I discovered one of the wonders of the modern world: Bodyglide.  This magic substance is a bit like vaseline, but comes in a stick (a bit like one of those stick deodorants that you wind up from the bottom) - you apply it to all your exposed bits before attempting to shoehorn yourself into your wetsuit and it makes getting it on and, crucially, getting it off considerably easier.

It was time to drop off our non-transition stuff in the bag drop and head to the start.  As we got to the assembly area, the wave in front of ours, all sporting orange hats, were just being taken over to the briefing area and then on to the pontoon.  At this point, we were next to a group of four or five Sikh guys who were all doing their first triathlon (James had to point out to one of them that he still had the stickers on the lenses of his goggles - it turned out he'd forgotten his prescription goggles and had had to buy some at the expo) - they turned out to be quite a feature of my race as I was neck and neck with them in the swim and saw them again at both transitions.

Soon it was our turn to head to the briefing area.  A man with a megaphone told us what would happen at the start and then we headed out onto the pontoon to get ready.  As we walked out, I suddenly felt very emotional, as I remembered why I was doing the race and all the work I'd put in to get me to that point.  We were allowed to sit on the pontoon with our feet in the water for a couple of minutes before being told we could lower ourselves in.  This is where it all went a bit wrong for me - I slipped as I was lowering myself and ended up more or less catapulting myself into the water, going a full two feet under the surface and eventually surfacing coughing and spluttering and with water up my nose.  James said later that he wondered what had happened to me as I was there one second and not the next.  In the end, I was alright and grabbed the pontoon as required a little while before the thirty second warning.  The ten second warning was sounded and then we were off!

We had been told by many a seasoned triathlete to expect a washing machine churn of arms and legs as we set off, with people swimming straight over others and doing everything they could to get an advantage.  It turned out that, in this instance, either we were so strung out along the pontoon that we couldn't get near enough to swim over people or none of us was competitive enough to be bothered about barging others out of the way.  In fact, the only person who barged me at all was James.  I decided not to barge back as it would be a waste of energy!  After the first 20 metres or so the split between the speedy front-runners and us not-so-speedy triers became evident and that was pretty much how it stayed for the rest of the swim.  One of the Sikh guys had to grab on to a kayak near the first buoy, but he made it in the end.  Otherwise, I didn't see anyone in any particular difficulty and we all made it back to the pontoon and up the ramp into the next phase, transition 1.

The way the timing system works is that as soon as you leave the water there is a timing mat that your timing chip communicates with, which means that from that moment the system is timing your transition time, until you cross the bike start mats.  This includes the run from the water to the transition area, which is something I hadn't trained for and wished I had.  The run was 300m in a wetsuit that you're trying to take off, barefoot and on a slippery blue carpet.  This took me a while.  Once I got into transition, I ran back to my bike and got the bottom half of the wetsuit off very, very easily (thanks to the Bodyglide) and then set about putting on my socks and cycling shoes, gloves, glasses, helmet and Marie Curie vest.  The one thing I forgot to do at this point was have a drink of water. D'oh.  I grabbed my bike and set off to the cycle exit from the transition area and ran down to the mount line (remember Jonny Brownlee in the Olympics? - I wasn't going to make that mistake!) to get onto my bike - then I was off.

We had been told that the bike course was flat.  This was lies.  It is fair to say that it wasn't mountainous or even particularly hilly, but it definitely (definitely) wasn't flat.  I headed out down Serpentine Road and then along the bottom edge of the park, round the corner over Serpentine Bridge and then heard someone shouting my name - it was James coming back the other way, about half a lap ahead of me.  I made it to the first turning point, near Speakers' Corner and negotiated my way around the 180 degree turn - the bit I'd been dreading.  I headed back along the return part of the lap, past the fantastic Marie Curie supporters and navigated around the other 180 degree turning point at the end of the first lap - this one felt much tighter and I only just made it.  I passed James again in more or less the same place, so I must have been just about keeping pace with him, even though I appeared to have given him a head start.  After the second lap, I headed back up Serpentine Road towards the transition and heard another person shouting my name - it was my friend Cecile, who had just arrived to support us.  I stopped just before the dismount line (the chap behind me got it wrong and went over the line - I don't know what happened to him) and ran back into the transition area.

Once in transition, having racked my bike, my first priority was to have a drink and an energy sweet.  That accomplished, I switched shoes, took off my helmet, glasses and gloves and swivelled my number belt around so that my race number was on my front, then headed for the run exit, just after which I saw Cecile again and gave her a massive high five.  After a couple of hundred metres, I realised I was in trouble.  I think that sitting on the bike for a while after swimming had taken its toll on my lower back and I found that I had a pain just above the base of my spine.  Walking didn't really hurt so much, but running did.  I carried on walking a bit and running a bit for the rest of the first kilometre or so and then, all of a sudden, it eased off and I was able to run the rest of the way.  Just after I'd got my mojo back, I shocked some Spanish speaking supporters (who were supporting everyone, but in Spanish) by thanking them, in Spanish, for their support.  On this part of the course, I was heading more or less due west along the southern side of the Serpentine and, given the time of day and the time of year, the sun was full in my face for that whole long stretch.  I was overheating a bit, but thankfully respite was just around the corner (literally) in the form of the shade of some trees.  I went past the Marie Curie supporters again, who were all shouting my name, which was written on my vest and printed on my race number, and blowing whistles.  Once I'd got over the Serpentine Bridge, I turned right towards the finish.

Just finished - that "laugh
or cry" moment.

As I drew level with the grandstand, the finish line commentators clocked me and gave me a shout out, which was very sweet of them, but they weren't done with me yet.  I saw James and Cecile shouting for me at the turning point into the finishing straight, and as I turned in, the commentators started interrogating me - they announced my (full) name, the crowd were cheering, I was waving, and then they asked me if it was my first triathlon.  Frankly, at this point, I had no idea.  In fact, if they hadn't just told me who I was, I don't think I'd have known.  My brain kicked in and I managed a thumbs up and as I crossed the line with my arms raised in victory, they shouted in unison "You are a triathlete!"

Then I promptly burst into tears.  Bearing in mind that I'm not allowed to watch the London Marathon or any Olympic medal ceremonies on the television any more because I'm such a sap, this was not entirely surprising.  Fortunately, there was an ambulance lady just after the finish line who, having established that I was physically OK, gave me a big hug.  She is awesome.

The Lambrusco, pretzel and Ribena party (with Matilda).

I somehow got myself around the corner to get my medal, have my timing chip removed and then have my picture taken with a big cheesy grin by the event photographers.  I met James and Cecile and then we were off to find our bags and bikes.

We finished the day with a lovely picnic in the park with our friends Cecile, Matilda, Anna and Céline, who had all brought food for us and, in Cecile's case, Lambrusco.  Oh yes, classy beings that we are, we were drinking mini-bottles of Lambrusco, from the bottle, on a park bench. Cecile said she only just stopped short of getting straws...

We spent a while watching the inline skaters doing their tricks on Serpentine Road, but soon it was starting to get dark and chilly and it was time to go home.  We headed for the London Hilton, just across Park Lane and managed to get both of us, all our kit and both of our bikes into the back of a black cab at the taxi rank, thanks to the extremely accommodating driver, who knew exactly how to fit everything and everyone in and wasn't at all fazed by the situation.  Soon enough, we were home and sleepy.  A very long day.

Quite a lot of things surprised me about the event - the main one was how spread out everyone was on the cycle course, as I'd expected it to be a lot busier.  Another was that to finish the cycle in the time I managed, I must have been going at twice the speed of my average commute (although I wonder whether I was faster or slower than the person who reportedly did the cycle on a Boris bike).  I finished in 176th place in the women's open super sprint and in 35th place in my age group in a little over an hour and a half.

Several people have asked me what's next. The first thing is, of course, the London to Brighton Bike Ride, which is now less than two weeks away. After that, we'll see.  So far today, three opportunities have presented themselves - another triathlon, a longer open-water swim and playing American football (no, I'm not even joking).  Other suggestions are, of course, welcome!

Today, I feel surprisingly OK, although a little tired and a bit achy.  I'm anticipating that, as is usually the way, I will be a lot more achy tomorrow.  Whoopeedoo.

If you haven't had the chance yet to sponsor us (or you wanted to wait to see if we'd do it!!), it's definitely not too late.  Our fundraising page will be open for a while yet at www.justgiving.com/bbjatriathlon, so you can go there at your leisure to make a donation to Marie Curie Cancer Care.

Classy Lambrusco in the park, with Cecile (why am I
clutching those pretzels for dear life?)

James and I would both like to thank everyone who has supported us during this journey, whether by making a donation, by sending us a message, by asking us about our training or simply by thinking of us - it means a lot to us and we couldn't have done it without you!

Only one more sleep to go!

Today was a registration day.  We got up this morning and went to Hyde Park to pick up all our bits and bobs ready for tomorrow.  The first thing I had to navigate was having entered the triathlon in my married name and having photo ID in my maiden name.  I decided to take our marriage certificate with me in case there were any issues, but it turned out that taking my husband was sufficient.

It was great to go and have a look at the course and the transition area today so that we have a vague idea of where we're going tomorrow. The elite races were on today, although when we were there it was the corporate relays that were going on.  That said, there were quite a few GB athletes wandering about (in kit) from all different age groups, warming up and getting ready for their races later in the day.

The "blue chicken"

We had a bit of walk around the expo and James got his last bits and pieces from one of the stalls, then we had to head home as I had a rehearsal this afternoon.  Now we're home and sorting everything out because I have to play the organ at church tomorrow morning, so we won't have too much time to get ready after that and before we need to set off.

I've written my name in my wetsuit, pumped up my tyres (not that they needed much) and found all my kit.  Now the main thing is to work out which stickers need to be affixed to which bits of me and my bike! James, on the other hand, has been spending quite a long time trying to figure out how to put on his race-day swimming hat.  So far we've had the "blue chicken" and the "utterly inept".  I'm looking forward to being able to share the "properly on the head" at some point in the future.

The "utterly inept"

Just about all there is left to do at this point is wait until we go to the park tomorrow - I'd actually rather do it all now than go through the waiting, but wait we must!  I keep going through everything in my head - how I'm going to wait for everyone else to get away on the swim, how I'm going to be super-speedy on my bike, how my transitions are going to pan out.  I'm not thinking about the run, though.  I try not to think about running.

This time tomorrow, we will have finished and will hopefully be enjoying a well-deserved picnic in the park.  If you'd like to sponsor my triumphal sausage roll, there's still time to do so by going to www.justgiving.com/bbjatriathlon and donating a few quid to Marie Curie Cancer Care.

One Week to Go!

This time next week, I'll be putting on my tri-capris, packing my wetsuit and making sure I have the requisite number of shoes - it will be race day!!

I can't believe how quickly it has come around.  This weekend, I should be making my final preparations, making sure my transitions are smooth and putting in that last little bit of training.  Instead, I'm stuck indoors with a hideous cold and I feel rather like someone's shut my head in a washing machine.  Some might say that this is actually very good training for the start of the swim, where the number of flailing arms and legs means that the churning water resembles something along the lines of an old-fashioned twin-tub.  However, my view is that I want to be out on my bike but I can't even think about walking for more than about ten minutes without feeling woozy.

The good news is, of course, that these things are usually quite short-lived and having it now rather than this time next week is definitely better.  I'm not sure that helps my mood much, but I think I am now over the worst of it and anticipate feeling a lot better tomorrow, and possibly ready for a bit of training.

If you haven't had a moment to sponsor me for the triathlon yet, it's definitely not too late.  I'm doing it to raise money for Marie Curie Cancer Care in memory of my Uncle Donald and you can help me by making a donation on my Justgiving page at www.justgiving.com/bbjatriathlon.  Thank you for all your support!

A service with a smile

Today is a cycling day.  Well, sort of.  I'm still trying to pretend I'm not ill while suffering immensely with a horribly cough (and, now, you'll be pleased to hear, the occasional sneeze), but there was a more pressing health need than my own at stake today.

After getting up early to vote this morning, I got on my bike and cycled down to the gatehouse to the reservoir where I went swimming a couple of weeks ago and dropped it off with Jon at BikeMech for a service.  In 10 days' time (gulp!) my bike will need to go through a (probably quite rudimentary) safety check on the way into the triathlon transition area and, as it hasn't ever had any work done on it or been looked at from a technical perspective by anyone other than me, James and the nice guy who fixed my toe clip a couple of weeks ago, I figured it was probably about time that someone cast a professional eye over it.

Over all, it wasn't in bad shape, but my perennial gear problem has been playing up a bit lately and I also had an issue with the front mudguard (mostly that it was held on by one bolt when it should have four, and the wires that were supposed to hold it on were all bent the wrong way from it being folded).

I rolled up to the workshop just after it opened and was greeted by Jon's beautiful dog, who keeps him company while he works.  Having made a new friend, I knocked on the door and poked my head around to find a tardis-like set-up that the Doctor would be proud of - tools and parts as far as the eye could see (which wasn't very far, but you get my drift) and there were at least three bikes in there as well.

After Jon had taken my details, I left my "baby" with him and caught the bus to work.  It always seems a bit odd when one has cause to go on public transport with a cycle helmet and bag but without a bike.  I got some very funny looks.

This evening I left work a little early to go and pick the bike up.  The dog was snoozing this time, and Jon had the bike all ready.  I gave it a quick spin up to the filter station and back and the improvement was enormous - it just feels, well, better.  The gears are smooth, the brakes are good and, importantly, my front mudguard no longer flaps about in the wind.  The cost of all this fine tuning?  £25.  I was amazed at how little it was.  I shall be returning.

The Money Shot

I promised faithfully, some time ago, that upon reaching £100 of donations for Marie Curie Cancer Care I would post a photo of me in my oh-so-glamorous (and ever-so-slightly-stripey) swimming hat.

Well, dear reader, that day has finally come.  Today, our fundraising total hit £115, thanks to a generous donation from a work colleague, and so here it is - the Money Shot - my swimming hat pic.

I think it's particularly attractive as I seem to have managed to contort my eyebrow into a strange position by sticking it to my hairline with the hat; trust me, I can't do that unaided by silicon!

Just because we've reached this mini-milestone along the way doesn't mean it's too late for you to donate if you haven't yet had the chance - you never know what picture you might get if we hit £200....!  The button to get to our Justgiving page is on the right hand side - click it and follow the instructions.  Thanks once again for all your support!

Where have I gone?

The Sidley Singers at the Legal
Harmony choral competition

Yeah, I know, I went missing again.  This time, life got in the way and that meant that last week was a rest week.  The combination of singing in a choral competition at Southwark Cathedral, having to finish making a quilt for a retiring vicar and my husband's birthday meant that I didn't have any time at all to do any training - all those early mornings that I would have been swimming or cycling were spent in my loft stitching and all my evenings were taken up with netball, more quilting, the choral competition itself and a birthday party.


My plan was, therefore, to get back on the bike and back in the pool (and, I suppose, back into my running shoes) this week to prepare myself for the triathlon, which is now less than two weeks away.  However, now I have another problem - I'm ill.  I have a cough-type thing which is really annoying and is probably only going to get worse if I start exerting myself too much.  I've figured that I'd rather do the triathlon and be slightly under-prepared than try training too much while ill and not make it to race day.  I will be doing a bit, but given that I should be into my taper now anyway, I won't be overdoing it.

The Quilt

It seems, therefore, that now is a good time to be reminding both myself and you why it is that I'm putting myself through all this.  As I have mentioned before, the reason I initially entered the triathlon was that I wanted to do something to support my Uncle Donald, who was suffering from oesophogeal cancer.  He was still at home at that point and my parents were caring for him, but he was deteriorating and had to go into hospital soon after.  Because I live and work so far away from the family home, and also because of the very nature of his illness, I felt like I wasn't able to actually do anything to make it better.  Therefore, I hit on the idea of raising some money for Marie Curie Cancer Care, a charity that our family may ultimately have needed to use the services of in one way or another.  As it happened, Uncle Donald's condition deteriorated very quickly and he died in hospital on 12 March, before we had been in contact with Marie Curie.

Marie Curie provide home nurses and hospice care to patients who are at the end of their lives.  They enable people to be cared for in the place that they wish, whether that be in their own home or in a specialist environment.  In addition, they provide invaluable support to families and carers, giving advice and encouragement and just generally being there to call on when needed.  It must take an extremely special kind of person to be an end of life care nurse - this is something I had first hand experience of witnessing in the hospital where my uncle spent his last weeks; although they were not Marie Curie nurses, their job is similar, and I could not believe the amount of understanding, compassion, care, cheerfulness and love they showed to their patients.  These people deserve our support for the amazing job that they do, and one of the ways that we can support them is by donating money.

This is why I decided to do the triathlon - I would be extremely grateful if you could show your support for my efforts by making a donation to Marie Curie Cancer Care.  You can do that by going to this page, clicking the "donate" button and following the instructions.  Thank you all for being with me on this journey.

Swim-distancegate and the cut-off time saga

Today is a rest day.  It isn't supposed to be a rest day, but I'm out tonight, straight from work, for my netball team end of season dinner, so kit management was going to be too difficult for me to train as well.  I'll do something tomorrow - I'm not sure what, but something.

However, in the last couple of days, there has still been stuff going on.  The main thing has been the publication of the start times and race numbers for all the competitors in the WorldTri London triathlon, along with the Competitor Guide (which has in it all of the info about where to be and when). So, at 17:00 on Sunday, 1 June, I shall be starting my first triathlon in Wave 61, wearing a blue swimming hat and sporting number 5395. James will be starting at the same time, with similar headgear, and number 5394.  Needless to say, if you're around in London that day and would like to cheer us on, make your way to Hyde Park as it would be great to see a few friendly faces!!

Some of the things that the Competitor Guide does are to set out exactly how many laps you have to do in each discipline and, crucially, how far each of the three triathlon distances is and what the cut-off times are (i.e. the time you have to complete the triathlon within, else they might pull you off the course and not let you finish).  When we signed up for the super sprint distance, the website said (and still does say), quite clearly, that the swim distance is 400m.  This is what we've been training for and, as I've found out in the last couple of days, what all the other super sprinters have been training for, too.  However, in the Competitor Guide, consistently throughout, the swim is referred to as being one lap of 500m.  That would represent an increase in the swim distance of 25%.  That's a lot further.

In addition, we had been told at sign-up that the cut-off time for the super sprint distance would be 1.5 hours.  While this is certainly achievable for me, it could have got a little on the tight side in the event that I got my leg stuck in my wetsuit or, for example, had to swim 500m instead of 400m.  In the Competitor Guide, however, the cut-off is set at an absolute time of 7 p.m., regardless of what your start time is - for me, with a 5 p.m. start time, this means that I would have an extra half an hour to complete the race, which would take off a huge amount of pressure (during my marathon training I learned to live in abject terror of the sweeper bus); for those with a later start, though, this would mean they might have five or ten minutes less time to finish.

There were a number of other errors in the Guide as well (such as a reference to the event being on 1 May and the number of laps for the sprint distance being put in for the super sprint), but the swim distance and cut-off times seemed to be the main issue.

The super sprinters, including me, very quickly took to social media - first of all to verify among ourselves that our understanding of 400m swim and 1.5 hour cut-off was consistent (which it was), and then to try to get some answers on how far we needed to be swimming and, effectively, how fast.  There were many, many tweets and facebook messages to the organisers asking for clarification and several people said they had e-mailed as well (which I also did).  Eventually, last night, someone got a response to an e-mail and posted it on facebook - the swim is 400m and the cut-off is about 7 p.m. but they aren't going to enforce it too rigidly.  Result.  The cut-off time saga is over.  Swim-distancegate is resolved.  As you were.