April 20, 2015

Triathlon

By Stephen Scanlon

Hayward’s Heath 19/04/2015

Follow me on twitter here https://twitter.com/scanoTRI

This weekend’s race takes me down to the south of London to a small town called Haywards Heath. This race happens to be the third anniversary of my first triathlon, this very weekend, at this event. Three years ago I was talked into trying a triathlon, knowing me it was probably over a few beers down the local Ale House. I remember my Dad saying that they were a great experience and that I should give one a shot. I’m sure he was feeling comfortable at the time since it was his second season, I wasn’t sure what to expect really and didn’t understand why people were looking at me with two heads as I pushed a hard tail MTB bike into transition. It was only when I was out on the bike, being lapped by people with funny shaped helmets that I realised why!

Having come a long way over the years – now squeezing into a tri suit, riding a TT bicycle and running in ridiculously light footwear, I was really looking forward to this race. I felt like I had the right tools for the job this time. I have ran super-sprints, sprints and Olympic distance races up until now so the 400m swim, 23km bike, 5 km run was not a worry to me, I was more focused on how far up the field I could finish in my age category. After finishing 8that the Bicester Tri I was slowly becoming addicted to placing well in races! I have found this mentality has impacted on my training quite positively. I have been training quite a lot in the pool lately and recently started upping the mileage on the bike which I rarely have done in the past. I’ve brought this confidence with me into the pool and as a result I am pushing harder for longer, similarly on the bike. A very simple approach, but effective. It sounds easy to plan a good training session but as I have discovered, if you’re head isn’t in the game, forget it. Try think of a recent success, sport or non sport related and take the energy with you to your next training session. Keep a clear mind and use this energy to stay focused on technique. I find if my concentration is lapsing, take a 5 min breather in the pool. Who cares? No one is watching. I have and it’s worked wonders. Give it a shot!

Race Day:

The format on race day was quite unique, as it is every year at this event. The 400m swim was managed in a ‘Snake’ formation with athletes starting in one corner of the pool, swimming up one side of a lane, down the other side and then hopping under the divide and starting over again in the next lane. Eventually you ended up in the far corner of the pool and left the leisure centre and out to transition. The bike leg was two laps of a relatively flat course with one or two kickers that made up 23km in total. The run was 5km in total and was 3 laps of the housing estate that surrounded the leisure centre – quite hilly to be fair!

Swim – I put in a time of 7:24 on the swim, it was really tough go build any momentum when we had to duck under the lane ropes and as the pool got busier, congestion became a huge factor. I also hadn’t swam during the week leading up to the race as the London Aquatics Centre was closed to the public to facilitate the British Swimming Championships. I won’t be remembering that swim leg for a while. Not to worry, the sun was out and I was looking forward to the cycle!

Bike – I took a bit of time in transition as I wasn’t allowed swim with my calf guards on. I wear them now while training and racing and find that I don’t suffer from the same amount of pain on my Achilles; something must be working so I will keep wearing them. Once I had all my gear on and had made it out of transition, I was on the road. They had changed the bike course from last years one and the new course was very hilly and I was out of the saddle from the start – I was not expecting that. Once I got rolling I felt strong on the road but there were some very steep kickers that caught most of us of guard. But with climbs come some pretty steep decent and luckily they were stretched out, I even managed to pass a motorcycle marshal on a decent – I wonder how fast he was going (Yes, I forgot my Garmin!). Once I had both laps done, I was feeling very excited about the run. I always take note of who passes me on the last 5km of the bike – they are my prey on the run!

Run – The run was three laps of quite a hilly route but I was feeling good. I took the first few hundred metres slow because I wanted to make sure my calf/Achilles didn’t flair up after pushing way too fast at the start. This proved a good decision and I was maintaining a steady pace. I was also happy that I started catching a few guys early on, so I kept it going! I ended up putting in a 5km time of 21:07 which wasn’t too bad for me considering how painful those hills were!

In the end I finished 11thin my age group with a time of 1:28 – not my fastest race, but looking forward to putting in some positive training sessions over the next two weeks.

Next race:

The next race on the agenda is the ‘All Nations Triathlon’ on the 9/5/2015 which is organised by ‘The Fix Events’ and is held at the Olympic Rowing venue at Dorney Lake in Berkshire. This race is a 400m lake swim, 20km bike and 5km run format. It will be my first time to attend this event; however I have raced this format at this venue at the end of last season as part of a relay team. Each member of the team did the full distance in a swim,swim,swim – bike,bike,bike – run,run,run format. I did it with my brother Robert and our friend Lisa and came 3rd! Great event! I am really looking forward to the race in two weeks and I plan to do a lot of swimming before the event, it’s a 400m open water wetsuit swim so I feel the stronger I am on the swim the better chance I’ll have at a clean transition onto the bike. The bike is a lapped course which follows the path that circles the rowing lake. It’s a flat bike ride but the fact that it’s quite an open venue it can be quite prone to gusts if there’s any wind around. Since I’ve upgraded my wheels my bike seems to take on the form of a spinnaker sail in high winds – I’ll need to keep an eye out for that. I do quite enjoy the run on this course. It’s one 5km lap of the Rowing Lake and completely flat. As usual, I am predicting to make up a lot of places on the run – the long straight ‘out and back’ format seems to be mentally challenging people and I found the last time I really enjoyed picking people off by keeping focused on a good posture and seeing each runner individual targets to pass. Again, small mental games seem to work well for me when fatigue and tiredness want to take over.

The plan over the next two weeks is to train hard and regularly in the pool, up the mileage on the bike, throw in the odd 5 & 10km run and most importantly stay out of the beer gardens of Reading on these long sunny evenings we are having lately! Once the next race is done it will be full steam ahead preparing for WTS London on the 31stMay in Hyde Park.