Tri / Triathlon / Triathlons - do they float your boat?

Wow! Well done!

completely missed this, great work!

was the swim non wetsuit this year?

enough to put me off from the race all together to be honest!

I'm still about 95% for Wales, have told myself to wait till this weekend to make a call, have a big stag do next weekend which isn't ideal for the first week of proper training, and need to speak to my coach about the whole thing as well really, but beginning to feel ok, have a 10mile tt tonight to see what kind of state the legs are in so could be interesting!!

What have you entered @hats ?

have you got accomodation

No, not yet. Been putting it off with various excuses (whether family coming or not, leaving it to after the 24, etc).

Going to start looking this weekend.

Back on a positive spin now. Doing the first 180km of the 24 in 7h15 helped as did the couple of lake swims I've done (especially as the last one was in my own wetsuit).

Thanks guys.

I was crapping myself all week as the lake temp was hovering at 24.5C until Saturday. They decided on Saturday evening it would be wetsuit legal, thank ****.

Here's my mini race report:

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I raced Ironman Switzerland today in a hot and humid Zurich. The weather was supposed to be thunderstormy so I'm glad it ended up being perfect, if maybe a little too hot. This was my first full Ironman and I'd been training hard for it since about a year ago. Before 2015, I was a pure cyclist. 5km was the furthest I'd run and couldn't even swim 25m without gasping for breath.

I'm happy to say the training paid off and I smashed my target time of 12 hours! My total race time was 11:02:53.

Swim - 1:31:16
T1 - 00:06:21
Bike - 5:36:08
T2 - 00:07:36
Run - 3:41:33

I hate swimming and I'm terrible at it, especially without a wetsuit. It was decided last minute that wetsuits were legal as the water temp had been hovering around the limit of 24.5C for most of the week! Thank God. The swim was long and arduous (for me), the water was choppy and people kept swimming into my line. I completed the swim not far from my estimated 90mins so I'm happy enough with that considering I actually swam the wrong way for a bit following others who got lost. The buoys clearly weren't big and orange enough! Ideally I'd have prescription goggles to prevent this. I was relieved to get out of the water.

I wasn't rushing my transitions and allowed for that in my 12h projection. I hopped on the bike and set off on an epic 180km (2x90km laps) with 1300m of ascent. This was a fast course for sure but despite this, it wasn't easy. Coming off the back of a 3.8km swim I wasn't feeling great! I took the first lap relatively easy with the intention of upping the effort in the second. That worked well enough until I felt the onset of leg cramps in the final 40km whenever I tried to put power down. I kept having to stop pedalling and stretch until it subsided which hampered my progress. No amount of coke or electrolyte drink seemed to help but I made it to the end, nearly averaging 20mph but not quite. I did beat my projected 6h time though.

I was relieved to get off my bike and now had to run a marathon! The run course was 4-laps of a flat loop through the city and by the lake. At this point it was survival mode. I projected a 4h marathon at plodding pace which is all I could muster at this stage. The first two laps weren't too bad, slowish but I felt okay. I didn't have any GI issues from all the sugary energy I'd been consuming and I did under 1 hour for both laps. Then it started to get really hard on the last two laps! My body was just shutting down and it became a series of runs between aid stations. I walked through every one to take time to drink and eat stuff and this worked well. However, by the last lap the dreaded cramps re-appeared, this time in my running leg muscles. I tried licking table salt from sachets they gave out, drinking lots of water and eating salty snacks but nothing helped. I just had to make it to the finish no matter what! When I saw I had 5km left I just imagined myself doing my normal loop around Clapham Common, only 20mins to go. Not that I could run a 20min 5k at this point!

Crossing the line was glorious and I have to admit I cried a tiny bit. I had dedicated this race to the memory of my brother, raising money for charity in the process, and I beat my target time by nearly an hour so it was quite emotional. It was 11 hours of hell and frankly, I can't recommend it to anyone. :D

I have even more respect now for Pro Ironman athletes!

//

A few pics... :D

Sorry I didn't post earlier but I missed the wetsuit discussion.

This whole worry about warm water happened to me at IMCH in 2010. Predicted high water temps and multiple threats about banning wetsuits. At the time I'd never swum OW without a wetsuit and with close to zero body fat was worried about buoyancy. In an attempt to build some confidence I raced a local 3.8k swim race with no wetsuit and was fine until the evening sun dipped behind the trees, at which point I started haemorrhaging warmth. I finished the race but c. 25% slower than normal. My mates saw me finish but were getting worried when they hadn't seen me for a while and eventually found me still in my trunks and shivering in the back of my car with no recollection of how I got there of anything else in the past hour. Now shit scared, and only a couple of days before the race I dropped £300 one of those swim skin suits (not sure if they are still legal) in the hope that it would help retain at least some warmth.

Come race morning they made the decision that wetsuits would be allowed, so it was all a big fuss over nothing... I still have that swim skin in my wardrobe somewhere... never worn.

Stupid IMCH.

That sounds just like my ordeal! I managed to get a cheap swim skin second hand but I'm glad I didn't need it.

You sound very similar to me. I get chilly at indoor pools nevermind outside. I don't feel comfortably warm unless the water is above 20C. Any colder than that and I need a wetsuit and neoprene cap.

Also, I totally believe I have a buoyancy problem. I'm not a fast swimmer, but I refuse to believe my technique is so bad that fat people can swim quicker! They just float better. :P

Great write-up @lreilly and well done! That's a pretty decent mara time on its own, let alone after a swim, cycle and having only started running since 2015!

Monster Middle. It's near my parents house and there's a great tea room in the town so if all else fails I can go for tea with my mum.

Great write up! 11 hours is brilliant. And you almost look like you're enjoying yourself in that bike photo.

Thanks! Feeling the post-race blues big time though. :(

Have no motivation or energy when I go for a run or cycle now and I've totally given up swimming.

Swimming is not all that anyway. Maybe think of a run or cycle that you can do solely for fun, no training or anything. Cake stops and sunshine.

Anyone else racing in London this weekend?

Yes, for some reason I thought it'd be a good idea to do an Olympic distance two weeks after an Iron-distance.

Oh well, Daniela Ryf won Challenge Roth and Ironman Switzerland within a week. I'm sure I'll manage!

Quick write up of today's race if anyone is interested!

Swim - 1.5 km avg 01:55 min/100m 0:28:39
Bike - 40 km avg 36.49 km/h 1:05:47
Run - 10.5 km avg 06:01 min/km 1:03:16
Overall time - 2:44:23

Showed up at the swim assembly feeling confident and ready for my first tri. We jumped in the water and clever me decided to place myself in the very front of the wave. Feeling good, I got my GPS watch ready and before I knew it the horn sounded and mayhem started around me while I was trying to press the "start activity" button on my watch while instead pressing "back". It turns out that my wave was a fast one and all of a sudden I was getting kicked, punched and showed around like in a washing machine. Full panic mode, I decide that the watch will have to wait and in the struggle to keep up with everyone I start hyperventilating and swallowing at least a pint of delicious Thames water. 10 minutes or so into it I start getting into a groove and settle into a nice pace. At 28 minutes I leave the water and run up the ramp feeling seriously disoriented and starting to feel stomach cramps.

T1 goes well and I am finally on the bike ready to put down the hammer. I quickly settle into my goal heart rate of around 160 (which in hindsight was probably too high). Knowing that the run is my weakest discipline, I try to keep up the pace on the bike and gain some time. Besides, riding full aero on closed roads in London was such an awesome feeling I couldn't help giving it my all. On the bike leg I ended up number 381 out of 3355 people with an average speed of 36,5km/h. Super happy!

On to the run and I am still having stomach cramps. I have been drinking mostly energy drinks so far (big mistake) and I was afraid of taking in any more nutrition so I only brought one gel with me on to the run leg. This fell out of my back pocket almost immediately. 3 kilometers in and I realize that 1) I should have done way more bike/run brick sessions before the race and 2) my legs are turning into jello. At this point I am completely scraped of fuel and am desperately looking on the ground for dropped gels. Can't find any. I dig deep and somehow manage to finish without fainting.

All in all, it was a great experience! Total time was 2:44 which put me in the top 30% for the Tower Bridge route which I am super super happy with. I was hoping for around 3h so it was quite a surprise to see the results afterwards! Not sure if I want to repeat it anytime soon but if I do I learnt some valuable lessons :) :D

Congrats on your first triathlon! That is a very decent time and looks like you are solid on the swim and bike. Put in a good winter of run training and you'll be smashing a sub-90min next year.

For me, this was probably my last triathlon. Swimming just isn't my thing and yesterday I was reminded why rolling swim starts are nicer than mass starts! Despite swimming 3.8km only 2 weeks ago, after about 200m in the docks (disgusting compared to Lake Zurich) I wanted to grab a kayak and drop out of the race. :D

Once the washing machine (as you accurately described it) stopped spinning I finally got into my usual (slow) rhythm and made it through.

Physically and mentally, my heart just wasn't in it. I thought I'd be feeling super strong but I was still feeling weakened from the full Ironman. Still, I'm happy with my performance considering.

those results pages fro the London tri are a complete travesty...

good effort both,

Don't know what you mean.... I'm quite happy with my 39251.67kph speed! :D

Wow 2:19 is an absolute killer time, way to go! Specially so close after doing an ironman. I feel you on the swim, I really felt like giving up and grabbing hold of one of the kayaks..

Pretty much decided to bail on IM Wales. I could pretend it's due to an injury but it comes down to apathy mostly; not enough training in the last few months and never shifted the weight. (And I never shifted the weight because I didn't take it all seriously enough.)

Whilst I'd be fine for the swim and the cycle I don't really want to have to haul myself around a marathon and end up finishing in 15+ hours. (I was hoping more for 1h15 / 7h / 4h30 + 15m T1/2 = 13h)

2015 was supposed to be about getting my weight down (76kg target) and training for debut marathon. I got down to 83kg at one point but then it all went back on. Currently 88kg again. The running training went ok though, despite being too heavy.

2016 was then supposed to be about getting faster, but it was just fighting the excess.

The biggest problem for me is fitting in training along side work and family life. I knew this was going to be tricky but during term time I was able to regularly fit in 10+ hours a week without any impact on family time. (Only working 4 days a week helps so I get one day for a long swim and cycle whilst my daughter is at school.) I could then top this up on the bigger weeks with a few hours at the weekend or an evening.

The summer holidays have been a killer. Can't get into a routine for training and chose to do very little when I did get the chance. Beer + cheese in France too. Having the big 4 week pre-taper block of training over the summer was just impossible, just not enough time and don't have the holiday to take (covering the 13 weeks that children aren't at school is hard enough!)

Annoying that I entered IM Wales thinking it would sell out (it still hasn't). I could have saved myself a bunch of money if I'd been my usual lazy self.

Ideally I need a race that's either:-

• before the end of the school year (Fri 21st July next year), but then it's hard for family to come and watch as a Sunday night finish isn't good for daughter being at school on a Monday morning.
  
• or that weekend or a few weekends after so I'm in the easy part of the taper by the time I've got to do more parenting, this means a race late July or early August. Might look for one further afield and build a family holiday around it.
  
  

Come September I need to focus on some good base training and get the weight down properly (no excuses). I'll do another marathon in the Spring (entered London ballot but have a Brighton place already). If I get to the right place (weight wise) I can then look at what IM distance events there are that suit the timing.

Serpentine (1 mile) Swim in September should be fun though.

Oh, forgot I'm probably doing LEL in 2017. That's July 30th to 4th August. Hmm, that might prevent me from doing anything else...

2017 goals: Weight under 76kg by April. 4h30 mara, ideally sub-4h. LEL. Possible IM.
2018: Marathon. 400 miles in 24h TT. Ironman (if not in 2017).
2019: Marathon. PBP.

[EDIT] But then part of me thinks why not just give it a try anyway? It'll just cost ~£350 for 3 nights and give me an easy PB to beat next time...

@Greenbank

I would usually say you've made the right decision as starting a race without your heart being in it is a sure fire way to DNF, but you've shown yourself to be a tough old bastard (no idea if you are actually even older than me, just a turn of phrase) and if you want to do something you will, yes it's not that sexy to finish once it gets dark but finishing an ironman is still finishing an ironman, presumably you've already paid out for accommodation and the race so its just a case of turning up and doing it, plus energy gel/petrol costs.

Add to that the support for the run will get you through pretty much anything, so while it may not be pretty, if you make the bike cut off which I'm confident you would then you've got 6.5 hours to run/walk the thing...

Would really like to be there but for me cash and lack of town centre accommodation means its a no go, will probably try for Austria or Roth next year assuming cash allows.

Sod it. I can run for at least half of it and then walk/jog the rest. 15h+ IM here I come.

Just booked a twin room right next to the North Beach in Tenby as one had appeared on hotels.com. Only £20 to cancel if I don't go through with it.

3 weeks to sort myself out (one of which on holiday in Cornwall) and then a 2 week taper.

Ha. It was the lack of accommodation (I didn't have anything booked) that was bugging me too, until I checked a few websites just now and found what's probably someone's cancelled room.

Would really like to be there but for me cash and lack of town centre accommodation means its a no go

£255 gets you the other bed in my twin room right on the North Beach in Tenby (Fourcroft Hotel). Booking is 3 nights (Friday - Monday) assuming I haven't been fleeced or double booked by hotels.com

I will also be driving from SW15 on Friday morning and driving back Monday morning so could possibly combine that too since you're sort of on the way (if I guess where you are correctly).

HTFU is definitely the right attitude @Greenbank. Training is cheating anyway! Go and enjoy it, isn't what this cycling and running malarkey is meant to be all about??

I was at the finish line of IM Austria a few years ago and the people finishing 16 hours plus looked just as happy as those doing it in half the time (albeit a bit soggier as there was a massive storm going on).

My race is this weekend, plan at the moment is to sleep in a field near transition the night before using my wetsuit as a rollmat.