BCTTT Forum

by **jonathon.e** » 30 May 2011 12:59

Woodhall Spa,Lincolnshire
29th May 2011
One step beyond
marshalls at most junctions,and at road crossing
changing facilities,clothing storage,portaloos
T shirt

400m swim
24k bike
5k run

So to get the ball rolling as there are bound to be three other reports that will vary immensly
Rolled up early to watch and meet up with Sonofsammo,woody and Zacnici,despite my start time of 11.12,I was able to get there to watch Andrew(sos),in the swim,shouted at him as he got out,and was greeted by a quizzical ''Oh Hello',has he sped off to T1.
Spoke to Woody,before his swim and then sort out Zac(John),just before his swim.
Tried to watch and shout abuse as much as possible at either transition or the run,but knew I would get it back four fold at least by the time I started.

Chatted to Andrew as he finished and then went over to get changed,Time goes very quickly when you try to watch others,I also knew four others(not club members) racing as well,so tried to get to watch them.

The Excuse(sorry race report)
swim,400m or 396m,in a heated 33m pool,lane swimming,
started and straight away,out of the groove,not quite clicking,stitch early on,something I don't normally get,cruised up and down for 10 lengths,just starting the 11th length and the next wave goes off,the swimmer decides to swim up my right hand side,as another swimmer tries to overtake on my left,as the fourth swimmer in the lane is coming in the opposite direction.FFS,guys,its not open water.Andrew,remarked that I was remarkably composed in the situation.I let them past and followed them to the end,got out and trundled to T1.

T1.
unremarkable,about 55secs,

Bike.
this is where the tales will differ.The wind was either,strong at least 15 to 20 mph,or gusting 35-40,depending.
first 6 miles were slightly uphill,well it is Lincolnshire,with a teale wind and the last 9,either head or cross wind.Zac had mentioned about a sweeping downhill left hand bend,ha ha.
It was a struggle,still not able to get in the groove,only dusted by one cyclist,about 500m from the finish.

t2.
unremarkable again,about 45secs.

run
flat 5k
the least said the better,not enjoyable at all.

overall 6 mins slower than last year

by **Woody** » 30 May 2011 14:57

OK, my turn....

The day started with an early alarm and a scramble to get the kit into the car, quick boil of the kettle and a cuppa into the thermal mug ready for the road. Obviously I was sporting my pristine BCTTT hoody - loud and proud baby!! 5 mins into the drive I figured that I'm out the house, settled into the drive "I'll have a quick sip of tea'. Slurp, spill, splosh. Hoody, no longer pristine but sporting a massive tea stain right down the front! bugger.
My preparation for he race was, well, normal. I knew that at some point I was to swim....then bike....then run...oh, and it was in Woodhall Spa (which was out Lincoln way) so I headed East until the world became unfamiliar and then typed into the satnav on the phone 'woodhall spa'. I followed it like the proverbial sheep. All the time utterly convinced I wasn't going the right way. Somewhat confirmed when the phone piped up saying "You've reached your destination". I think the phone took me to actually be the proverbial sheep as I was on a country road surrounded by nothing but fields! Luckily I could see a built up area a couple of miles ahead so I followed my nose until eventually seeing the race running signs, followed them until I ended up in the car park. phew!

quick call to Andrew and I met him en route to the registration tent, quick panic at the registration when they asked to ID. erm.....not sure....took me a couple of minutes to hunt out my drivers licence (lucky I had it!) and finished registering. Picked up my number and T-shirt and it was done. I was ready to roll....oh no, not yet, portaloo!!

We started to stroll back to the car, bemoaning the weather as it was blustery and looked to threaten rain, when a strange man with a shark cup walked over - Zacnici!! (John) Good old meet and greet (always good to meet folks off the forum, put a face to a name and all that) and then we decided to grab kit and rack up.

Pretty straighforward racking everything up really, noticing what I'd not managed to sort out yet, Gripper laces and a tri top! they're on the 'to do' list. I'd decided to go with the TL bike shirt and figured tying my laces couldn't really be that bad...could it? A lady next to me saw me laying everything out and asked if I'd done one before as she seemed a bit flustered. Bad start love if your looking to me for advice! :lol:

John had gone to get sorted so after a quick scout of the pool Andrew headed off to get ready, leaving me to my own self doubting thoughts. I had a bet on with Jonathon.e if I could come to within 10 mins of his PB on the course then I'd win. Loser buys the beers. I had resigned myself to buying beers! :roll:

It wasn't long before Andrew was poolside...and I had the video going

As Jon.e says, there's nothing to make the time fly than watching someone else so I headed back to the car to get ready but bumped into Jon.e. Quick hello and a chat then away I went! I was soon stood at Poolside with the nervous 'I hate swimming, please let it be over quickly' thoughts racing through my head.

"Number 225 please"

sh*t...that's me! hat on, info taken in, lane identified....knees a tremblin'!

and we're off! I was determined to give FC a go and I did do 2 lengths but a combination of getting knackered and seeing everyone else in my wave ahead of me and default setting kicked in and BS came back

so I soon settled into it after calming my self curses for not completing FC and had caught up, and even over took, some of the folks from my wave but I now wasn't sure how many lengths I'd done! My Garmin started beeping and whistling and shouting at me which meant at one point I was swimming underwater and playing with the settings! not surprisingly, the garmin was now useless or this race! (something not missed by Jon.e!) I thought I'd done 12 lengths but watched in horror as 2 folks in the lanes either side of me turned around and swam back!? Surely that was their last length as well?? erm....ah.....ooh....what to do?? maybe I have mis-counted? I soon touched he wall, couldn't check my time which would have told me I was finished so....I turned around and did another couple. Just to make sure, you know, for safe measure :roll:

It transpires that I should have got out....bugger!

Well, swim over with. Time to do the 'nice stuff' now. I ran into T1 hot on the heels of the others in my wave. T1 turned out to be a mini cluster all of it's own! It was all OK until....Team Laws bike top. I figured it'd be better to zip it half way and then put it on over my head....erm, no! The bloody thing rolled up under my arms and I must have spent a good few minutes trying to sort it. By that time I was the last out of T1....not a happy bunny!

Mount line, on bike, head down, PEDAL!!!! I wanted to catch those from my wave at least. and I did :mrgreen:

but....

about 5 mins after leaving T1 I found myself on the steady uphill section having taken about 4 or 5 people, feeling positive, I spotted a Mansfield Trisuit ahead and marked them out as my target (I like to play catch the pigeon when racing on the bike!). Head down, is it windy?, pedalled away then looked up to see the tri suit a lot closer BUT it was closer because the guy was off his bike walking down the hill!? A sad a dejected bloke heading for a DNF. Well, I'm in the BCTTT. We don't let that happen!! So after asking him what's wrong it transpires that he's got a puncture and no tubes or kit or pump at all. I pulled over, jumped off the bike, took off my saddle bag and pump and handed them to him telling him to make sure he finishes regardless of time and then find me back at transition. Now, I was actually grateful for this experience as the question is regularly asked 'stop and help or race your race'. This was the crunch....what would I do?? Well, now I know! Even with the little bet going on I didn't even consider not helping, that's worth a PB in itself.

Back on the bike and the bet was still in my head so the only thoughts in my head were, "Gotta make up that time" so throughout the entire race I was pushing it, especially as he wind was just stopping me in my tracks if I didn't! I can honestly say that the bike section was the hardest riding I've ever done, constant headwind regardless of what direction I was travelling in only punctuated by the brief gusting side winds (that blew me to the middle of the road on at least 3 occasions!). Zacnici had mentioned a 'long sweeping downhill section' and I was still looking for it when I rolled into T2! In all, I managed to take a good few folks on the bike so I was pretty pleased with the bike route, all things considering, and even without any elasatic laces T2 went OK.

The run hurt.

I genuinely couldn't feel my legs for probably 2 miles? but reasurringly I still managed to settle into my rythym and ignored the lack of feeling in the legs. Again with the running I continued to over take a few people and once my feeling came back to the legs I was feeling good and for the first time in my entire history of Triathlons I managed a sprint finish! I was particularly happy with that considering I'd ran at better than my 10K PB pace after such a hard bike leg :mrgreen:

Official Times: 1:21:18
S: 11:13
T1: 2:09
B: 44:57
T2: 1:06
R: 21:53

All in all, a great day. Happy with the time, all things considered, and I'd recommend the race to anyone thinking about it!

Good day had by all

by **King Sad** » 30 May 2011 20:27

My turn now ...

Got to Woodhall nice and early and met up with Sonofsammo (Andy) and Woody (Mike) conspicuous in their BCCT hoodies, Woody's complete with tea stains. It was great to meet them at last, Jonathen.E because he goes against the ethos of turning up and cuffing it actually trains so had a later start. Gave the guys a quick heads up on the course 'it's mainly flat with the wind behind you out and against you back with a climb of 50m over the first 7Km and a long sweeping descent' - honestly there is :oops:

. We wished each other luck, I registered, racked up and made my way to the pool and met Jonathan so had a bit of a chat and hurled abuse at Mike in the pool.

33m open air heated pool; swimming is my weakest, reckoned here I could do between 8:35 and 9:00 depending on the breaks. Took it steady but towards the end it congested a bit and was stuck behind 2 chaps for about a length or so, got fed up and seeing nobody coming towards us launched an attack with 20m to go; three abreast wasn't happy about doing it but overtook them and got out about 5-10m ahead crossing the mat at 9:19, slower than I wanted but still 1:07 faster than last year, woohoo.

T1, I don't know what I am doing this year in T1, took bloody ages 1:42, acting like a right gorp; it's all laid out, rehearsed yet it has been going to pot, GET A GRIP JOHN!

Off on the bike, feeling happier, Shakti (my bike) was behaving well and was hoping to improve on last years time of 49:28 (weather was perfect then) as this was the first time at Woodhall for Shakti, last year I rode my Focus Tria so carbon bling and 50 section wheels had something to prove. Started to overtake a few of the slower riders and had a Ribble in my sights belonging to the guy who started in the next lane to me in the pool, 266 (thought he was a girl at first - sorry), he had a 30sec lead. Eventually took him, feeling v pleased with that and then the first serious piece of cross wind, threw me about 5 foot across the road, pleased to say I didn't back off and kept the pace on except on one stretch where I came out of aero for about 200m. After about 750m 266 overtook me, he had 34's on and didn't seem overly affected by the wind, he gave me a real race and increased his lead by another 22sec by T2. Came to the long sweeping descent (it really is there) http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/34648538, normally you can crank it up over the crest and tuck down aero, freewheeling, not this year, crikey had to peddle hard against the wind. Andy and Mike later collared me asking 'where was that long sweeping descent?' sorry guys. Again pleased to say that so confident was I with Shakti that I kept aero through most of the bends and corners. Time, 46:33, almost 3min faster than last year when conditions were perfect double woohoo.

T2, gorp, ran past my rack 1:12, sheesh bottom kicking time.

Run, I expected my run times to drop as I have been concentrating on the bike this year which is starting to pay off; no dramas, no jelly legs, no hurling just a nice steady pace. Time 22:50 much slower than last year by 1:26.

Overall; 1:21:36, 2:44 faster than last year – triple woohoo, but take back one woohoo for clusters in T1 and T2, lost about 45sec on stupid mistakes. Although I am pleased that I am coming up higher in the results that also means that 45sec lost in arsing about in transition cost me 25 places. 180 out of 510, just nudged out of top third by my T1/T2 clusters, but one hell of a race.

PS we all gathered at the line to cheer in Jonathan who finished indecently quickly and looking quite refreshed. For pictures see the thread viewtopic.php?f=3&t=4569&start=10

Once again great to meet the guys, lots of good vibes going in transition, all happy bunnies, if it hadn't been for the wind some great times but hey also gave a good story to tell.