First Triathlon of the Season

Today was my first triathlon of the season;  and I'm not afraid to admit I was scared lol

Yesterday my quads were feeling tight and achy; this morning they still felt sore; nevertheless race day was here so time to quit moaning and get on with it :)

I had a bowl of cherios dry and then throughout the morning consumed about 250ml of H5 and the same in water;  took a gel+ when heat 3 started.Now I need to sort out a warm up routine;  I didn't do any; I'm never really sure what to do!

Swim - 1500m - 29.20

I'm really happy with this;  wasn't really sure how this would go;  apart from the Inverness jaunt;  I'm only swimming once a week and due to Iain not being well this week, the swim didn't happen;  so no swim in 10 days.   I decided not to tumble;  I wanted it more realistic for the OW swims, obviously the drive of the wall aids us.  It was in a way a messy swim; the guys had put slower times down which resulted in about a dozen stops, it'll be interesting to see the swim data later.   I felt really strong throughout,  so well chuffed.  

T1 lol well let's say it wasn't good;  its a very short transition run!

Bike - 42km - 1 hr 44

Mmmmm now I knew this was going to be difficult for me;  its a very technical course and my lack of skills resulted in a time probably a good bit slower than it should have been. 

It was quite a hilly course;  they had to change it last minute due to roadworks,  thou it still has the big hill in and there was a lot of debris and loose gravel on the roads due to the heavy rain the day before.   I felt really strong up the hills but going down was a different matter;  lol I was slower then going up!  But there were parts of the course were I could push it and in times past I would have been on my brakes on these too; so that's an improvement;  however,  one good thing from today, is I now have the confidence to go out and tackle the hills round here and the decents are not as severe :)

My transitions need work, there weren't the smoothest lol

I set out for my run and felt great; I was wearing my garmin and I consciously had to back off;  I took a gel+ early on and had about 250ml of water at the turnaround;  I hadn't managed to take any more than a couple of sips of H5 on the bike due to my handling issues.  I was really thirsty so I actually backed right of to get the water into me;  I eased abit on the last mile more due to my periformus problems,  it hadn't been bad but could feel it in the last couple of miles,  I was holding 7.55s average and ended up with an average of 8.06.  Got a massage lined up for Tuesday that should sort it.

Even with the below par bike; a 3hr 7 is the fastest I've done an Olympic Distance. 

This is me heading out for my run :)