I raced a race! - Llanelli Sprint Tri Race Report

Last Sunday was my first triathlon of the 2013 season. It was a sprint tri in Llanelli, the town where I grew up. I’m very pleased with the way it went. I managed 2^nd in the Super Vet’s category and, more importantly, smashed my PB for the course and that’s with the swim course being about 1min longer this year. So it looks like all my training since I got serious is starting to pay off.

The swim finish (Photo: courtesy of Owen Evans wife of Cardiff Triathlon club)

I guess since I started racing triathlons (properly in Australia in the late 80’s) I’ve never been a contender for winning anything and consequently I’ve only ever really competed to do as best as I can. My objective has always been a PB rather than winning anything or beating anyone specific so I’ve paced races to finish as fast as I can. I can’t remember a time where I have actually gone for a sprint finish to try and be one or two places up the finishing list. However now with this plan of training, trying a bit harder and competing on the international age group stage I actually thought through what I would be like if it did come to some sort of sprint finish against one of my fellow age groupers trying to qualify. My observation was that I probably wouldn’t be very good. I normally don’t hold anything back in the swim or cycle and I’ve never been good or comfortable in the run, always seeming to be in pain from the start of the run to finish. My aim on the run is to get it over with without over straining myself. I’ve also never previously been concerned with who I’m racing, in my age group or others. This season, again with my targets in mind, I thought I should take things a bit more seriously. So before Llanelli I had a look at the start list. As for just about all tri’s this year there were a lot more entrants. In fact, 310 recorded finishers against 236 for last year. I had noted that I’d finished last year (in a PB) 6^th out of 20 Super Vets (50 -60 year olds), 11 mins & 28 secs behind the winner from Celtic Tri Club. He had again entered this year. I noted that last year I was second out of the water, 3 secs behind him. So I hatched a simple plan. As my swim is a bit faster this year I will try and get out in front on the swim and then just see when he passes me on the bike and see how close I can keep him. So the night before I even tried to remember his race number. Things in the swim went to plan. I was in the second of three waves with all but one of the +50 males and most of the +40 male vets.

The Melee of the swim start (Photo: courtesy of Owen Evans wife of Cardiff Triathlon club)

 I got a good start and led the 2^nd wave swim from start to finish. The first wave was all the females plus a few men and I’d already caught quite a few on the swim. On the bike I was slowly picking athletes off on the way out to Kidwelly. I was quite surprised that the first person that passed me did so quite late on in the cycle and it was a +40 man with a low number. But last year’s winner caught me just before T2. This, together with an abysmal T2 for me trying to get my run shoes on without getting cramp in my feet meant he was way in the distance when we got on the waterfront.

 Start of the run for me (Photo: courtesy of Owen Evans wife of Cardiff Triathlon club)

 

This is the bit about racing. I was slowly starting to catch him and in fact got to about 10m behind him at the 2.5km turn. So now what? I was slowing down and thinking I should just follow him till the finish and save everything for a sprint. But I don’t have a sprint finish! Eventually I thought, what the hell, this isn’t a qualifying race and I will probably do a slower time if I don’t run as fast as I can now so after the only little rise on the run I went passed him, as fast as I could trying to give an air of this was easy! Of course he then speeded up and followed me. Oh what pain. I just ran as fast as I could and went hell for leather for the last 400m. I beat him by 9 seconds. I was a bit of an embarrassment at the finish dry retching as they were trying to hand me my t-shirt, goodie bag etc. I have no idea how I didn’t actually throw up. For a little while I obviously though I had won my age group. But it was not to be. The one guy in my age group who started in the last wave was a couple of minutes faster. He was a “younger” guy who had just moved into the age group. This year I was 2^nd in AG out of 26. Overall I was 34^th out of 310 finishers; compared with last year where I was 71^st out of 236.

So all’s well that ends well. A second place AG trophy and a £20 voucher for a tri shop. I guess that now makes me a professional after all these years! 

It wasn’t all good though. Once again I got my specific problem at every triathlon of cramps in top of the foot when putting on both my bike and run shoes. It probably set me back about 30 – 45 secs in total in the transitions.  I’m now accepting this and put it down to getting older and some arthritis. Although I used to do it a few years ago, I won’t be now doing a flying start again with my bike shoes attached to the bike. The risk of getting cramp when inserting the feet when on the bike is too great for me. The other problem I had was that I couldn’t stay in the aero position for the whole bike leg -probably only about half. It’s the first time I’ve raced my new Trek Concept tri bike in anger (see previous post). I found that being in such a different position when compared to the aero’s on my training bike i.e. further forward; I was starting to get cramp in my forearms and had to drop down quite often. I’m hoping that with some specific exercises and more time on the tri bike this won’t happen again.

Going home to race triathlon

This weekend is the Llanelli sprint triathlon. I’ve done it for the last few years and assuming my list of ailments doesn’t get any worse (groin strain now added to the list!) I look forward to racing it again. Llanelli is where I was brought up and my dad still lives on the hill overlooking Stradey Park. Having gone to school on the cycle course, spent summers playing on the run course and learning to swim in North Dock – the swim venue - I can now already picture every metre of what’s waiting for me on Sunday. Far better than I can remember the Box End aquathlon course I did only two weeks ago!  Llanelli was a lot different in those growing up days. The docks, although already decayed, were still working docks. But the biggest change is where the run course is, through Sandy Water Park. If you didn’t know you would never believe that for over 70 years up to 1981 this was the site of Llanelli Steel Works. I can only now compare it to something like Isengard in Lord of the Rings; with steam and gas belching out 24hrs a day, the roar of the steel being poured and the constant clanking of rail trucks being shunted.

 

These are the sights and sounds I became accustomed to for the first 18 years of my life and took as normal. In fact I remember when we went on holiday I couldn’t sleep at first for the quiet! I qualified as a Metallurgical Engineer and after University emigrated to South Africa to get a job at the time of the demise of British industry under the hand of Margaret Thatcher. Even today on reflection it still irritates me the commercial and social damage done by these political motivated closures. Whilst countries in Europe – Germany, France etc., going through the same economic difficulties as the UK, supported their industries (including car manufacturing) and the associated communities for the long term benefits we can see in those countries today. By coincidence the (newly refurbished at the time) steel furnaces in Llanelli were dismantled and sold to a South African company. They are still in operation today on the outskirts of Johannesburg and it is a strange feeling driving past them knowing where they came from. On a historical note some of Margaret Thatcher’s letters have recently been released including this one about the closure of the Llanelli steel works in 1981.

 

Llanelli was an amazing place to “play” as a kid. In those days we were allowed out all day and wandered far and wide. As a parent now I shudder at what we got up to; sneaking right into the works, riding the shunted rail cars, catching eels in the chemical filled waterways and even walking & swimming across the tidal mud flats of the Loughor estuary to the Gower. I have to say what a fantastic job has been done with the water park and coastal path to try and return things to something like it was pre industry.

A view from our road over the Scarlets old Stradey Park ground, the Steel Works and the Gower taken in the 1970's

Sandy water park today. The site of the old steel works. Dad's house is on the hill on the right

 

Talking about the Loughor estuary I believe I’m still the proud holder of the record for the fastest swim between Burry Port harbour and Llanelli Beach. I did it back on the 25^th June 1977 as part of a race to raise funds for the Queen’s silver jubilee. Previous to that it was last raced in 1935. I don’t know about recently but I found out the race was held a few times in the 80’s but no one managed to beat my time of 70mins for the approximately 5km (as the crow flies) swim. I know it’s 5km thanks to the help of google maps and this recent photo which I’ve anointed.

 

 

Loughor estuary has one of the biggest tidal ranges in the UK and although the tide was almost in I was definitely “tide assisted”. I’ve always been pretty good at sighting and swimming straight during open water swims and I think I must have been even then for my first real long distance swim. I remember at the start I sighted on a chimney from the old Machynys works and fixed on that the whole race so swam straight across the bay. Whilst I think my competitors from Llanelli swimming club probably more followed the coast around. I say that because at the time I specialised at Breastroke and I know there were at least three guys who were faster than me at frontcrawl. Or maybe I was just better at the longer distance. Anyway I kept a few local newspaper clippings of the event and the trophy is still on the shelf. I personally think the Llanelli triathlon should be a sea swim rather than a lap around the old North Dock!

 

Another hurdle cleared: Swim – Run; Serpentine & Hyde Park

I’ve just checked the British Triathlon age group website and I have a Q1 next to my name, meaning that I have officially qualified for the ITU Aquathlon world championships in Hyde Park in September. So at least I will be racing on the Wednesday, 11 September in London.

 

The long term outcome of the London marathon was a very sore right Achilles tendon and, consequently, a painful right calf. I only had two weeks before the qualifying race, the Box End Aquathlon in Bedford so it was no running, physio appointments, massage and strengthening exercises to try and get it ok for the Aquathlon. It seemed to work as I managed to get around the 5km run course without it hindering me. Although I haven’t actually done any running for about 5 weeks (obviously excluding the 42.2km of the VLM) so I found the run hard. I think I’m now quite a bit off my 5km PB set in February this year. However it was a great day for the Box End race with it being warm and the sun shining. Water temp was barely 14C which made getting in the water not the most pleasant of experiences, especially putting the face in open water for the first time of the year.  But with a wet suit on it soon felt ok and I was quite happy with my swim. In fact when the results were out I was happy with all my splits and I actually did one of the fastest transitions. My times were an improvement on last year and I narrowed the gap to the AG’s who beat me last year and extended it from those behind me.

When I checked the British Tri website and saw the Q1 against my name I was a bit surprised that only three of us had Q against their name (me and the two guys who were in front of me) as I think there were at least 10 in the AG who had registered for the world champs and there were seven qualifying spots available. Then I realised that the others hadn’t made the 115% of the AG winners cut off time. I’d forgotten about this qualifying criteria for the world champs. I calculated I was about 106% of the AG 1^st place but shows the quality of our AG winner, who actually was a previous Aquathlon world champs gold medallist. I had a slightly faster swim time than him so it shows that I have to keep concentrating on my running.

I had entered a hilly triathlon race this Sunday but have pulled out to try and give my Achilles another weeks rest. I can see this being a constant battle through the summer. So my next race is 19^th May Llanelli sprint tri where I was brought up. It’s a great feeling to know every inch of the course. Even the swim is in the old North Dock, where I used to spend hours messing around, jumping off the dock gates and getting up to no good. Happy times!

 

London Marathon 2013 – 3 hours 50 minutes & 36 seconds

 

That was hard – very hard. And I’m not doing that again!  In the cold light of day I guess my time was ok. I beat my only previous other marathon time (London again from 9 years ago) by 24 minutes so I have to be happy with that but the second half of the race was just all pain for me.

The background of this is that I got a place through the ballot last year before deciding to concentrate on the triathlon targets for 2013. Consequently, although I’d upped my running distance quite a bit for the last four months or so, I was underdone on the long runs (+20 miles) coming into this. The one long pre race I entered, the San Dominico 20 miler, was cancelled due to the bad weather. Two Saturday’s ago I ran 34kms which was basically three times from home around Roath and the lake in Cardiff. That was fine but on the following Monday, trying to do some intervals, I felt my Achilles tighten. Since then it’s been no running and ice the Achilles twice a day. So I started the race with some trepidation. You don’t get the opportunity do the VLM often so I was going to do it and try and do it as fast as I could.

Here they come to the start at Blackheath. I must have walked a bit quicker!

 

Pre race I applied a non steroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAIDs) gel on the Achillies and had a strip of Ibuprofen tablets with me. Interestingly on the radio on Saturday they were warning runners NOT to take any NSAIDs as a study of the Bonn marathon had shown issues with kidney and stomach problems. As anyone who  has run the VLM will know it takes ages to get going so I wasn’t worried about going out too fast and putting strain on the Achilles but even before I crossed the start line I could feel the aching irritation of it. 1km first drinks station and I’d popped my first tablet. The pain eased a bit and I tried to concentrate on an even pace but this is not easy at the VLM. I started in one of the middle pens. I’d thought I’d put down a reasonably fast target time on my application but obviously not as fast as a lot of others. It was a little bit irritating how many slow runners started near the front and I mean slow, not someone pacing correctly. The course is actually quite narrow (for 38k runners) and the spectator crowds so huge they tended to encroach off pavements etc. So it was slow/fast for about the first 15km. When a gap opened you really had to accelerate through it before it closed for another few minutes. There were so many runners running around on pavements, jumping on and running on central reservations. This is obviously not good for an evenly paced marathon effort.

I was happy getting to the half marathon marker in 1.44 but then, even after my 3^rd painkiller, the heel pain was increasing and I could feel myself sort of limping. This, together with what I can acknowledge now was tiredness, made me slow down. I was carrying my High5 gels and they seemed to go down ok, but it was getting quite warm. From about 25km it became a battle. I really was thinking of stopping but you realised the crowds just wouldn’t let you. They gave you “encouragement” even if you stopped to walk. I kept going mainly with the thought that my family and friends were at the 35km mark and that’s where I would stop. However by then, and I have to admit with a further tablet, my Achilles had eased a bit so I thought I could finish. As it turns out I got a very little bit of a second wind in the last 5kms and actually felt quite comfortable. Though not comfortable enough to think about a sprint finish at the end!  My splits are below and they are all over the place. Afterwards I made sure I took on plenty of water and it seems like I don’t have any issues with my pill popping. I certainly went way over any recommended limit and I’m not going to do that again but I think it allowed me to finish the marathon. A day later my Achilies doesn’t feel as bad as I thought it would (but only time will tell when I try and run next). Compare this with my quads – aaah!  I wonder how many days I will be walking down stairs backwards.

Split	Time Of Day	Time	Diff	min/km	km/h
5K	10:27:25	00:25:12	25:12:00	05:03	11.91
10K	10:51:25	00:49:12	24:00:00	04:48	12.5
15K	11:15:54	01:13:41	24:29:00	04:54	12.25
20K	11:41:04	01:38:51	25:10:00	05:03	11.92
HALF	11:46:34	01:44:21	05:30	05:01	11.99
25K	12:07:26	02:05:13	20:52	05:21	11.22
30K	12:36:56	02:34:43	29:30:00	05:54	10.17
35K	13:09:00	03:06:47	32:04:00	06:25	9.36
40K	13:39:49	03:37:36	30:49:00	06:10	9.73
Finish time	13:52:49	03:50:36	13:00	05:55	10.14

The First Welsh Triathlon Champion?

 

Sitting on the shelf in our front room, a little bit neglected, is a silver trophy. As always the trophy needs cleaning but if you look closely at the engraving it says;

TRIATHLON
CHAMPIONSHIPS
MENS
WELSH CHAMPION
1978
M. J. G. BATTERSBY

 The event was held in Haverfordwest on Sunday, 19^th March 1978. That’s over 35 years ago. It’s interesting to note that the first ever Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii took place on 18^th February, 1978, only 29 days earlier.

However this was not exactly a triathlon as we know today. These first Welsh Triathlon Championships were arranged and held under the auspices of the Modern Pentathlon Association of Great Britain. The three events were swimming, running and.... pistol shooting!  We had heard mumblings about these triathlons (with cycling) as they had started a couple of years earlier in the USA. I guess the MPAGB wanted to get on the bandwagon.

At the time I was studying for my A-levels and was asked to participate by my local swim club. I’d “retired” from swimming, well the training bit of it anyway, a few years earlier (girls, pubs – you know how it goes) but I was still fairly fit. I also had done some cross country running at school so I thought I would give it a go. I remember learning how to shoot a pistol accurately at the Territorial Army target range in the Drill Hall in Llanelli. The event consisted of a 500m pool swim, a 5km cross country run and 0.177 target pistol shooting. There were breaks in between events, so not continuous like today’s triathlon. It was a cold and wet day (much like most of this Spring 2013) and the XC was run through a bog. Afterwards I was asked to represent Wales at the forthcoming British Triathlon Championships at Crystal Palace but unfortunately it clashed with my A-Level exams.

There can’t be many people on this planet who can say they’ve raced triathlons in five different decades.

So if those pesky cyclists hadn’t got their hands on the sport I could have been a contender!

Here are some old local press clippings.

The pic is mostly the Llanelli swim team. I’m on the far right with the “easy rider” glasses on (it was a stage I was going through!)

 

And we’re racing! (Hopefully)

I saw a physio about my swimmers shoulder and it turns out with a bit of luck and a lot of rehab work it should be ok.  It looks like it’s not directly my rotator cuff but my bicep that is sore. It’s connected/caused by the rotator cuff but not any sort of impingement as I was worried about. It’s good that I picked it up early. The physio thought, and I agree, it’s probably caused by lack of rotation when swimming and my poor flexibility, especially of my spine. So it’s a new set of strengthening, stretching and flexibility exercises and importantly to continue with the bilateral breathing as per my last blog.

Even before I saw the physio another old issue reappeared in the form of tendonitis of my right Achilles. I did my final long run before the London marathon last Saturday (6^th April) which was fine but then on the Monday I did an easy interval session with Cardiff Tri. I was going easy but half way through I started to feel that annoying twinge at the back of my heel. I cut short the session and did a slow jog followed by some intense icing. I did some more light running again this Monday and it was still tight. I’m hoping it’s just a reaction to doing some sprints so soon after my long run. Like the swimmers shoulder, I started getting Achilles tendonitis just before the Ironman 5 years ago. I’ve had orthotics fitted for my “heavy over pronation”. I’ve constantly been doing exercises (heel drops), stretching and then icing after runs for the last few years which I thought had solved (or at least managed) the problem. All I can do now is rest, stretch and ice often until the marathon on Sunday.

All this happened in the week that I have just about finished entering all the races I’m planning to do for this year. It got me worried that any flare up of these issues or other new ones and I can’t race, then I am seriously out of pocket with all these entry fees. Waiting until closer to the event was not an option as this year these events are selling out fast. I think this is partly due to the UK having the AG world championships here in September but mostly the effect of the Olympics on people. It’s getting people active. The organiser of our local Try-a-Tri said that the event sold out in 38 minutes when it went live on Easter Monday evening.  Just about every event I’ve entered is now sold out or nearly full.  I just hope that I can stay healthy and compete as they just about all have a “no refunds” policy. The normal stuff..... “most costs are incurred before the event so unfortunately we cannot offer refunds etc. etc.”  I can’t argue with that, it’s just it seems like a game of roulette committing (and paying) for things so far in advance when there is a good possibility you’re not going to make some starts. You can see this normally from all those DNS in the results from previous year’s races.

Including the London Marathon I’m up to 16 Triathlon and running events entered for 2013. That’s at least 10 more than I would normally do in an average year. I’ve even entered two Triathlons on consecutive days (Sprint & OD ITU qualifiers). In the past I’ve struggled with two Tri’s in consecutive weekends, so that’s going to be an interesting weekend!  The list includes five ITU Tri qualifiers, one ETU qualifier, and one ITU aquathlon qualifier. In amongst all these are two British Champs, two Welsh Champs and three Welsh Grand Prix races, including an off road tri, which I think I’m looking forward to the most. Then there is of course is the ETU Age Group Champs in Turkey and, if I ever qualify, the ITU Champs in London.

That must be over £800 in entry fees I’ve already spent. Wow – just did a search on my accounts software and came up with £798.35. That is just in, probably non-refundable, entries. Let's not think of all the other expenses.

Got to keep fit and healthy now!

Bilateral Breathing

I did bilateral... and I liked it!

The feel of symmetrical magic

I did bilateral just to try it

I hope my coach don’t mind it

If felt so wrong

It felt so right

Don’t mean I can swim tonight

I did bilateral and I like it

I liked it!

With apologies to Katy Perry!

Unfortunately I’ve developed “Swimmers Shoulder”. It’s an irritating pain in my right shoulder when I bring my arm over in the recovery position when I’m swimming frontcrawl. As a lifelong swimmer it’s an occupational hazard. I’ve had it before about 6 weeks before my Ironman back in 2008 and was obviously caused then, like now, by a fairly large increase in front crawl swimming. I got through it last time by cutting back a bit on distance which wasn’t a problem as I was close to the event, some quite intense physiotherapy and then some strengthening exercises. It went away with rest after the Ironman. This time I’m going to have to try and manage it all the way through to September whilst trying to maintain some reasonable weekly swim distances.

So I’ve got a physiotherapist consultation booked this week and I’m back to doing all my old strengthening exercises with various flexi bands. I’m also resigned to easing off the frontcrawl for a while. I guess Swimmers Shoulder has not really been too much of an issue for me in the past because, as I’ve previously mentioned, my first and best stroke is breastroke so little chance of the repetitive over arm movement that causes it. However, you really should swim frontcrawl in triathlons if you want to be any good so I’ve been concentrating on this again over the winter training and hence this situation. Swimmers Shoulder revolves around Rotator Cuff issues in the shoulder. When I suffered it before, the physio explained to me it was due to repetitive strain involving the shoulder joint and the associated soft tissues. As you get older you can manage to keep your muscle size and strength up by exercise and a good diet but there’s not a lot you can do to maintain joints and soft tissues. Pah this getting older!  In this case all you can do is to try and strengthen all the associated muscles around the Rotator Cuff that you don’t normally strengthen. This is where all the various exercises come in. As my irritation is on the recovery phase of the arm cycle, rather than the pull through, it’s possible I might be having internal impingement which is a bit of a worry. I know a couple of swimmers who have had this and it just got slowly worse for them over time. Ending in operations, a lengthy rehabilitation and, to be honest, resulting in not being as fast swimmers as they used to be. 

Having an unsymmetrical stroke almost certainly is a big factor in developing swimmers shoulder. I breathe to the same left side but I have a reasonably symmetrical stroke. Better than most who breathe to only to one side. It’s obviously not symmetrical enough! 

Here's a video Terry, my Cardiff Masters swimming coach, took of my frontcrawl a few months ago before the pain.

When I was little I did swim bilaterally (for a number of years actually). However when I started to specialise in breastroke and I only got to do frontcrawl in relays I just drifted to breathing on one side only. Then later in masters swimming it was just too much effort (and no need?). Knowing what I knew, even during my last encounter with this pain, I went to breathing every fourth stoke on the left side, rather than bilateral, because I didn't want to do it.

But, if I’m ever going to keep going through this summer I’m going to have to make an effort to try and recover the situation. I’ve now done a couple of swim sessions and whilst the first one was difficult, I managed to do the whole of the second session breathing bilaterally. And at the end, I even liked it!  You really could feel the symmetry.  Another benefit of bilateral is that you can watch your recovery stoke on both sides. Is your elbow in the right place?  Is your hand entry straight?

So that is the plan. Easy off for a bit, get physio, do strengthening and flexibility exercises and always swim bilaterally in training. But come any race I’m sure I’m going to be back to one sided race breathing. After all these years it’s still going to be faster for me come race time.