Blog #6

The London Triathlon - 

This was my first ever Elite Olympic distance race and I was defiantly looking forward to it. 

The race started and I got out well in the swim. By the first bouy I could feel I was in a decent position and doing ok. I ended up coming out the water just under 30 seconds down from the leader and beside top British athlete Adam Bowden which gave me confidence I was doing well. This swim was a great improvement from Blenheim considering I was about 40 seconds down and that was over 750m whereas this was 1500m! After the long transition into T1 I came out slightly on my own with Adam Bowden and a couple of others about 5-10 seconds down on me. I tried to go out hard to catch up the back end of what would become the first pack. Suddenly my calves started cramping badly and I had to stretch them out meaning I then just sat onto the back of the three behind. We began working but it slowly fell apart and in the end another couple of packs from behind by the end of the bike. We had lost about 2.5 minuets on the front pack of 13 by the end of the bike. So I new I was running for a top 20 coming into T2. On the run I gave it what I had, it was nothing special but nothing to bad, and was much better than my race at Blenheim. 

Overall the olympic distance felt no different to a sprint distance. It felt just as fast and felt as if it was over just as quickly. I think thats a good thing!? I was happy with my first race over this distance. 

Tour de France Trip - 

A couple of weeks before the London Triathlon myself and my friend Brenden (an Irish cyclist) decided that we would go and watch the tour and cycle alongside 3 stages. We decided we would cycle over from Banyoles (Spain) to Pau (France). That was 500km away… in two days!!! 


Considering my longest ride ever is about 150km and we were going 250km each day with bits and bods in a bag which wouldn’t normally feel that heavy on a short (It does after a while) I don’t think I had quite realised what I had got myself into. I was wrecked after day 1, but I had done it. I eventually got there. 


My best memory from the Tour was Climbing up the col de Peyresourde with thousands of fans cheering at you. Then being just inches away from the likes of Chris Froome and Marcel Kittel just gives you goosebumps. I had an enormous urge to be a pro cyclist after that until I thought better of it. They are incredible athletes and its taken me until seeing them fly up the mountain to realise it! After watching our 3 stages we cycled back eh 230km home in one day going through the Alps, which was also amazing. As painful as it was and as burnt as I got, I am so glad that I did it and is something I will defiantly remember. 

Onto August!