British Standard Distance Triathlon Championships, 6 Jun 2021

On 6th June I raced at the British Standard Distance Championships in Leeds. I went into this race with clear goals laid out. The race was a world championship qualifier, so I hoped I would be in contention for a spot on the age group team.  It was also a chance to become British age group champ in the standard distance, which I was excited to have a crack at as I’m still relatively new to standard distance. 

After a pretty restless over night stay in a hotel (sorry mum and dad but we need to nip the snoring I the bud), I woke up feeling like a bit of a grumpy teenager. But my pre-race breakfast favourites livened me up and I felt ready to go. The morning of the race was a bit of a nightmare. Firstly, road closures meant that trying to access the car park was like being in a maze so getting lost set us back a bit for time. When we got close to Roundhay park we were surprised to see a huge queue going towards the car park. Every athlete had been given a time slot to arrive, register, rack and race so the day was meant to run like clockwork however some eager beavers had arrived early meaning there was a surge of people trying to arrive at once. Although we should have had plenty of time, I had to abandon the car about 5km from the venue and ride to registration just to make it on time. However, I was faced with queue after queue and so by the time I reached transition I had limited time to get racked and down to the swim start. 

Luckily, I did make it to the start and I spent the time I had to spare to compose myself and mentally prepare to race. The swim was once again a staggered start due to covid. However due to the large amount of participants, my age group bunched up quite quickly and we also had to deal with the stragglers from the previous male wave. I worked hard on the swim and tried to keep a consistent pace, even though this was difficult due to how many swimmers I had to navigate around. I came out of the swim knowing I put out a relatively good performance compared to the other girls as I hadn’t seen anyone overtake me. However, I was personally a bit disappointed as I struggled with my sighting and felt I could have pushed a bit harder. I was surprised to find that my swim was actually very strong. I completed the 1500m course in 20:58 ranking me 25th /1210 men and women! 

Concerned that I hadn’t done as well in the swim as I’d have liked I used transition to make up some time, and T1 was my strongest segment of the day as I ranked 23rd.  I continued to push hard onto the bike course, using the uphill climb straight out of transition to increase the gap between me and the other competitors. I was the first lady out onto the bike course which gave me a good gauge on how well I was doing amongst the field. Having said that it was very hard to know what position you were actually in due to the staggered start and the mixed age group waves. The bike course was quite tough, with two long gradual climbs per lap. I worked hard on the uphill and used the down hill to recover. I completed the 35km bike course in 1:05:10, which I was pleased with. 

I felt quite apprehensive for the run. In the lead up to the race I had been struggling with my knees, however I was hoping the adrenalin would mask the pain. I’m very aware that I should not really have raced carrying an injury but it was my last race of that block of training, and I knew I’d have a long time to recover and get my knees sorted before racing again. I actually felt ok for the majority of the run, apart from a section which was sloped sideways. I tried to keep a very consistent pace on the run, and despite feeling like it went on forever, I completed the 10km course in 43min59s. This was a big improvement from BUCS standard a few weeks prior. 

The race ended with the steepest ascent to the finish I’ve ever experienced. Dad shouted out to me ‘sprint Lilly’; I don’t think I’ve ever heard something so funny! I’d just completed one of the longest races of my life and then had Everest to climb at the end- there was no way I was sprinting! When I crossed the line the guy on the speaker announced that it was likely I had won my age group! I felt quite giddy with excitement as I did not expect to win! We had to await official results as they weren’t sure due to the staggered start whether anyone had beaten me, but it turns out I won by just over a minute. BRITISH CHAMPION! This has meant that I have automatically qualified to represent the GBR age group team at the 2022 World championship and European Championship! I’d best start saving as the worlds is in Abu Dhabi!!!

In the meantime, I turn my attention back to elite racing as I will hopefully be racing at Hetton and Mallory in the coming weeks. I have not been on a British Super Series start line since 2019 and have not been at race fitness due to injury since the 2017 series. I am excited for the race to see what performance I can put down and identify areas for improvement. I know it is going to be a challenge, especially since the race is super sprint distance (a quarter of the distance I’ve been training for recently!). Whilst winning age group races is fulfilling, just being in the mix at a super series race is exciting! I have also got London Triathlon (standard distance) booked in, so its going to be interesting to see how I prep for the two races which are polar opposite in distance- I’m ready to give it a good bash though! 

Thanks Mum and Dad for coming all the way up from Kent to take me to Leeds! It was nice to have a little get away from Loughborough for a bit too! 

Lilly Gibbs