Dorney Lake Sprint Triathlon, 15 May 2022

Dorney Lake was my first triathlon of 2022 and also a European Qualifying Event. Looking at the start list, it is arguably the strongest field of athletes I have faced so far and I was excited to see where I would place early in the season. The course was flat and consisted of a lake swim followed by a four-lap bike course around the lake on a smooth tarmac path, and finishing with an out and back run.  

The swim did not go as I had planned. This was my first open water mass start and it was chaotic to say the least. I positioned myself on the second row and as the gun went off all hell broke loose. I was swum over, kicked and smacked by numerous flying arms and I almost started to panic. I decided to take a longer route and swam outwards into the clearer water so there was more space although this meant taking a longer route round. I exited the swim in the bottom third and was disappointed with my swim time, although it was still a race PB and you can’t be too negative about that! 

Into T1 and what a disaster! I soon realised that my wetsuit had not been done up correctly and the cord to activate the quick release was caught in the velcro preventing me from getting out of it! I danced around and tried all manner of manoeuvres and really started to panic as more athletes ran past me. Just as I was contemplating getting on my bike in my wetsuit the zip opened and I was away and out of T1.

The bike course is a tale of 2 halves: the first two laps I rode on my own, I could see a large group working together approximately 400m ahead of me (the race was supposed to be non-drafting but nobody was abiding by this!) but as hard as I tried, I was unable to close the gap. As I finished the second lap, the lead group from the next wave came out just in front of me and I put in a quick sprint and managed to get on the back wheel. The last two laps I thoroughly enjoyed, reaching speeds of 43kph on a flat course felt brilliant and Roy (my new Ribble bike) was just a dream to ride.  

T2 went smoothly and I was soon out onto the run course. This was a straight 2.5km out and back. I started off well at a 3:50min/km pace and focussed on the athletes in front of me. By the halfway point I think I had taken 3 places and as I turned I kicked on determined to run down more places. I soon overtook three more athletes and was feeling strong as I reached the 3.5km mark. However, this feeling did not last long and with approximately 1km to go the real pain hit, my legs were so heavy and my lungs started to scream and I felt like the finish line was just not moving any closer. I dug deep and told myself how disappointed I would feel afterwards if I allowed one of the athletes, that I had worked so hard to catch, overtake me again and this spurred me on to the finish.  

Overall, I came 11th out of 22 in my Age Group which is a big improvement from last year. There was a big learning curve in the swim and plenty of areas to improve. However, I am excited to see what I can achieve this season.

Alli Coleman