Southport Sprint Triathlon, 22 May 2022

Although it has only been a week since my last race at Dorney Lake, I decided to enter Southport for two reasons. Firstly, it is the only course from last year that is almost exactly the same (or so I thought) so it would be good to compare times and secondly, it is the closest race I could find to my grandma who has never seen me race and this was perhaps her only opportunity.

On the day, the weather was dry and it was a very pleasant 18 degrees. Learning from last weekend’s race, I positioned myself at the front for the swim start and this definitely paid off. I wasn’t swum over, kicked or smacked in the face and managed to get through the swim without any issues and took 2 minutes off my time from the previous year. I exited the swim in 10th place which for me is a great improvement!

T1 went smoothly and I managed to take two more athletes and as I jumped on my bike, I put in a fast first few hundred meters and took another two places. The bike course was a one lap of a 20km loop and really was a tale of two halves due to the strong wind. As I reached the second turning point and headed back to transition for the final 5km, the wind was head on and I had to work extremely hard to try and maintain any speed.

As I approached T2, there was another athlete just ahead of me who I had worked hard to close the gap on the bike course. I am confident I am quick in transition so relied on this to get in front before hitting the run. My plan worked and I ran out of T2 in 5th place and started looking ahead for the next position to hunt down.

Unfortunately, I soon found out that the bike section, and perhaps my race the week before, had taken everything out of my legs and I had nothing left. All I could do was attempt to maintain an average run and hope I had but enough distance between myself and 6th place. I also found out that the run course had been extended and was slightly over the 5km… not good news for my legs! However, I held my position and finished 5th overall and took my first Age Group win.

Despite my disappointing run, I took over 8 minutes off my overall time from last year, won my age group and most importantly my grandma cheered me on the whole way round!

Alli Coleman