Weymouth 70.3, 17 Sep 2023

Well, where to begin – an eventful outing to say the least. Arriving Friday before race day Sunday, the weather was glorious, the sea a little choppy, but lovely conditions. A fair amount of weather watching through the week, and some more Friday and Saturday meant that I knew what the weather could have in store for us.

Waking up race morning around 04:40 (hoping to get to transition for 06:00), I was greeted with an almighty thunderstorm: fast forward 20 minutes, the thunderstorm is still in full force and it blows the power in the house we are staying at (fortunately I had boiled the kettle for my coffee and was having overnight oats!). Mentally preparing myself for what was to come (delayed start/shortened swim/cancelled swim), we drove down to transition for 06:00 to be greeted by a pond at transition, my bike was over a great big puddle, fun! As we approached 06:30 the storm began to ease so we headed into the transition tent, asked some volunteers the situation, and as far as they were aware, everything was proceeding as normal, great! Wetsuit on in the chaos of a full transition tent, we headed to race start, I was beginning to get the pre-race nervous sick feeling now, as we shuffled our way down to the red carpet. If I thought I felt sick before, it was nothing like the feeling I felt when I saw the sea for the first time, a choppy swell and some nice white-caps, joys!! Race start scheduled for 07:15, at around 07:05 the call was made that due to electrical activity, the current and the waves that the swim was cancelled. And although, usually, my favourite part of a race, I was incredibly relieved. Maybe my memories from Barcelona swim have had more of an impact than I realised!

Anyway, now to become a bike-run race (fortunately not a duathlon as I’m not about that pre-bike run!). They held us just outside transition and let us know that they would invite us into the transition tent in our bike rack rows. In transition you can take your time to get changed, prepare before you head out on the bike, where it would be a rolling start – 3 athletes every 6 seconds. I queued for the toilet (for about 20 minutes), chatted to some lovely ladies, and then heard row B called out. So off I went to do my non-timed T1. I set off just before 08:00 and was met with a lovely wind along the sea front, before the first climb of the day. Conscious of the 3 climbs, I took it steady not wanting to burn the matches too early, HR felt good and I was able to carry on smoothly post hill. Due to the wind, it was very much a hybrid bike race of some time on aero bars, some times upright, but overall I did spend quite a lot of time in aero position (shame none of the cameras caught it!). I was fuelling well, and happy with how I was progressing, on track for a time I would be pleased with. We got to the second climb, and the biggest of the day, and you could just begin to feel the droplets of rain coming through the trees. Again I kept the effort measured and didn’t feel broken at the top, but by this point the rain was starting to get heavier. A lot of descending from this point out, meant I would have to take it easy. As the descents started the rain and wind really picked up, I was struggling to see with the almost biblical rain. I saw a bike crash a few riders in front of me, and decided that I would just make it to the end of the bike in one piece. With a lot of standing water gathering incredibly quickly, I was cautious for the second half of the bike, which impacted my time overall. My brother and uncle were out supporting me in Dorchester and I almost missed them as I couldn’t see much! But super nice to hear them cheering. Finally I made it back to T2 and I felt good.

A relatively (as I went to the loo) quick T2 and I was off out on the run. It felt good and smooth and I was surprised by my pace as it felt easy. The first 4-5km I was conscious not to push it but the pace was low and it felt good. I did look to slow down after that as I knew I had a long way to go, and I often suffer in the last 4km. Turned to start the 1st of the 2 full laps (2.5 lap course) and I was greeted by a delightful 30mph headwind, I wasn’t really looking at my watch, just running on feel, when I took a glance down and was 1:00min/km slower than what that pace normally feels like, doh. Not to worry, I’m sure it would pick up. I turned to run back along the sea front, thinking I would get a sort of tail-wind, wrong! More of a cross wind this time! The run was a battle, trying to not get too caught up in pace, knowing there was still a long way to go. I finally made it to the last 4km and it was hard, I was well and truly empty, so just kept pushing as much as I could and not worrying about the watch. When I made it to the last 500m I could hear my brother cheering, but there was nothing left to give, not even on the finishing carpet could I muster up enough for a sprint finish – I had well and truly emptied the tank. I crossed the line a bit disappointed.

Post-race reflections are that it was definitely anti-climatic for my A-race of the year, given the form I have been in (I should have had a much better run) but there were a lot of lessons learnt which is the biggest take-away given the challenge for next year’s full distance! I have a couple of tweaks I want to do for bike set-up/bottle position etc. I know that I need more salt on board, and also more salty snacks to cut through the sweetness. I also think I want to run a marathon a few months before (currently looking at Manchester) to ensure that I’ve got the whole distance in my legs. I’m going to focus on calf and Achilles strength too as I could begin to feel it in the later kms, so positives to take from it!

Now to decide what to do for the remaining weeks of the season as I feel I have not satisfied my inner competitive thoughts for the year yet!

Lottie Lindsley