The Chilly Sprint Duathlon, 8 Mar 2026

I headed to Castle Combe for my first duathlon of the year, and it happened to be a European Championships qualifier!

Unfortunately, I had missed a few training sessions as I hadn’t been feeling well a couple of weeks before the race. However, on race day, I was feeling ok and ready to give it a good shot. 

The bike race was held on the race circuit, with the run being partly on the circuit, as well as on the gravel track around the outside of the circuit.

Run 1

As I started, I realised that my watch wasn’t recording so faffed around with it and missed out on a fast start, the pack quickly separated into a small group of faster women at the front and although I tried to catch them, I couldn’t, and the gap gradually increased, I ended up running on my own for a while before the group behind me caught me up and passed me, as I couldn’t keep up the pace.

I went into transition and couldn’t find my bike, a marshall pointed me in the right direction, and I heard another athlete saying to me that we could ride together.

Bike

I recognised the athlete, Karina, from other duathlon races that I had been to, and we rode together for the first lap, taking turns to draft off each other. We slowed down at a chicane near the end of the first lap, Karina got ahead, and I was unable to catch her up. I rode on my own for a while, then another athlete, who I also recognised, called Erica, joined me, and we drafted off each other for the rest of the race. We weren’t allowed to draft off men or athletes on a different lap to us, so we had to be careful to keep an eye on who was around us and not be tempted to join the group of fast women when they came past on their last lap!

Run 2

I left transition ahead of Erica, but she soon passed me. I then passed another athlete about halfway around. I actually felt stronger on the run than usual, with my legs not feeling too heavy this time!

I got a pb for the 5k and finished first in my age group, but wasn’t sure if I had qualified for next year’s race as I’m going up an age group and therefore needed to compare my results to other people in the age group above.

A week later, I received an email from British Triathlon confirming that I had qualified for the European Championships in 2027!

Sarah Hunter