Race Report, Sprint Distance Tri, Standard Distance Tri

Bristol Harbourside Triathlon

bristollogoReport by Jon Roodhouse                                         SUNDAY, 14TH JUNE 2015

This year three members of Tri-Logic took part in the Bristol Harbourside Triathlon. Kathryn Osborne and I in the Standard distance event and Mike Wright in the Sprint. The event is very well organised, incredibly friendly and I would recommend it to all of you. It’s definitely worth doing and also not that far from Cornwall. I can’t speak for the others but I really enjoyed myself even with some of the issues I had. The following is a report on how my race panned out.

Swim

The swim takes place in the Cumberland Basin, part of Bristol's historic Harbour and adjacent to the Brunel Lock and for the Standard distance it was a two lap affair.

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The only way that I can describe the start is like a rugby scrum in water. It took a good 300m or so to even think about trying to swim properly and on turning at one of the buoys on the first lap I was kicked in the face and nearly lost my goggles (it’s a good job the strap was under my swim cap otherwise they would have gone). At that point I couldn't see anything and in the resultant flap I somehow managed to swim into the harbour wall. Once I put the goggles back in place and I got back into the swimming the rest of lap 1 was fine. On the second lap I suffered from open water radar malfunction and this led to me having a number of taps from the support boats telling me to change direction. Useless!!!! I don’t know how much time I lost but as my swimming has been quite strong recently and after looking at my time I think it was a fair bit. Anyway, happy to be out of the water I headed on to the bike.

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Bike

The bike routes for both distances take place on closed roads, under the shadow of the famous Clifton Suspension Bridge. The bike route is principally flat with a slight upward gradient on part of the way out which was also into a slight headwind. On a positive note this meant slightly down hill on the way back with the wind behind you. There were also a couple of technical turns for good measure.

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For my race this was a four lap course and the closed roads presented a great opportunity to stay on the aero-bars for extended periods and I hoped that this would mean a quick time. On lap one I saw Kathryn who was in the swim wave before me and then set about chasing her down. Eventually on my lap three, Kathryn’s final lap I caught and passed her. It was great to have a target to aim for. I said before the start that I would be happy with my bike split if I averaged above 20mph and with an average of 20.9mph I did just that. So I can’t complain about the bike. After a smooth transition I then went off onto the run.

Run

The 10k run was out and back on the River Avon tow path. For the first 2k I felt like I had someone else’s legs but after I got into my running things weren’t too bad. It was so nice to see Chrissie Wellington out on course cheering on the competitors and when she shouted at me to ‘keep pushing you’re doing a good job’ I had no choice other than to try and do just that. I had hoped to run close to 7.20 pace and get near 45 minutes but I just couldn’t find the speed, not even with the encouragement of a living triathlon legend.

Overall

This was a great experience and I will probably be heading back next year in an attempt to beat my time. Well done to Mike and Kathryn.

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Name
Swim
Bike
Run
Total
GC
Cat
Jon Roodhouse 28:31 1:11:54 47:44 2:32:55 79 39
Kathryn Osborne 27:30 1:26:40 1:02:25 3:01:29 245 2

Standard Distance results available here.

Name
Swim
Bike
Run
Total
GC
Cat
Mike Wright 22:20  46:20  38:14  1:57:38 170 20

Sprint Distance results available here.