I was looking forward to the Bala race, the forecast was good, I was feeling good and felt I could do a good time. I didn't sleep well on Saturday night, I was up at 3.45am on Sunday morning and off by 4.30am. At that time of day the drive to North Wales is easy, no traffic, you can even drive on the M6 through Birmingham with no difficulty. I began to pick up other cars seemingly heading for Bala once I was on the old A5 after Chirk - you could tell, the tri-bikes on the roof and the car stickers. I arrived at Bala at 7.15am, only a few cars in the car park (Rugby club pitches), and headed straight to registration - no queueing, pick up my number, goody bag (nice big towel), marked my number on the arm and leg and pick up the chip. What to do next as my wave wasn't until 10am. I took my time to get sorted at the car sorting all the gear out before heading down to the transition area. When I got there the wait to get in was about 20 minutes as the officials were checking your helmet was tight, brakes, etc so it took some time. Headed off to my racking point right on the waterfront, the lake was flat, the sun was out with a few big dark clouds over the hills to the west. I was sorted by about 8.45 so time to have a chat, all the senior vets were near each other so comparing notes and much talk of tactics to get an England age group place. As we waited the wind got up and we all felt cold, the waves were beginning to look like white horses again.
We were called through to the start area at about 9.45am, the last wave, the smallest group with about 150 competitors, we moved slowly into the water as it was cold, shallow and pebbles to walk on with difficulty. The swim is a straight out and back course, no chance to get lost and it was clear, waves not to big so you could easily see the buoys. We were off, I started strongly and felt good but after about 100m I felt a bang on my back knowing it was another swimmer went with the blow, what surprised me was a second much heavier blow to the middle of my back that hurt and winded me, it took a while to recover I stopped swimming and for a moment felt quite ill and thought I had had enough. I started to swim again, I took a while to get to a comfortable pace and settled into the swim enjoying the rest of it. To get out was not easy as the water is shallow with lots of large pebbles to walk/run/swim across but felt strong and headed off to take wet suit off and get on the bike, not the fastest transition but I was quickly off. The bike route is an out and back on closed roads. In the last wave with a 38.18 swim and 3.48 T1 there were not many athletes behind, they were all in front. I quickly started catching up and overtaking other riders, settling into a strong ride, feeling good and comfortable on very good roads - where were the potholes? In no time I seemed to be at the 20km turn point and heading back. The route is undulating, I was on the large ring for the whole course, still overtaking. My ride was 1.11.52, I thought it would have been faster but more than 20mph so pleased anyway. A quick transition, 1.09 and out onto the run. Straight away the run didn't feel right, I had painful shins right from the start, I was really frustrated as my brick sessions had gone well of hard rides and I do not get problems with my shins. I was painfully slow to start with, I was half way round before my legs began to feel better and I was able to push on even so I was disappointed with my run at 54.06.
So my total time was 2.49.16, 4.30 faster that the Barton Marina standard last year, but hey I had done Ironman training and should have been stronger. Overall I was disappointed with my performance, still not sure where it went wrong, but I will be back to improve next year at the standard distance.
The drive back was very enjoyable, I headed back towards Welshpool driving on roads I could not remember over the hills rather than all A5 until I got to Shrewsbury.
I have thought through why it had gone wrong, Zoe suggested it could have been a reaction as I had very tight calf muscles when I saw her on Monday, or it was just not my day. I took 2 days rest on Monday and Tuesday, my motivation was shot. I went for a run tonight just to get the legs moving, I will get back into training for NY marathon in the next few days, I may change my plans for Sunday and do a 20 mile run rather than a race, I need to get my focus back and get some quality training over the next few weeks.
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