Parkrun #11 - Maidenhead

11.08.2018

Up early on a Saturday morning and a bit of a rush to get everyone ready for the drive over to Maidenhead for our first family Parkrun.

It was a bright and sunny day, maybe even too warm even at 9am.

We met a group of other buggy runners, and the organizer of the Buggy group.

I wasn't going to try to be in the front at the start, but this was probably a mistake. Due to some earth works, there is only a narrow passage now to get through to the main path, and I got stuck for a while with no way to overtake. Not pushing the buggy into people's ankles is difficult, and I had to walk at times. Anna and I ran together for a bit, but then I saw a gap and pushed Lya into it and lost her.

After my slow start things got better, though it was still quite variable where I needed to overtake, or where I ran up the small steep hill - pushing was hard and a little slippery there.

Happy to finish my first buggy Parkrun - the time 26:01 (79th out of 279) doesn't really matter much. Anna beat 30 minutes again with 29:48.

Links
Strava - Link
Parkrun - Link
Photos on Facebook group

London Triathlon 2018

05.08.2018

I felt almost ready for this one. I went for a non-wetsuit swim this week and had no issues with around 900m. Last year I struggled with the end of the swim but this year I have had more practice. My bike times have been pretty good on the Evo Friday night TT. And my running is OK - I can do 5k, and hang on for the rest, as usual.

I stayed overnight at Olivia's, which was probably a mistake. I hardly slept at all and woke up very tired. Neverthless Olivia, Luke and I got out just after 6:30am for the short ride along CS3 to the start. I was in a wave 20 minutes after them (at 8:05) but we went together.

Registration was where we got our chips and numbers, which isn't ideal, as last year they were posted out and so there was less faffing around in the morning when you've got enough to think about.

I watched Luke and Olivia run off to their start at the last minute, and felt fairly calm - I was ready, and the weather was good, and the threatened non-wetsuit swim had not materialised.

In the water, I tried to start my watch, but it wouldn't find a satellite and so I had to give up when the horn went. I swam my own race, though masses of other fast swimmers came up behind me after only a short time and one bashed me on the lip. The advice was to stay on the left - but if you do that you have to swim farther. I got to the end without further incident, maybe I slowed a bit too much to sight, as my 40:32 time is pretty sedentary even for me.

A fairly poor wetsuit removal, and an average T1, and I was out on the bike. This was fun, my Garmin was working this year, and I felt fast. I overtook a lot of people, and was only overtaken once. Unfortunately the long tunnel we ride though skews the Garmin's figures so it's impossible to really know how you are doing. I pushed as hard as I could, knowing there was a 10k to run later. Very pleased to find I was nearly a minute faster than last year with 1:02:09. When I took off my TT helmet, a mass of sweat poured out.

As I was leaving T2 (where I had actually run down the wrong line with my bike and had to duck under the scaffolding poles - rookie mistake) I saw Olivia arriving. I must have missed overtaking her on the bike. Then I saw Luke and said hello. I hadn't caught him, he was on lap 2 of the 4 lap course (changed from last year's 3 laps)

I now saw Anna and Lyra who had arrived to support. I felt ok, tired obviously, but chugging along. Near the end of the 2nd lap something went wrong with my left calf. I assumed it was the usual problem. I limped for a bit, gave the calf a bit of a thump, stamped my leg hard and tried to get running again. I stopped and stretched it a bit, but not much, I was losing time. It was getting hot, and the segments inside the Excel were quite welcoming in their coolness. I kept going, not as fast as before sadly, but as good as I could. Watching my aveage speed, it seemed ok, with no real idea, I wondered if I was going to be able to finish near a time of 2:30:00.

In the finish chute I bumped into Luke again, who decided to sprint for the line - I had to let him go as my leg was hurting quite a lot, and I'm not a sprinter anyway.

Curiously, my run time was a MASSIVE 54:17. My Garmin reports 11:67k. As a lot of running was inside, I don't know what the real distance was. It wasn't 10k. I'm pretty annoyed they changed the distance - I have no way to compare against last year now.

Overall my time was 2:43:11. This is slow for Olympic, so the longer run (and they still report it as 10k) messes everything up.  I was 454th out of 1887. In my age group I was around 21st out of over 100. If I could swim I'd be top 10 there. Something to think about.

Olivia did 3:15:00 and Luke 2:57:40 - off the back of hardly any training.

Results
Sporthive here
Photos Unlikely to still be here
Strava Bike Run