Full Distance Debut at The Dalesman

Background

In order to fully appreciate this race, I feel the need to set the scene and introduce myself a little… It’s early 2020, COVID has just come on the scene and there are whispers of a ‘lockdown’ looming. Before then, I’d never ran more than around 15km, didn’t own a bike and couldn’t swim. I was an avid gym goer and amateur powerlifter. When BOJO announced the first lockdown and closed down my beloved gym, I needed to find other ways to occupy myself and stay fit. I started running, me being me, a few weeks into this I decided to enter the Edinburgh marathon later that year. I got onto strava and saw some of my mates cycling, so I bought myself a bike and got into cycling. Naturally I started watching youtube videos on how I could get quicker and during this search, I discovered triathlons. Specifically, I saw a video of someone finishing an Ironman.

This was to be my new obsession and would dominate my life for the next year or so. Without much thinking, I signed up to Ironman Finland which was due to take place in August 2021. I’d be fine right? I bought myself a wetsuit, took myself to a Scottish loch to teach myself to swim. This went HORRIBLY. It was freezing cold, I didn’t know how to breath and swam about 30 meters with my head out the water before calling it quits. I guess I’d bitten off more than I could chew, entering an Ironman as my first ever triathlon eh? Many Youtube videos later and some very questionable looks as I sat at home with my head in a bowl wearing goggles to practice breathing together with some persistence and I slowly built myself up and made some progress. Fast forward to late 2020 and I’m scowering the internet for training plans to properly prepare myself for my first Triathlon. This is where coach Paul reached out, we exchanged a few messages, had a video call about my goals and I bit the bullet and got myself a coach. This absolutely proved to be invaluable. 2021 turned into a fantastic sporting year for me, mostly due to Pauls wisdom when it came to coaching.

I completed my first marathon in a time of 2:59:48 and I completed the Lakesman virtual half. I was smashing PB’s week after week and continuing to make progress with my swim and gain more confidence in the water. All that was left was to complete Ironman Finland… COVID wouldn’t still be going on then surely? But it was, and alas, travel restrictions prevented us from being able to travel. About six weeks before the event, I pulled the plug and cancelled everything. I began scowering the internet for alternatives. Many were sold out, all but one, the Dalesman, a small local ‘Iron distance’ triathlon in the Yorkshire dales set to take place on the Sunday 22 August. My girlfriend also agreed to take part in the half distance too!

So we travelled down on the Friday, 2 days before the event, the car jam packed with kit, being my first event, I didn’t really know what to expect and there was some ambiguity online with regards to aid stations so I ended up taking everything I would need to get myself round. Me being me, I also took a backup of everything, and a backup for the backup. I obviously got tutted at several times when I pulled out 4 pairs of goggles when we arrived. I’ve never had a strap break or anything like that, but for some reason, on race weekend I was expecting to have 3 break? I also took a wheel off my road bike as it eluded to me that I’d never changed a tube before, so I spent the Friday night practicing taking the tyre on/off and replacing inner tubes. Saturday was registration day, a chap from my work who had also entered the race was there too so we met up and drove the bike route. It was a 2 loop route so we just drove it the once. That was meant to put my mind at ease but instead I saw hills, lots of hills… living in Aberdeenshire, I am used to hilly cycles, but this was definitely on the hillier side of hilly… for me anyway. We set our garmins to record and discovered there was around 1000m of elevation per the 90km loop., what a day it was to be. Later that day, we went to registration and for the first time, I felt the buzz of an event! I was excited but also very apprehensive. We were given our swim caps and transition bags, we were also given a ‘fuel bag’ for the bike and the run which would be taken to aid stations at certain points (I forget how far in they were) but I filled my bike bag with extra water bottles filled with hi5 energy drink. I opted to not use the run fuel bag as I was told there would be generic aid stations with water available. Given it was my first tri, I hadn’t any experience with how/where I would place fuel. I decided to put all my fuel for the bike in my bike transition bag (gels and bars) and stuff them into the back of my Trisuit in T1 and put more fuels (gels) in my run transition bag and stuff them into the back of my Trisuit in T2. I also put in a waterproof jacket and some arm warmers into my bike bag, just in case it was chilly. So.. that was it, ready to go..

The start time was 0600 so I set my alarm for 0415 and headed to bed. We were about a 25minute drive from the event. To say I was nervous in the morning was an understatement. We drove there, arrived super early so I could get a good look at where I’d be swimming, check my bike over and try and relax a little.

The swim was to go off in 2 waves, I was in the second. The first wave all entered into the water, swam about 50meters to the start line and treaded water at there until they sent on their way… then, in we went. The water was warm, warmer than anything I’d swam in in Scotland. So that was a nice surprise. I took the 50m swim to the start line to really concentrate on keeping my breathing under control and not panicking. Being a new swimmer, I’m not that confident in the water and my plan was to stay out of everyone’s way and not get caught up in the ‘washing machine’. I put myself at the back, on the left hand side, ready for the 2.5 lapped swim. And we’re off.. I found a nice rhythm, got my breathing under control and felt okay. Until about 50m in I swam through loads, and I mean LOADS of weeds, I got tangled up, got them all over me, could hardly pull through the water because of these big thick weeds. I’ve never experienced that before but I just tried to keep my breathing under control and not think about it too much. This became a theme, weeds weeds weeds, everywhere.. yuck! The swim passed quite slowly, I had a lot of time to think, I thought a lot about how far my swimming had come, although I was slow, I was comfortable, I was encountering weeds, other swimmers, swallowing water every now and again, but I was calm and controlled, the complete opposite from one year ago when I first plunged into that Scottish loch. I finished the swim in 1hr40. I would have liked to have been closer to 1hr30, but it was not to be. I’m used to swimming in a smaller body of water and sighting buoys a lot closer together, I had some sighting issues and stopped on a few occasions to get my bearings, this coupled with the weed related issues meant it wasn’t my best swim, but it was done. I got out of the water, 170th… out of around 180 athletes. So almost last, but I expected to be near the back, so this didn’t even phase me.

I got into T1, threw on my bike kit, stuffed my trisuit with nutrition and grabbed my bike. No need for the arm warmers or waterproof! Now I have nothing to compare this too, but I felt like I was running with my bike for ages before being allowed to get onto it, but eventually I got on and settled in for a hilly, two loop bike course. The bike course was essentially climbs for 55kish and then a bit of descent into a flat 30k. As soon as I got into the meat of the bike and started hitting the steeper climbs (14%+ gradiants) I started really picking people off. I was overtaking people left right and centre, one of the benefits of being a slow swimmer I guess. I was super focused on my nutrition too, making sure to stick to the plan and drink a bottle an hour, we hit the first aid station around 40k in and I swapped an empty bottle out, all was going to plan! Towards the end of the first loop I ran into a lot of traffic, I caught the back end of the standard distance triathlon so that was good motivation to keep the effort levels up as I overtook more and more people.. until I had to turn off to start my second loop whilst they went off to start their runs. This was, as expected, the mentally hard point. The first loop had been hard, the hills were brutal and had taken a lot out of my legs already, but I remained consistent, still caught and overtook people, stuck to my nutrition plan and finished my bike in around 6hr20 and my time was 43rd! I guess all those disgusting threshold intervals Paul had given me on the turbo trainer had paid off! I did kind of want a 6hr bike split, but the hills made that pretty impossible for me, especially if I was to keep something in the tank for my strongest leg, the run. I lost my bar tape somewhere on the second lap and at one point, I managed to send my garmin flying and had to stop to collect it, but otherwise, it went alright! I did wish I was on a road bike during some of the ascents and descents I must say, the roads were very twisty so I spent a lot of time not on my aero bars.

I came into T2 with a smile on my face, I actually couldn’t believe I was 2/3 of the way into completing my first triathlon. I got my trainers on, stuffed my trisuit with gels again and off I set. I felt good for the start of the run, I wanted to run under 3hr30 and my first 15-20k was definitely on target. I was probably averaging 4:50/km’s and feeling good, again passing people left right and centre. About 22km in, things went south though. I started to get cramp in both hamstrings, and I couldn’t shake it, my pace slowed drastically to around 5:20/km. They completely seized at one point and I stopped to stretch, a kind passer by gave me 3 salt tablets. I took one with some water from the aid station, chewed the other (this was disgusting) and kept the other. I was able to keep running, but nowhere near to my full potential, my heart rate was fine, my fitness felt fine but my legs were not in a good way. Every step was putting me on the edge of full cramp. I stopped everytime I passed an aid station, necked a cup of water and took whatever they had, sausage rolls, bananas, anything to try and stop the cramp. The crowd cheered a lot which was amazing, I’d never experienced anything like it, I also got lots of positive comments on my colourful SEC trisuit but unfortunately, I wasn’t able to stop the cramp! I spent 20k running with some degree of cramp in both hamstrings. But… I did finish.. my run time was 3:42, a little disappointing for me but 16th overall in the run.

That was it.. I was an Ironman… first triathlon… DONE! What a feeling. Looking back, I thought my hi5 energy drink contained sodium, turns out it didn’t, So I essentially took on no salt for the entire event, probably a miracle I didn’t cramp sooner to be honest. So.. what next?