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Bala Middle Distance
Triathlon by Russ Watson
Bala
was the scene of my first attempt at a distance longer then
standard distance as preparation for IM UK in August. The
race had been entered for some time, the camp site booked
and the route planned. Team Watson and co (myself, the boss
(wife) Joyce, 10 year old son Dean, Joyce’s brother Alan and
Joyce’s drinking partner Chantelle) set off for Wales on
Saturday afternoon in two cars loaded with tentage and all
necessary ancillaries with two objectives in mind, firstly
for me to race my first middle distance race and secondly
for the other three to go on the lash!! Both missions were
readily accepted and fulfilled with great gusto. Arrived at
camp site mid afternoon, pitched tents and the three
drinkers cracked open the carryout to start achieving
mission number one! Time now around 4pm, registration on
the Saturday was 2pm – 5pm at the leisure centre next to
transition, so we all hopped in to the car and I drove us to
the leisure centre and registered. I then sent the three
drinkers to the café across the road to continue mission
number 1 whilst I informed them I was going to swim the swim
course as I hadn’t trained that day yet and wanted to get at
least one open water swim in before race day as the last
time I had swam open water was when the RAF had entered the
European Emergency Services Triathlon in Guernsey in 2004!!
I was informed by the three drinkers of my obvious insanity
as I donned my wetsuit and took to the water, my boy Dean
just thought the whole trip was just one long giggle and had
a ball. I was thinking the water would be colder than it
was, I soon became accustomed to the cold and settled into
an easy relaxed pace practicing spotting the buoys and
visualizing how I wanted to try and pace the swim the next
day. After a short time in the water I decided just to swim
the complete course to give myself a bit of a training
session and thought a recce of the course would be a good
idea for the next day. The course was a straight out and
back swim of 2000 meters, I felt good and was pleased that I
wasn’t struggling to get my breathing correct and was
sighting the buoys every 5th stroke. I got to the turn
around point and started to retrace the course back to the
finish. It was at this point I became aware that the lake,
although obviously not tidal, was running in a certain
direction and the wind must be making a difference to the
waves as I couldn’t believe the difference in speed I was ma naging
to generate with no more effort, this piece of information
would help the following day during the race as I was able
to keep a little in reserve on the outbound leg of the swim
and increase my pace considerably after the turnaround point
and let the waves help me home. Finished the swim in a
comfortable 38 mins and was met by the drinkers at the lake
side informing me that their carryout was finished and would
I like to get a move on so we could get some more drink!! A
quick change followed and straight into town, sat down at
the first beer garden we came to and was informed by the
three drinkers that ‘eating’s cheating’ and that their
dinner was going to be liquid. There then followed several
hours of sitting outside various watering holes with the
drinkers drinking their body weight in either white wine or
larger with me and Dean drinking diet coke and eating
whatever we could get our hands on. Poured the drinkers
into the car at 10pm, obviously after a brief stop off at
the off license to ensure that there was enough drink to
allow them to push through to the early hours!! Back to the
tent, Dean abandoned me and went to his bed with the passing
comment of ‘good luck dad’ I asked ‘what, good luck with the
race?’ he replied ‘no with trying to get those three to
bed.’ How right he was!! Cooked and consumed some pasta
and tomato sauce and told the drinkers to keep the noise
down and headed to bed. Funny thing but tent canvas isn’t
as sound proofing as bricks and mortar, a point lost on the
drinkers who thought that if they sat in the other tent then
obviously they couldn’t be heard!! The drink was finally
consumed and peace descended and I managed to get to sleep.
Alarm was set for 7am as race start time was 9:30am.
Revenge was sweet as I assaulted the three drinkers with
water on the way to the showers and was given repeated death
threats!! Breakfast of porridge and chopped up banana and
750ml of powerbar sports drink. Sorted kit into transition
box and Joyce and Dean took the car and kit to the start and
I rode my bike to give myself a warm up.
 Cool
temperatures and very little wind greeted us at the start.
Racked my bike, sorted my gear out into bike and run piles
and checked my nutrition bag on the top tube of my bike. 3
powerbar energy gels and two powerbar energy bars. 750ml of
powerbar sports drink on bike also. Powerbar are the
nutrition products being used at IM UK so that is all I have
been using for a couple of months now so my system is used
to them. Donned my wet suit, listened to a very through
race brief, eat a banana 30 mins before start time and
chilled out with my support team. Watched the first wave
depart and had an energy gel and entered the water with
around 5 mins to go before the start. Warmed up and then
made my way to the start line and took up position at the
front and close to the marker buoys on my left hand side and
waited for the off. Was very calm at this stage, a
different experience for me from my last open water events
albeit they were nearly 3 years ago, I was so much more
confident about both my swimming and my ability overall.
The start got counted down from 10 -1 and then the hooter
sounded and we were off, there was the usual melee at the
start as 200 upright bobbing souls packed close together
went to 200 horizontal souls all fighting for the same piece
of water, this is all part of the fun of triathlon for me
and I enjoyed the mass of arms and legs all thrashing around
about me. Soon enough the field settled down into its
different swim abilities and I concentrated on relaxing and
having a good long stroke length and kept to my plan of
sighting every 5 strokes and tried to draft off some of the
slightly faster swimmers just ahead of me, but this is
something I will have to practice as I didn’t really enjoy
being so close to another swimmer and preferred my own
smooth water in front of me. I was swimming at the same
pace of another guy just to my left and used him as my pacer
keeping him to my left till the turn around point when I put
the little extra energy I had been saving in full force and
moved
 up
through the field a little on the way back. Exited the
water feeling amazing that I had actually managed to be, for
me anyway, competitive during the swim, a new experience for
me and was really chuffed. A short run to transition and to
my bike location, spent several minutes here following again
what I had planned and that was to apply a tuba-grip bandage
to my right calf and then to wear a pair of oxy socks (AKA
the white knee high socks worn by Paula Radcliffe) over the
top of this to give my sore calf as much support as
possible. Was pleased I did as planned and not get carried
away worrying about loosing time in T1 sorting my self out
and not following my race plan, helmet / shoes were donned
and off I went out onto the bike course with team Watson’s
encouragement ringing in my ears. The race brief had stated
that the majority of climbing on the bike was during the
first 12 miles and this proved to be the case. I was on a
bit of a high at this stage after my good swim and went off
a little too quickly, forgetting I had 50 miles to cycle at
race pace. Sanity returned to my mind once I hit the first
hill and I kept a high cadence in a low gear and in the
saddle the whole way up, passing as I did so, several other
riders all out the saddle trying to push far too big a
gear. This would prove to be the norm over the next 12 or
so miles till the climbing was over for now, and then
followed some excellent down hill stretches and flat
sections. I had decided before hand to have an energy gel
as soon as I started the bike and then to have an energy bar
every half hour and another energy gel every hour and I
stuck to this plan and think this helped to spread out the
right amount of nutrition across the course.
 I
simply drank my fluid whenever I felt like a drink. The
middle section of the course was the hardest for me as it
was very undulating and quite poor road surface and I
struggled to get any sort of rhythm going. I relaxed though
and contented myself knowing that the course was the same
for everyone, during this time I was still passing people
from both my wave and the first wave of swimmers so must
have been doing something right. Around 40 miles the hilly
section again finished and it was a fast downhill / flat run
into the finish. I had an average cadence of 99 and an
average speed of 20.4 MPH for the whole course and passed
dozens of other riders and was only passed by 3 so that is a
good enough ratio for me and again was again really pleased
as I neared the end of the bike course. I came back into
transition dismounted and racked my bike and prepared myself
for the run. Joyce and Dean were right next to my bike
racking position and it was nice to see them looking so
proud and encouraging me. I grabbed the final energy gel I
had left in my transition box and headed out through the
crowds with the PA man telling the crowd who I was and who I
was racing for. The support during the run from both
spectators and other
 humbling
and encouraging to hear people give you support due to the
nature of our job. I really didn’t know how the run was
going to go, 2 weeks ago when I pulled my calf muscle on a 3
mile transition run following a 102 mile cycle, I thought
that my race was over due to the pain I was in, It felt at
the time that it happened like I had been kicked in the leg
by a horse. I took 5 complete days off and only managed 5
swims and one cycle for the two weeks up to race day. The
trip had been planned for ages and I was past the cut off
point to get my race fee back so told myself to go and do
the swim and cycle and if I felt my calf going again on the
run that I would stop and call it a day. I took the run
very cautiously, and it took great self control not to push
on as I was being over taken on what usually is my strongest
event. After about 3 miles I had relaxed and was enjoying
the easy pace and although my calf was sore it didn’t feel
like it was going to pull ag ain
so I tried to up the pace a little and my calf immediately
tightened up and I backed off again. I was just happy to be
running again and really enjoyed the relaxed pace and
managed to actually take in some of the beautiful views from
the course over the lake. The run course would have been a
killer had I been racing injury free and pushing as hard as
I would of been, the course is an out and back and is
undulating the whole way but the hill towards the end of the
out ward section is a beast. Watching the leaders passing
on the other side of the road was simply amazing, to see
these guys running as quick as they were on that course at
the end of a middle distance event was awe inspiring for
me. After the turn around it was a simple case of retracing
my footsteps at the same relaxed pace and counting off the
miles till I could hear the PA man again and knew I was
nearly home. The crowds were excellent and you can’t help
but feel good about yourself with everyone telling you how
well you have done and clapping you home. Team Watson were
waiting at the finish line and I finished with a big smile
on my face. This is simply the best triathlon I have taken
part in, it is extremely well organized and marshaled and
the course is tough but beautiful. I will definitely be
going back and will hopefully be able to run the run section
as hard as I would have liked to. Still very pleased with
my time though and think I must have lost around 10 minutes
on the run due to taking it easy. All in all a great
weekend away with great company and a great race. Roll on
Serbourne!! |
