Holmfirth is hilly!

It's been a while since my last post, mainly due to the lack of racing or exciting stuff, but I now need to report on two races, the second to follow this in quick succession!

My first race of the 2014 season was in Holmfirth, West Yorkshire. First of the Summer Tri (along with Last of the Summer Tri) is a sprint triathlon series run by a Knutsford tri club member, Dave Armitage. It consists of a 400m pool swim, 24km bike and 5.7km run. That latter two stages consisting of many ups and downs!

10 days before this race I returned home from Portugal after a 10 day training camp with my running club. Unfortunately I neither swam nor biked in Portugal, just ran - a lot. So coming into the triathlon, if I didn't have my bike legs or swim arms at least I had my running legs and a tan!

Mum and I drove to Holmfirth the day before to have a little course recce and to avoid the need to wake up at an ungodly hour the day of the race. Driving through the town to the leisure centre I could see cars parked at crazy angles, roads that seemed to go straight up and sheep that appeared to be defying gravity. The idea of racing on my Starley TT bike was slipping out of my mind and I was pretty sure I'd be using my roadie, good job I took both just in case! Upon driving round the course we encountered hills that even the car groaned to get up, but hey, all the more interesting and challenging right?!

The gradient profile of the bike route

After a drive, a cycle and a short run we made our way to the hotel just a short drive from the race location. What we didn't know was that it was Huddersfield's last football game of the season (a sport which I do not follow closely) and so everywhere was pretty packed. Brilliant, I thought. I better not get woken up in the night by loud football fans. Following dinner tucked away on a table for two in a restaurant full of lager drinking football fans, Mum and I went back to the room to chill out and try to watch WTS Cape Town - which failed miserably due to some very awful WiFi. Oh and Huddersfield lost 2-0...

Race day! After a not-too-early alarm, some breakfast and squeezing two bikes into one elevator we made our way to the leisure centre. After registering and racking I hung about in the changing rooms ready for the start. I was the second wave into the water, just 20 seconds after the first...

Having only had one swim session since being home from Portugal I was slightly nervous about being able to perform in the swim. Usually I can tell from the first two lengths whether I'm really with it, and I really wasn't. Nevertheless I completed the 400m and tried to forget about the below-par performance. Getting out of the pool was extremely difficult on my tired shoulders and I then proceeded to slip on the grass into T1 and knock my head on a pole. What a fabulous start!

Out of T1 and onto the bike which consisted of 3 loops of 8km. This worked quite well as my mum was shouting the time gap until the next female competitor behind me, this kept me working to try and hold a gap. I thoroughly enjoyed the bike leg, even with it's short and sharp and long and steady hills, because the downhills were great! Throughout the bike leg I kept my eyes on a guy in front of me and then passed him just before coming into T2.

Jelly legs to the max, I racked, swapped and unclipped various items and headed out for the 5.7km run. Yet upon exiting T2 I passed the second place female just coming in. 'I've got to get a move on'. Up the first long hill I passed a few men and felt to be making good ground however when the gradient switched and I began to stride out downhill my ankle absolutely killed! Not this injury again!? I was forced to slow it up a bit because it hurt too much to maintain the pace. About halfway through I was passed by the 2nd woman who said 'well done' upon overtaking. Even though I was being overtaken I enjoy the sportsmanship we get in this sport. The best thing I could do now was to hold a decent pace and try to place a good time since the race was done in heats, so you're not always racing next to those you're up against. With the end in sight I picked it up for the last 400m and my ankle calmed down a bit after the gradient levelled out.

In the end I managed to hold onto 2nd, only by 6 seconds and claim 1st in the open age-group category. It was hard, it was hilly but I really enjoyed this race because of the challenge and I'd love to do it again.

Stay motivated,

Lucy