Foremarke Hall Sprint
Triathlon (Swim 400m / Bike 20K / Run 5K)
Emma S continued her excellent bike form on Sunday 2nd July
where she recorded the second-fastest age-group bike leg in the Foremarke Hall
sprint tri, which helped to power her to a creditable 5/25 in her age group and
17/72 in the female field overall. Emma hasn’t been able to fit in much (any)
swim training this season so has huge potential to improve further - as long as
she can juggle training and keep her form in
the other disciplines, of course.
Emma again flew the Go Veggie flag on what is one of her
favourite 5K courses and had an impressive run to finish in 23.53. Her finish
time was all the more impressive given the hot and humid conditions on the
evening of the race, plus the ‘interesting’ crowd participation that
traditionally accompanies this event. Racing around the centre of Doncaster post 7.00pm attracts all manner of spectators
from pub-goers to the town’s all-too-many cardboard-city dwellers. It’s generally
a very good natured affair but it has been known for competitors to have to
hurdle the occasional collapsed drunk.
Leger Man Middle
Distance Triathlon (Swim 1900m / Bike 85K / Run 20K)
Steve W is at the upper end of his triathlon age-group
cohort so, rather than concentrating on his specialism of sprint-distance tris,
is mixing things up a bit this year. As part of his not-going-stale strategy,
Steve took to the start line of this middle distance triathlon last Sunday with
a single determined plan not to overdo the bike leg. A cracking (for Steve)
1900m swim split of 31.04 saw him out of the water in 12th position overall
and a swift transition saw him out on to the bike course in 9th.
And so to the plan of a measured bike effort. This was
reportedly difficult for Steve, who had to remain super-disciplined and allow
several fellow competitors to come by him and disappear up the road in order to
stay under his self-imposed limit of 80% of his maximum heart rate.
The end of the 85K bike leg saw Steve tired - but crucially
not frazzled - and he was able to painfully shuffle a little faster than a few
others (pic) and picked up a few spots in the 20K run leg to finish an
impressive 7th overall in a time of 4:33:09.
Triathlons of this distance are all about pacing and though
it’s a fine line between optimising speed and being doubled over in a hedgerow,
Steve thinks it might be possible to
raise his pace in the bike leg just enough to bring about an overall
improvement. Watch this space…
