What I learned yesterday

Yesterday I did another sprint triathlon after doing one two weekends ago. This one was in a village about a 45 minute drive from me, so again it was a nice gently start to the day. It wasn’t quite so gentle later on and this is what I learned:

1 – Triathlons are bloody hard work – even the sprint distance.

2 – Sprint is very much a misnomer – I’m not sure that other than a quick burst in the pool I officially sprinted ever during the event.

3 – I owe Steve £20 – I made a silly bet that I was bound to lose, but that’s ok because he has done 14 triathlons this year for charity and I’m happy to pay up to his charity – you should too if you’ve got a spare tenner (https://www.justgiving.com/Tri2014/).

4 – Actually, despite the above, it’s a pretty good way to spend a Sunday (especially when you can then go down the pub afterwards and have a few pints and a game of darts – which is what I did for post-event refuelling).

5 – It was great to meet Rachel in real life and I love the TeamBear ethos.

6 – I could spend a LOT of money on kit – I’m not going to, but it’s fascinating to rack my bike up next to bikes that probably cost more than my car.

7 – I have a very weird relationship with on course support – and I’ll probably blog about this more later.

8 – I’m not going to enter another event before I sort out my personal life – I probably won’t blog about this later – I’ll leave it intentionally cryptic, those that know, know. But if I need to go to *that* place at the moment I find it full. I don’t want to make excuses, but I do think this has affected *some* of my performances this year.

9 – Some driver are dicks. There were 3 or 4 that passed me by the absolute narrowest of margins on the course, but the trophy today goes to the woman that decided to turn right next to me in the village at the end of the event. She crowded me at the junction, turned with me and then overtook me even though I was indicating to turn right. I do hope that the 13 seconds she gained by that helped her out.

10 – I need to find a way to stop nipple rash – nuff said.

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11 – Monday morning update. Number 4 was a bad idea!

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Suffer but NEVER surrender

I’ve got my second triathlon coming up in a few days – I’m going to East Leake to do the sprint triathlon down there. The course is a little longer than the Southwell one I did the other week (a slightly longer bike ride), but it’s meant to be flatter too.

I’d like to say that I’m looking forward to it, but….

However, something that I will be using as a mantra for the event is:

This is the motto of the great Team Bear tri team that I am proud to be a member of. It’s a virtual team of like-minded athletes who want to support and cheer the effort (not the times or results, but the effort) of each other. Where possible there is physical cheering too, but there is always a lot of virtual (social media) cheering.

I talked recently about the great community within swimming – and that’s true – but it turns out that its not just swimmers, there are other nice people out there too. I’ve been chatting on Twitter to a couple of people who have provided great support and cheering over the last couple of months (especially after Windermere) and as we got to know each other better I realised that they were part of Team Bear, so I checked it out and I LOVED the ethos of the team (apart from the cake bit). I told them I loved it and they asked me to join, so I did – as simple as that.

I’ve already found out that another Team Bear member will be doing the East Leake tri too – it’s actually his 14th triathlon this year and he’s raising money for Derby Hospitals. To make it more fun, I’ve told him that if he beats me on Sunday, I’ll put £20 in the pot (as Team Bear is not really about the results, I’m gonna put £20 in the pot no matter what – but don’t tell him).

So if you see someone with “sbNs” written on their hand on Sunday it’s likely to be me (or Steve). Please cheer us on in true Team Bear fashion.