The Outlaw

What a thoroughly enjoyable race. In fact, I will go further. What a thoroughly enjoyable weekend. The stats are that the RAF Tri relay team finished 16th overall and 5th relay team home; splits (important to all triathletes!) were as follows:

Swim - Kelda - 1.02.25 (14th fastest of 26 relay teams)

T1 - 1.39 (9th)

Bike - Me - 5.14.36 (3rd)

T2 - 0.33 (6th)

Run - Simon - 3.34.35 (7th)

Total - 9.53.50 (5th)

It was a very early start. Awake at 0400 but Kelda provided an excellent breakfast of cheese omelette followed by berries and yoghurt. I felt really good as I walked down to transition, loaded my bike with bottles and pumped the tyres up. For the cyclist in a relay team that was all I needed to do. I said hello to the other RAF Tri competitors I saw and also a few TriTalk buddies, and then had a good view of the start. And then I could relax. Yeah right! I went to the loo, chatted to my fellow relay cyclists, checked kit, went to the loo etc etc. After some 50 minutes or so and the first swimmers emerged from the water. Seeing other relay teams hand over and set out on the bike was immensely frustrating, but we knew that an hour was a realistic target. I saw Greg MacDonald emerge after a great swim, I gave a shout of encouragement and he ran over, shook my hand and wished me good luck before he headed off to collect his bike. Paul Fullalove followed just a few seconds after Greg.

After 62 minutes or so I got the shout from our 'spotter' that Kelda was out of the water. A few seconds later and Kelda emerged from the change tent to hand over the timing chip. After a bit of a faff the timing chip was around my ankle and I grabbed my bike and headed out onto the course. The first part of the bike leg was around the boating lake and I was already into the groove and overtaking people. A couple of tight bends and it was out onto the road and then along a dual carriageway where the inside lane had been coned off for the race - excellent. My HR belt didn't seem to be transmitting the right figures as my computer was showing 240+ bpm at this point, and I resigned myself to racing by RPE, something I wasn't overly keen on after my disaster in Barcelona last year. However, it sorted itself out after a few miles and I settled into a rhythm. The 13.5 miles to the lap route seemed to take an age, but once onto the laps the route was relatively traffic free (although this would change as the day wore on). After a few miles I was heading up the only real hill on the course when I head a voice I recognised "Come on Mick, you've got no excuse!" It was Westy on his gorgeous Fuji bike. We chatted briefly before he headed off on his way to recording the 3rd fastest bike split of the race, and one of only 3 competitors to go under 5 hours for the bike. The bike route had excellent marshalls and feed stations but towards the end of the lap it got a bit lonely, and on a couple of occasions I wondered if I had gone off route! In some of the villages there were groups of supporters, and it reminded me of Frankfurt 2006 where the whole villages seemed to come out to support. In a couple of places, the organisers had to be creative to overcome safety issues at dangerous corners, and on one corner they had built a wooden structure that you rode up to travel in single file before re-joining the road. On another occasion you missed a roundabout by cutting through a pub car park! Very innovative. Towards the end of the lap was a very fast dual carriageway section where I took advantage of the tailwind and an 11-tooth for a few very fast miles.

At the end of the first lap I was greeted by Kelda and Adrian cheering me on. I think they were a little concerned because I was somewhat behind their predicted time of arrival. But I had a plan and after my issues at Barcelona last year I was determined to execute it properly. I'd set myself a target of riding at or about 145bpm for the first 2 laps; I say about because I was happy to let the HR rise above this going uphill (but not excessively so) but would then let it recover on the subsequent flat or downhill. This meant I was overtaken by a few people but I was determined to not allow myself to be sucked in to going faster than I had planned. I was still averaging around 35kmh so was happy. On the second lap I started to catch the BOPers but at this stage they were fairly well spread out and didn't cause any problems. I was also more disciplined in controlling my HR on this lap that resulted in a small drop in average speed. At the end of lap 2 I saw Kelda and Adrian again and headed off on to lap 3. It was now time to execute the next stage of the plan. HR limit was increased to 160 although this was not to be breached on the hills, and I was surprised how much faster I was travelling. I have 2 particular memories - one was of travelling downhill into one of the smaller villages and passing a 30mph speed restriction sign at well in excess of 40mph! The other was following a BOPer into a village that had one of those electronic speed signs - the BOPer went through and it was showing 14mph; I followed at 22! I was enjoying this lap; I saw an RAF trisuit ahead (still one of the most easily recognisable kits out there) towards the end of lap 2 but couldn't quite close the gap. But towards the end of lap 3 I caught him and gave a cheery hello mate as I went passed. I thought it was Paul Fullalove, but when the next RAF guy I passed WAS Paul Fullalove I was a bit confused (turns out the previous RAF rider was Greg MacDonald). I didn't dwell on it too much as I was working hard at this stage of the race, and at the end of lap 3 I headed for home (having had a near miss with a family pushing a pram). The next couple of miles were a head down full on TT effort, but the not very steep uphill to the right turn at the traffic lights really hurt, and I had the first twinges of cramp. The next few miles were painful - twisty, turny, potholes, speed bumps, gravel, you name it, if it could slow you down it was there. But out the other side there was only a mile or so to go to T2. I'd already recced the return bit and worked out where I needed to remove my feet from my shoes. Despite a woeful lack of triathlons of late I executed a perfect dismount and handed my bike to the very young ATC cadet, despite him being on the same side of the bike that I was. I looked up, and to my dismay, there was NO RUNNER. Simon, where are you? WHERE THE **** ARE YOU? A lady marshal obviously witnessed my distress and pointed to the far end of the tent. I looked up and there was Simon waving. I 'sprinted' (it's a relative term because 1, I don't run at all, and 2, I'd just ridden 111 miles (yes, only 111 miles) on the bike!) to the far end of the tent and Simon whipped off the timing chip and was on his way. I collapsed in a heap and was extremely grateful for the recovery bag provided by Kelda - Mars bar chocolate milkshake and banana. Excellent.

I was initially somewhat disappointed by my time, but after finding out that the fastest bike split was 4.52 and only 3 people went under 5 hours I was reassured that I had done OK. A quick check of the provisional results suggested I had recorded the 20th fastest bike split (of some 900 entrants). More importantly, I had a plan and executed it, managing to ignore other athletes and ride my own race. I had fuelled appropriately and was spent at the end, not before.

After something to eat and a very pleasant shower I was changed and back at the racetrack to watch Simon's progress. After 2 of the 3 laps he was looking good, and possibly heading for a marathon PB. Unfortunately Simon suffered an attack of cramp and in the final 8 miles dropped some 20 minutes off his ETA based on his lap 2 time. However, we were delighted to see him heading for the finish and at the end we ran down the finish chute together and crossed the line, arms raised (with me crashing in to the finish line marshal for good measure).

This was the first running of The Outlaw and it was an exceptionally good first effort. I had planned to give up time trialling at the end of this season, but as I drove away I mentioned to my son that I could be tempted back for another attempt next year. So who wants to make up a relay team for The Outlaw on 24 July 2011?