Derwent Duathlon

Today I’m competing in the Derwent Duathlon which starts from the Fairholmes Visitor Centre in the Upper Derwent Valley, Derbyshire. It was bloody foggy as when we left Nottingham at stupid 0'clock but by the time we were up in the Peak District visibility was almost perfect.

This is a duathlon with a difference; the two run courses are very different. One is 4.5k of fell running, the other 6.5k of mainly road running. You have to do both but in which order is your own choice. As we start and hurtle down the hill to the decision point the field seems almost equally split on which one to do first. I go fell first, certainly not fancying climbing hills on tired legs.

The fell course is narrow and because the field is still tightly bunched a lot of walking is involved, which is fine with me. This I realise is not the best option if you wish to win. To win I guess you must do the road first, so that you then get a clear run at the fell section with the field more spread out.

My calves screamed at me on the uphill sections but thankfully they didn't give up the ghost and 26 minutes later I’m back in transition.

The bike course is hell, there's no other way of describing it because the road was riddled with pot holes. Big tip - don’t bring your best bike, like I had. The organiser had marked the biggest ones with cones but the unmarked ones were still capable of doing damage.

One pot hole knocked the ‘sender’ for my bike computer into my spokes and I had to stop to disentangle it. Then a road wide crevice appeared and although I lifted my front wheel over it, my back one hit it at speed causing my rear tyre to explode. So I had to stop and fix that.

Then once I was up and riding again I hit another one. This time something went on my back brake leaving it locked against my wheel rim. So I had to stop again, this time opting to disable the brake completely.

Finally I got lap one of two over, threw my punctured tube towards L and set off on lap two. I had thought of aborting at this point and going straight on to the run but this is supposed to be hard training after all. I just didn’t bank on this sort of hard.

I was well down the field but able to reel a few in. Thankfully by now I knew where all the pot holes were.

The road was also now full of walkers, other cyclists, families with kids, kids on bikes, kids on scooters and a group of mountain bikers coming straight towards me with no intention of giving way. This combined with the poor state of the road had already caused most competitors to back off and give up on racing hard, although I doubt the ones at the front did.

I got through it and went off on my road run, which was thankfully uneventful. It was also nice to see that the finish wasn’t back up the hill where the start and transition were. I crossed the line relieved and in 69th place of the 94 who finished. There were 9 DNFs.

It wasn't pleasant at times but was sort of good fun. It is potentially a great event and if the road is tarmaced by next year, as it is rumoured it should be, then it could be bike friendly too. The main thing today was to get some training miles in and that was certainly achieved.

Cheshire Cat

Back in 2010 L and I did the Cheshire Cat sportive which starts and finishes at Crewe Alexandra FC. Today, four years on, we return. I need it as training for my half-arsed Ironman and L, well she simply wants to spend more time as a cyclist. It’s going to be a long one, I’m doing 75 miles and L 40, so we leave the boys at home.

We’re both been allocated at 10am start time, which is in the last group, but we manage to get away by 9.45.

My route heads out towards Leek via the infamous climb of Mow Cop before the route turns left, skirts the Peak District and heads not quite to Macclesfield before looping back to Crewe via Holmes Chapel and Nantwich. L’s shorter route avoids the big climbs like Mow Cop by leaving us somewhere around Congleton before rejoining our route at Holmes Chapel.

There are some serious climbs in the first half of my route. Mow Cop is just one of them but probably the most fearsome and you get a medal if you make it up the 1 in 4 climb without putting a foot down. I didn’t quite manage it. It was looking good until I ran out of road as I zigzagged up and clipped the kerb, which toppled me over. I find out later that they hadn’t penalised me for this and I could have had a medal, if I’d joined the 100 person long queue at the finish...

A bigger disappointment though was when I rode into the first feed station at Tittesworth Reservoir after 31 hard miles to find that they had no food left. All they could offer was a strictly rationed two gels each, which I took although I’d already got a pocket full of them.

The second half of the ride was much flatter and great fun too. At the second feed at Holmes Chapel they did have some food left, if you count little angel cakes. These were disappearing fast as everyone grabbed half a dozen. There was a rumour going around that they’d had bananas once but they were long gone. Even that wouldn’t have been great, I’ve got used to doing sportives where you get the likes of sandwiches, cakes, flapjacks, sausage rolls, cold pizza slices, hot soup, hot tea etc

Pulling out of there I have 17 miles to go, or rather 20 because they seem to have mis-measured. At the finish, where L is waiting, there’s the aforementioned long queue for medals and not even a cup of hot tea as a reward. The goodie bag is half decent though. Yet, disgusted at being half starved to death, I opt to head elsewhere to spend money on food.

Dambuster Duathlon

It’s an early start today for the Dambuster Duathlon which is held at Rutland Water. The event doubles up (or should that be triples up) as a 2014 ITU Worlds Qualifier and a 2015 ETU European Qualifier meaning that I’m seriously out of my depth here.

L and the dogs are dragged out of bed early as well to come, support, administer last rights etc. Which is much appreciated although L spends a fair amount of time eyeing up all the other WAGS outfits. Having already requested a new WAG dress for the Outlaw Half she’s now added a new pair of boots to the required kit. At this rate the supporters’ kit is going to cost me more than the actual competing kit. The boots are considerably more expensive than the aero-bars I’ve been looking at.

There are 700 entrants arranged in three starts. The male elite at 8.20, the aging male veterans (including myself) at 8.30, the fully aged oak smoked and matured in whisky casks male veterans at 8.40 and all the ladies at 8.50. This means I’m going to have two seriously focused groups chasing me down.

I manage to hold them all off during the initial 10k run and more importantly also hold my calves together. Although that took some concentration as I try to keep my foot flat and not run on my toes. I run 47 minutes for the 10k whilst looking for something under 50, although I didn’t actually have much choice about my pacing. The path is so narrow and the field so tightly packed that you simply have to go with the flow as overtaking or being overtaken isn’t really an option.

The run is an out and back along the edge of the dam and the water itself has huge waves on it. So everybody is relieved that it’s not a full triathlon but I doubt anyone is quite as relieved as I am. The water still has quite an effect on the event though with quite a fierce wind always present coming off the water for the run.

The aged veterans do come past me en bloc on the bike leg, the first 15k of which is a painful blur on tired legs and mainly into a strong headwind. Once the oldies had disappeared into the distance, a few of the women start to come past me although not in great numbers. Each one seemed to be sporting pigtails, which is clearly the way to go for a faster time this year, blow the training. Not sure they'd suit me though.

By now I’d got the use of my legs back and I start to enjoy trying to chase the girlies down the road, naturally failing miserably each time and anyway it would have counted as illegal drafting had I actually caught one of them.

Surprisingly enough I’m also overtaking some of the young whippersnappers from the first group, the not-so-elite of the elite group. So all very satisfying and I’m disappointed when the bike section ends.

Back in transition and into the final 5k run, where I develop a short of shuffling routine around the course. All that was needed was the zimmer frame to complete the look. Oddly once I complete the event in an inspiring 2:45 having been aiming for anything less than 3 hours I found out that the pace of my second run was faster than the first one. Would you credit it. I guess this is what you call moral boosting.

Cheadle Spring 5

Today I make my running return. My first outing on the tarmac since the ill advised Christmas Pudding run at Langdale before Christmas.

We are at the Cheadle Spring 5, a mammoth five miler but needs must. I manage to up my pace a little from the levels of my training runs (all three of them) and record 39:16 and 83^rd place, half way down the field. The official photos show me battling with some school kid who I managed to fend off eventually. It wasn’t a glorious return but a return it was.