Steyning duathlon

This race was the polar opposite of the national champs just a week before. British Triathlon appear to have got in on the act and made it very clear at the start that any cheating would not be tolerated. And it seemed to do the trick. 7 laps of Steyning town centre on the first run saw me come into transition not too far behind Lee Piercy and 4th overall. Straight onto the bike and I felt strong. At just over 3 miles I had conceded one position but felt I could claw this back and then a feeling of dread overcame me. There was a huge amount of traffic up ahead, a Police motorcyclist in attendance and a major road closure. It became immediately apparent that a serious road traffic accident and a possible fatality had occured. My first thoughts were that it was one of us but it turned out to be a motorcycle crash that occured 10 minutes prior to us even getting to the spot. Fortunately nobody was hurt. Scary. Anyway, we all rode back to transition and ended up doing a 20 mile time trial on the old Steyning course followed by the 5 lap run. I didn't witness a whiff of drafting on the entire course and instead of failing to crack the top 50 I romped home to 5th, my best ever position in a national ranking race.

Out on the first run, following a cracking pace



















And onto the first bike (!) of two.



















And finally at the start of the "time trial"

National (drafting.....) Duathlon championships

And so to Milton Keynes. Well, the somewhat more splendid Emberton country park actually. I was hoping to improve upon my somewhat poor showing in this race from last year and after nearly cracking the top 20 at Clumber park I was confident of a good performance. Well I was almost 3 minutes quicker than last year and managed improvements in all three disciplines, particuarly the bike. Unfortunately this didn't really translate into a notable improvement on my position from last year and I failed again to crack the top 50. Why? How on earth could I have been almost 3 whole minutes quicker than last year yet fail to improve on my position? In a word, DRAFTING. There was a ridiculous amount of it going on. At about the 6 mile stage on my bike, a group of about 20 came flying past. What do you do? Grin and bear it or....cheat? I can't see the point of cheating. Frustrating? Yes. But I know I put in a good performance on the day and I know it was MY performance.

Early morning mist

B of the bang!