My duathlon debut.
After a cold winter of commuting to and from work with a combination of running and biking, I decided to enter a duathlon, the Clumber Classic which incorporated the British duathlon championships!
My main problem would turn out to be the fact that my daily commute is only 5miles each way, so each of my training sessions had been only approximately 35 minutes max!
The race was a 10k run followed by 40k on the bike and then another 5k run, over 2 hours of hard effort.
I started in the second wave of competitors which was for athletes in the 35 to 39 and 40 to 44 age groups. It was an undulating 2 lap out and back course and after the first mile picking my way through the boys that had gone out at sub five minute mile pace I was running comfortably with the leaders and we were closing down the back markers from the younger age group that had started 5 minutes before us. I finished the first 10km in 33min11sec, and was first in my age group - I think, because by this point we were mixed up with many of the earlier wave of runners.
The 40km bike section was were the trouble set in, after only a couple of miles I felt cramps in both my calf muscles, due perhaps to the cold wet weather ( it was only around 3 degrees and drizzling ) or maybe dehydration after the run. I found myself having to free-wheel and try to stretch out my legs, all the time loosing time. On the sections I could pedal riders were still passing me despite at times my speed hitting over 25mph! After the first of the 2 bike laps I was reduced to 'just getting around' mode and finishing the course. The 40km route took 1hr12min leaving me around 6minutes down on the guys that would make the World Championship team.
The final 5km run was a strange affair, with my feet cold, wet and numb and legs stiff from the hour on the bike getting moving was difficult and after an opening mile outside 6 and a half minutes I was passing runners all the way to finish in 18min11sec with an overall time of 2hours 6mins 18seconds for 117th place.
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