Swansea 70.3

Pre Race

The week before the race, I had a bit of a stomach bug, so I was getting a bit stressy about not being able to do the training that my coach, Mark, had set. I was also feeling like I had had a lot of recovery since Broadhaven, which was also making me a bit anxious. I rode the course around 2 weeks out, and it was a bit of a dismal day, with a lot of drizzle and wind, so I wasn’t super excited for the bike, and was really looking forward to getting the race done, and enjoying an end of season break, as this was to be my last race.

We were staying in an Air bnb near the prison, and a strong smell of dope in the air 😂 which was about a 15 minute walk to transition. We arrived Friday, I registered when we arrived, and bumped into Bec, one of my one to one athletes, we had a quick chat, and then headed back to our place for food.

The day before, I walked back and forth to transition a couple of times, meeting up with Annie, and Bec from the team, and we also ended up climbing across rocks in Oxwich to try and find some climbing! Great race preparation….

Race Morning

It was going to be hot again for this race, so I made sure I had pre-hydrated the night before and the morning of the race. I was pretty early into transition, because I couldn’t hang around in our 1 bedroom air bnb, so after breakfast I headed off.

I soon realised I had underestimated how cool it was. I was just wearing my tri suit, and before 6am in the morning it’s not too warm at the moment. I met Anwen, who I used to coach and we had a chat, she was supporting her partner, but I had to get moving as I was starting to shiver. Once I’d put my drinks, fuel and computer on my bike I headed into the change tent. It was a bit warmer in there so I just hung out on a bench where I spotted Ruth Astle, and then Alistair Brownlee, who was asking around for safety pins.

Once I’d warmed up a bit I headed over to drop my white bag off, and get over to the swim start. At the swim start I spotted Caris, another team member who was doing the swim part of the relay, in skins. Their team won the womens relay 🎉

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The Swim

There was a bit of delay starting, and there was someone at the the swim exit who looked like they were looking for something in the water, but I don’t know why we were held up. The pro’s went off first after being able to acclimatise in the water, then we had a rolling start. The swim course wasn’t totally straightforward, and I got a bit disorientated when we were heading back to the exit. visibility for the buoys wasn’t great, as the sun was in our eyes, and it was hard to see the whole course on land.

My swim was ok, and I completed it in a similar time to Staffordshire last year, I don’t know why the GPS line is so wiggly 😂

The pro men start

T1

The run into T1 was around 500m, which you had to run on tarmac, we were reminded several times that we weren’t allowed to wear shoes for this bit. It was ok underfoot but I was glad to get to my bike!

Carys Mai Hughs overtaking me on the way to transition

The Bike

After checking out the bike course, I was estimating that it would take me between 3h and 3h15m. The route is quite technical once you get out of Swansea, lots of sharp turns, and a few steep descents.

There are quite a few sharp turns, and a lot of climbing. It was quite hard to hold a consistent power, so my numbers were down on what I was expecting, and talking to Mark afterwards he said that other athletes had found that their power was lower than it would normally have been.

Still I was pleased to get in just under 3 hours! Fuelling wise everything went well, and my power didn’t drop significantly over the ride. In the last 5 and a half miles the course goes downhill, and back along the flat into Swansea. I made the decision to ease off here, as I know it would only cost a few seconds if I didn’t push, and it gave me a bit of time to get ready for running.

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T2

I managed to get out of T2 pretty quickly, I had my soft flask of drink, and some energy chews, which were already in my race belt, so all I had to do was get my trainers, cap and sunglasses.

The Run

I started out at a pace I thought I’d be able to maintain (around a 7 minute mile), which I managed to hold for around 3 miles or so, enough time to catch up with and pass Madison Shaddick, who I raced with at Broadhaven, and who had passed me towards the end of the bike.

The course is 2 loops out and back so you can see who is behind, and I could see I’d put a bit of distance between us, by the time I got to the turnaround.

I did try and maintain the pace, but dropped down to an average 7:14 minute mile, Around 5 miles from the end I managed to overtake a guy who I’d passed on the bike, who had then overtaken me at the beginning of the run, which was a good morale boost.

Some of my chews had squashed together in the back of my race belt over the course of the day, so I had to bite bits off, which wasn’t the best, but I needed the energy! At very feed station I used water to cool myself and then had another cup to drink.

The support on the run was fantastic, because it was along the front, there were supporters the whole way along. Obviously the best feed station was the Porthcawl Tridents one, where Rhiannon from the team was volunteering 😁

It was also lovely to see Patrick and the boys towards the end of the run, and I managed to get a high five near the finish. I did smile, honest 😉

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Full results here

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Afterthoughts

It was awesome to see some of the team, Liz, and Bec racing, and also Annie who was volunteering gave me my medal at the end, getting ready for next year when she’s going to complete her first 70.3 🙌🏻

I finished in a time of 5:13:34, around 30 seconds faster than in Staffordshire last year, this was all down to the run, which is flat in Swansea, and hilly in Staffordshire!

It’s great to have a 70.3 so close to home, the weather was good for racing, as long as you weren’t out on the run for too long! And the scenery on the Gower is beautiful, so I would definitely recommend the race, as long as you don’t mind hilly bike courses!

Sandman Legend

Pre Race

I was inspired to do this race because I did the standard distance before in 2012, and really enjoyed it.

When one of my team members said she was doing it, it planted a seed, and I thought it would be a nice event to do at the end of the season. It took me a bit of time but finally I decided to enter the legend distance (70.3) rather than the standard distance. I chose to keep it quiet that I was competing just to take a bit of pressure off, (thanks Lorna for giving me that idea!)

I also invited my mum up, as she hasn’t been away for a long time with restrictions in place, so it was great for us to get away together. Looking at the event and where it fell I was happy to see that my period was due the Tuesday before the race, which was perfect, but writing this a week later it still hasn’t started, so I was feeling a bit stressed about that.

Race Morning

I woke up what felt like every hour the night before, but we didn’t have to get up too early for the event to start. I was in wave 2 which started at 8:20, so left the house at around 6:45 to get there which wasn’t too bad! We’d been to the beach the night before to register, and the sea had been beautifully calm, when we arrived I looked at the flags and realised that it wouldn’t be as nice as it had been the day before! There was a lot of wind chop and quite a big swell. I went to sort my transition kit out, and bumped into Jan from the tri club, it was nice to see a friendly face and have a little chat.

I pre-loaded with a hydration mix with a bit of extra salt from a salt tab in there, breakfast was an instant oats, I was feeling a bit nauseous, so made a note to keep on top of fuelling on the bike and run.

The Swim

The sea did not look too inviting, and during the briefing the organisers announced that the swim would be cut short to 1km, which was a good decision. We had to swim out into the waves, then across a short distance, then back to shore, so it was only the going out bit that was really bad!

Every time I thought I was getting into a rhythm a big wave would loom above me, and I would swallow water. Once I reached the first buoy I knew it would be easier, going across was ok, and then going back to shore we had help from the swell. I can’t say there was much speed there, the swim was more a case of surviving. When I came out of the water the announcer called that I was 4th female out of the water.

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T1

We had a short run into transition from the beach, and everything went fine, I had some quick transitions on the day so I was happy with that.

The Bike

The bike course has slightly more elevation, and is a little bit longer than Ironman Staffordshire which I did in July, (still haven’t published my report from that!) so I was expecting a similar time, I thought I would probably be a lot slower, around 3h-3:15 looking at previous finishing times, and the bike course was also slightly longer.

It was a bit rainy when we got on the bike, but it soon dried out. The first part of the ride is a climb up from the beach along a drive with speed bumps.

I took it fairly steady along here as I was faffing about with my Garmin so I could see all of my data. When we got on the road I saw a woman up ahead, and started catching up. She was slowing down a lot for corners, so I got past as quick as I could, and then tried to get some distance between us, my legs were feeling pretty good, much better than my last race.

I averaged 188 watts and 194 normalised power for the 1st half and 168w/186np for the second half. In Staffs I averaged  172w/183np for the first half and 157w/175np for the second half. It was a lot cooler, and better conditions for me here in Anglesey.

Soon after I’d overtaken I was then overtaken, by the eventual winner, and towards the end of the bike leg I was overtaken again, by Nerys Jones, so I thought I must be in around 5th 6th place now. 

I really enjoyed the bike course, there was plenty of space on the roads and it wasn’t crowded. There was a bit of congestion coming back into Newborough with cars, and on the last section we started to catch up with the olympic athletes which definitely helps with motivation. I finished the bike leg in 2h55m which was under my predicted time.

Fuelling I had a bottle of Skratch super fuel, and a bottle of hydration mix, and every 20 minutes I had half an energy ball.

T2

No problems in T2 I took a small soft flask with a drink in it, and took some clif blocks and Skratch chews, which I ate a couple of every 20 minutes.

The Run

I was a bit worried about running, as in Staffordshire I felt I’d underperformed, so I wasn’t really expecting much. The run is beautiful, through the woods and over some sand dunes then back along the beach and the sun was out now. The temperature was still good though, not too hot!

Around 4 miles in I saw Nerys ahead, and started to catch her, when I got close I thought “oh shit” as the last time I raced her in a run race she overtook me just over halfway through. I was contemplating whether to overtake or not, but in the end I had too, then had to keep the pace up. 

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I could still hear her behind me for the rest of the first lap, so just held my pace as best I could. 

On the second lap near the end someone told me I was around a minute behind 1st place, which was confusing as I thought I was in around 5th still, as I got hear the end my mum was there cheering, and when I crossed the line I was called out in 2nd place.

Full results here

 

Afterthoughts

I love the Always Aim High events as the locations are always beautiful, and the atmosphere is super relaxed, and friendly. It was the perfect end to the season. I haven’t planned to race that time of year for a while because of school holidays and training, but with all the lockdowns and cancelled events over the past 18 months I made an exception, and was glad that I did.

Having a quick look back on power data, this was the highest power I’ve ever sustained in a 70.3 event. I dropped off a fair amount in the second half of the bike (20w), but still managed to run well off the bike, posting the fastest female run split of the day.

Every race is different and it’s interesting to see what your body and mind can do on the day!

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Riding a 100 mile Time Trial

National 100 mile Time Trial Championship 2021

So the last time I rode a 100 mile time trial was for my Kona prep in 2017.

After enjoying a 25 mile TT in Llandovery I thought I’d enter another TT event, as they are great training, and I haven’t raced for such a long time I thought this would be a good lead in to my main event, Ironman Staffordshire 70.3.

What I didn’t realise when I entered the event was that it was a National Championship event! Usually the course in Wales is a Welsh championship, so there are less riders and the standard isn’t quite as high!

CTT have partnered with Spindata who sent out predicted finishing positions, which put things in a bit of perspective 😂

The start list had 27 women out of 120 entrants (about 22%) compared to the last Welsh Championship I did, which had 12 women out of 83 entrants (about 7%)

This is really good to see the numbers going up, I have noticed that CTT have been posting more imagery of women, and they have been under pressure to hand out equal prizes. These things do work!

Pre Race

So this was the first time I had gone away on my own, since January 2020, (thanks to COVID lockdowns) and I was a bit anxious leaving, but once I got on the road I felt positive. My power numbers have been pretty good recently, and I thought I could possibly improve on my past effort, even though I’ve not been training as much as I did for Kona! But this event was at the end of a pretty hard training week.

Arriving at Abergavenny I made a trip to Waitrose to buy my breakfast and dinner.

Instant Oats and a yoghurt for breakfast, and a poke bowl for dinner.

I didn’t really want to go back to the hotel, so went for a short walk and ate my food on a bench. After that I decided to drop my spare bottle at the lay-by so I didn’t have to do it in the morning. I had a terrible nights sleep, as I was nervous for the next day, but it’s happened before so it was all ok!

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The ride

My start time was 6:39am so I left the hotel at 5:45am, signed in at Race headquarters, realised I’d forgotten my pins, and as the organisers were running short on pins I made a mess of my arm numbers which flapped the whole way around!

It was a short ride to the start so I got my nutrition on my bike, and rode over. I was starting in-between lots of women who were faster than me, so expected to get overtaken pretty early, and regularly.

As we rode to the start there was a torrential downpour, so had a bit of, on or off, with my glasses. I opted for on, once the rain had died down, and I could see again. The weather was like this most of the day, a few very heavy showers and a bit of sunshine, the roads were dry for some of the time!

The course is a lapped course but it was different from previous courses, and had a bit less dual carriageway 🎉

We started down a minor road before getting onto the dual carriageway then riding to a turn off, which was undulating and mostly downhill, so it gave us a little bit of a break mentally, then back on the dual carriageway to a roundabout to turn around and repeat.

As predicted I started getting overtaken within the first 5 miles. Mentally I was fine with this, as I knew from the start sheets that this would happen. I caught a couple of riders too, as I settled in to my goal pace.

I didn’t feel great starting, it felt harder than I thought it would to hold my goal power, and my shoulder was stiff so I was pretty uncomfortable. I also had to battle some fairly negative thoughts about the distance and also of the event. It all came flooding back how the last part is such a struggle mentally, to keep pushing on, so I refocussed on 5 miles at a time.

I’ve set my Garmin to lap every 5 miles as it really helps to break down the event into smaller chunks. Honestly though within the first 10 miles I felt like pulling out, I was hoping that I’d get into the rhythm and just try to ride one 5 mile lap at a time.

Once I’d done 2 laps of the course, for some reason I thought the description of the course had said it was 2.5 laps, so at this point I got over excited, thinking that I didn’t have to ride my least favourite section of dual carriageway again, but a quick bit of maths made me realise that I was wrong and I had to ride down it again, another thing to mess with my head. I quickly moved on and got back in the zone! The last 25 miles is always so challenging, I was getting uncomfortable my legs were sore and I often wanted to stop pedalling.

Race Analysis

Garmin data here, previous data here,

So looking at the data, the 2 rides are very similar. The course was different so there are slightly more power drops in 2021, there were some sections where you could freewheel and recover which I made the most of!

Normalised power and average power were exactly the same but for a lower heart rate in 2021, so looking at things overall, it was a pretty good day out, considering I haven’t ridden that far for around 2 years. My official time was slightly quicker too, so I got a new PB over 100 miles.

It shows that endurance doesn’t just disappear if you don’t ride long frequently, and the cumulative effect of staying consistent with training over the last 4 years also comes into play.

There is also a very important psychological aspect that makes a difference.

100 mile Time Trials are tough, there is not much distraction from all of the thoughts going around your head, so you need strategies to manage them, which is great practice for long triathlon events.

If you can ride a long, lonely time trial, and manage everything that goes along with it, then when you have spectators and the buzz of a triathlon event, it will feel a lot easier.

Have you ridden a long time trial?

What did you learn?

2021

2017

Results here

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A new challenge 6 weeks to go

This is the first personal blog post I’ve written since Kona! Probably because I’ve been busy building my business up and I’ve been a bit less focussed on training this year. When I planned my season I didn’t want to repeat the same events that I took part in last year, as I knew I was at peak fitness last year, and thought I may get a bit demoralised by comparing past events. So I have done a few events that were similar, and some completely different stuff! I decided back in the winter to enter an Xterra event. I did one years ago, and enjoyed it, so I planned this one, mostly because it was at the end of the school term time, which meant I would be able to have a summer which didn’t involve me training too much! This is the event that I entered.

When I entered the event I didn’t really look at the profile much. I just thought it looked hard, but would get me out of my comfort zone a bit! So this year I have been able to do a bit more mountain biking and off road running to prepare me for the race, which I love!

I suggested the race to my friend Rachel, who has bravely chosen to join me in a trip to Italy, and I’m also looking forward to a mini break without children!

Races I have done, are; The Wildflower duathlon, a couple of time trials and a couple of off road running races. This is me finishing the Beast Bach, a local off road event that I have done before. I was suffering at the end, as I was pushing hard to stay in 1st place! My time was pretty close to my PB on the course, so I was pretty happy with that.

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We’ve been up to Snowdonia on a few family breaks where I ran, and enjoyed taking the boys on some climbing and scrambling adventures! As it gets closer to the race I’ve been looking at doing a couple more races, and one of these off road runs is definitely on the cards, along with the Cardiff Tri, which I entered a while back.

Its harder to find mountain bike events, as I’m trying to keep things low key and stay fairly local for events, so I’ve only done one off road cycle event in Builth Wells. It was a mud fest, very slippery. As Rachel keeps reminding me, its going to be hard! The bike route takes in over 4000ft of climbing over 30km, (a bit like riding up Snowdon) and the run is pretty undulating! Full course details are here

The countdown is on, and I’m looking forward to posting a race report when I get back.

 

Kona travel log

Travelling to the other side of the world to race is hard at the best of times, but travelling with 2 children and a cold is not so much fun, 2 days before we left for Hawaii I started getting cold symptoms, so had to abandon my training plan. Patrick and I spent Wednesday packing, just before picking up Milo from school we had a call saying that our flight had been changed to a BA flight, and that we were leaving from T5 instead of T2/3, which meant trekking across the airport with our bags and bike. It actually wasn’t too much hassle just a bit of an annoying deviation.

 

Once Devon had had his scissors confiscated and my mysterious powders had been checked out, we were through security, and refilling our water bottles. I had a timetable for drinking, moving around and eating throughout the journey, which I stuck to and I think it would have made a big difference had I not had a cold. The boys were fantastic on the flight, courtesy of screens. It was easy to clock the athletes on the flight wandering around eating fruit and vegetables and refilling water! We arrived in the evening in Hawaii and attempted to fit the bike box in the SUV we had hired, it didn’t fit but they upgraded us to a minivan. Patrick managed to negotiate the HUGE vehicle to our apartment in Kona and it was straight to bed.

I woke up in the morning with a really tight throat from the air con, and messaged Mark to let him know. I wasn’t meant to be training anyway for the first couple of days but it was so difficult seeing triathletes everywhere swimming, riding and running when I was still coughing and jet-lagged. I had all these images in my head of me swimming out to the coffee boat, cycling on the queen K and running on Ali-i drive to practise and acclimatise but this wasn’t going to happen, and getting my head around this was not easy! Although we managed to get our shopping done once we’d recovered from the shock of the prices.

 

No spam was consumed on this holiday. But we could have won a free trip to Hawaii if we’d bought some!

Milos’ Milos

So the next few days were spent snorkelling, and avoiding getting sunstroke. Tuesday was a busy day, the first day of registration, the keiki dip n dash, and the parade of nations.

Tired boys.

I was still coughing on Wednesday so it was off for some snorkelling and a bit of culture.

 

On Thursday we planned to ride up to Hawi so I could do a ride from there, as that is where it is usually windy. Mark said it was Ok to ride easy, for up to an hour so I rode down the hill for 20 mins and then back up to Hawi. It was good to finally get out on the bike, and feel what the wind was doing. Afterwards we walked down to a beach, where Patrick and Milo managed to get stung by Portuguese man of war!! Which didn’t really help my stress levels!

The next day I managed a swim and a short run. I bumped into a women who I had chatted with at the parade of nations, and we exchanged numbers and wished each other luck. I racked up in-between swimming and running. So all that was left to do was try and get some sleep before the big day. Race report coming up!

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September (the road to Kona)

Another month, another 100 mile time trial, this one in polar opposite conditions to the one in June. The weather was cold, wet and windy, as opposed to one of the hottest days of the year! Not ideal for Kona preparation, but one hundred miles all the same. My result was good. I held 10 watts more power and knocked around 9 minutes off my PB, for the course. I also felt lot better mentally and was able to break the ride down, and focus on each part a bit better. On the last stretch I managed to pick my pace up a bit and was only 1 second off the winning female for the last section. Final results are here, as you can see the result sheet was full of DNS/DNF!!

After the TT I had a horrible run to do, which I managed OK but spoke to Mark on the Tuesday, he gave me a bit more recovery before the next push.

The weekend after, I got to watch Ironman Wales, as I had THE WHOLE WEEKEND OFF! Unfortunately the weather was appalling, rain, and wind most of the day. I cycled up to Templeton and was soaked through within 10 mins, so I stayed for one lap of the bike before going home to dry out so that we could catch the train from Kilgetty to Tenby to watch some running. It seemed quite quiet compared to previous years, (probably because of the weather) and we managed to get some spectating in before dinner and the train home. I must admit I was happy to be spectating and not participating this year!

I only had a couple more big weekends to go until the big day, the first of which seemed to kick start my period a week early. I have been tracking this like a hawk, as it has physiological effects on your body. What this meant, if my period started early, was that I would be around 1-2 days from my next period on race day, which is the worst time, especially in the heat, as blood plasma volume is lower which means you are at extra risk of dehydration, my core temperature will also be naturally higher, which makes things harder in the heat; however after a couple of days it decided to go away and reappear for Dale Half Marathon, its still not ideal as I will be in the second half of my cycle for Kona, and have the same problems as above, but nothing I can do except prepare for it to be tough, stay hydrated, and on top of my nutrition. If you want to read more about hormones and how they affect your training then there is a link here.

The day before Dale I had a longish ride so lots of fatigue in my legs. It was a tough weekend, but should be worth it! I was happy with my time at Dale, only a few minutes off my PB for a half so everything is still looking good.

The following week I had to go back to some heat prep, which sounds OK (40mins in a hot bath) but really isn’t very pleasant, as its 40 minutes in a 40 degree bath after a training session. The first time I did it, I managed 25 minutes before feeling dizzy and sick and had to get out, the next time was 35, then I finally managed 40mins.

We had a final appointment in Cardiff for Patrick to have his bladder scanned and a consultation with Professor Kyneston. Everything was positive, and he recommended having an MRI to check on prostate cancer in a years time, then probably another 5 years after, so we can go away knowing that everything is OK, for now. We were both happy and relieved to get home, after that! The next stage is getting to Kona, which will be a mission in itself, but I’m feeling positive and excited about being there.

How do you define success?

Success conjures up many images, and is not defined in the same way for everyone. When racing, success, in its most basic terms is measured by your result. But is that really success? Some of the times that I feel the most accomplished is not necessarily when I have done well in a race. If the competition was not there, and it was an easy win, then it is not as satisfying as when I have overcome mental blocks, or pulled myself back from negative thoughts or a dark place.

We all have different circumstances and lives, measuring yourself against other people is at best futile, and at worst damaging to your mental health. So how do you measure your own success? or find ways of celebrating the small things? First you need to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve. It may be, a PB, it may be, just finishing a race in brutal conditions (I’m thinking Ironman Wales this year!), it may be, managing to balance your life, so you have time to do the things that you really want to, or overcoming a fear.

All of these things are valid ways of celebrating what you have achieved, and if things don’t go well in a race there are always things to take away from it, there will have been some success somewhere, you just may need to look for it. Find a way of being proud of yourself, and you will be successful.

If you did race Ironman Wales at the weekend, then here are some stats about the race and the amount of DNF and time differences to other years that you may find interesting. I’m sure when looking at them you will find something to be proud of!

Ironman Wales 2017: Age Group Results and Kona Qualification

August (The road to Kona)

I spent most of the first day of August in Patricks hospital room in Cardiff while he recovered from surgery, with a brief excursion to the pool and Waitrose, which handily is next door to the hospital. (So glad we don’t have one near us, it would be so dangerous. I seem to have spent a lot of time this month in Waitrose one way or another!) Patricks parents came to stay for a few nights after the op, so that we could have some help with the kids. They took them out for the day on the Friday that we came home, which was really helpful as I could get things organised at home and fit in my training.

The week after, we were given another appointment for Patrick, in Cardiff, that day was the only day of training that I missed, which is testament to the support that I am getting. The day after the appointment Patrick seemed pretty low, he was uncomfortable and I really wanted to make him feel better, but there was really nothing I could do. I was feeling guilty about racing at the weekend but Patrick assured me that he wanted me to race, so he had lined up a beach BBQ with a friend, and my mum was on hand to drive, I felt like I was leaving him in safe hands.

Race report is here. I was really happy with my overall race, and its looking promising for my endurance fitness. When I got home I felt a bit rough for a couple of days but had a lot of recovery in my diary so managed to bounce back fairly fast. I packed my bike in the bike bag, that Jan has kindly lent me, to check if it would fit in the car (it did), and caught up on a few jobs that needed doing.

Now that Kona is so close, I’m beginning to think about afterwards, Patrick and I had to drive to Cardiff again for another appointment, so we had a chance to chat about next year and what our plans are. I know we both need a break from me competing at a high level. But I also need something to get excited about!

The remainder of August seemed to fly by. My training started to build again towards the end of the month, and I started dreaming about Kona! There are still some final things I need to sort out before going, and I’m planning on tackling these when the boys go back to school.

I had a great recovery day at the end of August with the family, unfortunately Milo was ill so it didn’t quite go as planned but we managed to catch the worlds most expensive mackerel on a fishing trip in Tenby! The good news is that Patrick seems to be on the mend. He still has an appointment at the end of September to check that things have gone Ok, so we’re hoping that will go well, and another appointment to discuss any cancer treatment at the beginning of September.

July (The road to Kona)

Before, and after a storm, comes calm. I have been preparing myself for the next storm at the end of the month, when Patrick is booked in for his operation. We have been here before though, and have support to get through, so we are feeling pretty positive about this next chapter.

The beginning of July saw us driving up to the Lake district for Patricks dads 70’th birthday. On the way we were passing the spot where I had left my water bottles from the 100mile TT, I asked Patrick if he thought they’d still be there. He thought they would be but I had my doubts, happily I was wrong! I was really excited about reclaiming my bottles. (its the little things)

In the Lakes I just took my running kit, and was up at 7am to run both mornings. Its always great to run somewhere new, and do a bit of route finding, however on the second day I found myself quite high up, with just shorts and a running vest, thinking that I probably should have had some extra layers. Its easy to forget how exposed you can be in the mountains.

When we got back I continued with quite a heavy training block, still putting out some good numbers. Towards the middle of the month, I travelled up to Loughborough to visit my coach, and get a bit of swim input. We went out on the bike on the day I arrived, and Mark recorded and went through my swim stroke, correcting a few faults in the afternoon/evening, and then continued in to the next day. It was good to have some time away and focus on myself for a few days. I saw some definite improvements in my swim stroke after spending a couple of days swimming and revising drills.

When I got back to Pembrokeshire, I needed to start a bit of heat prep to find out how I coped. This involved making the bathroom hot and steamy, then setting up the turbo in there, to do some bike sessions. The first session was on a beautiful sunny day, which made me wonder what the hell I was doing! The 2nd session was horrible, 5 lots of 8 minute efforts at FTP building each set, which needless to say, DID NOT HAPPEN!! The 3rd session felt a little easier, probably because it was, and I ended up faffing around with my garmin for half an hour, as it decided to crash, just as I got on the turbo to do the session, which meant that the bathroom lost a bit of heat! This was all done in-between ferrying children to various birthday parties.

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The last Saturday in July was The Wales Triathlon (race report here), a good test of where I was physically before Patricks operation on the Monday.

May and June (The road to Kona)

I have combined May and June, because such lot has happened, in these last 2 months at home. At times it has been very stressful and sad, but I’m hoping that we are through the worst of it now.

The month started with an easy week leading in to Llanelli Half marathon. I was planning on doing a local 10km race, but the date was changed to the week after, so I checked to find another local-(ish) race and found Llanelli. I checked with Patrick to see if I could go, and with my coach, they both said yes, so early on Sunday morning I found myself driving to Llanelli. I was feeling pretty fresh, so hoping to go under 1:30, which was a goal last year at the Cardiff half. I didn’t manage it, I’ll blame the weather! The field was quite small and as I set off there was only one woman in front of me, so I stayed  within around 10 meters behind. When I got to around 10 miles I thought I would have to make a move now or not at all, so I started to speed up to catch her. I remembered to put some pace in, as I passed, and hold on to the pace, so that I could open up a good gap,  I managed to get a fairly good lead. The last few miles were painful (I kept reminding myself it was only 5k!) but I held on to 1st place and went under 1:30 which I was very happy about.

http://labs.strava.com/flyby/viewer/#974748980?c=gcjjbj8g&z=E&t=1P3jG6&a=NH0ZOoyrMTo

The week after, it was back to it, after a couple of easier days. Patrick had a hospital appointment on the Wednesday so I rode out to meet him at Glangwili. When we finally got in we asked our prepared list of questions, and then the consultant dropped the bombshell, that they had found cancer cells in one of the samples that had been sent off, after Patricks prostate operation in February.

We were pretty shocked and didn’t really ask the questions that we wanted to ask, and were sent away with a leaflet and a phone number. Patrick was put on the list for an MRI scan, and given another appointment with the consultant. Since then we have done a lot of reading, and are hoping for the best (that the cancer is localised and has not spread anywhere else.) Obviously there has been a lot of stress and upset associated with the information that we were given. Until Patrick has had the results of the scan we don’t really know what the future holds. I went in to some training sessions wondering what the hell I was doing, but training has also been a way to forget everything, and focus on something else for a while.

As far as training has been going, I have continued improving and breaking PB’s, but it all feels a bit empty at the moment, until we have some more information I suppose it will be like that, and I’m just going through the motions. It didn’t help that we all got ill at the end of the month, and Patrick came down with a kidney infection. Hopefully next month things should become a bit clearer.

June

June started, with a race. The Deva Middle distance Triathlon. You can read the race report here. It was touch and go as to whether I would race or not, as the week leading in was so stressful. Patrick had a kidney infection on Tuesday and was very ill with a high temperature in bed for 2 days. This was during half term, so the kids were off school and everything was a bit harder. Thankfully my mum lives down the road, and has been very supportive, so I could carry on with my planned training, which was a bit lighter anyway. I spent quite a bit of time crying and feeling pretty low during the week.

The week after Deva, Patrick had an MRI scan, followed by an appointment with the urology consultant in Glangwili. We were told that the cancer was T2, and his PSA scores are low which means that it is a low risk prostate cancer. This was a big relief for us. The week after, we had an appointment with a consultant in Cardiff, to discuss this, and a possible operation on Patricks bladder, which may mean that he can stop having to self catheterise. The consultant confirmed our thoughts about the prostate cancer, which is that the cancer cells were found by chance, and that they are no immediate risk, so Patrick has opted for active surveillance. However he will be having abdominal surgery for his bladder problems at the end of July which means that he can’t drive for 4 weeks during the school holidays! Its good to have some positive things happening though and I hope that the operation improves his quality of life. Its been pretty hard for the past few years.

After a couple of easy weeks I travelled up to Llanwrda for the West Wales Cyclists league 100 mile TT. It was looking to be a hot day, so the night before I made up 5 bottles of Skratch labs hydration and put them in the fridge. In the morning I dropped them off in a lay-by near Llandovery for pick up later. After about 10 miles I was already in pain from saddle pressure, which wasn’t a good sign, and for the rest of the ride I was shifting about trying to find a comfortable spot (there wasn’t one!) I pushed fairly hard up to Brecon, then there was a bit more ascending before some great downhill into Llandovery, where I tried to keep up power, but not too much! From Llandovery I know the course, and this was the bit I was dreading, the road surface is horrible in places, and I kept having to lift myself off my saddle to relieve the pain, my head was in bits really, not giving myself very positive self talk! And I just rode it out as best I could to the finish. I came in in a pretty decent time of 4:48:59 and picked up 2nd female. My £20 cash prize was quickly spent on new water bottles, as I left my spares in the lay-by, oops!

The week after was an easier week, and we had another appointment with another consultant in Swansea, cue, waiting for 2 hours in hospital to be told what we already knew. It was good to go though, as we have more confirmation that we are making the right descision for Patrick.

So next month is the last month before the school holidays, with only 15 weeks until Kona, I’m looking forward to getting a good block of training in.