National Champs Race Report

National Standard distance championships on the 1^st July was the last and main race in my first racing block of this year and my only race of this month.

The evening before the race was a long one, I was very nervous but most of the nerves were for my uni results rather than National Champs. I couldn’t sleep so ended up staying up until midnight and checking my results as soon as I could. It was a nice surprise to find I’d managed to get a 1^st in my first year studying Chemistry at NTU.

I woke up very happy on Saturday morning, a little tired from not getting much sleep but was excited to race. Angus and I got our kit together and left for Ripon.

We arrived nice and early so left our kit in the car as we went to register and have a look around at the lake and expo area.

It wasn’t long before we were getting into our Zone3 Vanquish wetsuits and Angus was lining up to get into the lake as he was in the first wave. It was nice being able to watch Angus set off with my parents who had come to support but I didn’t get to watch for long as I got called for my wave start.

It was a very windy day and it seemed to pick up a lot as I was waiting to get into the lake. The water was quite a nice temperature and was very clean when I got in, however it was very weedy. It was a nice wide start but it was tough to tread water with the amount of weeds in the lake. When I the horn sounded I sprinted to get out of the weeds but they were everywhere, when I put my hand in to pull back It was mainly weeds that got pulled back rather than water.

Up the lake I missed the front group and was swimming as fast as I could through the weeds with another girl on my feet to try and catch them. About 3/4 of the way up the lake I had dropped the girl off my feet but had still not yet reached the front group.

On the way back down the lake I picked a better route with less weeds than up the lake and managed to get on the back of the front group of swimmers. However, two girls had gone off the front and were just pulling further away for the rest of the swim.

For the last 100m(ish) the group split as we had caught a few swimmers from the last wave, this made the narrow exit tough as there were many swimmers trying to get out at the same time.

My Zone3 Vanquish wetsuit pulled to my waist nice and easy in the short run to transition.

Going out on the bike it felt very windy and I hate riding in the wind so I wasn’t looking forward to the next 40km.

The bike course was an out and back and could have been nice and fast in different weather conditions, but my lack of confidence of riding in the wind definitely had a big effect on my bike split.

I am not very good at bike handling at the best of times but in crosswinds I find it hard to stay cycling in a straight line and not get blown in the middle of the road, which is quite scary and when vehicles come past (especially lorries) I brake and slow down to avoid as much of a gust.

I made the most of the tailwind sections and pushed through the bits of headwind but most of the course was crosswind. I gave the bike my best effort on the day and pushed myself out of my comfort zone a few times on the bike.

I was 3^rd 20-24 out of the swim but after a tough bike I had dropped down to 7^th…

The run course was really tough on lots of different surfaces, it was definitely the hardest 10km run I’ve done, it took so much out of your legs. I was happy to just hold on to 7^th place after a tough race.

I had hoped to get onto the podium but after a tough race with such a strong field I am very happy to come away with 7^th 20-24 at my first National Championships at Standard Distance. I’m still only 19 so I am a young one in the age category so there’s still lots to come for me in this age group! Angus raced well and came 2nd 20-24 male, check out his blog - https://angussmithtriathlon.wordpress.com/2017/07/30/national-champs/

For the rest of July Angus and I have had a much needed break from training and racing. Last week we started to break ourselves back into training with a light 6-hour week and for the next 7 weeks we will build up for World Championships which is our next A race of the year.

Thanks for reading!

Emily