Liam Ball Sprint Triathlon!

The first triathlon of the year can go either one of two ways. Fantastic as your pre season training was perfect, or shocking as your pre season training clearly just hasn’t been good enough, time would tell as the saying goes! First race as always, on the Mayday bank holiday weekend, was the Liam Ball sprint triathlon in Templemore Sports Complex, where all the eager triathletes from our neck of the woods would finally get the race season underway.
Signed in, transition prepped, and ready to go, my start time was here. Everyone in my swim lane seemed to be on the same wave length, in and around 12 minutes was the thought from each of us and this suited me for sure. Pace was steady and nothing mental, resulting in a 12 minute swim on the dot, the lead man paced it really well, so cheers for that! T1 is long at the Liam Ball which is annoying, but it is what it is, it’s the same for everyone I suppose, what’s more annoying is the fact transition is on an all weather pitch, so when you put your cycling shoes on there’s a high possibility of a stone or two in your shoe, haha!
Onto the bike leg, and for the first 2 miles it is flat and fast, I was feeling fresh and sitting comfortably around 24 mph. Then the first drag of a hill, it’s not that tough but it just requires that extra push and it’s a little taxing of energy really just to hold something around 16-18mph. I’m a decent climber on the bike though, and here I got past a few NWTC guys who are our local rivals, this is always a pleasure 😉
My average was still really good at the turning point, I knew things felt good and I kept it going all the way back, again, a fast flat 2 mile at the end gave me a rewarding average of 20.8mph. My time was around 36 minutes which is a full minute quicker than my PB on the bike. Very happy!
T2 was just ok, I felt this was a tad slow in comparison to my usual quick T2’s. Still, I was out in under a minute, the last challenge was the 5K run, I was a bit worried about this as my legs are still in recovery mode from the marathon just two weeks ago. Running is normally my strongest of the three disciplines, so I’m sure you can imagine I’m slightly frustrated at the minute. I tried to keep things steady and it seemed to work out well enough considering. I ran a 21min 23sec time, which, is ok, but nothing spectacular, for sure this is now the area I need to focus on again.
All in all, when the finish line was crossed, I managed a new PB of 1hour 12minutes 12seconds! I finished 4th in my age category and 44th overall. I was delighted with this for sure, even with the recovering marathon legs it all went really well, this has gave me a great start to the season and hopefully I can kick on from here for more great results as the races come thick and fast.
Aaron