Weekend Round Up 4th 5th September
Friday evening saw Tuff Fitty’s 30th anniversary birthday party event which was well attended. (separate report). This was in addition to lots of Tuff race action over the weekend as the post Covid race calendar remains busy. Read on:-
ENGLISH SPRINT CHAMPIONSHIPS
We start with The English Sprint Triathlon Championships held up at Kempston in Bedfordshire. Niki Treacy and Maisie Johnston travelled up to Box End Lakes with Niki reporting in as follows:-
“We were both very excited on the drive up to be taking part in the English championships, with hopes of both getting on the podium, maybe? However, race day didn’t start well. Maisie woke feeling very unwell – dizzy and sick. We considered aborting the whole thing and just driving home but Maisie wanted at least one of us to race.
So we rocked up and I got stuck in and tried my hardest “not to be shit”. Maisie, being the kind supportive soul she is, dragged herself round the race venue to give me a shout. Much to my relief she started to feel a bit better as the day wore on.
It was a nice course; lake swim, rolling bike course, and a lumpy’ish cross country twisty/turny run route. I almost enjoyed the run – obviously not trying hard enough! Anyhow, totes-amazeballs 😃 I won my age group and managed 11th female overall. Very chuffed. Christened my new Tuffs pink Trisuit in style.
2 dampeners on the day though. 1 Maisie not being able to race and 2. Missing the Tuffs anniversary barbi.
Niki
SOUTHWATER RELAYS
The annual Sprint Relay Championships at Southwater and once again there was a great Tuff contingent on display. For those living on the coast with the drive ‘over the mountains’ (South Downs) there was a lot of mist around and thoughts turned to Cotswold and the cancelled swim. However the morning proved to be bright and sunny although for the later relay participants the heat built quite rapidly.
The first Tuff team home were the McFitty’s in 9th place with Ollie Mcdonald passing to Drew Gowland and Callum Lelliott. Then next home were No Idea Yet with Dan Fitzgerald and James Togneri being joined by Luke Smith. Tuff Tiity followed with Alex Webb leading, passing the baton to Pete Littleboy & Simon Thistlethwaite. The Bish Babs Brock Brothers of James Brock, Lee Bishop and Jon Babbage were closely followed by The Zoom Psychers of Dom Amey, Graham Liddell & Catharine Western. Pedal Power included Jo Baldwin & Verity-Jane Lacey. Doing Our Best team comprised Steve Woodbridge, Claire Moyle & Mike Barrett. The Mexican Sandwich saw Debra & Matthieu Cauchy-Duval race. Les Pearce was in a team with his open water swim buddies – apologies Les, you were the only one the editor missed in the photo gallery below. Your Pace or Mine saw Paul Martin, Karly Martin & Leah Simms race together where this was Karly’s first open water tri. Ye Olde Tuffs of Alistair Evans, Chris Evans and Jenny Oliver. It was particularly gratifying to see Alistair Evans lead out as he completed his first ever Triathlon; well done Al. Whilst run by Horsham Amphibians, this year the event co-ordination and timing was run by Raw Energy Pursuits so Debbie Boxall, Trevor Harvey, Jon Roper, Tiff Orton, Andy Ward & Clive Harvey were on hand with palm readers controlling the results and Ross Court was present to dish out the banter
Here’s how the Bish Babb Brock team got on, with James Brock taking up the very amusing tale:-
“I feel absolutely compelled to write a race report given how incredibly funny this morning was.
The team as you all know was Bish, Babb Brock. (Lee Bishop, Jon Babbage & Jimbo)
Jon arrived at my house and said we need to go back to Littlehampton to pick up his cycling shoes. As luck would have it, we are the same size. “ Fear not tall team mate! For I have a spare! “ I cried…
We smiled gleefully and set off to get Lee & onto the start.
The banter in Jon’s van was on form straight away!
I wanted to go first as I thrive in mass starts, the open water is my spiritual home and where I truly become one with nature!
Off I start…. Cold, breathing tightens, kick kick splash splash, breathing tightens further, colder, whack, whack dunk! Now gasping for breath, vision gone I was officially blind (turned out my Google’s had steamed up) whack whack dunk! That’s it!! I’m getting out, I rolled on my back and before I could say “Bish Babb Brock” the kayakers had thrown me a lifeline as if rescuing me from the sinking titanic! I jogged back to the bike and completed the rest of the race…
Next was Lee Bishop aka “Bum Cheeks”
Now my mate bum cheeks was quick all morning and didn’t miss a beat (that’s we he told us anyway) turns out he did make a wrong turn and ran back down the swimming pontoon but we are not allowed to mention that!
Finally, my boy Jonny Bee 🐝 Babbage! He absolutely owned his swim, made a lovely transition just as I ran around the corner to cheer him on a cold chill descended down my spine. “We run different pedal set ups”
Watching Jon mount his bike and try to clip in with the wrong cleats was like watching bambi learning to walk! As always, Bee is not one to quit or let anything get in his way. Alas, Jon pushed on and put in a great bike leg & finished his run strong.
The banter on the way home was brutal but already we are looking forward to next year! Perhaps with a new race order, kit checklist & a closer look at the course!
Don’t be shit….. ops #BetterLuckNextTime
Jimbo
Click on the Photo below to open the full Flickr album
LITTLEHAMPTON10k
At the Littlehampton 10k there were over 680 runners and included in that were some very well placed Tuffs. The course started on the Green at Littlehampton before a loop of the town, along the seafront prom with a lap around Mewsbrook Park. From there it was further along the seafront and a loop into Rustington and back along the prom. First Tuff home and 14th overall was Mark Walford in just 38:36, phew, a fantastic run and a new PB for him. Kev Pearson was next in 44:14. Emma Hinton, (who also obtained a new PB), Shelley Babbage and it was great to see Kate Evans starting her run comeback after injury. Shelley reports:-
Chestnut Tree Littlehampton 10K. Great race and nice medal. Shame it clashed with Southwater Relays. I was just over the halfway point when I saw Mark on his way back to the finish line. 😱 Nice to see Kev & Emma also. The best part of the morning was watching my Sam finish his first official 10k – very proud Mum.
Shelley
SUSSEX ORIGINAL STANDARD TRIATHLON
Next up we have Adrian Oliver who travelled across to East Sussex to Ashburnham House, containing 220 acres of grounds ideal for a swim in the lake and run around the grounds:-
“2021 started with the thought – “Judging from 2020, 2021 is going to be quiet year in terms of triathlon events”. Someone mentioned Sussex Triathlon at Ashburnham back in January – let’s enrol! After all, we’ve been to conferences at Ashburnham in the past – lovely place – why not do a triathlon! How hard can it be?! How wrong I was! Oh – and now it clashes with Southwater Relays rescheduled from 2020…going to be a lonely race….
Having missed out on my first lake swim event at the Cotswold (so only 1/3 Ironman…), and having only ever swum open water in the sea (with interesting cross currents), I was excited to experience my first lake swim.
Having 2/3 done the Cotswold Half Ironman, 40km cycle compared to the 91km, and 10km compared to a half marathon should be a walk in the park…or so I thought…
First challenge – where is Ashburnham again? Oh – over there! “Just” North of Bexhill, the location of 4th of the Sussex Cross Country Races. At least there was no traffic driving at 5am… Arrived with over 1 hour before race start to a beautiful morning – critically, NO FOG over the lake! Registration complete, racking done, transition setup – lots of recently cut grass cuttings (now transferred around our car and home…). Hum – only 4 plastic loos…how big is this event? Only 52 participants in the standard and 55 in the sprint! Better join that queue NOW!
The lily surrounded lake was a warm 19’C – wetsuit optional. Not being Susan, wetsuit it was (along with most others). Interestingly only 1 other competitor had their goggle straps under their swim hat…amateur!
Another first was a water start (done those in the Arun and Adur, but you always end up having to work to keep still). Klaxon goes and we are off for 2 laps of the lake perimeter. This was my 4th swim in 4 days – still recovering from Tiff’s killer Thursday session (tapering is for sissies) – race plan – steady as she goes. Managed to sight and locate the turning buoys in each corner, including swimming almost straight towards each one, and avoiding navigating into a clump of man-eating lilies. Lap 1 done…lap 2 now complete…time to exit – what were the lily avoiding instructions? Turn hard right, swim 10 strokes, veer left, 10 more strokes, veer right, then you are home…
Leisurely T1 completed, then a 300m uphill run to cycle mount…fortunately a relatively flat start, although I had already set my gears correctly. Cross the bridge…and…HILL!! No, not THAT hill! The one I drove down earlier…that was a LONG downhill drive… Average 5.5% over 700m, peaking 16% gradient (“Orangery Power Climb” Strava segment…) 19km per lap – they said only the first 8km were “uphill”, then the rest was “downhill”. Hum – they lied! I measured it as the first 12km uphill. Finally down! I mean, DOWN! Fast windy country roads down! Oh – nobody said anything about a hill in the “down” section! 9% over 400m. Finally lap 1 over – lets do it ALL again! Finally, back down that 16% hill back to T2.
T2 was a far more efficient (less slow) affair. Off on the run – trail shoes! Round the lake, back…and…No! Not THAT hill again! I’m walking THAT! Finally, down – and lap 1 complete…which means… THAT hill…again! Finally back into the finish – smile for the cameras – oh…no cameras… Nice medal though.
Eventually extracted my results:
- 1.4km swim: 24:18, 7th out of the water (delighted with that!)
- 39km cycle: 1:30:40, 23rd cycle time
- 8.9km run: 48:48, 26th run time
- Overall: 2:48:05 – 20th overall out of 52
Overall, I enjoyed this Sussex Original Triathlon.
What I liked:
- Lovely setting
- Nice lake swim
- Very challenging cycle
- Challenging run
- Small event
- Nice solid medal
What I didn’t like:
- The long drive there, and even longer back due to daytime Sunday traffic
- No event photographers
- No event T-Shirt (you could buy them, but not as nice as REP ones)
- Some of the cycling roads were uneven
- Missing “atmosphere” due to small event and no noisy Tuffs
Observations:
- Perhaps I should have tapered before, or at least not done that Tiff swim session…
- Get more than 2 hours sleep the night before (overactive mind…)
- Work on my transitions more
- Get faster on the bike, especially uphill
- Get faster on the run (perhaps related to my “training mass” around my middle…)
Would I recommend this event to anyone else? Yes – it is lovely, but it is very challenging. It does have a lot of similarities with the Arundel Lido Triathlon (not the swim obviously – but similar bike and run distances and ascent). And Arundel is only 15 minutes away, compared to 3 hours total travel time… And Arundel Lido being run by REP, have event photography and great T-shirts!
Adrian
SOUTH COAST CHALLENGE
We have a report of great determination from Sheila Bailey who changes the title of the race from South Coast Challenge to — ‘100km the nutters way’. This race is one of the challenges she has set to raise money for the charity Mind this year. Please feel able to help donate towards her goal as she has further challenges set this year:-
“Imagine the scene; it’s the evening of the Friday 3rd of September. Now under normal circumstances Fridays are an easy workday and you have plenty of spare time to get things done, but oh no, not today, because you have a long list of things to do. Your workday over runs and is busy as anything. As you can imagine this is not how I had thought the day before my 10okm would go, but I got everything done by the skin of my teeth. As everyone knows you NEVER sleep the night before an event (if anyone knows how to, please share with the group). So I get off to bed reasonably early and am still lying awake until around 1am. Next thing I know the alarm is going off at 5am and oh crikey it’s the day! The South Coast Challenge 100km (they lied but more on that later) Bramley Camping in Polegate to Arundel Football Club, the cut off time is 36 hours my personal challenge is less than 24hours”.
“The start was well organised, everyone gets in, grabs their event pack and then heads to the portaloo, where I was expecting a long queue. To my delight there wasn’t a queue, just lots of extremely clean toilets ready and waiting, Now I would like to say it was due to great event organisation but it could have been because we were in the first wave to set off. We did the obligatory warm up of star jumps, lunges etc all to very bad disco music, then off we went. Now the organisers had changed the start of the route fairly late and I, like quite a few people, had not really paid attention to it, but we certainly did at the 1.5km mark when we headed up a very very long steep hill. There were quite a few shocked people and some that struggled a lot with that hill which did not bode well the remainder of the challenge”.
“My original plan had been to run/walk the course, however the person I had signed up to do the event with, was struggling with the hills and the terrain from very early on. We chatted about this as I was having to wait a lot for her to catch up and we agreed that it would be better for me to head off on my own and to see her at rest stops etc. So off I headed, we had already spoken to a few other people on the route so when I bumped into one of them, Stella, further along we just fell into chatting. Whilst we walked and threw in a 5 min run every half an hour or so. This worked really well for us then at the 25km check point we met up with another lady, Dawn who was walking alone and she tagged along. Again she was happy to walk/run and we all had a similar pace. We quite happily chatted away over the next 27km. My friend Julia was driving the route and meeting me at checkpoints and carrying my overnight gear etc. She met us by Brighton Racecourse with homemade Lemon Drizzle cake and Costa coffee. We then carried on towards the halfway point. We danced most of the way along Brighton Seafront, we were very jealous of the people in the bars and the smell of the chips on the pier was an absolute killer”.
“At the halfway point (57.3km) Stella left us as she was completing the 100km over 2 days. Dawn and I grab some food, changed into warmer clothes ready for the night walk. I had a small blister that I got checked out by a medic who put on a blister plaster and some tape over the top to stop it rubbing and we joined a group leaving to head off into the dark. We stuck with this group until we reached the next checkpoint at 71km. We thought we would need to stay in with a group but nope, they just let you wander off when you liked, so we decided to take a slightly longer break here (25mins rather than the 15 some of the others took) and had extra food etc. We headed off into the dark a little worried as neither of us really knew where we were or where we were going! But we did know that the route was well marked with glow in the dark arrows and lots and lots of glow sticks. As we were wandering along the top of the downs the fog rolled in and it was thick and damp. At one point we could not see 6 foot in front of us so we just took it easy, walked next to each other and kept an eye for those green glow sticks and our mantra was we just have to get to the next check point it is only xxx Km away”.
“We made it to 82km which is Windlesham School, in my head I knew that I had a really rough idea where this was, so I started to feel a little better about things and felt like I was nearly home. We had the best pizza ever (I am sure it was only a Lidl special but it was total heaven at 3am). At this point I knew that I had another blister on the sole of my foot and I suspected that it was the tape the medic had put on that had caused it, but I did not want to take my shoes or socks off as I was not sure I would ever put them back on. We saw about ten people stop at this point but we said what is the point of stopping now; we are so close to finishing and we set off to the next checkpoint at 94km with our mantra being its only 11km, 2 and a smidge park runs, I mean who can’t do a park run or two at 3am!”
“As we were walking along and chatting and discussing swimming techniques and I was demonstrating the technique Coach Kev P had shown me on land once, I suddenly realised where we were, we were at Jon’s (Jon Roper) Barn! I had seen it in so many Strava pictures and Tiff had taken me up there a few times when we were out walking. It was the best feeling to really know where I was and that I really wasn’t that far from home”.
“We got to the 94km checkpoint and my feet were killing me, but I knew it was only 6km, one park run, we were so close to Arundel, if you had known in which direction to look you could probably see it, we had a piece of celebration cake, a cup of coffee and headed out. As we headed out my watched died; pants, I had forgot to charge it at 82 and 94km, thankfully my phone still had loads of charge so I set Strava to log the last bit. As we came out of Houghton I again realised where I was and that the route, they were taking us back on I had used as a training route without realising. I also knew it would be really tough in the dark. We plodded on by this point there was not much running but we just checked off the markers knowing each one got us closer to the finish and a full English breakfast”.
“As we came down by the Black Rabbit, and I saw the 99km sign, I was thinking to myself there is no way Arundel Football Club is only 1km away! But maybe it is and it just seems further because I am tired and its dark etc. We then passed the 100km marker, you can imagine how annoying that is, I really wanted to stamp my feet but I couldn’t they hurt too much but we couldn’t stop we had to get to the finish. 102.4km and we arrived at the finish line, there were no crowds just mine and Dawns family and a couple of marshals which was great, probably the first event finish line that I haven’t cried at. The breakfast was a bit of a let down but by that time I wasn’t fussed, all I cared about was that I had finished in 22 hours, 32 mins and 32 seconds, so way within the 36 hour cut off and under my hope of 24 hours, there wasn’t as much running as I had originally planned but I am ok with that because I finished in a respectable time and made some great friends on the way and that is all that matters”.
“Would I do it again? Nope not in a million years or for a million pounds, would I recommend the event organisers yep, it was very well organised, a well-marked out route, the food and drinks were in good supply. Would I ever suggest anyone should give it a go; well, they can make decision after they have seen the pictures of my blistered feet!”
Sheila
BHF LONDON TO BRIGHTON OFF-ROAD BIKE RIDE
Our final report for this week comes from Phil Lintott-Clarke from his British Heart Foundation ride:-
“What a fantastic event and day out yesterday raising money for the British Heart Foundation. Team “Over 50 thinning hair triathletes”, myself, Andy Vincent and Phil Baker smashed out 97 KM for a worthy cause, thanks to anyone who donated!
Early start for Bex to drive us all up to the start in the Thames, yes, on Saturday Andy, great mix of demanding climbs, fun and technical single track descents, fast trails and a real punisher up Truleigh hill towards the end on tired legs.
Andy, otherwise known as the “bunny hop king” did us proud on his Gravel bike, Phil B grinding it out at the front on his hard tail while I selected comfort mode on my new full sus baby and had a nap in the saddle. This proved to be a false sense of security as, on hearing Andy’s hoots and roars behind me, I looked to see Phil turned turtle in the nettles trying to ride through the pain.
Brilliantly organised event, marvellous marshals, great fun riding, and only 5 hrs and 24 to get your bling and a nice can of water.
I’m sure my awesome riding partners would join me in recommending this event.- they do”
Phil
PARKRUN
At Littlehampton parkrun, there was another great result from Emily Moore, crossing the line as fourth person overall and 1st female in a time of 19:31. Next home was Bob Thomas on his fifth consecutive parkrun. Alistair Evans was with the organising crew acting as sweeper prior to his Southwater race on Sunday.
Hove Prom parkrun saw Dave March shave further time off his recent set of runs with a great 20:26 finishing time.
Elaine Rousseau was our sole representative at Worthing parkrun notching up her 98th parkrun.
