Vitruvian Middle Distance Tri, Saturday 8th September 2007

Report by Rob Harper

Sitting in the tent eating breakfast by torchlight at 4:30am was certainly a "what the hell am I doing" moment. It's a somewhat eerie start to the Vitruvian tri with hundreds of people wandering around in the dark bleary eyed trying to sort out bikes etc. But soon the sun was rising over Rutland Water and the atmosphere was building ready for the start of the race, which was also this year's middle distance national champs.

The 1900m swim was a two-lap affair with the novelty of a short beach run between laps; although there wasn't any ITU style "it's a knockout" grappling when I came out of the water! The swim was fairly uneventful (as usual), few sighting issues with the first buoy being straight into the rising sun, and the second one bloody miles away.

The bike course is two laps of the Dambuster course and comes in at about 51 miles. The main talking point is the so called "Rutland Ripple", three climbs one after the other. I'd not had the chance to go round the course before the race but I assumed that these would probably not be as bad as some people make out (especially when training on a diet of Brickworks, Windgather, Cat etc). Other than that there are long fast sections on generally good road surface, another hill towards the end of the lap and some tedious drags on the A606 back to race HQ. There was also a stiff Westerly breeze giving a headwind on the A606, this was particularly felt immediately on turning out of the Rutland centre; pushing hard and only going 15/16mph is not a good sign!

Spent most of the bike pushing a steady pace and trying to get gels and fluid down. The hills were quite welcome as a chance to get out of the saddle and have a bit of a stretch. By the end of the first lap I was just about on my target pace but feeling pretty comfy, plenty of fluids left so no need to mess around with the bottle swap and straight out onto lap 2. More of the same really and kept on roughly the same pace. Came into T2 on about 2:28 for the bike, inside my target of 2:30 and set up well for the run.

The run course is 21km, two out and backs across the dam and round to Normanton church; flat apart from a couple of short climbs near the start. Plenty of aid stations along the way so no chance of going hungry or thirsty, and a good crowd at the HQ end of things. First km was a bit slow as I needed a quick, err, comfort break let's say, but after that I got going although it took until the first turn for my calf muscles to loosen up and my left foot to feel properly attached to the rest of my body. I was using the recommended "quarters" pacing plan i.e. easy for the first quarter, up a gear for quarters two and three, then up another gear everything you've got for the final quarter. This worked pretty well and I never really felt uncomfortable on the run. Out and back runs are always good for seeing everyone else racing and I again saw Helen and Dan, plus ex-MTC Jan Rogers. I'm sure I must have gone past Natalie too at some point so apologies for blanking you!

Around the final corner and a bit of a pointless sprint finish to the line (well a race is a race!). Finished in 4:37:40, well inside my 4:45 target so I was chuffed. I really enjoyed the race, it's very well organized and there was a great atmosphere; I'd thoroughly recommend it to anyone looking to do a middle distance race next year. Dan also came in under 5 hours, and Helen and Natalie finished within a couple of minutes of each other, both well under 6 hours. Good performances all.

Results (1.9k/84k/21k)

Pos	Name	Swim	Pos	T1	Bike	Pos	T2	Run	Pos	Total
69	Harper, Rob	00:38:41	385	00:01:33	02:28:31	86	00:01:26	01:27:26	29	04:37:40
173	Ling, Daniel	03:15:05	-	21:20:38	02:37:20	210	00:00:00	00:00:00	-	04:56:04
326	Reed, Nick	00:44:17	585	00:03:20	02:35:40	181	00:02:32	01:48:39	323	05:14:30
540	Sloman, Helen	00:37:08	296	00:02:20	03:05:51	602	00:01:12	01:59:17	482	05:45:50
551	Mckee, Natalie	00:38:19	361	00:03:11	03:03:13	589	00:01:57	02:01:14	508	05:47:55

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