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I'd originally entered Cambridge as it was the last qualifier for the world duathlon champs in Edinburgh. As i'd been away for all of the others it was the only option left. By the time the race came around i'd decided i didn't want to race at edninburgh anyway so i now had an awful long drive for a hard training session (7.5k run, 40k bike, 7.5k run....ouch). It was also forecast to be a shocker of a weekend. Luckily i'd talked skip into it so i had some company and being a Northampton lad we stayed at his the night before to break up the drive. We still had an early start on race day and the weather didn't disappoint with heavy rain, plenty of wind and freezing temps. As the gun went to start my wave i was still wearing pretty much every item of clothing i had brought with me including buff, winter gloves, sealskin socks, compression calf guard things, gillet, etc, etc. Suprisingly i came into T1 about 10th in my wave and feeling good if abit hot and wasted some time and places taking off some of the layers. I'd decided not to kill myself on the bike as the conditions were pretty bad and i wanted to save something for the second run rather than dying like i do in most duathlons. To be honest haven taken all my layers off I wished i hadn't as i was frozen by the middle of the bike. When I checked my time at the end of the race I had ridden 6 minutes slower than Skip! So maybe i should have pushed a bit harder to keep warm! My second run went well and I made up some places despite not feeling my feet till 3k in. Results are below:

• 6 Skipper, Paul 00:27:30 00:00:40 01:02:49 00:00:36 00:28:43 02:00:21
• 24 Harvey, Rob 00:27:49 00:01:04 01:08:36 00:00:55 00:28:37 02:07:05

On the positive side I would have qualified if I'd applied for Edinburgh. Good food after the race including lots of tea to warm up. We bumped into ex-MTC member Paul Cassels who now lives down that way and it was great to catch up. He says he's missing the tri club. We also did a 5 mile run race the next day organised by some of Skips friends as part of their town fair. It was great, complete with hog roast, coconut shy and welly throwing (after the race not during it). We even ran ok considering we were knackered with Skip coming in 4th and me in 7th (i think).

Hot Harlech

If Cambridge was cold and abit miserable Harlech was hot, picturesque and felt abit like being on holiday. Tim Johns always goes on the forum and promises good weather to anyone that enters and to be honest he hasn't been wrong in the last few years. I did the race 3 years ago and the weather was great then too and I ended up finishing 3rd. I lost 2nd place on the 25% hill upto the castle where the race finishes so this time i vowed to save a little something to smash it.

I wasn't scheduled to go off till after 11am so the long drive didn't need too early a start. When i arrived i could see plenty of MTC competitors and supporters milling around with Steve Collins relaxing in a deck chair near the transition area (very cool steve!) when I saw him again on the run he didn't look so relaxed and was probably wishing he could have the deck chair back. For some reason your start time was pretty meaningless and you could just wander up and go whenever you got to the front of the queue which in my case was pretty much last. The swim only 400m (shame) and was over pretty fast so out onto the bike and up the big hill out of town. I tried to push hard on the bike as I new Chris Clarke was behind me and would no doubt come flying past at some stage, but my legs had other ideas and I rode like abit of an idiot getting my gearing all wrong and loosing momentum on some of the up/down sections. I still managed to come into T2 in front of Chris but as I was running out I saw him come in so I new I'd lost time. I really like the run at Harlech as it winds its way over the sand dunes down to the beach. You then run along the beach for a few Km's before heading back into town and upto the castle. I kept falling over on the twisty path over the dunes and when we got onto the beach it was softer than last time i did it which sapped some energy (good practice for Xterra Italy see below). Still I ran ok, always trying to keep alittle in the tank for the final push up the hill. As a rounded the corner and started the climb i put the hammer down and went full gas....... this lasted about 10 secs before i was pretty much walking. My mum and dad had come to watch and they were stood pretty much at the steepest point so as I walked past they had time for a chat. I think my dad was walking along side me at the time. Anyway i got some momentum back as the climb flattened out and crossed the line to meet up with all the other MTC crew and have a photo shoot in out lovely yellow Harlech Triathlon day glow jacket things.... Does anyone have the picture? I finished 3rd again. Stupid hill.

1 Clarke, Christopher 00:06:01 (9) 00:44:37 (3) 00:23:43 (3) 01:14:21
2 Brook, Peter 00:06:05 1 (3) 00:46:52 (7) 00:25:09 (4) 01:18:06
3 Harvey, Rob 00:05:51 (7) 00:46:59 (8) 00:25:58 (7) 01:18:48

See tri247 for full results of all MTC members.

Scorchio Sardinia

Jacqui (my girlfriend) is going to race a few Xterra events and the first one she could do was the European Champs in Sardinia. I thought about it for a moment and decided that as her coach I should really be there to make sure she was ok. This had nothing to do with the great weather and amazing location. Stupidly I also said I would race to get a proper understanding of what Xterra involves. So we packed up our bikes (first time taking a MTB abroad for either of us) and headed off to Cagliari. We then had what should have been a 3 hour drive to Orosei where the race was but it took more like 4.5 as I was relying on Sardinian sign posts. Not a good idea. We arrived at about 3am and then realised we had no idea where in the town the hotel was. Planning! Got to be about 4am. We then spent the rest of the week saying how nice the place was, recovering from the travel and practicing on the course. To be honest I nearly had a heart attack the first time we rode round the bike course. It was sandy meaning lots of slipping and sliding, especially around corners and on climbs. I'm ok on a MTB when I'm going round British Trail Centres for the 20th time so I know the route, etc and when I'm going am my own leisurely pace but this was a whole new kettle of fish and then add in that it was a race!. Luckily as the week went on a more people rode the route the lines got easier and I started to relax. The run was more straight forward but with plenty of soft sand running and some rope bridge type things to be negotiated it wasn't going to be easy. Despite looking forward to it before we left Jacqui was now pretty nervous too.

Most of the week had been pretty mild with a nice breeze but race day was a scorcher. Luckily the sea was cool and calm with a beach start. I used all of the surf skills I'd picked up in Australia to get a nice lead on everyone at the start so had a fast swim. Through transition and onto the bike was a different story. People were passing me at one hell of a rate but there was no point trying to push any harder as instead of falling off 3 times I would have fallen 33 times. I would have quite happily stopped 10 minutes into the bike at the top of the first big climb as i was boiling and knackered, but as I got my head straight and started to get into it I actually enjoyed it. I ended up in a few bushes and got wiped out by someone overtaking when he shouldn't but apart from that i rode pretty well (but not fast). At least i didn't fall off one of the temporary bridges and into the rive like some bloke did and it all got caught on video and played at the after party... priceless!

Out onto the run and I made back quite a few places until I had to stop for a wee. A good sign that i wasn't too dehydrated but once I got going again it was just a plod for the finish with not alot to run for really. I was knackered and greeted by a happy looking Jacqui who had finished 6th! As Rob Harper put it in an email to me this week I got properly chicked as she beat me by about 9 minutes  , but when i comes to Xterra I think I'm going to have to get used to that. You can read Jac's report of how her race went at www.jacquislack.com

If you want to see the full scale of how fast the proper MTB'ers are then full results are available from Xterra website! Scary.... I'd recommend this to anyone because of the atmosphere, location and great organisation. Like Ironman but more laid back. It's not easy though and I saw a few people having a very bad day out there so I would recommend plenty of practice before the day (unlike me and Jac).