I came 76th out of 354 competitors in the Ballbaster Duathlon today. I'm pretty pleased with this as 1) I haven't been training all that much recently, 2) I was shattered before I even started and 3) most of the 354 were hardcore multi-sport athletes – there were Ironman tattoos, carbon fibre wheels and Great Britain team members galore this morning. I'd heard horror stories about nasty weather in previous years (they've had hypothermia cases in the past, apparently) but it turned out to be a beautiful morning.
I had no idea how to pace the event, but the sage advice from a number of Ballbuster veterans was to take at least the first ten minutes of the run easy. With hindsight, I probably took it slightly too easy and came into the first transition very bright and breezy (and wondering if the Ballbuster was really as tough as it was cracked up to be). I felt strong on the bike, and took all three climbs of the big ascent fairly steadily – I was worried that I would be overgeared (39×23, for the cycling nerds) but I rarely needed it in reality.
The second transition (bike to run) was a bit wobbly and it quickly became apparent that I hadn't taken on enough fluid on the bike. Almost immediately, my quads and calves started cramping up, and it seemed like a lifetime before I made it into the only water stop of the eight-mile loop. I downed two cups and ran/sloshed on for a bit, before realising that I was still dehydrated. At the foot of the final (two-mile) hill I spotted manna from heaven – a full bottle of sports drink, complete with bottle cage, lying in the leaves on the side of the road – it must have fallen off someone's bike. I gulped down a few delicious mouthfuls (only much later did it strike me that I'd taken a bit of a gamble – the drink was a suspicious shade of orangey-yellow) and ran on. 
The last slog up the hill was really tough – an out-of-body experience, to borrow the phrase of a GB duathlete I chatted to at the finish.
Anyway, the cold facts: run one – 0:52:15, bike – 1:20:13, run two – 1:02:52 (as you can see, I died a bit here), total time – 3:15:20 (40 miles). In all, it was a great day out – a hardcore course, brilliantly organised with a great atmosphere – it felt more like a collective challenge than a race, and there was lots of back-slapping at the finish.
(Last up, a quick thank you to the gang at Sigma Sport, not only of doing such a brilliant job of servicing my road bike this week, but also for providing some very welcome, and entirely unexpected cheering-on at the steepest bit of the race.)
(Edited to add photos, courtesy of ProSportPhotos.)
— Filed under Training
I'm racing the Ballbuster Duathlon (run/bike/run) tomorrow morning… I'm in a rush to get to bed and grab a few hours of sleep (race registration is at 0700, which means setting the alarm for 0500).
It's a 40-mile course (8-mile run, 24-mile bike and 8-mile run) which takes us up the infamous Box Hill no less than five times. The organisers have sent out a few ominous-sounding email newsletters recently, and I somehow doubt it's going to be the easiest Saturday morning of my life…
Pace judgment is required especially on the downhill running sections which will be hard on the quads and the knees. A word of warning- the Beast of the hill will have its revenge if you don't give it the respect it deserves. It's better to run the 1st run 10 min slower than lose 20 min on the final run. In other words take the 1st run slowly. You have been warned.
Providing I survive unscathed, I'll post a full update, along with a long overdue write-up of the last couple of weeks. Wish me luck!
— Filed under Training
'How to make your mountain photos special' – an interview with Tim Gasperak.
— Filed under Aside
'Ben Saunders – He is not crazy but he lives in the snow. i can't believe he his still alive just by living in the snow. I think he would eat some fish the he catches raw or he cookes it half. And i think he sometimes makes sushi out of the fish that he eats. If i would eat out their like that i would die because there might not be cable or electricity and a phone or a heater to warm you up.'
Excellent.
— Filed under Rumination
A friend sent me a text message today, signed off with 'keep smiling and juggling'. I wonder if they realise how apt it was – it seems like I'm trying to fit in at least twice as much as I actually have time for at the moment, with the resulting suspicion that *everything* is being either rushed (sleeping, eating, training, writing), neglected (email, blogging, social life) or ignored entirely (that nagging feeling that I need to say no to a few things, and focus on the really important stuff).
PopTech was brilliant. 'Brilliant' is a huge cop-out, I know, but I took hardly any notes, and a full-blown write-up would take hours. For me, it all came together on Saturday morning, in a session called 'Big Fixes', when Cameron Sinclair, Neil Gershenfeld and Bunker Roy took to the stage. Cameron's talk was perhaps the most rousing of the entire conference ('I can hire an entire village for the price of one Halliburton employee…') and his impassioned stories of engaging communities with the simple incentive of making the world a better place proved a striking contrast to Peter Diamandis' talk on day one (of engaging individuals through the incentive of a whopping great cash prize).
Sadly, I wasn't speaking this year (sad because you couldn't hope for a warmer audience than the PopTech crowd) but I did get to serve ice cream.
— Filed under Speaking
The Arctic Monkeys (no relation) – I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor.
— Filed under Aside