Bishopbriggs & North Berwick Triathlons

Last year Ian McKenzie had been talked into doing his first triathlon at North Berwick by David Herbertson, veteran of…well, one. Hit 40 and you try these life changing events!  I chose North Berwick as a good starter triathlon, on the basis that it had the shortest swim of any novice event in Scotland at 250m. They also have a relay triathlon with a lot of families getting involved - children do the swim, some …..well most of them, faster than us!  Last year North Berwick triathlon was on the same day as Bishopbriggs but with the events split by a week in 2011 we decided to be brave…..mad and do both! Bishopbriggs came first and brought double bad news – a later start in the day and a longer swim at 400m.

Race day nerves were very evident when a somewhat nervous David turned up at Ian’s house 25 minutes early on the basis he would have been thrown out the house if he hadn’t left of his own accord. Funnily enough, Ian was already kitted up and ready to go as well….the journey to Bishopbriggs found two “veterans” gibbering nervously like idiots. David has been practicing hard at improving his swimming on a Wednesday night, training with Athelite in Hamilton College, but was still worried about maintaining the front crawl for sixteen lengths. Ian hadn’t been swimming as much and was now wishing he had!

Standing poolside David’s “nervous cough” appeared at regular intervals until his heat was called and he finally got in the water – when keeping your mouth shut is one lesson he has learnt! This was a first real attempt at swimming front crawl through an event (two years ago I couldn’t swim ten yards freestyle). The suggestion from a marshall that I could use the five minute warm up to do some extra lengths was greeted with a polite but incredulous “are you having a laugh?”. Suffice to say that the entire poolside crowd was in amazement as a thrashing Tasmanian Devil created a whirlpool that sucked in anything within five yards except on lengths where the swimmer in front had been caught – yes I did say caught! Even overtaken!!! Elegant, no. Effective, no. Done, yes!

As David departed out on the two laps of the bike course (10:39 mins later) it was Ian’s turn to hurl himself in the water in the next heat. A nice smooth swim from Ian all the way saw him leave the pool in a much faster time of 9:22 to chase David on the bike. By this time David had the bit between his teeth and had overtaken everyone he could see but the penny didn’t drop that he was now at the front of his heat until he got annoyed with a guy on a motorbike who turned out to be a marshall! David finished the 11k cycle in 22:20 and Ian 22:42.

As usual David’s bike to run transition was long enough for a cup of tea which lost a couple of places to the people previously overtaken on the bike. Ian’s transition was 35 seconds compared to David’s 1 minute 20 and that allowed him to catch right up, albeit we didn’t know how close our times were at this stage as we were in different heats. David recorded the second fastest time of the day over the 3km run at 12:23 with Ian completing the course in 14:36 racing down the finish in typical style but narrowly losing out to the lady who took 3^rd place in the ladies race…yes George, he was beaten by a woman too….

When we walked back in to the sports centre the organisers had some results showing on a computer which showed David in 3^rd place which gave us a good laugh at the very thought. One hour later the official results did go up with David in 5^th place overall (3^rd male and 1^stvet) and Ian in 7^th overall (4^th male and 2^nd vet). How delighted and shocked were we!!!  Martin Duthie also recorded a much more impressive 15^th in the main Sprint level triathlon event placed as 5^th vet. After the shock of actually having to go to a prize ceremony we went home still not quite believing the results!

Next we went back to North Berwick where the shorter swim is always good news for David. Having both just made it into the top half of the results last year we would have settled for something similar again this year. As usual the families came along to make a weekend of this weekend and we booked accommodation in Berwick as the 8am briefing in the sports centre would mean an unearthly departure time from EK if we didn’t stay through there. A visit to the pool the day before did nothing to settle the nerves which had returned…

David was first in the pool and managed to record a time of 5 mins 30 seconds which was half a minute ahead of his prediction. After the mad dash outside to change he was away on his cycle run of 11k. Ian hit the pool forty minutes later and just didn’t quite find his groove this time, recording 6 minutes for the swim. Ian did find some form again in the transition area where video evidence later proved he could have a leisurely towelling down and still left for the bike leg  in 5 seconds less than David’s transition time of 1:25.

Both of us had very similar cycle times and the second transitions were again very close although David’s run time of 17:11 for the 4km opened up a gap on Ian for the first time at this race.

After what he regarded as a disappointing start in the swim Ian came home in 23^rd place while David recorded his second good finish, this time with 3^rd place overall (1minute and 20 behind the winner…)

So we have one more event lined up in the triathlon calendar – Stirling Novice Triathlon while you are all at Rouken Glen. Watch this space for the next adventure….

Thanks to David for the comprehensive report.

Alan