It was another busy weekend for everyone at You Can Sport - athletes and coaches alike. We had people at events across the UK; racing, commentating, interviewing, coaching and spectating. One of our newer athletes, Julia, was competing in her season opener (take two...after her planned opener was snowed off by the Beast from the East a couple of months ago) at the Selkirk Standard triathlon. She finished off her race with the 2nd fastest female run split of the day to take 2nd place in her age group, a great improvement from 5th last year. What better way to start the season than with a podium finish - congratulations. Julia now has the Edinburgh Marathon this weekend, and then a few weeks later the Edinburgh Ironman 70.3 in July. Over in Pitlochry was the annual Etape Caledonia cycling event. The weekend started with Graham hosting a series of interviews with world record holder Mark Beaumont. These offered great insight into the many adventures Mark has had over the years and provided inspiration to the participants taking part in the event the next day. Sunday was the main event. A 45 or 85 mile cycle around the stunning Scottish Highlands. Among the thousands of riders taking part on the Sunday was Amanda - one of our athletes coached by Craig and using this as a training ride for her upcoming races. Throughout the day Graham provided the event commentary - filled with many "woop woop"'s i'm sure - and called out the riders are they crossed the line. Craig had been out hill running with Amanda on the Saturday as part of her build up to Celtman next month where he will also be on support runner duties. On Sunday Craig was coaching at the Scottish Swimming Come and Try Open Water event. A session where swimmers of all abilities can learn open water skills and techniques within a safe environment. Then, down in London Gregg was spectating at the Virgin Sport Hackney Half Marathon. A brilliant event in East London with around 20,000 participants. It is definitely an event to consider in future - particularly those looking for a quick time on a flat course. Next week we host the Scottish Sea Farms Triathlon Festival for the second year. Fingers crossed the current good weather continues!
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Xterra Malta was the opening event of my triathlon season. The build up to the event had been what I felt was ‘good enough’ but there were still improvements to be made. The Scottish ‘Spring’ had made it a little difficult to keep my motivation and consistency at times leading up to the race. Qualifying for the Xterra World Championships was my main goal. This meant an Age Group win would have to be on the cards. With only a small number of athletes in my 20-24 category there was a good chance it would be a tight race for the top spot. The beach start meant that choosing a good start position was important to get the best line to the first turn buoy – front and centre for me. It did take me a couple hundred metres to get into a rhythm but managed to sit with a small group for the first loop and upon the ‘Australian exit’ run along the beach to start lap 2 I could see that I had dragged a group along behind me. The end of the second lap positions hadn’t really changed and I exited onto the Golden Bay sand with a few others for company. The run to transition took us from the beach and up a steep set of steps to the main transition area. In a quest to find some marginal gains I opted to get out of my wetsuit before climbing the steps. Out onto the bike I had dropped a position thanks to trying to put on bike gloves with wet hands (with the very rough terrain they were highly recommended). Once I was out on the bike I focused on keeping the athletes ahead in sight and gradually worked on closing them down. I didn’t feel great to begin with and struggled to put down any considerable power on the climbs. Nearing the end of lap 1 I started to feel better, but then that’s where it went downhill... On the final rough rocky section of the lap I heard the dreaded ‘sshhhhhhh’ of a pierced tyre. I was hoping that the tubeless sealant would do its thing and seal the puncture as I rolled along but the hole proved just too big to repair itself and the tyre went down. And down. And down some more! All this just 2km away from the end of the lap. I stopped to attempt my best patch-work on the hole but alas – no joy! So, after a few naughty words to myself I slowly made my way back to finish the lap - essentially just riding on the rim for 2km on far from smooth trails. Just as I neared the final straight of the lap I passed Gregg, who had been waiting for considerably longer than anticipated, and I said, “this is going to be a long lap”. Yes, I was considering riding 15km on the rim…not advised! Then a very kind spectator offered me a tube to (try) fix the flat. It worked, to an extent. I managed to get *almost* 5km into lap 2 of the bike where on yet another rough rocky descent… ‘sshhhhhhh!’ And that was that. It was a long 5km walk/roll back to the transition area that took around 40minutes. I had company of a young athlete from Netherlands who also suffered the same issue on the same section. We rolled back the most direct route to transition with a fair bit of sliding around on the rocks but eventually we made it back. As I rolled up to enter transition, popping a wheelie upon arrival, the marshals and spectators were cheering me on before realising the state of my rear tyre. I handed in my timing chip and asked if I could still do the run. I could. So, I racked my bike in the most relaxed T2 I’ve done and exited to head out and enjoy the wonderful views on the run course. On the run route I was trying not to interfere with the slightly slower runners who were still officially in the race as we marched single file up the cliff edge towards the highest part of the course. Once you reached the top, it was a nice technical rocky descent to finish the lap looking down onto the bay where the swim took place. I ended the lap in 24mins and aimed to get round the second and final lap in near enough the same time. I managed lap 2 in 25mins and finished with a run split that would have given me a top 3 split for my age group. I am now looking at entering another Xterra event later in the year to hopefully put together a full race and chase that Maui spot. Next up will be the Highland Cross in June and then Ironman Barcelona in October. Who knows what else will be in between those, I’ll wait and see. Thanks to Gregg for Malta race photographer and supporter duties. It’s been a busy start to 2018 for all of us at You Can Sport – both from an athlete and business perspective.
We sponsored our first event – the Stirling Duathlon. This race hosted the Scottish National Duathon Champs, the Scottish Student Triathlon (SST) Duathlon Champs and was also an ITU age group qualifier for 2019. The winning club of our free coaching session was the Grangemouth Triathlon Club. Coming up in the next few weeks we have the return of the Scottish Sea Farms Triathlon Festival at the University of Stirling. This is set to be even bigger and better than last year’s successful event. We are still on the lookout for more volunteers to help throughout the day. So, if you are free on Sunday 27th May, and would like to help out, please contact coaching@youcansport.co.uk with your details. You will be provided with lots of food and drink throughout the day as well as some other goodies, and maybe even a tan (if last year’s weather is anything to go by!). You Can Sport Athletes Ross’ first event of this year was the Falkirk Ultra Race, an 8hr ultramarathon where he was able to cover a huge 68.6km within the time. He then opened his triathlon season at the East Fife sprint triathlon with a 6 minute PB and a brilliant 19min 5km run split. Fionna completed her first ever marathon in Barcelona in a time of 5:48. Gregg ran another half marathon PB at the Surrey Half in a time of 1:36. Graham was back out competing in the Open Adventure Open5 series in the Peaks (Edale)as a Male Pairing with Keith finishing 5th, and then in the Dales (Grassington) as a Mixed Pair with Suzanne coming in 6th. Craig competed at the opening Xterra event of the season in Malta. He was unfortunately forced to withdraw after a double puncture on the rocky bike course. Before that his swim of 21:11 was the 6th fastest age group time of the day. Wanting to make the most of the day, he was able to make his way back to T2 from the bike course and was allowed to go out and enjoy the run around the scenic coastal course. A detailed account of his day will follow. In the next few weeks we’ll have athletes competing at the London, Stirling and Edinburgh marathons, the Tiree Half Marathon, Selkirk Standard Triathlon and plenty other events across the country! Good luck to all our athletes. |
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