Monday: Easy run, around 50 mins, RPE=1-2. Beautiful sunny morning looked like first hot day of the year.
Tuesday: Long swim in the morning, 0700 in the pool. 3km, steady swims 3 x 1km with about 20 seconds rest in between. Felt strong and consistent for the full 3km.
Wednesday: Easy swim. Evening bike ride around Expo area. Four or Five strong riders, speeds up to 40kmh. Good hit out. RPE=5-7.
Thursday: Run in park around lunchtime. Lovely day very sunny. RPE=5/6. 11km. 1hr+
Friday: Travel day to Fuzhou. No training.
Saturday: Cycled down to watch the pro race, and over to register. No other training. Ate early and slept early. Drank plenty of water and got race gear ready.
Sunday: Race day – cool conditions, drizzled from time to time. 2 laps swim, 6 laps bike, 4 laps on the run. All flat. Result: 2 hours 22 mins 50 secs – a personal best in each of the three disciplines! Swam well through the two laps, we went off 2 minutes after a previous group so had to swim through the slower swimmers but not too difficult as there weren’t that many people. I didn’t race with a watch and a HR monitor so had no idea what time I did but felt good. Got into a rhythm and didn’t go off course too much with regular sighting.
Bike
Transition was a 50 metre run and took a bit longer to put on socks for the ride and run. Didn’t put on the top as it wasn’t sunny – although later I would find that my shoulders got a little sunburned. Got out on the course and kept a good pace on first lap. Realised I couldn’t stomach much as every time I drank some sports drink my stomach cramped a little. Stuck with the water. Field was fairly spread out although later in the race the usual drafters would come out. About what you expect, I kicked a few people off my wheel. Started raining on the first lap which made the 180 turn interesting. Apparently a few people crashed. Took a gel on the third lap as that was all I could take down. Was going well until on the fourth lap after I shook someone off my wheel, I lost my concentration and lost count of the laps! Without a watch I was not sure whether I was on the fourth of fifth lap. Took a while before I asked a friend from the Dalian club for the time that I could work out that I was on the fifth. Finished fairly strong and came into the transition ready for the run. I went through full bottle of water and most of the 750ml sports drink.
Run
It was cool with slight rain on the run. Perfect. It makes such a big difference the temperature being low twenties compared to the usual mid thirties. Learning from the time trial the week before, I wanted to go out strong on the first lap and then get into the rhythm. The course was a four lap out and back to GuShan bridge so an interesting feature was that you ran past your competitors several times each lap. I saw Eric on the first lap and he looked totally fresh and I thought for sure he would catch me. Noticed the leading Chinese racer Dan Qing who was about a lap and half ahead, so I realised then that I had probably done the right number of laps on the bike. Felt good over the first half and as more racers came on the run course I could see all the Shanghai Triathlon Club members on the course and the fast runners like Bruce went past me albeit a lap back. I got into steady pace and kept pushing on the third. Started to flag a bit on the start of the final lap although my club members weren’t making significant ground. Pushed a lot harder from about 1km out and finished strong. There was no clock at the finish so I didn’t know my time. Found out it was a personal best 2 hour 22 mins 50 seconds with a breakdown of 27 minute swim, 67 mins on the bike and a 45 minute run. Fifth in my age group.
Total sessions:4 plus the race
