OMG I’m 41! Does that signal the end of 40s 4 40?! Am I too old for any more of those shenanigans now?
I’ll post a conclusion to #40s440 separately, but for now want to express my gratitude for everyone’s support and contributions to my ‘Forties for 40’ concept – what a blast being 40 has been #40s440!
Some may recall that I was scheduled to climb Cartenz Pyramid (my 4th of the World’s 7 summits and one of the original Forties 4 40 challenges) on both my 40th and 41st Birthdays but due to the ongoing travel restrictions surrounding the COIVD 19 pandemic, I haven’t been able to travel and / or enter Indonesia.
I WILL climb Cartenz Pyramid but it will be the subject of a future post…
Not to be outdone, I signed up as an age group entry to the Olympic distance ITU World Triathlon Championship race in Abu Dhabi as an alternative challenge. The 2021 instalment was later in the year than usual and as luck would have it, on my actual Birthday!
I’ve done this race twice before, once in 2016 on the cornice (left picture below) and once in 2017 around the Grand Prix circuit (right picture below).
Thankfully the 2021 event is also around the Grand Prix circuit so I was thrilled to race around it again and try to beat my previous time.
Being that it was relatively flat and a smooth surface I changed my wheels, rear cassette and brake pads to suit.
Venus on Kite Beach, Dubai
The Elite races were on the Friday so I made a video summary of both the male and female print races after I finished my practice swim. I even got to meet some of my heroes mashallah 😍
I originally signed up to complete to the Olympic distance triathlon but two days before the race was due to take place this was cancelled due to the weather conditions being too hot.
Everyone who had entered the Olympic distance (1,500m swim; 40km bike; 10km run) was offered the opportunity to complete the Sprint (750m swim; 20km bike; 5km run) instead and I decided to race – after all, I had come this far!
First and foremost, I need to state that i am really happy with my position of 78th overall out of 479 male finishers (top 16%) and 26th out of 182 in my 40-49 age group (top 14%).
Even better, if I add the females to it (a total if 103, 8 of which came before me) this equates to an overall place of 86 out of 582 and therefore in the top 15% overall – a great result for me!
However, three things are of note:
1). It seems like the distances of each discipline were out. My Garmin says that each discipline was further than the stated distances? I will go into detail in the sections below.
2). Joining the original sprint and Olympic races meant there were far too many bikes on the technically challenging 2 lap 10km course. Imagine if everyone is on the course and spread out evenly, that would equate to at least 22 people on bikes per kilometre – keeping yourself to yourself is a challenge in itself!
3). Not the best organisation. Left hand not talking to right hand type stuff on the part of the organisers and my luxury Hotel (the W on Yas Island) who despite trying very hard to impress, unfortunately couldn’t get basic bed and breakfast right!
On the basis that everyone has to do the same course, what counts is the order and time you go past the finish line, not the specific distances so I remain pleased with my result.
Swim:
Recognising that the swim was half what I thought I was going to swim, I didn’t hold back and made a point of maintaining good form. I therefore assumed and felt like I was swimming at less than 1:40 per 100 metres. The results say I was swimming at 1:59 per kilometre? This is because they if you divide the distance the swim should have been (750m) by my time you get a slower pace. My Garmin measured the swim at 877 metres – an extra 127 metres and taking an extra couple of minutes to swim it!
I doubt it was from me veering off path because there wasn’t much scope for getting it wrong!
More likely I would have been swimming at the 1:35 average moving page as per the below:
In any case, the water was like a bath, the temperature was lovely and whilst setting people off in age groups rather than abilities led to slow swimmers getting overtaken too often by faster ones coming up the rear, it remained a civilised affair.
T1:
Fine, no issues just got on with it.
Bike:
Massively technical two-lap 10 kilometre course and brilliant to cycle on the Grand Prix Circuit again. It is so smooth and the corners fantastic but I am always amazed just how undulating it is and to feel the different cambers all over it. It’s a pleasure to cycle fast on but don’t hit the tall curbs whatever you do!
I love the tight twists and turns and swerving around, it’s a real test of bike handling. The only thing that detracted from it was how many people were on the course. Often people, including me, would get in the way and trying not to draft became really difficult.
You can see from my heart rate that I was trying hard and stupidly, I did not register my entry into the second transition at the correct time so the figures are a little skewed because of this.
Nonetheless, my Garmin measured the distance at over a kilometre more than stated – there really wasn’t that much scope for additional distance so I suspect the course has not been measured quite correctly?
T2:
Couldn’t find my spot, no numbers, no markers, no signage or sections – ran past it and had to come back, left my Garmin running so didn’t record the time properly – doh!
Run:
Probably my best 5k run as part of a triathlon. I didn’t look at my watch once. After all the training I’ve done, I know how fast I am running by how I feel and I knew I was running well less than 5 minutes per kilometre, more like 4:30 and I resolved to simply run as fast as I could.
With this in mind, when I see the official results that say I ran 5k in 25:42 at a pace of 5:15 I can hardly believe it. I know how I was pushing. Taking a look at the Garmin post race, tells me I was running at an average of 4:41 and that I actually ran 5.39km so again, the distance seems out.
After a cycle like that, the run was an uneventful and simple but warm 2.5km out and back.
Conclusion:
I’m made up to have been running at an average of 4:41 on my 41st Birthday (lol) #40s441?!
Huge respect to the Elite athletes that presumably only raced in the afternoon so us plebs could watch them?! I aw a few collapse and they were sweating heavily working really hard so this gave me an insight as to what my race might be like – thankfully, I started just after 7am when the sun, heat and humidity were bearable!
Notwithstanding my disappointment, in retrospect I think cancelling the Olympic was a good call. There would have been a lot of medical calls had it continued. However, that many people doing a Sprint with a two-lap bike course was bordering on dangerous at times and this led to some bunching – the event just was not big enough to handle that many people all at once so I’m actually glad a lot Olympic hopefuls didn’t swap to the sprint as this provided some natural alleviation to the problem.
If it were not for the questionable accuracy regarding the distances, I think this would have been a PB for me as I feel stronger in all disciplines and the Garmin agrees!
Alas, my official Sprint PB still stands at 1:17:41 as per the below:
I’m interested to hear anyone else’s experience of this race and if their own tech recorded any similar anomalies regarding the distance.
I will post up and further relevant information and official photos as and when…
I’ve seen some incredible stuff over the past few days at the ITU World Triathlon Championship, none more so than the ‘People of Determination’ as the UAE refers to someone who is less able than others, for whatever reason.
I really like this terminology and will adopt it going forward.
Who are people of determination?
Under the National Policy for Empowering People with Special Needs, people with special needs or disabilities will be referred to as ‘people of determination’ to recognise their achievements in different fields. As explained on the Abu Dhabi portal, the law defines a person with special needs as someone suffering from a temporary or permanent, full or partial deficiency or infirmity in his physical, sensory, mental, communication, educational or psychological abilities to an extent that limits his possibility of performing the ordinary requirements as people without special needs.
The UAE Government runs long-term targeted campaigns to help people of determination and they do not seem to be looking for donations.
One way or another ‘Juggling’ is something we all do, balancing work, family, social and personal commitments can be a real challenge. So much so, it’s easy to ‘drop a ball’ every so often…
Forties for 40 has had me juggling so many different things that at times I didn’t know if i was making progress or not but when i look back at how far I’ve come, it’s been a remarkable journey.
I originally learnt how to juggle as a child but it’s not really something I kept up with unless the opportunity to show off presented itself (and this invariably led to me putting bruised fruit back in the bowl!).
Like ‘spinning plates’, ‘juggling’ became a metaphor for managing many moving parts at the same time.
Having found I could only actually juggle for about 10 seconds before I made a mistake and dropped a ball, I decided to challenge myself to see if I could last a full 40 seconds – what seemed like a really short time proved more difficult than I originally anticipated.
The main issue I had was maintaining my concentration. Stupid, often completely irrelevant thoughts would pop into my mind or I would start thinking about when and how much I was breathing and even this would be enough to put me off!
Juggling really is a test of mind, hand and eye coordination; you have to control and anticipate where each ball will land before reaching your hand out to catch a ball before quickly throwing it again.
I can juggle 2 balls in either my left or right hand and three halls in both hands. I understand juggling 4 balls is really only juggling two balls in both the left and right hands at the same time and juggling 5 balls is very similar to juggling 3 balls but requires each ball to be thrown much higher to make time to fit the others in.
This challenge is based on juggling 3 balls for a minimum of 40 seconds.
I started out with tennis balls but they were too bouncy and often bounced right out of my hands.
I upgraded to a set of 120 gram Speevers Xballs that are a specific weight and more like a bag than a ball so they fall really consistently and do not bounce upon impact – these helped a lot!
I’ve heard so many good things about cold showers but actively avoid them – what have I been missing?
May be you’ve heard the phrase ‘nothing warms you like a cold shower‘?
Well, I challenged myself to take 40 cold showers and recorded my experience not only prove it but to record it and try and understand what all the fuss is about.
You can see the video I made of my experience via the below YouTube link:
After dong a bit of research, I was surprised to find that showers are only classed as cold when the water temperature below 21°C which I think is still quite warm?
With that in mind, I began the challenge in Riyadh with much trepidation only to find that even on the very coldest setting, the water was still not actually that cold so I decided to wait until I was in the UK to ensure the shower was truly cold… and it was, really, really cold!
I understand that exposure to cold water produces endorphins, the cold water sends electrical impulses to your brain that increase alertness, clarity, and energy levels which can improve general well-being and optimism.
Examples of some other benefits people have suggested are as follows:
Wakes you up
Increases circulation
Reduced stress and other symptoms
Improve hair and skin
Reduces post-workout muscle soreness
May stimulate the metabolism and assist weight loss
Improved immunity
Sure a cold shower stimulates the heart rate, makes you more alert and is quicker than a warm shower but I found that the threat of a cold shower made me stay in bed longer, dreading the event and putting it off! I didn’t enjoy it as much as steaming away in a hot shower feeling the hot water running down my skin and so a cold shower had the opposite effect, in fact I’d go as far as to say that it depressed me – what a miserable experience!
I was so keen to get out of each cold shower that I really didn’t spend long enough in there to get clean! Nor did the really cold water activate any products such as shampoo and soap as well as hot water does.
Supposedly exposure to cold water increases your metabolism and levels out hormone levels and even more so if this is done earlier in the day. I guess regular exposure could help weight loss if a person has naturally slow metabolism but I do not believe cold showers alone are not going to offset a poor diet for example.
I totally get swimming in cold water because the body to work slightly harder to maintain its core temperature so immersion is invigorating. I assume this is good exercise for the circulatory system and could lead to the skin looking better or help blood pressure. The problem with a shower is that there is no immersion and I really didn’t feel anything other than uninspired by it, whereas open water swimming for example is thrilling.
I appreciate that ice can reduce inflammation and I think not only does the skin shrink as all things do when cold, by reducing the temperature of an area of the body, this accelerates the delivery of warmer, freshly oxygenated blood to that area, thereby accelerating recovery time. This works better for me on a targeted area with a shower and I am yet to try an ice bath but that’s for another time.
The shock of cold water in the bloodstream stimulates leukocytes. This means that taking cold showers can help your resistance to common illnesses, like colds and the flu.
I reckon the majority of people prefer a warm shower but I like it steamy hot.
Science says that hot showers activate the parasympathetic nervous system which can help us relax and will help some people get to sleep but for me I found it stimulating, refreshing and energy giving.
Examples of some of the benefits of hot showers I’ve heard are as follows:
Respiratory symptoms relief / reduce congestion
Easier to get cleaner
Muscle relaxation
Stress relief
I do love a steam room and a really hot shower is the closest thing I’ve got at my own home. The heat from the water and the steam can help to open airways and clear out your nasal passages. I also found it a lot easer to get clean and to feel cleaner afterwards as the hot shower opened up the pores of my skin, which facilitated me cleaning out the trapped dirt and oil.
Some people find that hot showers irritate their skin and make them itch and I feel sorry for them but it has not ever had this effect on me and I can’t imagine warm showers do much for blood pressure or weight loss.
Conclusion:
There are obvious benefits to both hot and cold showers and after my experience, I think both are important but at different times, for different reasons and for different people.
For example, I would pick a warm shower to bathe, to relax, to warm up and to share with someone. Conversely, I would pick a cold shower to wake up, to have a refreshing and quick ‘splash and dash’ and to cool down after exercise for example.
Perhaps the best balance could be achieved by starting with a warm shower to relax and get clean and then switching to cool to rinse off , close your pores and freshen up…
Like a lot of things, persistent extremes of anything aren’t healthy and by introducing balance and variety into your routine you can get the best of both words, tailored to your own self.
Nothing warms you like a cold shower? Yer right..!
I don’t regret many things in life but each time I cut my beard I instantly wish I hadn’t…
Thankfully, lock down and wearing masks presented an ideal opportunity to let it to grow without fear of looking unkempt or ‘unprofessional’!
I understand that the average growth rate is about half an inch or 12.7mm a month so growing a 40mm beard should take about 4 months.
Now I was under the impression that each strand of hair would have to be at least 40mm long to be able to say I had grown a 40mm beard and it seemed to be taking a log time to achieve that – was I trimming it too much too often?!
I stopped cutting my facial hair during Ramadan 2021 (which ended mid-May) and since then I only trimmed it occasionally in an attempt to maintain some semblance of control. At the time of posting this blog it’s mid-October 2021 and that equates to 5 or 6 months growth but only now do the individual strands seem to be comfortably above 40mm to claim it.
Theoretically, my beard should have reached somewhere between 63mm and 76mm in that time but with all this confusion regarding how to ascertain the correct length, I wasn’t sure how to measure it properly!
I was under the impression that each strand of hair would have to be at least 40mm long
Thankfully my Mother referred me to the good old Guinness Book of Records. According to them, the longest beard measures 2.495 m (8 ft 2.5 in) and belongs to Sarwan Singh of Canada!
This led me to read up on the World Beard and Moustache Championships. Unsurprisingly, there are rules in place and these determine that beard length should be measured from the lower edge of the bottom lip to the end of the beard below the chin, without stretching any hairs.
“Without my beard, I’m not me. I’m pretending to be someone I’m not.” – Sarwan Singh
Applying these rules, meant I had actually grown a 2.5 inch or 65mm beard in 5 or 6 months so on the slower side of the average but definitely well over 40mm (may be I did trim it too much, to often?!).
In retrospect, I wish I had documented the growth day-by-day and had photographed it so I could create a time-lapse but will everything else gong on that kind of commitment is for another time…
I really enjoy having a beard, it keeps my face protected from sun and wind and I swear kept me warmer during the Ironman.
I didn’t ever find any cornflakes in it but it did get a bit matted on occasion and was difficult to keep clean when on the bike part of the Ironman. It’s also strange to feel it flopping about during a swim, especially when I turn in the pool.
Probably my greatest surprise was just how red it grew; I have a new found appreciation for all the ‘Ginger T*sser’ jokes…
The Fortieth of my 40 donations goes to the Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM).
CALM are united against suicide. That means standing against feeling shit, standing up to stereotypes, and standing together to show life is always worth living.
CALM help to make sure everyone gets the support they need, no matter what.
125 lives are lost every week to suicide. And 75% of all UK suicides are male.
CALM aim to change that by provoking conversation, running life-saving services, and bringing people together so they reject living miserably, get help when they need it and don’t die by suicide.
The sum of my continuum of covers, taken in good humour and with a solid dose of artistic license is an ode to the friends I’ve made over the past 40 years – thank you for being part of it.
The songs were all chosen using two requirements:
Does it have meaning to me regarding someone or something, and
Will it fit in a 40 song mash-up?
I learned the guitar part of each song or specific riff that I wanted to stitch together and then concentrated on trying to achieve an acceptable transition between each song so that it could be played as if mixed by a DJ, in a continuum. Some songs had to be in there, others were simply made to fit around them.
I’ve been able to play the guitar since I was young but find that I have to play regularly in order to remember anything worth playing. Out of all the 40s 4 40 challenges, this one was planned to be over the longest time. I started learning and relearning these riffs at the start of 2020 and it’s still not perfect. It has taken a lot of playing to get to this point but I’ve really enjoyed it.
I was initially hoping to demonstrate how, similarly to the ‘Amen Break’ just how many songs revolve around similar chord patterns and whilst this remains true and features a lot in the continuum, I found this approach somewhat limiting in song choices so chose not to use any meaningless ones simply because they fit better.
Some people will appreciate the whole list, others only one or two at best. Think nothing of it if a specific song didn’t make the cut; sorry if I murdered anyone’s favourite tune!
The full list of songs / riffs with credit to the original artist is as follows:
1 Are you with me – Lost Frequencies 2 Shape of my Heart / Lucid Dreams – Sting / Juice Wrld 3 Bond theme tune – Monty Norman 4 Come as you are – Nirvana 5 Dive – Nirvana 6 Day Tripper – The Beatles 7 Cigarettes and Alcohol – Oasis 8 Park life – Blur 9 All Apologies – Nirvana 10 Serve the Servants – Nirvana 11 Married with Children – Oasis 12 Where is my mind? – Pixies 13 Lithium – Nirvana 14 Polly – Nirvana 15 All I have to do is Dream – Everly Brothers 16 About a Girl – Nirvana 17 Zombie – The Cranberries / Dolores O’Riordan 18 Gangster’s Paradise – Coolio 19 Half the World Away – Oasis 20 Crazy little thing called Love – Queen 21 Should I stay or should I go – The Clash 22 For Lovers – Wolfman featuring Pete Doherty 23 Still DRE – Dr DRE 24 Pennyroyal Tea – Nirvana 25 Pumped Up Kicks – Foster the People 26 Smells like Team Spirit – Nirvana 27 Foxy Lady – Jimmi Hendrix 28 Shook Ones – Mobb Deep / Claptone 29 Billie Gene – Michael Jackson 30 Smoke on the Water – Black Sabbath 31 Money for Nothing – Dire Straits 32 Surf – Mac Miller 33 Sunshine of your love – Cream 34 Voodoo Chile – Jimmi Hendrix 35 Purple Haze – Jimmi Hendrix 36 For all the Cows – Foo Fighters 37 Welcome to Paradise – Green Day 38 Doctor Doctor – UFO 39 Coronation Street – Eric Spear 40 You Wish – Nightmares on Wax
I used a first run Fender 50th Anniversary JagStang in Sonic Blue that I modified with a Seymour Duncan Lipstick Tube at the neck and a Fender Special Design Humbucker at the bridge, both were switched to run in phase with each other.
The amp is a Marshall SC20H Studio Classic JCM 800 Lead Series powering a Marshall 1 x 12 SC112 Speaker Cabinet. I didn’t use any effects nor did I apply any distortion to the guitar and amplifier’s natural sound.
Having watched the recording back, I’m pretty sure I made at least one mistake on each one of the riffs but at hey, I got to the end! I went outside to record when it was sunny and before too long it was cold and raining – my fingers were freezing and you can see the rain coming down from around 11 minutes 11 seconds!
I am less familiar with the JagStang having been away from for a number of years so remain optimistic that I will improve.
To that end, I will attempt another run of this on the Gibson Les Paul I’ve been playing for the past few years for comparison purposes as time and location allows.
As Mark Twain said “Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection”.
By the 5th of February 2022, the recording has had 440 views!
I’ll be the first to admit it’s hardly gone viral but had I been paying in front of 440 punters, I think I would have been nervous so this is a great example of how effective YouTube is as a sharing platform.
The Thirty Ninth of my 40 donations goes to Level Up. Level Up is a Feminist organisation based in the UK whose mission is to build a community of people who can work together to interrupt all forms of gender injustice.
Level Up’s vision is a world where people of all genders are loved and liberated from the systems of oppression that lead to bodily and systemic violence.
Level Up want a membership from all walks of life. Our race, class, sexuality, gender identity and ability affect our experiences of sexism, and Level Up run campaigns that take that into account.
Level Up want feminism to be easy to understand: Plenty of people care about gender equality who haven’t read lots of feminist theory or been involved in activism. Level Up is the place for them.
Level Up want to have fun: Living with sexism can be tiring. Level Up want to make campaigning as fun and enjoyable as possible and Level Up try not to take themselves too seriously all the time.
This 70.3 had the potential to be my best race ever but probably not for the reasons you might first suspect.
A 70.3 is the total distance covered in miles in this triathlon event, made up of a 1.2 mile / 1.9km swim, a 56 mile / 90km cycle, followed by a 13.1 mile / 21.3km run. My Personal Best (PB) to complete an event of this distance is 5 hours 7 minutes and I figured that based on improving my run alone (which I was trying to do as part of 40s 4 40) I should be able to knock 20 minutes off, meaning that a 4 hour 40-something PB was ‘within reach’.
They often say it’s the journey that counts not the destination and ‘the journey’ is definitely one thing I appreciate about longer distance events.
This particular journey began many months ago when completed Ironman Dubai and got my first result in the February of 2019. I then picked up an Ironman Kazakhstan flyer at Ironman 70.3 Turkey in November 2019 and stuck it to my fridge. Of course such a fast and flat course would be perfect for achieving a new PB of 4 hours 40-something minutes and I was curious about a country I knew very little about, so I signed up for the next race in 2020!
I trained hard throughout 2019 and my times came down accordingly. Thanks to these three results in 2019 I came in the top 5% of all athletes in my age group and was awarded ‘All World Athlete’ (AWA) status for the following year (2020) as per the below:
Top 5% of my Age Group!
AWA status is awarded to Athletes on a points based system where your three best results in a race year count toward your final score in that same year. You are then ranked worldwide against this score and I came in the top 5% of all athletes in my age group. Those who are within the top 1% get Gold status, those within the top 5% are awarded Silver status and those in the top 10% get Bronze status. Being AWA status gets you certain privileges like priority entry to new races, fast lane check in at events and special swim caps, not to mention the kudos 😉
You can find more information via the following links:
Things were looking good until the Covid-19 pandemic started to really affect all of us. I hadn’t even considered how the events industry would be so badly affected. An early warning sign of how much things would be impacted was when the All World Athlete Welcome Packs were delayed.
Delayed
The race in Kazakhstan was supposed to take place on the 23rd August 2020 but as our communities became more heavily impacted by COVID, halthcare was overloaded and travel practically nonexistent so the race was deferred by a whole 12 months to 15th August 2021.
Cancellation & deferral offer
Confirmation of my deferral to August 2021
In some ways this was fortuitous as whilst training hard in anticipation of the event, I had a bicycle accident that ultimately required hospitalisation and significantly affected my ability to train as I actually had to convalesce for a time.
‘Anatomy of a bruise’ – seroma in my left thigh, heavy bruising along my left side, grazing and wrist pain
Thankfully, Ironman acknowledged all this disruption by kindly extending my AWA status by another year to the end of 2021.
AWA Extension!
I have to recognise and thank the Kazakhstan Ironman Organisation team, as they did almost made it happen for me in 2021!
The team really did a sterling job of trying to accommodate me. I had a visa, I had a hotel, I had a flight and irrespective of the travel restrictions, up until only a few weeks before the event was to take place, all bets remained on and the race was still happening.
Then my flight was cancelled.
I was not able to take part.
Khallas
As luck would have it, and thanks to the extension of my All World Athlete status to the end of 2021, in mid-June 2021 I was offered priority entry to the ‘One Year Only’ Bolton Ironman 70.3 in September; only a few months after Kazakhstan was scheduled for!
I saw this as something of an insurance policy in case Kazakhstan did not go ahead and I’m really really glad now that I took the opportunity to compete!
Mashallah
Further, my place at Kazakhstan has been deferred to 2022 so I don’t feel like I lost out and am looking forward to eventually racing in Kazakhstan then!
My Bolton 70.3 Registration
“After the success of IRONMAN UK in July, Bolton is ready to welcome you once again for a one year only, 70.3 distance race. Feel the incredible atmosphere created by the supporters, volunteers and fellow athletes as you pass the incredible scenery before arriving at the impressive finish line in the heart of the town centre.”
…and so this really answers the question as to why this race could well be my best race ever. Not because I will get a PB, nor is it because I will fulfil my 40s 4 40 aspirations. It is simply because through a series of seemingly unrelated events beyond my control and against the odds, I get the opportunity to race my favourite distance on my home turf, set against the most incredible scenery on one of the most challenging and unique courses possible, with family and friends supporting me and with all the benefits of Silver All World Athlete Status!
For sure this is going to be a memorable race, no matter what the result!
AWA Priority
Mindful I was aiming to complete the distance in 4 hours 40 minutes, I should probably concede that I’ll be content with more like 5 hours and 40 minutes on a course like this but as the saying goes: ‘Anything is Possible….’.
Summary of the course
Everywhere I trained was as warm and clear as a bath
Technically, mentally and physically demanding course
Even the run looks hilly!
I will update this blog with the results from the race, my Garmin data and anything else worthy of note in due course.
I’m bib number 149 for anyone who is interested.
Bib number 149
Bib number 149 – how I intend to look on the course
You can download the Ironman Athlete Tracker and follow my progress during the event from the following link:
I made a video of my unpacking and assembling my Fuji Norcom Straight 2.1 Time Trial bike and talk about some of how I have set it up specifically for this 70.3:
Fuji Norcom Straight 2.1 Time Trial (TT) bike
The original Bolton Ironman event is renown for being challenging and this type of bike could prove difficult on such hilly terrain.
The bike has an ISM seat, Continental Grand Prix 5000 2020 Tour de France Limited Edition tyres, Shimano Ultegra chain set and carbon pedals and numerous other personalised minor modifications.
I chose to use wheels with an aluminium rim and fitted sutable brake pads to provide decent stopping power in all conditions on this challenging course. The wheels have a shallower dish than my others and this is intended to mitigate the effects of crosswinds over the high and exposed parts of the route whilst still proving some aerodynamic benefit.
I also changed the rear cassette to one with a wide range of gears suitable for high speed on the flat and on the descents whilst also enabling me to climb the many hills (11-28).
I took my bike for a ‘shakedown’ test ride on the local roads and they were so rough at speed that my BBB C02 holder fractured off! I’m glad it happened in enough time to order a new one from Barbiri next day delivery from Planet X. I am reliant upon this to carry the C02 canisters that I would use to reinflate my tyres in the event of a puncture.
This experience gave me some idea of what was to come!
Pennington Flash
I’ll be wearing a wetsuit for the swim as it will be around 17 degrees Celsius and I note some previous complaints regarding the water quality at Pennington Flash and whist it has been named as one of Lancashire’s best open water swimming venues there can be problems with blue-green algae (a seasonal growth on the water surface which is toxic to humans).
With this mind, I was initially somewhat perturbed by an email sent two days before the event that said the practice swim was cancelled due to ‘natural aquatic material’ that needing cleaning up:
Email from Ironman
Despite my fears that it was a build up of duck waste or something such, it was in fact a dense mat of Aquatic Weed and a guy was down there the day before dredging it out (you can see his amphibious tractor operating in the middle-right of the below picture).
The day before:
I went for a slow and steady run a day before the event and my Garmin updated my V02 Max statistics to 53 or ‘Superior’ – this was welcome reassurance that I had made progress during my training.
Race prepared (from within 48 hours of the race!
The swim to bike transition was at Pennington Flash but the Bike to Run transition was in the centre of Bolton and we had to leave the necessary stuff in the respectful bags and places the day before. I cannot thank my Mother enough for helping sort this out with me.
I felt torn leaving my bike to sit out all night in the cold but she was rubbing shoulders with royalty and I would check on her in the morning before the start of the race.
I went to bed hoping I had included everything I needed to in the right bags!
Having a low race number was a real privilege in transition
Race Report:
The Swim:
All the swim training I had been doing had been either in well maintained pools or in the Red Sea that are crystal clear and between 24 and 30 degrees Celsius. I realise how much of a first world problem this is but just to set the record straight, ‘the Flash’ is a fundamentally different beast.
I had been taking cold showers as one of the 40s 4 40 challenges (see future blog) and this definitely helped me to anticipation the shock of the temperature difference.
The Flash was 17.4 degrees Celsius on the day and despite the IRONMAN team’s efforts remained absolutely full of pond weed! Visibility was about half a metre and it was really easy to touch weed and get it wrapped around your ankles.
I wore my heavier wetsuit and honestly, the temperature wasn’t that bad. Sure, my hands, feet and head started to get cold toward the end of the swim but in the heat of the moment, there wasn’t time to get too cold.
It wasn’t my best swim ever because I fell off the end of the pontoon and effectively tombstoned my entry, got caught up in loads of pond weed and then kept breathing to the right and therefore pulling to the right. Not being used to swimming in a lake without lines to follow made it challenging to swim straight and this meant I spent a lot of time almost off course wide of the pack and not benefitting from any draft. You can see from the below diagram how much time I spent not swimming straight!
The swim was 1.9 kilometres but Garmin reckons I swam 2 kilometres so irrespective of the above, I’m really happy with my official time of 33 minutes 36 seconds. Had I kept it on track, this could have been my fastest swim in a 70.3 yet so I was feeling strong!
Glad to be back on dry land…
The Bike:
There is only one word to describe the bike course, and that’s ‘Brutal’. You can see from the below green elevation profile how undulating it was, with around 952 metres of climbing on the bike alone.
You may note a significant gap about a third of the way in on both the blue speed and red heart rate graphs, immediately after one of the fastest sections.
At this point, I was travelling downhill at approximately 68 kilometres per hour in the process of overtaking another guy to my left. The road surface was extremely rough before the decent began but seemed to have smoothed out further down the hill until we both hit a narrow section of the road that upon closer inspection latterly, appeared to have been resurfaced a number of times.
Clearly when going downhill on a narrow road at almost 70 kilometres per hour, one of the last things you need is any significant changes in road surface and this particular change was difficult to allow for as it was not marked in any way and initially appeared to be flush.
However, flush it was not and we both took off, taking a real kick in the rear as the rear tyre bounced off the bumpy road surface. The jolt was so severe that it caused the water bottle mounted behind my seat to fly out and start skidding down the road behind me. The other guy lost his hydration system and tool kit – it was like a slow-motion in-flight incident with items flying all over the place. We both slowed down to stop and retrieve our items and I lay my bike down in a bush at the right side of the road before making my way back up the hill on foot to see if I could find my bottle.
I could not believe how many bottles and bits and repair kits and all sorts of bike gear was strewn all over the road, clearly this had happened to a lot more people than just us!
It took me a few minutes of running up and down that section of the hill looking in the bushes to find my bottle – it had skidded a long way and I had not been able to look exactly where it went as I was braking hard and tying to stay on!
I checked the other guys was OK, cleared the road bit and then headed back to my bike. By this time a lot of cyclists had passed us and I’m grateful they asked if I was OK. Crossing that narrow road again back to my bike with others racing past at over 50 kilometres per hour was crazy!
The route itself was beautiful and wild and incredible to ride. Technically challenging and a really stimulating in all senses. People were out on the street all along the route cheering us along and this included Family and Friends and Tri Preston supporters which was truly amazing to see – thank you all!
Yes, the road surface was not good and at times I’d probably call it dangerous but this added to the challenge. It was not as easy as simply putting your head down and working away for a couple of hours, this took some technical skill and bike handing skills just to get round!
You can see some data below including notable statistics like my maximum speed of 69.5 kilometres per hour, my average heart rate of 150 beats per minute, over 2,000 calories burnt and total ascent of over 950 metres.
These stats came from the Garmin Forerunner 245 I was using to navigate
The above stats came from the Garmin Forerunner 910xt that I had on my wrist tracking the multi-sport activity as a single event. I do not trust the accuracy as much as the above 245 data – I do not think I hit 99.1kph for example!
Seeing my friends at this point really spurred me on – it was ace! Credit to Craig de Freitas for this photograph.
The Run:
The run was one of four quarters for me. The course was made up on 2.5 laps so it was easy to know what point on the race you were at. There were supporters all over the course and Bolton Town Centre looked brilliant with events and tunes and banners and people celebrating.
It normally takes me a couple of kilometres to feel OK running after a long cycle. Long cycles and especially running immediately after them is definitely something I did not do enough of in my training and I blame the summer months in Riyadh for giving me an excuse not to spend hours on the bike.
It would be ridiculous to suggest I had not completed any long rides after I cycled for 40 hours back in June 2021 but really that was an exceptional event and not part of any structured (or useful!) training plan. Most of my rides have been an hour or two maximum. As a result, I found the first 5km of the run tough, I struggled to get going, my legs were sore and despite revelling in running around Le Mans Crescent, the route was predominantly uphill (the route through the park was practically vertical followed by a long drag up Chorley New Road and on to the turn point) and I was flagging.
However, once I had turned and started to run back into Bolton, my legs got going and as this part was downhill, I perked up in the second quarter. Once I had run through town and seen where the Finish line was, I knew I was on my second lap with about 10km left to go and I started feeling a lot better and started working harder. I powered myself back up to the turn point and then made a point of running as fast as I could for the final five kilometres and last quarter of the run.
You can see in the blue pace graph below that my pace drops significantly occasionally – this was me walking through the food stations taking a swill of water, a cup of Gatorade and one time, a banana (that I ate half of).
My best pace was 3 minutes 30 seconds per kilometre and this was surely as I was running downhill at some point. Nonetheless, I was running less than 5 minute per kilometres for the final four or five kilometres. I wish I had been able to keep this up for longer but I understand why I did not feel able to earlier in the run and I am confident that my run performance has improved. In fact, this is my fastest half marathon as part of a 70.3 and to achieve that on a challenging course full of undulations is great!
The final few kilometres of the run through Queens Park
The Finish:
So the tile of this post is IRONMAN 70.3 in 4 hours 40 minutes and for all the reasons and excuses listed above, it was extremely unlikely that I would achieve that time on this Bolton course.
Nonetheless, ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE and I was absolutely made up so find that irrespective of my actual finish time, the board did actually appear to read #40s440 as I crossed the line – this magic was made even more apparent by simply adding a post-edit zero!
Mashallah
Unedited version of the above picture
Finisher! #IM703Bolton
Finisher! #IM703Bolton
Me larking around with one of the photographers on the walk back through the park, post-race #IM703Bolton
The Finisher Medal – One Year Only embossed on the rear
Top level multi-sport summary from my Garmin
Official Finisher Certificate from IRONMAN
Clicking the below picture of link will take you to a minute of film that goes some way to show how incredible the support was throughout Ironman 70.3 Bolton.
It’s a compilation of videos and live photos with special thanks to Craig and Lucinda for their contributions:
I came 313th overall out of 1,154 so top 27% and I’m confident that did not have anything more to give on the day. My swim was representative and I didn’t freak out in the cold, I used all 22 gears on the bike and got a respectable top speed, had my best 70.3 run yet and miraculously managed to see 40s440 on the finish line timing board at the end of this unique event – I am thrilled to bits with the whole experience!
Coincidentally, I also came 44th out of 169 in the age 40 to 44 category (again, top 27%) which is interesting – it must be true that things come to you, just not always quite how you anticipate they will #40s440!
Thanks for all the support; feel free to ask any questions.
