World Champs time

Fly in the morning to Spain to race for team GB at the World Championships at the long course, 4km swim, 120km bike and 30km run. Hope I feel better out there than the last 2 weekends training! Will update upon my return.

Silver at the National Middle Distance Championships

Training seems to be going spot on in accordance with the programme as on Sunday it was the National Middle Distance Championships and for the second time in triathlon I won a National Silver Medal!!! I now have a National standard distance medal and a National Middle distance medal, any guesses what one of next years objectives might be?

The day started at 03:55 with the alarm going off for breakfast due to the race starting at 06:30. I'd racked my bike the day before and registered so all I had to do was turn up and get ready. The place was a bit of a mess due to the amount of rain the whole country seems to have had, transition was a swamp. I started the swim and it was a bit on the violent side to start with until about 250 meters in where I found some space to settle into my own pace, I swam well and exited the water in the top 30 of the first of two waves. I was surprised to be just behind Mike Masters who was only about 5 meters ahead getting out of the water. The run to transition was very muddy and slippy and I nearly fell over but got there in one piece and with a smooth transition I was on the bike for the 92km course. I felt I was going OK but just didn't feel at the top of my game on the bike, hard to explain but just didn't seem to be firing on all cylinders. I still had a good bike split and arrived back in transition in 14th place (not forgetting there was a second wave).

Transition 2 went OK given the amount of mud and I'm not sure who would be better off, those who'd opted for socks or those (me included that weren't bothering with them) due to the mud and water in transition but luckily the run course was changed to reflect the conditions and would be completely on tarmac. It was an out and back section before a lap of the park perimeter road and was 3 laps. On the out and back bit there was a 1 mile climb which I was clocking 6:24 going up and of course you had to come back down which was being knocked out at 5:50. I had a great run and moved up the positions from my wave to 10th but after the second wave were in I finished 12th overall and second in my age group. Once the results were up I found that I'd done the 3rd fastest run overall which at a National Championship race I'm very happy about.

3 days later on Wednesday it was a test of recovery ability to see how quick I could come from a middle distance race into an Olympic distance for the inter services. I felt a little tired but on Tuesday I'd swam and biked to loosen off a bit. The race started and I swam OK, once on the bike that's where things started to happen, I quickly made up lots of places and hit transition in about 13th or 14th. Onto the run and I made up more places passing Pete Norris at around the 6k point and moving through to finish 7th overall. Another satisfying performance, I just need things to go well over the next 2 weeks before the World Long Course Championships in Spain. The last of the big stuff is this weekend with a 2 hour ride Saturday then 3 hour ride Sunday with a 1 hour 30 run off the bike brick.

That's all for now.

RAF Sprint Champion 3 years running

Last Wednesday was the RAF Sprint Championship held at RAF Cranwell. The event was the last in the sprint series and I was keen to win. I had won this event in 2010 and 2011 and wanted to win for a third time, this however meant I was putting pressure on myself and I was nervous before the race. As my wave was about to start I got into the water in my new posh RAF team kit made by ZeroD. I have to say it felt fast in the water and despite a hold up in the first 50 meters by a slower swimmer from the wave in front I still managed to climb out the water on 5:40 just 5 seconds behind Brad Goggin, Joe Dale and Paul Cassels. The new transition location meant quite a long run to the bike and my official swim was 6:33, I had a good transition and was out on the bike chasing the others from my wave. I caught Paul quickly and passed Brad and Joe after about 2km of the bike and opened the gap nicely, on the return leg of the bike I passed Reg Swallow who had started 4 minutes ahead on the earlier wave, and was soon on my way back into transition with the fastest bike split of the day by just over 30 seconds. I set off on the run and could see Mike Taylor from the earlier wave not to far in front, I didn't seem to be closing him down despite trying hard but then in the last 2km I suddenly started catching him quite quickly and passed him with about 200 meters to go. I crossed the line to take the win by 1 minute 31 seconds with the fastest run of the day too which was nice as I didn't feel comfortable on the run from the brick session I'd done the day before. I was the RAF Sprint Champion for 2012 and also won the series scoring 299 from a possible 300 points.

This weekend is the Cowman Middle Distance National Championships which I'm looking forward to and then its only 3 weeks until the World Championships. Lets hope for lots of rain in Spain as I've had lots of practise of riding in the rain thanks to the great British summer!

Busy weekend racing and training

This weekend was a busy one, Saturday was the Dambuster triathlon, a world championship qualifier and an  interesting day really. First thing of note was that I'd decided to ride my new bike that I only picked up Thursday lunch time, that was going to be a gamble but all in I managed to set it up to a good enough position using the turbo trainer and although it needs a couple more tweaks yet it went well (well enough for the 24th fastest bike split of the day) with a 1:06 on a very windy day. That was the next thing of note, the weather! As usual the weather was not great but when is it ever good for this race? A few weeks of heavy rain meant there was water in the lake and lots of it, as a result of the heavy rain the water temp was only 12 degrees so BTA regulations meant we were only allowed a max swim of 1km so the race directors changed it to a 1km swim instead of 1.5km. We also had a beach start instead of a deep water start. The swim went quite well and I exited over the timing mat in 14:21 and then it was bike time, it was very very windy so I opted to run the 50 front instead of the 80 which was a good decision. The bike went well and I felt comfy on the new bike, it descends well and handles the cross winds, its a nice predictable handling bike. At then end of the bike I made a minor mistake by reaching the bike onto the transition rack at the same time as undoing my helmet, I was told off by the race referee but not given a penalty as it was a borderline decision but I was delayed by about 30-40 seconds whilst my error was pointed out. I had done the windy 42km bike course in 1:06:25, now it was time to run and I think that's the first time I've ever felt the wind impacting on my speed whilst running, one direction over the dam was slow and the other was a lot quicker, I ran well and clocked a 33:58 for a total time of 1:57:13 which was 14th overall and 2nd in my age group, given it's a world championship qualifier so in theory a stronger field I'm pretty happy with that as I didn't taper for this event it was just training.

Sunday was back to work (training) so I was out on the bike for 2 hours which I managed to average at 19.2 mph followed by a 9.5 mile run averaging 6:17's, a good effort the day after a race when my natural instinct is telling me I should be on a rest day! All in a good weekends work :-)

The bike, I have bought a Specialized Transition with full ultegra groupset, set it up with my own wheels so the Grammo carbon 50's I got with it are for sale should anyone be interested? Pics will follow later when I get home from work.

Race cancelled

This weekends race (The Valhalla middle distance) was cancelled on Monday last week due to "unresolved issues" so not really sure what the reason was. I was a little annoyed to start with as I'm using various events as my build up to the world champs. As it turns out it was a blessing in disguise, I was at Wembley for the Capital FM Summer ball on Saturday, we got in the stadium at just after 2pm and the concert started at 4pm. There were 15 acts on the bill with 4 surprise acts announced on the day. The event went on until 10:45pm and we got out of the car park at midnight, a quick stop for food and toilet on the A1 but didn't arrive home until 3am and my legs were very tired after being on my feet all day. I don't think I'd of been in much shape for the race so a bonus that it wasn't on. I managed to get an 82 mile ride in later in the day at an average of 19.7 mph on the road bike so not too bad. Saturday is the Dambuster triathlon and funny old thing the forecast is pants, will they ever get a nice day for that race?

5 Days, 3 races

Well its been a busy few days, I've been training hard and part of the training was a ride in the peaks on the MTB Thursday last week, the weather was amazing, the scenery was superb and the trails were unbelievably good. I had a chill out day Friday then Saturday was the Beaver Middle Distance race. My coach had said I would be tired going into the event after the 3 week training block i'd just completed so don't expect a great race. As it turned out I had a good race, swam 1 min quicker than the previous year, biked 2 mins quicker and ran the same pace to finish in 4 hours 5 mins and 1 second. This was good enough for 13th overall and 3rd in my age group. The following day I was up at Swallow near Caister for the bicyclemania 40 mile mountain bike event. During the 40 miles we climbed just over 3700 feet, I hit 38.7mph on one of the descents and finished 3rd, the only reason I didn't win was 2 guys in front of me went the wrong way and cut 2 miles off the course. I had a quick (not quick really) 3 mile run after finishing, swam Monday, ran Tuesday then yesterday was the RAF Odiham sprint triathlon. I felt OK but once the swim started I knew my shoulders were still tired from the weekend so just swam steady thinking I can make time on the bike. It took a couple of miles on the bike to get going but then it all fell into place and the rest of the race was good. I finished in first place and won by 2 min 26 sec with a time of 1:03:28. This is my easy week this week so a gentle 40 min run today, 1 hour swim tomorrow and the only training this weekend is a 1 hour 30 bike so a nice weekend ahead.

Bit of an update

Its been a few weeks since the Grantham race, I've made some changes since then. I've started tweeting more and you can follow the tweets @SharpeDaz on twitter. I've also decided to go down the coaching route to see if  I can make some progress as although I've done very well over the last few years I think there is improvement still to come but I need some help to get there. My coach Stefan has made a lot of changes to the way I train and after nearly three weeks I'm feeling stronger already. This weekend I will be racing middle distance but with my training plan I will be going into the race tired so I'm not expecting to PB however yesterdays 3 hour bike into 1 1/2 hour run was great and I felt strong so things are looking promising. All the training is built around being in top shape for the World Championships at the end of July, but I have other races on the way to that event to check my progress.

Talking of races I did another sprint a couple of weeks ago at Brize Norton, had a good swim climbing out the water on 5:45 which was nice and the fastest 400 this year for me, had a great battle on the bike and then on the run with Greg Macdonald and the fight went all the way to the finish with Greg pulling away toward the end of the run to take the win by just 13 seconds. It  was a great head to head battle and I really enjoyed such close racing.

So its middle distance (Beaver) on Saturday, mountain bike sportive on Sunday and Odiham sprint on Wednesday the 30th, pretty busy  few days.