Race report Duathlon Round 3 – 5kms run / 21kms bike / 2.5kms run

I knew the weather had to better than the last duathlon, the conditions were great no wind and no rain which meant the bike was going to be fast and furious, the race start was slightly different with a mass start instead of a rolling start, this is not great for the smart racers that let the fast ones go or the fast ones for the first 1kms, I’ve always said if you run your first km faster than the last km you fucked up……

I settled into a nice rhythm and started to build up the speed running with some of my competitors was good I could also see a few others running ahead which I knew I would catch them on the bike or at least on the last run, coming into transition I felt relaxed like I had a lot more to give.

Above are the sessions we did on the Saturday pre race, I wouldnt normally do these thresh hold sets the day before a race but because it was only a training duathlon it didnt really matter, it seems to of worked well although I didn’t feel i had the best bike the legs were still slightly fatigued from the week before 24hour training block but it didn’t matter I kept on powering through head down bum up so much so that I took a wrong turn wasnt focusing on the course enough and lost me about 30-40 sec but caught back up to those that pased me and finished the final lap, having a good transition again I wanted to give these last 2.5 kms all I had, the last 12 months ive felt that Ive had really good legs off the bike I always though I need to run more off the bike in training I was wrong… I found that less running off the bike and more aerobic condiditoning has given me a bigger HR stroke volume and better fitness to run off bike better, I brought it home as hard as I could although 2nd place was like 3 meters infront of me and I just couldnt find another level of hurt.

finished 1:05:25

was such a fantastic with the team and an age group 3rd was “ok” for now, but the next test is the first triathlon at westlakes in 2 weeks.