A big stepping stone towards the ironman last Sunday which I passed, but only just. Picture the scene, 5.30 in the morning with the sun just rising over the tidal river at Bucklers Hard, near Beaulieu in the New Forest. Absolutely stunning and difficult to argue with those that say it’s the most picturesque triathlon setting in the UK. Beautiful, but very chilly and with the water temperature at only 11.3C triathlon rules dictated the swim had to be cut from 1900 to just 750 metres with wetsuits compulsory (anyone who seriously contemplated not wearing one should be carted off).   This caused problems for the organisers who couldn’t have too many swimmers in the water on such a short course and had to set us off in separate waves which meant standing around for a while and my feet got so cold that the water seemed warm when my turn to start finally came! But it wasn’t warm, it was freezing and having been in the water for around 12 minutes, I can see why the rules about wetsuits and distances are in place. Then went off on the 50 mile bike leg, but whilst Sunday was a really nice day, it took the sun a while to come up and my feet were still frozen when I started the run around 2 hours 45 minutes later, although other than the uncomfortable feet I was really pleased with the ride.     The run started badly and didn’t really improve, I had had a cold during the week and started coughing as I set out and as part of the breathing in process managed to suck in what I assume was a large fly only to promptly swallow it! It got tougher as I went round, the sun came up and some sections had little shade and I just lacked energy running much slower than I had hoped (probably a combination of the cold, suffering a stomach upset for the 2 days prior to the race and general lack of training for the run leg). But I did finally get round the 14 miles with a total time of 5 hours 36 minutes, which was probably about 10 minutes quicker than last year when adjusting the time to reflect the shorter swim. All in all reasonably please under the circumstances, but now need to get some longer distance work in, especially for the run.   So on to the prat, arguably me for going in to a long race suffering the effects of a cold and a dodgy stomach, although I felt I had no choice with the ironman so close, so it goes to a fellow competitor (most of whom are brilliant) who whilst on the bike going down a really fast section about 25 miles in decided to suddenly brake sharply and pull out in to the middle of the road without looking. He seemed to know a group of spectators on the other side of the road and decided to stop to talk! I was right behind and just managed to swerve past him but he could have caused a pile up. Absolute moron!

No prats again (other than a couple of inconsiderate pedestrians when I was running)  as I took it easy at the weekend in preparation for a Middle distance Triathlon in the New Forest on Sunday 13 May which is roughly half ironman distance (1900metre swim, 50 mile on the bike and 14 mile run). This was my first  (and so far only) go at the middle distance last year and I really struggled in the last part of the run as I was recovering from injury at the time. I have promised my physio that I will treat it as a training session for the ironman, rather than 'racing' with other competitors, but should still be able to improve on my time from last year because I was so slow on the run. As it will involve an open water swim in the tidal river at Bucklers Hard, I have tried to fit in my first dip in the sea but so far have been frustrated by the tides, weather and work commitments so it looks like the first dip of the year will be on race day. 5.30 am may be chilly!

Still no prats!! A couple of near misses whilst running with people not looking where they were going when crossing pavements, but both said sorry. The biggest problem has been the weekend weather and I opted to go out on Saturday morning as the forecast for Sunday was really bad. Unfortunately it was raining, although not particularly hard, and wasn't really a problem until I went down a steep hill on the A285 between Tangmere and Petworth on the approach to Duncton where there was a load of surface water on the road and I got soaked from the spray  (the bike has no mud guards), particularly my shoes and lower legs. Once my feet were wet they got really cold and for the second week running a planned 60 mile ride became 50.