Race Report - ITU Cross Duathlon - Targu Mures

I arrived on the Friday lunchtime, assembled my bike and headed up, with one of my new GB team-mates, to recce the course on the first evening. 

That probably wasn't the best plan as I was still trying to adjust to the heat. Also, we pushed a little too hard on the long climb up to the course and then started at slightly the wrong place on the lap meaning that all the most technical bits were crammed in to the first section. This took a huge toll on my confidence as I was exhausted, overheated and spent most of the first 15 minutes pushing my bike or taking wrong turns. We eventually got onto a slightly better section of the course, but still struggled for nearly an hour and racked up over 5 miles trying to get round a 3.5-mile lap of the course. The course lap record is just outside 15 minutes. 

Having survived that single lap, I decided food, and rest, and a fresh look in the morning were the best approach. On the Saturday morning I had the same lap down to 40 minutes, and I spent a lot more time riding and a lot less time pushing. I figured on race day I could get each lap down to ~30 minutes for a two-hour total ride, so I decided to be happy with that and go back to my apartment, and do a short run to look at the swim course for Wednesday. It was murky weedy and frankly disgusting. Then back home to watch the online briefing and pretend to do some touristing in the afternoon.

On the Sunday morning I wanted to get the last of the recce's in for later in the week so I rode over to the swim section, and rode the extra Cross Triathlon mountain bike section that led from the swim up to the main mountain bike course, parked my bike at a cafe at the top, and went for a slow jog / walk round a lap of the run course. 

It is a common joke among runners that the guys who design hill running courses, don't like track and road runners and want to see specialist hill runners win, so they make courses as hard as they can to deter 'normal' runners from winning. The dude who designed this course started from that point and decided that it wasn't really fair, and he should make it hard enough that even hill runners would hate it. The cliff at the end of each was so tough that even the elite athletes were having to walk it on their first lap. 

Just to reiterate that: The course was so tough that less than 3km and 10 minutes into a 2 hour+ event, even full-time professional athletes would be reduced to walking. 

On race day I went up early to watch the Elite race and to give my legs time to clear from the significant ascent to the course. I watched the Elite race and saw them walking and stumbling up the main hill on the first run, and the mountain bike course was little better. Elite and U23 athletes were having to dismount all over the lap to get up stabby little climbs, or because twists on slopes were too tight to get round without any momentum. None of this was boosting my confidence for my attempt in the afternoon. The leading Elite male athletes finished in just under 2 hours with the Elite woman winner finishing in 2 hours 22. Based on that I was looking to get finished in about 3 hours. 

I made sure to drink plenty and eat sensibly throughout the morning as we set up transitions and waited to start. It was going to be a long, hot afternoon and at that point my main aim was just to survive the day without any disasters. 

We all gathered at the start, and then the faffing really started. The announcer called for everyone under-50 to come to the line for the first heat. This wasn't what the briefing said, and wasn't what the official start sheet said, so the Head Technical Official sent all the over-45's back to wait for the second heat. Then the announcer called us forward again and the official sent us back again. This went on for about 5 minutes while they tried (and failed, see later) to figure out which heat they wanted to put us in. 

In the end we went in the second heat, with the older age groups, which I think suited all of us as it meant the course was much more spaced out and no-one in my race was trying to chase younger age-groups.

When we were called to the start line for the first run I went straight to the very back of the pack. And when the gun went, I stayed there. My plan was to take it very easy and try and work my way into the race. I expected it to take me anywhere between 2:45 - 3:15 hours, which would be the longest time I have raced for in about 10 years (I checked it was 9 years). I also had the temperature and conditions to deal with, and another 3-hour-plus race coming two days later, so there was no need to burn matches in the first 20 minutes. In retrospect it turns out that this was everybody's plan and even the guys at the front were taking it comparatively easy, so I was probably taking it much too easy. 

After the first km, I started to gently move through the field of older athletes, but at a pace I could comfortably maintain. About 2km in to the lap I realised I could hear the crowd cheering, and while I knew the lap was short I couldn't believe we were within hearing range of the transition already. Then it occurred to me that the noise would be from the crowd on the killer hill. And they were loud. 

Being sensible on the first section allowed me to jog / shuffle about half way up the big hill before walking like everyone else. I passed about 3 people just in that short section. The organisers had hilariously put timing mats at the top and bottom of the hill, so that they could give out a spot prize for the fastest ascent, and they had even hung a bell for everyone to ring at the top to show they had survived the climb. When I rang the bell at the top, the crowd gave a big cheer (as they did for everyone). It was fantastic.

And I kept the same approach for the second lap. Nice and easy, and just keep picking off slower runners where they came to me, and try to get as far up the hill as possible before walking. I did 17:40, and 17:50 for the two laps including the short section in to transition.

When I arrived in T1, all of the bikes around mine were gone, which is about what I expected. I had been overly careful with my first run pace and was hoping that some of the 6 other bodies in my age group would blow up, have mechanicals, or would somehow turn out to be worse mountain bikers than me.

And for the first lap on the bike I went quite well. I managed to ride most of the technical sections without getting off. I was even managing to still pass some riders from the older age-groups that I had let go on the run. Whenever I did need to dismount I was hopping straight back on at the earliest opportunity and back on the pedals. And I did a 26 minute first lap.  Comfortably inside my 30min / lap prediction. 

On to the second lap and I just tried to concentrate on riding sensibly and getting round the course. I managed to pass one of the riders from my age-group to move me up to 6th place but in turn, towards the end of the lap, I was lapped by the first of the fast riders from the early heat.  They had a 10-minute headstart, plus whatever they had made on the run and through their first two and half bike laps, and had 20 years less in their legs, so I wasn't hugely surprised. More surprising was how few of them were passing and that no-one from my heat was also coming round. 

The mountain bike course was pretty well shaded and I was actually getting quite cool on lap 3 and decided I wanted to zip up my suit, but after a few attempts I realised the zip was stuck. When I dismounted for one of the worse climbs I decided to stop and sort it. At the time, half a lap of discomfort and that short stop to get more comfortable in my suit seemed like a huge inconvenience, but Wednesdays race would put that into perspective. 

Lap 3 felt like my best bike lap. I was comfortable all the way round, and even with the zip stop I felt like I was doing my best lap. It turns out (having seen the results and gps breakdown) that it felt good because I was working less hard. This was also the lap that the leaders from my own age-group heat started coming past. I realised that my drinks bottle was nearly empty, so this was the first lap that I took the time to collect an extra drink from the single feed station and then kept the remains of my drink bottle for the far end of the course. It was just operating like a running water stop, so grab a cup, drink half, tip the rest on your head, throw cup towards bin bag, all while prepping for a sudden downhill turn and entry in to the technical section. It went better than I expected. I missed the bin bag, but I didn't crash or spill. 

On to the last lap of the bike and I finally had a handle on the lines for the fast downhill sections, but was short on legs for the stabby little climbs so I was having to hop off and push up the hills for more of them. I finished the last of my water about halfway round the lap, and this was the first time it occurred to me that I had taken in 0 calories since the race had started. On one of the early technical sections the first of the leading women, from the heat 10 minutes behind, passed me. 

Just towards the end of the lap, two of the GB female athletes that I had been socialising with through the week also went past me. They were clearly technically better mountain bikers than me and were managing to ride up some of the sections where I was getting half-way and having to dismount and push. I was then managing to make a little bit back on them whenever we were on flatter and less technical sections. We all went in to transition together.

On to the second run and I actually felt quite good. I could still see the two GB ladies in front of me and just set of to start passing them. I was into a decent jog quite quickly. Definitely faster than my first run start, despite the tired legs. But this time I was all over the fuel stops. There were 4 on each run lap and I took drinks from ever one and grabbed random gels at the two that had them. I passed one of the women straight out of T2 and then gradually closed on the other, catching her in the first kilometer. 

Then I noticed there were other men on the course around me and while none of them looked to be in my age-group, they gave me targets to pick off as I was feeling surprisingly good. I even managed to shuffle a few steps up the hill before cutting back to a walk. That hill nearly finished me. I couldn't manage to get back up to a jog off the top of it and it turned into just a march to the next aid station for a gel and cup of water. 

That was enough to get me back up to a gentle jog to the blue carpet, with a firm push (you couldn't with any kind of honesty call it a sprint finish) when I saw how close I was to the 3 hour mark. 

I crossed the line in 2 hours 59 minutes 56 seconds and 6th in the World. 

I am really happy with that. It is my best finish ever at any International race. I lost a chunk of time on the bike, but not as big a chunk as I expected and I didn't do any damage to myself or my bike before the Cross-Triathlon two days later.