Bala photos

Couple of photos from Bala- as you can see from my face at the end of the run I was really enjoying it at this point!

Bala Race report

Had a really good race at the weekend and still feeling happy about it now:) Its probably my best result ever considering the competition and the fact it was the british championships. Just checking through the results listings now and the top 20 in the senior division still stands with a 34th in the overall competition with the fast veterans (40+) included (and one female!!!... louise collins who came 2nd in ironman lanzarote last year and is one of the fastest girls around). Total entries was 700 with about 620 completing the distance.
The day started off with a pretty good swim with me doing the 2km in under 30min and prob coming out about 20th overall, next it was onto the bike and this is where I knew I was in good form. The whole cycle felt really quick and I posted a fast 2hrs20 for the tough 50 odd miles. Coming into transition though as always happens with me and triathlon I knew the run was going to be hard. Although I lost a good few places on the run I still managed a 1hr30 run on a hilly course which I was well pleased with. This is the only part of triathlon now where I really feel I can improve a lot and although the 1.30 run was good it was only the 90th fastest time on the day!!! Unbelievably I was probably sitting in the top 10-top 15 in the british champs after the bike until the run section.... at least I know where I need to improve:)
Special thanks go to colin moore (who completed the course in a credible 6hr30 after a puncture) who came back to inverness to pick me up after some travel problems on friday and to Tim and Katie who I stayed with in Chester and who ferried me round all weekend and had to put up with me dressed in lycra for the majority of it!
Will post some photos up soon

Bala Middle Distance Results

Interclub 2010

Last night saw the annual running of the interclub cycle race between Caithness CC and Wick Wheelers. In this race the top eight riders from each teams time is taken and cumulated and whoever has the lowest total time is the winner. This year the race was run between Wick and Thurso and although the night wasnt great in terms of weather, ie steady rain for the whole race at least there was a easterly tail wind which produced some quick times.
I gave myself the day off from training which is rare these days and it really paid off- did a 41minute and was quickest on the night- really scared myself a couple of times with how fast I was going on the new bike!! Caithness put together some good times and won by just over 30 minutes however this is a lot closer than last year and im sure with the younger riders Wick have coming through it'll be a much closer race next year.

assynt photos

Assynt triathlon

On Saturday a team of us from caithness headed over to the west coast for the Assynt triathlon. Based around Lochinver this adventure race consists of a 21 mile road run, 15 mile cycle, 5 mile kayak and 8 mile hill race. I travelled across on friday with friends roz and hamper and we camped on friday night.
Our team consisted of myself, roz and hamper splitting up the road run, coby from brora doing the cycle, mark cleminson doing the kayak and team captain colin earnshaw doing the hill run. It was a really hot day and everyone put loads of effort in with the result being we came out 2nd overall out of 7 teams. Next year were going to go for first place!!
Thanks to expert photographer hamper for the photo of me running with some pretty stunning backdrop:) going to put some more photos up soon.

Kirkwall Standard Photo

Left to right : Rod, Robin, yours truely, brian, david and gemma.

Check the glare of mine, brians and davids head. They should use us as a renewable energy source instead of all the turbines and tide machines on orkney!

Kirkwall Standard Triathlon

This was the first standard distance triathlon i've done in over 2 years and it was good to get back to racing at this distance. Six of us travelled over from caithness to orkney including myself and david from thurso, brian and robin from wick and gemma and her friend Rod from Dundee. Conditions on the day were sunny with quite a mild temperature (for orkney). For me the race went well and after a good swim (1min pb) it was out on the bike to find it was actually really windy- struggled quite a lot with my new bike and the race wheel on the front caused me a lot of bother. Managed to get round in a good enough time and it was onto the run. With a lead of about 2-3mins at this point I thought I could hold the two guys off who I knew were chasing me and although I ran a pb Adrian ran 10k in 35min (mental!!!) and Torquil in 38min and this took them past me. Not really that dissapointed as 2hrs7min is a massive pb for me on this course- just need to get running quicker:) All in all it was a really good day and thanks go to beccy and keith for sorting out the event- its good to have events this far north so we dont have to travel!