Posted on July 07, 2014 by Jenny Cromack

This weekend I tried something new…..I did my first ever triathlon! For those of you who follow my blogs you will know that I’ve been doing some training for it, but not tonnes as I’m marathon training and I didn’t want it to interfere with my marathon training too much. For this reason I chose to do the Triathlon Pink as I knew regardless of training I would have the stamina to do this. So, as part of my training I’d obviously still been doing lots of running, I’d been cycling to and from work a couple of times a week which was the exact distance I needed for the day, I’d swum once (whoops!) and I’d practiced the transition from cycle to run once (double whoops!).

So, the big day came and whilst I was confident I would have the stamina for the course I was as nervous as hell when the Triathlon Pink team were briefing us by the pool side. The event is a women’s only event and un-timed too to try to encourage more women to try a triathlon and make it uncompetitive. Although, to be honest I still timed myself as I wanted to know how fast I could it for future reference in case I ever decided to do one again!

I was quite relieved when some of the women doing the shorter courses than me started swimming breaststroke at least I wouldn’t be the only person not swimming front crawl! They didn’t even ask us to dive in (my worse fear was diving and doing a belly flop!) so it was my turn I entered the water and pushed off and went for it, swimming breaststroke like I was being chased by shark…….I quickly realised that I was swimming too quickly to control my breathing and after a little panic that I couldn’t catch my breathe I had to swim 1/2 a length with my head out of the water to regain some control of my breathing! I was really kicking myself for setting off like a bull in a china shop, this was not a competitive environment I should be enjoying the moment too! Anyway, I got my breathing under control and then went back to swimming breaststroke with my head in the water, controlled powerful swimming like I normally do, not crazy fast with no power and I was out of the water in around 8 minutes.

I then ran the bike, for those of you who read my blog about the disaster with the tri-suit I had decided to opt for swimming costume in the pool, but had put my sports bra on underneath for the cycle and run, there is no way I could run without a sports bra and to be honest many of the women had opted for this look too! So over to the bike, shorts, vest and helmet on and on the way to 6 laps of a 1k track. This was amazing…..pretty flat with a few very short climbs, but I was in my element, speeding past people with the wind whizzing past – not as fast as the guys in Le Tour admittedly but still my legs felt strong….it felt good!

So after 6 laps I ran bike to the transition area with my bike racked it back up and then onto the run. I will be honest, following my practice of the transition I was worried about the run. During the practice my legs had felt like bambi’s for about 1 mile…..the run on this course was barely 2 miles what if my legs never got going properly. No need to panic though, after about 1/2 mile they were pretty much back to normal for the majority of the 3 laps of the 1k circuit. I checked my watch and was running a pretty decent pace so I was pleased. As I ran I calculated that if I kept that pace up I could probably do sub 45 minutes, my target had been sub 60 minutes, so this spurred me on!

As I entered John Charles Stadium at the end of the final lap we hit the running track and for once I managed a sprint finish with a smile on my face! The feeling was immense!

If anyone fancies a triathlon, but a bit like me, is nervous about whether they could do one, this is the perfect distance to try. I think next year I might substitute a marathon for a sprint triathlon instead.