Not A Triathlete

by : notatriathlete Blogs, Not Triathlons

Jebel Qada’ah

A life lesson day..

This week in the UAE we have a five day weekend, so to kick things off my husband and I decided to take on a hike we had been planning to do for a while – to summit Jebel Qada’ah, one of the UAE’s highest peaks. This doesn’t mean much in terms of actual elevation; it only sits at around 1200m above sea level, but it’s a fair way when you are climbing up from actual sea level! The peak sits virtually on its own in the far North-West of the UAE, on the very edge of the Hajjar range.

The morning was cool, the gradient pleasant, the views incredible. We were in for an unforgettable day. Little did we know, as we sauntered up the jeep tracks in Wadi Bih, that the day would be imprinted in our memories for more than just the exhilaration of a summit.

The first disclaimer is that yes, this hike is marked as “difficult” – we weren’t expecting a walk in the park. We knew we were going to be climbing and descending over 1400m over the course of 15km or so. We knew there would be no water sources and no shady stretches. What we didn’t know, as we followed the Garmin GPS steadily up the wadi, was that the trail would very soon vanish, and that the ascent would only be the very beginning of our challenges.

Wadi Bih looking glorious in the morning sun!

As we wound steadily upwards it became clear that it was going to be a tough day. The trail quickly became a wadi scramble, with the occasional rock cairn indicating that we were on the right track. The going was uneven but pleasant enough, the wadi cliffs towering above us, shading our ascent. We paused for frequent photo opportunities, snacked on our cute little packed lunch and sipped from our generous water supply, and pressed onwards.

The wadi scramble steadily became a full on climb, hand over knee and plagued by enormous orange hornets intent on our ham and cheese sandwiches. The shade receded and we were soon sweating our way up to the saddle, which seemed to be receding from view rather than getting closer. The only strategy was to pick a tree, pick a boulder and make it that far, without looking up to much. By the time we reached the pass, we were both drenched in sweat, ravenous and desperate for some shade. Just as we reached the crest, a fist sized rock toppled off the top and hit my husband squarely on his inner ankle, causing pain that would only become more and more of an issue as the day wore on.

We huddled in the shade under a rock and inhaled some lunch, saving our mini coke cans until the last second to avoid being swarmed by the hornets from the wadi again. Refreshed, we set off up the “easy enough” (according to Wikilocs) scramble to the summit. Not easy, and not a scramble. We climbed, bouldered and hauled our way up to what we assumed to be the peak, edging along precipices which dropped right down to the wadi we had just ascended. We had to then descend and ascend twice more to hit Peak Major, marked by a trig point, and Peak Minor, marked by a bedraggled looking UAE flag. This was the easy bit. We sat and munched down some more food and enjoyed our second mini coke, relieved that now we only had to descend. We had rationed the water on the climb and were confident that our remaining 2.5 litres would get us down.

We had absolutely no idea what was coming.

We dropped off the peak and followed the GPS down what can only be described as a scree slope. The length of that first scree slope descent was less than a kilometre, yet it took us an hour to reach the first shoulder back over in the direction of Wadi Bih. We were down to 2litres of water, and had not yet descended below the elevation of the saddle on our ascent. The sun was blasting in our faces, and the cool breath of air we had appreciated at the summit had stilled on the south facing slope. We traversed another scree slope, reaching some old village settlements, starting to feel positive that such signs of civilisation must mean a trail. Not so.

We rounded the edge of the settlement, to be confronted by yet another scree slope, at least another 2km wide. The GPS showed that we had to cross this almost in its entirety before turning south to make our final descent down the loose, ankle rolling rubble. We fell, we rolled, we stumbled, and all the while our energy reserves dwindled. By the time we were half way across the traverse, we were down to 1.5 litres of water, with no sign of the road below, and no sign of any type of trail. My husband’s ankle had lost all sense of strength, and my legs were trembling so badly that every leap, every drop was a risk to my balance.

The first and easiest bit of the descent. No more photos after this point really as our only focus was on getting down.

We finally hit the bigger rocks of the wadi, and followed it down. We spotted village huts, then heard an engine from the valley below. We heard what I think may have been a Greater Spotted Eagle, and my spirits began to lift. And then, I stopped short. The wadi before us had vanished. Vanished in to the thin air of a 70ft sheer cliff, worn smooth by millennia of violent storm water thundering down the mountainside. There was no way down. We had a litre of water left, less than an hour of light, and an impassable cliff ahead of us.

I stared frantically at my GPS, wondering what on earth had gone wrong. Too late, I realised that in the depths of exhaustion and dehydration, I hadn’t noticed the buzzing telling me we were forty, sixty then a hundred metres off course. The realisation hit me that we would have to double back, up the wadi, and around the cliff to drop down on the other side. The only way to cross, without climbing all the way back to the top of the scree slope hundreds of metres above and behind us, was to skirt across the scree at the top of the cliff. My husband could barely put any weight on his ankle, and my entire body was completely spent, shaking uncontrollably. This was, in all reality, one of the most terrifying moments I have experienced in my life. We scrabbled across the scree, only feet away from the edge of the drop, and collapsed on the far side. I didn’t even have enough water in me to sob. I sat, shaking and heaving, as my husband fought to keep any sips of water in his dehydrated body. We had less than forty-five minutes of daylight left, and less than a litre of water. I had no signal, and a whistle and a head torch are only useful if there are people close enough to hear or see them.

Knowing that if we stopped for too long we wouldn’t have the energy to get up, we stumbled around the edge of the cliff, heading for yet another scree slope. My husband ended up glissading down as I clung to the solid forms at the edges of the wadi. Finally reaching a level gradient and bigger rocks, we saw the first rock cairn we had seen for hours, indicating we were back on some kind of recognised trail. We had 500ml of water left, and about thirty minutes of light. Stumbling off down the wadi, I called out to George that I bet him anything the road was around the next shoulder. It wasn’t. My GPS was all over the place, switching form 2.1km to go to 15km to go. We had absolutely no idea how long the last kilometres would take us.

Rounding yet another shoulder in the wadi, I yelled out as I saw a wall. A human crafted, cemented wall. We were close. We hit a jeep track, our trembling legs uncontrollable on the comparative smoothness of the surface. As darkness fell, we rounded a bend and saw a settlement, and the road we knew our car was parked upon. We downed the final 200ml of water and wobbled over to the road, turning west as darkness fell.

We came dowm from the top of that..with no trail.

Back on the road, our pace picked up and the cool air began to decrease the signs of dehydration, although we were both claggy mouthed and sick. 19.8 kilometres in to our 15km hike, a pickup truck, driven by an absolute hero of a local Emirati man, rounded the bend, stopped and handed us bottles of water before ushering us towards his truck. From their farms high up in the mountains, they had seen us emerging from the wadi and set off to find us and hydrate us, in the middle of the call to prayer. We jumped in the back of the pickup and he drove us to our little car, followed by his uncle who had brought more water.

As we drove home, as I drifted off to sleep that night and as I snoozed safely in our bed yesterday morning, it hit me time and time again how easily things could have been much more serious. We were, at some points yesterday, at risk of being in real danger. Whether of falling, or dehydration or of getting completely lost, I can’t say which was more likely. I feel like at different points they were all equally likely. Thankfully, we both kept our cool and kept muttering that we had to keep making sensible decisions, even at our lowest point. Whilst we came close to doing the opposite, we just about kept each other on track.

I love hiking. It is something that I have done my whole life, from when I was a tiny little tomboy begging my dad to go hiking in the Preseli range in Pembrokeshire, to taking on Everest Base Camp in 2014, to my plans to thru-hike the PCT in a few years’ time. But this wasn’t hiking. This was mountaineering, where the joy and pleasure of being in the wild was torn away by the sheer fear for our own safety. The highlight of the day was the ride from our local saviours, and the nectar of heaven they brought – water. have never been so glad to sit in the back of a pickup truck.

December 2, 2020

by : notatriathlete Uncategorized

Urban Ultra RockRunner

A rock-solid return to racing…

2020. The year of the unmentionable. Definitely, not the year of racing I had planned. However, in the midst of the craziness, the UAE’s Urban Ultra has managed to pull off a fantastic event which, despite taking place in the rugged, intimidating Hajjar foothills, could not have been more welcoming.

As the name suggests, Urban Ultra are responsible for some of the more mental races out here in the UAE. Those of you who have been reading my blogs for the last year will remember my stinker of a performance the the Coast-to-Coast last year – another UU event. They love a crazy challenge – and thank god, as my running mojo has, in recent months, buggered off to somewhere seemingly irretrievable. Of late, my long runs around the community have begun to err on the dull end of the spectrum, but a renewed discovery of the trails has made these the high point of my training week.

I can safely say that this race has re-vamped my love of running. It was bloody brilliant. With distances of 5km, 10km, 15km and 30km on offer it’s completely inclusive, even for families wanting to experience the wildness of the Hajjars in a safe, community-friendly way. For the more mental, 30km of wadi-winding is on offer, including some spectacular views and scrambles on the out-and-back route.

I (sensibly) opted to stick to 15km for my first trail race, and what a race it was. With COVID measures still very much in pace here in the UAE, the return to racing has had to look a little different. Triathlon starts feature a thousand dots for athletes to follow to the sea, no check in and super luxurious, spaced out transition areas. Road running races seem to, for the most part, consist of long, socially distant queues for the start line. Urban Ultra are trialing their genius Arrive and Run approach, whereby athletes can turn up at any point between certain times, wander to the start line and begin at their own leisure. For someone who finds race mornings extremely stressful, this proved absolutely ideal. It didn’t matter that I was late for my planned 6:30 arrival… I could run any time I wanted before 8am! There was virtually no one on the start line when I arrived, so I washed my hands, had my temperature taken and off I went – the most stress-free race start in history.

For the first three kilometers or so, the course follows jeep tracks and goat trails through the foothills of the Hajjar mountains before plunging in to some shaded, green wadis. The ground varies between sand and big, loose rocks, providing plenty of technical challenge for newbies like me! There are some impressive scrambles through colourful, water eroded rock formations before you burst out of super narrow channel to make the climb to the highest point of the course. It’s not steep, but for someone whose running has recently consisted mostly flat tarmac, a decent challenge! The highest point gives rise, if you can catch your breath, to some pretty impressive vistas out towards the desert before plunging down a steep, technical and exhilarating descent to the turning point. It was definitely a case of ‘run like Phoebe from Friends’ as I went careening down the mountain, trusting my feet and legs to find purchase on the rocky outcrops. You then drop back to the Wadi area, before hitting the turnaround point at 7.5km, grabbing some fresh fruit (with newly sanitized hands!), filling up on water and, yes, heading back up that steep, technical and exhilarating descent you just flew down. Not so fun going up, but actually a nice way to stretch and move your body around before the main descent back through the wadis.

The steady, continual descent on the way down really did show me why I was so out of breath on the way up – you make quite a bit of steady, continuous ascent in the middle few kilometres of the outward leg. I managed to get all the way to the 12km point before getting lost in a wadi – cue a scramble up the steep bank to re-join the intended route just before the 12.5km checkpoint. The last few kilometers were tough, mentally, the rolling foothills much less welcoming now that the temperatures had peaked to around 30 degrees and my legs were filled with lead! However, the beauty of trail running is that you are so bloody focused on where your feet are that you forget to worry about how long you still have to go – a massive plus for someone so prone to negative self-talk in a race! I flew down the final 800m or so of the trail, stumbling over the finish line delightedly – my first trail race, and I hadn’t thought about quitting.. not even once!

All in all, I have to say that this is probably the most I have enjoyed a running race in a very long time. There was no pressure, no PB-chasing, no benchmark to hit. The views were amazing and the stewards super cheerful and friendly. The course was well marked, unless you stopped paying attention (guilty!). UU followed all the COVID regulations to a tee, showing us that the return to racing really is on.

November 24, 2020

by : notatriathlete Not Triathlons

Post-lockdown life: the great (mental) escape.

As the UAE and much of the rest of the rest of the world begin to ease their way out of lockdown, I’ve found that normal service seems to be resuming for my own mental wellbeing. Not that I initially knew anything was in any way not normal; as someone who is in the fortunate position of not suffering with their mental health, lockdown and the pandemic hit me harder than I perhaps realised in the moment.

Here in the UAE, our lockdown came hard and fast, and had every non-essential worker literally confined their homes 24/7. The only exceptions were grocery and medicine shopping, and these only with an electronic permit issued by Dubai Police. Whilst I definitely felt the frustration of not being able to leave our one bedroom apartment, I didn’t feel, at the time, that the inactivity would have a particularly negative impact on my mental health. I’m a ‘coper’. I would be fine. But now that life here in Dubai is almost back to normal, I’m starting to see just how wrong I was.

Pre-COVID19, anyone who knows me personally will attest to the fact that I don’t stop unless I am severely hungover, and even then I can usually drag myself out in to the desert for a quick spin. I work, I train, work a bit more, I train a bit more then I pass out.

My husband does almost all the cooking in the week and does all the laundry (although this is more to do with my inability to keep pairs of socks together than anything else). On a rare free afternoon or morning, I invariably fill it with a skiing session or, more lately, a paddleboarding session. Essentially, I like to have plenty on.

Now, I am completely aware that I am one in almost seven billion when I say that COVID-19 quickly put paid to any kind of normality. Work stopped, training stopped, life as I knew it stopped. Yet amidst all this insanity, social media was filled with this desire to appear more motivated, to be more creative, to do more home workouts. On one hand, I appreciate the value it had – I definitely made sure that my lockdown stories were light and funny, that I made homemade honeycomb and that I posted it to my Instagram story.

COVID19 unwittingly created this online community to replace real the one we had lost. It was great while it lasted, but for me the honest truth is that I have never felt less motivated or less myself than during the past months. I was doing these things so that everyone else knew I was keeping up with lockdown life. In reality, I found training to be a huge slog, my desire to write completely evaporated and my lust for big adventures sometime in the hazy future disappeared entirely. It is only in the past few weeks, with Dubai easing out of lockdown and normal life cautiously emerging, that my mind has started re-aligning with the things I love.

I really do feel like with this return of routine has come a return to a more usual state of mind. Whilst I know that some more time to reflect and relax can be healthy, I feel like I have escaped from a bit of a black hole, mentally, physically and emotionally. I’m more motivated to get up early, more motivated to write, and to the consternation of my ever patient husband, more motivated to plan slightly mental adventures for the next few years. I have no idea whether these adventures will ever come to fruition, but at least now I can dream big, instead of dreaming about my next sanctioned trip to the supermarket.

Summit of Adam’s Peak, Sri Lanka. Definitely more fun than Carrefour.

July 10, 2020

by : notatriathlete Uncategorized

So much for getting back to normal…

Well, it’s been a weird few months. I think, wherever you are in the world, we can all agree on that. Dubai seems to have gone from lovely balmy March mornings to blazing June heat in the blink of an eye, and for us in the desert, the school year is very nearly done.

For me, as for most of the world’s population, any plans for 2020 have gone out of the window, including Ironman Wales in September. After months of uncertainty, the Ironman brand have seen sense and postponed the event to September 2021, effectively cancelling this year. For most of us this has come as a huge relief, especially as most athletes registered have not been able to swim since March. It came as a particular relief to me for a few other reasons too.

Unlike the UK ‘lockdown’, the regulations put in place here in the UAE were extremely strict. Now that we are beginning to emerge on the other side I’m glad of this, but at the time it was tough. For a four week period between mid-March and mid-April, no one here could leave the house without an electronic permit. These were only issued to each person once every three days, and only for essential trips such as groceries or medicine. Outdoor exercise was categorically not allowed. This meant that in addition to losing my swim fitness, my run fitness dropped off a cliff too.

I used the turbo almost every day, but even that became soul crushingly boring. Once restrictions were lifted at the end of April, I was basically incapable of running. I decided to challenge myself to run 5km every day for thirty days, just to regain some semblance of fitness. At the time we had to run in a mask, and by May in the UAE, temperatures really are beginning to hit the mid-thirties. Gross. However, I managed 26 days before I fell off the 5km wagon, just in time for restrictions to lift further and allow us to travel to the cycling track. The freedom of leaving the compound was HUGE.

We now have gyms, beaches and the cycling track open here, and rumour has it that pools will be next. I, however, will not be swimming. In a bout of total idiocy, I managed to come spectacularly off my bike last Friday morning. I had met up with some friends for an easy spin around the Al Qudra loop, was just about to set off when I casually went to drop my banana skin in the bin.

Somehow, I ended up over the handlebars with my bike on top of me, in front of at least thirty people. More embarrassed than in pain, I shook myself down and off we went. My elbow felt a bit wonky, but I told myself it was just a bump and not to be such a wimp. I managed this for 40km, by which point I was unable to put any weight at all on my left arm. I limped back to the car, supporting all my weight on my right arm. By the time I got home (thank goodness I drive an automatic!), the pain was such that we dashed straight to the hospital, me yelling at my poor husband every time he hit a speedbump at anything over 0.2mph.

The verdict is a fractured elbow that will apparently just heal on its own, as long as it stays in a sling. I’ve been told not to do any sport for a fortnight, until there is no pain in my elbow. Regardless, I’ll definitely be heading to the gym this week, if only to hit the stepper and the leg machines. My running fitness will have to wait.

June 18, 2020

by : notatriathlete Not Triathlons

Everest Base Camp 2014: The journey begins.

Kathmandu – Lukla – Phakding – Namche Bazaar.

Whenever I look back on my Everest trek, I am filled with nostalgia for the sharp, clear Himalayan air, the ache in my shoulders and the slightly spaced out feeling indicating just how far above sea level you really are.

My EBC adventure was part of an extended, belated ‘gap yah’ trip with my amazing travel buddy, Kiri. The 11 day hike came hot on the heels of spending 3 weeks travelling around Rajasthan, India, by car. We spent a couple of days gathering ourselves in the bustling capital of Kathmandu before heading to the domestic airport with our lovely guide, Nalam. From there we would catch our flight to Lukla, the gateway to the Khumbu Valley and the Everest Base Camp trek.

The process of getting a flight to Lukla really isn’t a straightforward one. Perhaps the oddest thing is that each flight number actually consists of four very small Twin Otter planes. You have to work out whether or not you are on the first ‘flight’, and then which plane of this ‘flight’ you are actually booked on. The next thing to strike us was the fact that these planes don’t actually fly by radar, but by sight. This means that if there is a hint of bad weather on the flight path, the planes simply don’t go…and this was precisely the case for the first three days of our planned EBC trek. We spent the vast majority of 72 hours in Kathmandu Domestic Airport waiting for this flight, to be finally rewarded on the fourth day of exasperation.

Crazy landing in Lukla aside, we arrived in the tiny mountainside village early enough in the day to get some decent miles in, settling in with the weight of our backpacks and the sudden leap in elevation.

Our first few hours on the trail were amongst wet, dense clouds which muffled all sound, so when a herd of Himalayan cattle suddenly thundered round a bend just the other side of a rope bridge, we had no option but to scurry back to let them lumber past. I’m not great with heights at the best of times, but after so many early mornings, the terror of the plane and the giddy excitement of finally being in the Khumbu Valley, that first rope bridge was definitely the worst.

We had only a short seven or eight kilometre hike for the first day, heading to the tiny village of Phakding, the first settlement up the valley. I can just remember being blown away by how charmingly Himalayan the village was. You hear horror stories about the ‘toilet paper trail, but in reality, Phakding looked like a postcard. Slippery stone steps led up through the centre of the village, various livestock hopped around and curious eyes followed our every move to the teahouse. This was one of the things I loved the most about the Khumbu – despite being inundated by ‘hiker trash’ every year, the villagers welcomed us every day with hospitality I haven’t seen in any other part of the world.

After sampling the famous dahl-baht (curried potatoes, rice and lentils – carb heaven!) we settled down in all our layers for our first night at altitude. I slept awfully.

Somehow, during the evening, our little room filled with every type of flying insect imaginable, resulting in a low-level humming and fluttering which lasted all night. I woke up feeling distinctly damp and chilly, a state in which I would perpetually remain for the entire hike.

The next day we began to ascend through the valley, heading towards the dreaded Namche Hill. The scenery was, obviously, amazing. We passed in to the Sagarmatha National park and were awarded our trekking passes, and meandered along the river enjoying the sunshine. I had decided to convert to vegetarianism during our trip in South East Asia and this was the day my decision was justified. On the riverbank, a young Sherpa boy napped in the afternoon warmth. Sitting next to him, covered by only an umbrella, was an enormous haunch of meat. The air around the meat was thick with thousands of feasting flies.

Retching a little at the thought of the dishes to be prepared with this meat, we continued up to the highest suspension bridge of the trek. I was so terrified I practically ran across it, something I would not advise when attempting to acclimatise at over 3000m above sea level. What came next was one of the toughest climbs I have ever experienced. Namche Hill is a gruellingly steep set of stairs that can take up to three hours to ascend.

The elevation gained is huge. I arrogantly thought that my fitness levels would sustain a relatively quick pace, but once again, I just hadn’t accounted for the altitude. After two grim hours of humble-pie, we finally arrived at the capital of the Khumbu, Namche Bazaar.

This village is often seen as the true gateway to the Everest region and was the busiest village we had seen so far. Bear in mind that when I say busy, there were at least two hundred people… in the whole settlement. We arrived at a teahouse owned by an uncle of our guide and settled in with hot chocolate and card games. Ahead of us were two days of short acclimatisation treks before we would strike out for higher altitudes.

Next up: Altitude, phantom veggie burgers and paraffin fried rice: Namche Baazar – Tengboche – Periche.

May 25, 2020

by : notatriathlete All Things Triathlon

Ironman Wales 2020: a socially distant dragon?

It is almost a whole month since I wrote anything. Well, anything that isn’t an email, a text or a set of instructions for my students, who have been distance learning now for almost four weeks. The world has ground to a halt, but somehow I seem to be more exhausted now from my working day than ever before.

Six weeks ago, I was recovering from a busy few weeks at IM 70.3 Dubai and Oman and a skiing trip to Almaty, Kazakhstan. We were getting ready to set off for a family trip to Canada. My training was on track and my fitness was rebounding after two weeks of rest following the racing. Then suddenly, on the 5th of March, the world from our viewpoint went mental. Within a few short days, the situation in the UAE went from a vague awareness that people were standing further apart, to all gyms, pools and parks being closed. These were swiftly followed by beaches, restaurants and shopping malls, but we were still allowed outside if we were ‘socially distant’.

I now live in a world where it is normal not to step foot outside my apartment for six or seven days at a time. A digital permit is needed to leave, even for essential goods such as groceries and medicine. I haven’t swum since Oman and I haven’t run since the 22nd of March. My training for Ironman Wales consists of endless hours on the turbo trainer and the Insanity program.

Now, I’m not naïve enough to be assuming that Ironman Wales will go ahead, and to be honest I don’t even know if I want it to. Not for any of the usual lack of fitness, scared, or “realised I actually hate triathlon reasons”, but because I don’t know if it should. At the point of writing this, over 115,000 people have died from COVID-19, almost eleven thousand of those in the UK alone. We are banned from any large gatherings, banned from seeing family and banned from visiting our elderly or vulnerable relatives. All this comes at a time when we probably need all these things the most. One of the main draws of Ironman Wales for me is the fact that it takes place in my home county, in a town which I and countless others have been visiting since we were tiny. There are almost 30 NEWTs racing this year from my old club in the UK. I have friends and relatives coming from all over the country to watch me race. Will they be able to come? Will my dad, who suffers from COPD, be safe to travel the 30 miles down the road by September? My best friend, who has severe asthma?

Above mentioned best friend facing the dragon in 2018.

Countless numbers pour in to the Iron Town of Tenby to watch athletes face the dragon every year. These crazies hail from all over the world, from first timers to pro athletes hunting that ever-elusive Kona slot. Visitors swarm all over the village from Friday afternoon through to Sunday evening, with every pub, restaurant, cafe and chippy cramming in as many tables as they possibly can to capitalise on hungry Ironmen (Ironwomen?!) and even hungrier supporters. Hand rails are grasped, shoulders are bumped, and several thousand proud pairs of lungs bellow Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau at the swim start.

Are you beginning to see where I’m going with this? The honest truth is that Ironman could probably let the event go ahead with a limit on spectators and with social distancing measures in place. My question is, do we, as athletes, want to put the people who make our racing possible at risk? Do we want to race in a race where spectators can’t scream encouragement in your face as you ascend Heartbreak Hill for the last time? A race where I don’t get the yells of “Don’t be shit!!” thrown at me like lifeline all the way up NEWT Hill? A race where you can’t high five kids who have been standing on the side of the road all day ‘high fiving for energy’?

I don’t know if I do. I’ll keep training nonetheless, but I’m starting to wonder whether the dragon should have a year off this year, to roar all the louder in 2021.

NEWT Hill. An entire hill taken over by members of the best club on the planet.

Photo credit: Emma Palfrey, Thomas Amery and Ironman Wales

April 13, 2020

by : notatriathlete All Things Triathlon

IM 70.3 World Championships: why I turned down my slot allocation to race in Taupo, NZ.

Last week, I received one of my most unsettling emails to date. Amid all the confusion and cancellations surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, Ironman had emailed me telling me that I had been allocated a slot at the 70.3 World Championships in Lake Taupo, New Zealand this November. What. The. Hell?!

Of course, my initial reaction was absolute elation, quickly followed by utter desperation at the fact that with a recently corona-cancelled holiday to Canada and flying back to the UK for IM Wales in September, there was absolutely no chance I could afford to go. Nevertheless, my little brain started whizzing around trying to work out how I could scrape the funds together. I spent the day agonising over a number of options, including deferring my IMW entry until next year.

By the time evening arrived on Friday, I had shed a number of tears and run through thousands of scenarios in my head, none of which would work fully. I ended up deciding not to take the only World Championship slot allocation I am ever likely to get for a number of reasons:

The fact that I would have to defer my IMW slot. I was bloody lucky to get a slot at this year’s 10th anniversary of one of the most iconic Ironman races on the calendar. The race sold out in 3 minutes. To throw this away, as well as all the prep I have already done, seems ungrateful. I also intend to spend a full 6 weeks this summer training back home in Pembrokeshire, specifically to prep for the race. If I defer my place, this means doing this in the summer of 2021. This brings me nicely on to my next point..
We live in Dubai for a number of reasons, but one of those is undoubtedly the fact that we live in the ‘middle’ of the world here, and it’s so much easier and cheaper to travel to new and exciting places from here than from the UK, or many other places. My husband and I have said that we would love to spend a summer travelling around NZ or even Latin America in the next couple of years, and if I defer IMW again, these plans get pushed back. Talk about first world problems but that’s our very fortunate truth.
This is the biggie. I don’t feel that deserve that place. The slot was allocated from my time at IM 70.3 Dubai, where I finished in 5:46. I just made it in to the top 50% of my age category if you count my combined time for the three disciplines (wait for the explanation…). However, due to an almighty cock-up with the swim start, half of the field did not have recorded swim times, meaning that for half of my age group, our official finish time was calculated on bike, T2 and run. IM has attempted to calm the understandable fury at this by doubling the World Championship slot allocations for each age group. Now, if we take a way the swim, I finished a vaguely respectable 15th from 44 who suffered the same fate. A good friend of mine came 4th in the same group and has a thoroughly-deserved World Championship slot. Pre-swim-deleting she had a phenomenal time of 5:11. If we take in to account the fact that some of the top athletes had qualified for the Taupo race before Dubai, this means that in order for that slot allocation to have rolled to me, at least 10 other people have turned down the slot. Whatever this is due to, I don’t feel that I deserve that allocation. I know a lot of other people will disagree with me but if I’m going to go to the IM 70.3 World Championships, I want to do it on merit rather than on technicality.

So when the call came from Ironman yesterday to confirm that I hadn’t taken up the place, I had no regrets in saying that I wasn’t going. My aim, for 2020, is to finish IMW in front of my family and friends, on the hilly, soggy grass of home. It isn’t to fly alone to New Zealand and take part in a high-calibre race for which I feel didn’t deserve to qualify. Maybe one day…

March 17, 2020

by : notatriathlete Not Triathlons

Not a triathlon – Skiing in Shymbulak, Almaty

Well, this is my first non-triathlon blog. I made this whole song and dance about not being a triathlete, yet my posts are exclusively about triathlon. So here is a little foray in to my non-triathlon yet still invariably active life.

My husband, rather bizarrely, spends a couple of weeks every year in the cities of Almaty and Nur Sultan (Astana) in Kazakhstan for work. This half term, instead of relaxing and tapering for my next race, I decided it would be a great idea to fly to join him for two days of skiing in the Zailyisky Alatau range at the Shymbulak resort. Bearing in mind that I can’t speak a bean of Russian and my husband had only ever skied in Ski Dubai, this was bound to be an interesting week.

Skiing in Almaty isn’t your standard chalet and walk to the gondola in the morning kind of deal. There are a few hotels up at the resort but as a country whose tourism industry really hasn’t taken off yet, you’re better sticking with a hotel in the city centre. We stayed at the Rixos, a decision based purely on the fact that this was where my husband had been staying for work, and my insistence on a comfy bed after a day of skiing. Despite a half hour drive to the gondola in the morning, this was a great decision. The Rixos in Almaty has one of the best showers I have EVER experienced, great room service and the bed really was absolute heaven.

Very excited by the snow outside the Rixos in Almaty!

Now, I count myself amongst the very lucky few who got to go skiing in Europe as a child. I also count myself massively lucky to have a younger brother who lives in the picture-perfect ski town of Whistler in BC, Canada. Let’s just say that if you have any experience of European or North American skiing, the speed of the lifts in Kazakhstan will give you time to fully reflect on those experiences. I would actually say that this is the biggest negative of the whole place. The lifts are just SO SLOW! The gondola from the car park to the bottom of the resort slopes is never ending and, for someone who isn’t great with heights, just a little gnarly. However, once we got up to the resort we found a well stocked, well-restauranted ski village, and we proceeded to rent our gear. We were greeted with a pretty sazzy online system with plenty of choices of skis and boots, but a limited range of helmets. Despite assurances from the staff that ‘you fine no helmet’, George ended up buying his and I ended up encasing my tiny little pea head in a children’s Minions helmet, as this was all they had left. Just the look I was going for with my oh-so-casual, carefully-selected-for-maximum-flattery black skiing outfit.

If you look carefully, you can see a little Minion poking out from under my goggle strap!

Avalanche warnings meant that the number of slopes open was pretty limited, but there were enough for us to start getting a few runs in before lunch, despite the helmet debacle. What we hadn’t accounted for was the sheer number of utterly incapable snowboarders on slopes which were clearly not designed for utter beginners! However, after a few close shaves, we quickly realised that the best way to avoid these arrogant, incapable snowboarders was to get past them, fast! Poor George got a very quick initiation to real mountain skiing, having to avoid at least thirty boarders sitting on their arses within the first 100m from the station.

Despite all these little negatives, the skiing was fantastic. Fresh snowfall overnight gave kept the slopes puffy and virtually ice free. The limit of only having one main run was actually fine as it was wide enough to get in plenty of practice. The run from the mid station was round 2km long, plenty for my triathlon-weakened quads! Having started so late due to helmet-gate we only managed four hours or so, but in all honesty I don’t think I could have managed more!

The second day far outstripped the first. Armed with our own helmets and a better understanding of the system, we were on the first chair at 10am. Snow had been falling all night and had continued in to the morning, and this gave us the enormous benefit of keeping the fair-weather locals at bay. We had fresh powder all day. I got a bit braver (see – arrogant) and discovered a couple of slightly more technical side runs which were virtually empty. After a great deal of persuading, George conceded that it could be a good idea to get off the main run and see some more of the resort. This was where the fun began! Drifts of untouched powder, twisty, technical little cat-tracks and the massive, complete silence that only really exists when it’s snowing. The temperature had dropped to -13°and every single sound was swallowed up. I have to say, it’s not often you get any distance of run all to yourself in any ski resort, no matter where you are in the world. That peace and quiet lasted all of a few minutes until a local guy who was absolutely notrevelling in the peace came tumbling past on his snowboard, yelling what I can only assume were obscenities in Russian. Reverie shattered, we made our way back to the village for a well earned hot chocolate and an éclair.

By the end of the day, my legs were in absolute pieces. Two years ago I remember scoffing at my brother who told me that I’d be amazed at how tired my legs would be after a day of skiing. My exact thought process was “LOL does he realise that I do half Ironmans for FUN?!”. The lol was entirely on me, as my poor legs were battered after three days last time I went to Whistler, and were battered after two in Almaty. We are off to Whistler again in December for my 30^thbirthday and Christmas, so as well as churning out an Ironman in September, I need to get on that squat rack in the gym and try to return my legs to some semblance of their previous strength!

March 9, 2020

by : notatriathlete Race Reports, Triathlon

Ironman Dubai 70.3 – the power of positive thinking

So. It’s done. The first marker of the Ironman Wales 2020 season was the Dubai 70.3 Ironman event. A race which, in the past, I have professed to hate. Let me just say, right here, that first impressions are not always right.

I had felt surprisingly calm in the lead up to the Dubai race. I really think it was the lack of pressure. Since qualifying for the GB Age Group team in my first ever middle distance race I think I’ve always felt a pressure to perform to that level. Needless to say, since that day in the Cotswolds back in 2017, I’ve never come close. I panic before every race and every time my pace drops of I start to beat myself up. I spiral in to a negative mindset and from that second, the race is lost. I went in to this race with the full awareness that I really could not hope to match 5:31, I am simply not fit enough. So the next goal was – fall in love with middle distance again.

I spent the whole week ensuring I was sleeping, eating and drinking enough. If I’m honest, I’ve been tapering since RAK tri three weeks ago – but not intentionally. Work/life/lack of second car have all conspired against me. I think I had swum four times, run around 9 times and cycled twice. I managed to smash out my first sub-25 minute 5km in eighteen months at Cigna Parkrun this weekend and have been feeling pretty good about my running. I felt that if I were to make any gains at all over my 2018 time on this track, it would be on the run. My swim is pretty solid and my cycling is, at this point, utter crap. I was in for a surprise.

Let me just state the fact that the conditions were ideal. No chop, no wind, a little bit foggy, and not as hot as some February days in the desert can be. I was as calm as can be going in to the swim, which absolutely flew by. There were a few (okay, a lot) of the usual idiots seeding themselves way too optimistically who were resorting to breaststroke by the first buoy. Truthfully, my only tactic was just to plough through them. Maybe that’ll encourage them to be honest next time. I caught a sharp left hook to my jaw coming round on to the home straight and even managed to yell hello to friend of mine who was marshalling on his paddleboard. I finished on exactly the time I was predicting given that the swim was 100m long, finishing in 37 min when I had hoped for mid-35 over 1.9km. Ideal.

Twat hat on, shoes on, food in pockets… go. Straight on to the bike, gel, yell hi to another friend who had come through the swim in exactly the same time and out on to a bizarrely pleasant bike course. I busied myself rehydrating and refuelling, adjusting kit and bottles and was amazed when the first 5km split bleeped over as sub-10 minutes. I told myself not to get over excited and to slow down a bit. I thought I did. The second 5km split bleeped over sub-10. I was super careful about drafting so couldn’t understand how I could be cycling this fast when I usually have to be clinging on to a wheel for any chance at averaging over 30kph. So, I assumed that there must be a pretty hefty tailwind… but all the flags were drifting in my direction, not away from me. They were clearly confused. I got my head down and focused on a steady rhythm and tried to ignore everything around me lest it get my hopes up for a positive bike split. But I kept seeing my splits. Bleep – 9:31. Bleep – 9:26. At one point – Bleep – 8:44. WHAT IS GOING ON?! I’M CRAP AT CYCLING!! The biggest challenge I faced was when I got to 65km in 2:06 and convinced myself that I still had 35km to go until I finished the 90km ride. Maths has never been my strength. That one took a good 90 seconds to work out. As I rode down Um Suqeim I realised I was in for a PB on the bike, something I hadn’t dreamed of in the lead up. I ended up finishing the split with a 9 minute all time PB, over 20 minutes faster than I had been expecting.

I realised I had two hours and twenty minutes to run the half marathon and beat 6 hours. I started off a little ambitiously, running the first 3km at 5:30 pace before realising that this was potentially a bit much. So, I settled in to try to enjoy the run as much as possible. Every time I felt hot or heavy, I made myself think of how much pain I was in at Parkrun the previous week and of how running this much slower was way easier. Of how there was an aid station around the corner with Coca-Cola and ice cold sponges. Of how two of my best friends were on the track cheerleading whenever I went past. Of how I was, somehow, going to beat my previous time for the course. I avoided the bouncy green path as much as possible, sticking to the bricks which provided far more momentum and speed. I smiled at everyone instead of giving my usual ‘pray for me’ grimace. I saw so many people I knew including my Dubai parents, yelling and cheering as I bounced (yes, bounced) past. I finished without crossing the line stopping my Garmin and reflected on the fact that for the first time in years I had fully enjoyed a race. Every second of it.

I’m writing this the day after the race trying to work out why it went so well. I was incredibly happy to be repping the kit for my old club back in Wales who I will be re-joining this year, despite being in the UAE. The Newport East Wales Triathlon Club is responsible for me falling in love with this sport, and I cannot wait to be part of the 27-odd strong team of NEWTs heading to Ironman Wales this September. Two fellow NEWTs were there and seeing familiar faces from my UK racing days was just fantastic. I saw one of my training buddies absolutely smash our age group, finishing in 5:11 despite tech issues on her bike. I saw a work friend break down all his expectations and finishing almost an hour faster than he had anticipated, despite forgetting his goggles and his Garmin. Most hilariously, I saw my husband’s face switch comically from concern to utter confusion when he saw me smiling as I left the athlete village. A timing error had led him to believe I was almost half an hour slower than I actually was, so the poor bugger was preparing to deal with self-berating, pissed off and grumpy Harri, not positive, smiley and upbeat Harri.

All it can come down to is lack of pressure and a positive mental attitude. And a miraculous bike split.

T-10 days to Ironman Muscat 70.3…

February 11, 2020

by : notatriathlete Race Reports

Ras al Khaimah Triathlon – a surprise of Olympic proportions.

Well, after all the negativity I have felt over the past few months of training, the RAK Olympic distance race actually went much better than expected. I had only managed to swim two or three times in the lead up so I had absolutely no idea how the 1500m would go. My bike is, as we all know, pretty weak and my running is only just starting to take shape. However, despite all my negative mental-prep, somehow I had a good race.

I drove from Dubai to RAK on the morning of the race with a friend, who was taking on his first triathlon. This meant that instead of spending the entire drive panicking about transition, nutrition and jellyfish, I distracted myself by trying to calm him down. Turns out this may actually be my new race tactic.

It was, by UAE standards, absolutely Baltic when we arrived at the race start. I had a North Face down jacket on and I could still feel the bite of winter. However, race nerves quickly kicked in and after a quick visit to the unusually gross toilets, it was time to rack the bikes and set up transition. Having not raced for over 18 months I’d been a bit worried about forgetting things, but I quickly got back in to my routine of socks rolled in to trainers, gels stuffed in underneath them and dangle my race belt from my tri-bars to show my number when I’m blindly racing/stumbling towards my bike.

In true style, despite being, by my standards, organised, I was still late enough to have to leg it down to the swim start in time for the briefing and a quick pre-race jellyfish check. Reassured that there were no evil, slimy demons in the water, I set my self in the second line of women to enter the water, confident that I could get out ahead and get myself a bit of space. Thank goodness I did. The start was absolute chaos with first-timers pushing eagerly to the front only to be mown down by faster, heavier and more brutal competitors. Thankfully, my wetsuit and my personal winter padding did the job of keeping me buoyant and speedy, and I managed to get out and to the first buoy before the melee. As I looped past the finish on to the second lap I realised I had now caught most of the wave ahead of me and that I was actually enjoying the swim! I half-heartedly tried kicking a few times but that seemed like an unnecessary waste of energy so I focused instead on long, streamlined strokes and conserving energy for the dreaded bike. The swim was measured wrong so we all ended up swimming 1750m, but with a Garmin time of 32 minutes, I staggered drunkenly out of the swim in positive spirits.

These lasted until around 30km in to the 40km bike split. I was pretty convinced I had held my own in the swim and was reassured by how many bikes were still left in transition when I stumbled through. So, twat-hat on on, shoes tightened, food stuffed in to pockets, inhaler cleared of salt water… go. The first 20kms felt like a breeze. I span at an easy 30km per hour, knowing that I would lose ground on the bike split. A few women came tanking past me but instead of being overtaken by negativity I was pretty chuffed to have beaten all these machine ladies out of the water! Sadly, the wind picked up in the last lap, and with it went my positivity and my energy. My legs suddenly weighed two tonnes, and gears that I had been spinning in earlier suddenly felt like they were coated in treacle. I ground my way to transition, forgetting my golden rule – always spin for the last few minutes of a bike split to prepare your legs for the onslaught of movement on the run.

This turned out to be a real mistake. I started off on the run with heavy legs and a generally unsure and wobbly mindset. I kept thinking that I should be able to run faster and deal with the pain, but every time I sped up I ended up backing off and settling back to a very conservative pace. You know that well heeled phrase ‘get comfortable with uncomfortable’? I was the antithesis of this phrase. I was basically on the sofa watching Netflix. I finished the run at Netflix pace feeling that I could have run the same distance at the same pace again. Positive in terms of endurance, but I definitely could and perhaps should have pushed harder.

All in all, RAK was a great race. The swim was an absolute dream and the run taught me a few lessons with regard to pushing myself. For a first race since racing for GB in Ibiza in 2018, I was happy with how I felt. I can still do all three disciplines, I still know how to execute a good transition and I still fit in to my wetsuit (just). I just need to realise that pain is part of the process, and I need to re-acquaint myself with this if I’m going to get anywhere with this IronMan training!

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February 5, 2020