So here it was. The day of the triathlon, 22 weeks of “training”, 180 quid on a pool membership, 150 quid on a wetsuit, 350 on new wheels, 70 on a tri-suit and 2 quid on a tub of vasaline – I was ready.
Up early doors after the best nights sleep at my mums ever. Had a big portion of chips, sausage, fishcake, gravy and curry the night before and no beers what-so-ever. Event was to start at 12:30 and I had to be there for a briefing at 12:00, so looked at 11:00 to get going down the Haven. After multiple ablutions, I was ready for the breakfast to fuel my day – so bacon sarnies all round. Only managed 1 and a half sandwiches and two cups of tea, then it was an hour to kill. So after a number of extra stops at the white throne, I was in the trisuit and checked and re-checked the instruments of my day of torture.
I took the bike for a quick spin after pumping the tires and decided not to take my cycle shorts – which was a good idea. I then stuck some oil in the car which wasn’t. After I put the oil in, I somehow managed to knock the oil cap off the engine and through the fan into the depths of the engine bay – aarrggghhhhh PANIC!
Heart sank, as the family came rushing out to look at my stupidity, luckily Sian, who is always brave in the face of danger stuck her hand into the bowels of the car and somehow managed to rescue it, just as I was about to disassemble the bike rack. I don’t know how she did it, and she damaged all of her arm, but amazingly the oil cap was rescued – panic over.
Got down Broad Haven around 11:15, and the car park was packed, after being directed into a very odd parking space we managed to get unloaded, Kate had the bike and proceeded to wheel it through the debris on the side of the car park, with me flinching every meter. Got past the toilet and thought I might have a go, but crouching in the crab position trying to wee out of a trisuit didn’t work for me here, so I gave up and went to rack.
Having never entered, or seen a triathlon before I wasn’t too sure what was to happen, but I found a space and was given instructions as to how to rack up, and I laid my stuff under the bike – I had taken a small box to put the stuff in, which as it happened was what one does in a triathlon. I put things straight and tried to stick some energy tablets to the handle bars and failed – so I just ate a couple.
Hanging around now, so after a while I tried the toilet again, and there was quite a queue for the throne room, so I struggled and pulled and squatted and managed to get some more liquid out.
Nearly time for the briefing, so I struggled into the wetsuit, convinced that mine was the tightest there – everyone else looked tanned, and muscular and fit and powerful, I looked squished and fat. I took a walk down to the sea front at this point and felt quite scared. The waves which were breaking were around a foot of so, but you could see there was a swell behind them as the boats setting up the buoys where really wobbly. I looked at the distance, and the waves and the distance and me and the waves and once more at the distance and felt like I was going to cry…
Got vasalined up and helped to pour my top half into the wetsuit and went to listen to the briefing. Also listened to the radio announcer who was waxing lyrical about how hard the course was, and that it was quite choppy. Time for a practice swim – earplugs in – check, stupid (but warm) yellow hat on – check, gogs on – check, nose clip on – check, and I waddled down to the water.
Had a quick swim out through the waves to the first (actually the last) buoy and panicked, then swam back and though – this is easy. As I got out of the water I attempted to adjust my nose clip, but got vasaline on it, and my nose. So, second panic of the day I looked in desperation for the supporters so I could towel it off or something. I had a short time before the start, and the stress levels were rising!!
I tried and tried and tried to get the nose clip on, it just wouldn’t, my heart sank to my knees, and then the hooter went off – my clip was tucked into my goggle strap and my first triathlon was starting.