Race Report: National Duathlon Champs

By Aileen Flynn. 

Last July lounging in the sun with the two lovely Lindas in Seapoint was when I finally bit the bullet and signed up to go long this year- Challenge Roth 2014 with the Piranhas – seemed like a good time to jump on the distance bandwagon.

I’ve been putting in a consistent winter of training in preparation for this and was looking forward to getting a race in last weekend- I knew it was going to be a blow out but I was ready to give it welly!

I did the Duathlon champs last year in Ashford and felt I didn’t race as well as I wanted- I took it too easy on the first run,lost sight of the competition early on and then just went through the motions to finish the distance.  This year I decided I’d try to run hard as I could for the first 10 km- it was awful! It was 2 laps of a hilly course- the first 7km were good but I slowed down a lot coming to the end of the 10 k and got passed by a few girls…but at least I could see them!

In and out of transition with a few encouraging shouts of support from the sidelines,I raced down the bumpy road to the mount line and set out on 4 laps of the 40k bike. I think I was 5^th or 6^th girl at that stage. The bike course was great- a few small climbs , quite technical but some nice fast bits to it too. For the first lap I couldn’t get my ass out of the saddle for the climbs- everything felt like an effort. I caught a couple of girls early on and got a shout from a marshal that I was 4^th– I knew who was ahead of me then and hoped I could catch 2 of them. My calves were cramping up sporadically on the bike, I had to change how I was pedalling and thought there is “no way I’m running after this!”. Then I dropped my chain- aargh!! By the 3^rd and 4^th lap I was feeling much better and had moved up into 2^nd position by the time I came into T2. Great!

Heading out on the last 5km run my legs were screaming… I knew by this stage that the run was just brutal and I was dreading it. I was caught by Eimear Fitzmaurice pretty soon and I tried to stay with her shoulder to shoulder for a bit,but once the course kicked up I was dropped. I tried to keep her in sight. I knew Anna Crooks would be putting in a good run behind me and was just praying she wouldn’t catch me- I had no fight left if she did!

With less than 2 km to go I glanced back down the hill and could only see some men- no girls- phew! I finished in 3^rd place, and was delighted to pick up my prize – a pair of sunnies and sweaty photo at the finish line.

It was a tough tough race- well done to everyone there! I don’t think I’ll be back…

Mallorca70.3 next…. Seems less daunting now after a Saturday morning in Skerries!