London Triathlon – A Test of Endurance

2004’s big challenge was to do the London Triathlon Sprint. It took place on 31 July and being the London Triathlon, it was based in the East of London, Docklands area. Yes, it requires a swim in the Thames too. It was my first triathlon and I’m not entirely convinced I’ll do another one. I did however complete this one and still managed to do it in a very good “average” time – 1 hour 44 minutes. The sprint is 750m swim, 20km cycle and 5km run. I had no problem with any one of these distances but I wasn’t sure about being able to do them all at once and keep up my pace. In November 03 I injured my knee so I knew that I’d have to leave running training to the last minute. I trained consistently by cycling daily to work, which was about 8 miles each way and swam weekly, topped up by sessions in the gym.

How does all this contribute to my long trip back home, one may ask? I figured that I needed to not only have a pretty good base level of fitness to do the Africa trip but also needed discipline and mental stamina. The triathlon seemed like a good idea. A lot of things we face in life are all “mind over matter” and the triathlon definitely strengthened my mind.

The bit of the triathlon that I reflect on most often is the swim. I’d been warned to stay out of the pack and so I tried to position myself to the far back of the group so that I wouldn’t be in the middle of the frenzy as every one swam off. You have to hop into the water and then swim out and wait for about 5 minutes before the race begins. It was icy cold. Not only was I gasping from the cold and couldn’t control my breath but the water stank. It seriously smelt bad. Every time I managed to get a good breath in I practically gagged. The race began and as I swam, I put my face into the water – it was like green pea soup with absolutely no visibility. That was not the worst, however, I’m quite a strong swimmer so naturally I was catching up with the middle of the group. Great! I kept getting kicked and ended up taking in a few mouthfuls of the putrid water. At one point I didn’t want to go on and thought about swimming to the bank. Then stubborn me kicked in and said, “I didn’t train this hard to quit.” I told myself that every stroke I took was one closer to the end and I finished the swim. Fortunately when I got to my bike I ended up puking and probably saved myself from bellyache.

Not only did I finish the triathlon but I also managed to raise some money for charity. A real win-win situation.