To continue the trend of not just running in Olympic cities I just did the Beijing International Triathlon.
The event was held at the Qing Long Lake Park which lies about
35km outside of the city itself.
I had hired my bike and was ready to pick it up at the hotel (who knows what I would have done if it wasn't there) but it was. The race registration and bike rack was down at
the lake which was about 7km down the road from the hotel. The 7km ride down
there would do me well as I had never actually ridden a racer before which is what they had given me so it
would be good practice as well as getting me to the lake. The instructions
seemed too simple…turn right, then right again and go straight until you reach
the lake. I thought I had done that but clearly not as I carried on straight
until I reached the entrance to the motorway……not quite the quiet surroundings
of a lake. Through lots of sign language to locals I eventually made it to the triathlon start area!
The swim was
1.5km clockwise lap of the lake, the bike ride
was 40km and was partially flat but did involve climbing up a mountain which
offered spectacular views of the surrounding area but was challenging to say
the least and the run was
a 10km off road run.
Crossing the
finish line was great (especially as they read out your name as you approach
the finish) and I was pleased to have completed the race. My results were
broken down as per the below:
Overall place: 135th
out of 377
Division place: 29th
out of 73
Gender place: 125th
out of 334
Overall time: 2h 57m
Swim (1.5km): 27m 33s
Bike (40km): 1h 38m 30s
Run (10km): 41m 59s
I was
pleased with this as it was a tough race. It also included an extra 600m run
from the swim exit to transition which adds on a little time to the usual
triathlon.
The
swim and run were decent times (I was actually 20th overall for the
run and 2nd for my division and 44th overall for the swim
and 6th for my division) but my bike ride just really let me down.
Beijing was a great city to be in and I would recommend a trip there to anyone (and the triathlon as well if you fancy it!)
Approaching the finish line:
The medal:
Post race race with a flag:
Until next time.....
No comments:
Post a Comment