What a day,
what a race: the aggregators exceeded all expectations, we finished fifth in
yesterday’s trio triathlon competition in Veenendaal. Although we were flying for
the entire race under the radar, our chip did not work and obviously they only
recorded us crossing the finish line, not before. Thanks to the organisers to
keep us in the ranking as this performance needs to be recognised. But lets tell
the story from the beginning.
After my
runners knee experience from last fall I focussed this year almost completely
on cycling, which was a perfect decision, but I still miss the triathlon. Luckily,
Europeana and The European Library have not only great experts to transform the
world with culture. They also have great and talented endurance sport athletes. Being part of a joint venture of Europeana and The European Library I
managed to get into a triathlon this year, as a trio or estafette. Together
with Joris and Simon, I participated in the Twinfield Triathlon in Veendendaal
yesterday (23 August 2014) and finished the ¼ as a trio. Simon was swimming 1,000 m,
I was riding my bike for 40 km and Joris ran the final 10 km.
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| Aggregators welcome: please put your bike here and only take it down before you leave for cycling. |
It was
quite a long day, Simon and I left The Hague at 8 in the morning (we were back at around 4pm), while a big
thunderstorm hit the city. Fortunately, the weather was getting better the
closer we got to Veendendaal, which is a city between Utrecht and Arnhem right
at the A12. We met Joris at a gas station just before Veenendaal to avoid
looking for each other at registration. We went into the transition area,
checked in the bike and helmet and made sure to understand the modalities
getting in and out the area. The triathlon staff was really strict to make sure
only authorised participants enter the area. Once we were in the transition area
and found our slot with the bib number 667 (and 666 really existed as well, but
nobody showed up to fill that slot...), we were all starting to prepare ourselves
for the event. Simon went off to explore the lake, I started to prepare my bike
and Joris checked the transition areas for the trio starters, between each
discipline.
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| Everybody ready to start. Orange caps for all the trios. Water was just under 20°C, cold, but still warmer than air temperature. Clearly no conditions you would go swimming... |
Excitement
was increasing the closer we got to the starting time. Joris stayed with Simon
to see him swimming, while I was getting myself ready for the ride. It is
pretty hard to follow a swimmer in the water as they all look the same. But
Simon did really well. I knew he is a very good swimmer, but he trained in
pools and not in these kind of open waters. And it was his first triathlon
appearance so you never know what happens. He was trying hard to keep in touch
with the best swimmers and he managed this really excellent. I’m very much
impressed: he left the water in third position, after 0:14:28, and handed me over
the chip. The two others in front of him needed more time to get on their bikes,
so I found myself being the first cyclist leaving the transition area. But at
this point we already had the impression something was wrong…
I had to
digest this ‘wow’ experience while running to the bike exit. I was really
excited, never had this before, being first in a race. Thanks Simon! As I’m not
a time trial expert (I prefer slow and steady over long distance, not fast and furious
but short), I was sure it would not take long to see the first people passing
by, which was true. But over the entire distance, I have not counted more than
4-5 people doing so, and Joris confirmed this when I handed over to him. But I
come to this later. The bike track was a 3 km stretch of a big national road,
and in between was the triathlon stadium, which normally is a big parking
place. Six rounds were on our agenda, every round we had to pass the stadium.
Weather was quite ok, only very few and short showers and a perfect wind that
was blowing as a tailwind for the long 3 km stretch, while the 3 km headwind piece
was divided into two pieces by the triathlon stadium passage. This passage was
quite useful to properly count rounds and also do the regular fueling after
each round. Before getting into the stadium the time was recorded every round,
but I did not hear the same ‘beep’ I heard from others crossing the mat, same
experience that Simon made, but I had it six times, something is going wrong
here…
It was very
busy the first two rounds. Imagine 300 cyclists on a 6 km track, i.e. every 20 m one cyclist (average). Drafting was not allowed, so keeping the 10 m
distance to the next cyclist was quite a challenge. Half of the second round
the sheriffs were riding next to me to pay attention we keep distance from each
other. This means I had to slow down sometimes if others were cycling at about
the same speed, quite annoying. Slowly the track was getting more empty (they
started the 300 ¼ starters in three waves, with 20 min difference, the trios
were in the last wave, so the starters from the first two waves disappeared
over time). Now I was getting into a good rhythm. I knew how fast to go at the
railroad underpass, how fast to pass the roundabouts, how to approach and pass the
stadium. Although my bike computer stopped working before I even started
cycling, with my watch and six little pieces of duck tape I managed to count
the six rounds properly. After 1:08:08 since I left the transition area I
handed over the number and the chip to Joris. Subtracting the 2 minutes all
other people spend transitioning from bike to run (was quite a long walk in the
transition area), my bike split for the 40 km was 1:06:40, which makes an
average speed of exactly 36 km/h. This is by far my best time trial ever! Just
to compare: the 40 km in a trio during the Berlin Triathlon in 2010 I finished
in 1:05:11, but drafting was allowed back then and I was the full time together with a
really great bunch of excellent cyclicts, which is a lot easier than doing it
all alone.
I changed
clothes while Joris were running four times around the lake, and he did that really fast.
At the end I had to hurry up to get with Simon to the area where the trios were
joined to finish together. We then followed Joris to the finish line and
celebrated his personal best on 10 km: 0:40:40. So every one of us got to the limit, did
his personal best in this team competition. But we still had the impression
that something was wrong, as we never heard a ‘beep’ confirming we crossed the
mat…
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| Finished, happy, but...do we have a time? |
A few hours
later the confirmation was online: we finished fifth in 2:04:49, FIFTH (!!!), but no
intermediates were recorded. Clearly the chip didn’t work, but I really appreciate
the organisers put us in the ranking. This great result needs to be recorded. My
sports year was really amazing to date, with two cycling classics in spring,
the ‘Styrkeproven’ between Trondheim and Oslo in June, cycling the Alps in July
and now my best result ever in a competition. All thumbs up and thanks to Simon
and Joris for this cool adventure and the great performance!
