ITU World Age Group Triathlon Championships. Chicago
Chicago Standard Distance Race report
Happiness is…..
…….Winning my age group at standard distance World Triathlon
Championship for the second year running. Having been defending champion in my
age group 75-79 the pressure was really on.
It was after a night of impressive thunder storms that
caused the race organisers to change the time of the elite women’s race and
cancel the eve of race, age group bike check in, as well as cancelling the
World Triathlon Sprint Championship award ceremony that race morning began.
The start pontoon was a little un-stable when the older
women’s wave went off, and also when what my husband calls the 'Old Gits' wave,
left ten minutes later. It was actually
during the later wave starts, that they altered the swim course and cut it down
to half distance for the half dozen AG waves that were left to start. The
reason being, that the start pontoon had all but broken away from the harbour
wall.
The swim was more challenging for the Standard Distance
Worlds with a slight chop and a quite strong current running that was pulling
swimmers out toward the open water away from the shore and the shelter and safety
of the harbour wall. I had a really strong swim that I was very happy with and
after exiting the water there was a long barefoot run to transition1, of around
360 metres during which time you were only allowed to take your wetsuit off
down to your waist. There then was run almost as long again through the sand
and grass transition and out to the mount line for the bike section.
All week long everybody had been dreading 40km the bike
because much of the two lap route was on underground sections of a three level
city main road. There has been endless talk about what glasses to wear because
of the sudden changes in light and gloom. I found the route to actually be very
good; it was like a time trial event or a race track. It was most disorientating
without daylight to tell you what direction you were travelling in. There were
quite a number of turns to left and right and some dead turns too but all the
turns had plenty of room and my own two laps of the course we pretty much the
same only dropping a few seconds on the second lap. My husband and I both had
very good bike times. Another 300 metres back into T2 after the bike and again
back out to start the run 10km proper. This meant that there must have been
well over a kilometre of extra running due to the long transitions.
The run was over the 10 km distance. Well over, and I was
glad when the multi lap course was over. Comparing notes afterwards, most
competitors agreed that the run was about 10.7 km. Feeling that I had given my
all after the run and feeling complete rubbish, I held no hopes of a podium
position and so did not check the notices on the way out of the post finish
recovery area.
Actually we had ambled back to transition to collect our
kit, ridden our bikes through the hazards of the city traffic back to our
hotel, run a bath and made coffee, before Steve looked online for the results.
I was just rinsing off my conditioner when Steve let out a noisy whoop and started
singing; ‘We are the Champions’ (That was not very good because he is no
Freddie Mercury). He then danced into the bathroom in his birthday suit to
congratulate me on retaining my World title. Unbelievable.
I think it was the swim that handed me the gold medal in my
age group and gave me a roughly 6.5 minute lead over the other women.
Swim: 34.31
T1: 7.20
Bike ride: 1 hour 22.01
T2: 4.58
Run: 1hour 22.13
Total time 3.31.00
The next morning we had a lovely swim in the pool that was
the training centre for Johnny Weissmuller when he was an Olympic swimmer,
years before he became better known at Tarzan. Very inspiring.
We celebrated and relaxed in Chicago ,
including enjoying a 'Trump Mojito' at 'Sixteen', the 16th floor terrace
of the Trump Towers
One very happy bunny here... No, two happy bunnies because
my coach/husband Steve is overjoyed about it.
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