PART ONE
Saturday 29th January saw me head up to Queensland’s Sunshine Coast to take part in my first ever offroad triathlon. I’d become a bit jaded with ‘traditional’ triathlons after going as far as I wanted to in that type of race, so I decided to move in a new direction and get into offroad multisport events with mountain biking and bush running and kayaking and whatnot.
The sun was shining although there was a bit of a howling southerly as the Tre-X Offroad Triathlon got underway. The swim was held in the lagoon of Twin Waters Resort just over the river from Maroochydore, and was held in water that was at least a couple of degrees than I was used do back down home. It was kind of like diving into a lukewarm bath – but more on that later!
The swim has always been my strongest leg, and I am pretty sure I got out of the water one of the first three in my age group after the 500m swim. This worked out to be just under 10 minutes.
I transitioned and headed out on the bike leg, which was muddy in places, sandy in others and incredibly windy. No chance here for getting into a rhythm and turning the legs over, and due to the flatness of the track, no chance of taking a break anywhere along the course as you coast down a nice big hill like what I’m used to with the Central Coast Mountain Bike Club at Ourimbah. As expected, a lot of the guys that I left in my wake during the swim overtook me during this bike leg, along with a couple of the speedsters that took off in the waves after. It does kind of make one think “Why did I bother going to that effort in the swim if my lead was just going to be in vain before I’ve even finished lap 1 on the bike?”
The track wasn’t technical at all, but they tried to make it more interesting for the more advanced mountain bikers by putting a plank bridge up and over a log that was about 2 feet high. I hit this and rolled up just fine, but as I got to the top I lost balance and my front wheel went off the side of the downramp. I thought I was going to go over the handlebars but fortunately the drop wasn’t too severe and I was able to keep my front forks from going under my centre of gravity. I swore I’d do better at this on my second lap, but the same happened. Third lap? I took the chicken run to the left!
There was also a rather sketchy bit going around a corner where my front wheel hit a loose patch of dirt and slid out. I have no idea how I managed to unclip in time to plant my foot, but some sort of Jedi reflexes must have been at work and I managed to stay on.
Off the bike and off on a run, which consisted predominantly of sand running through the dunes and along the beach. Thankfully I’d been heading back out with the Shoreline Shufflers on Tuesday mornings lately, and doing a 7km dune and beach run around Norah Head. As we got on the beach proper, there was an awesome tailwind blowing us on. I had to smile as I saw a bunch of runners coming back into the headwind and were running along at each others’ shoulders staying out of the wind, a bit like a one-sided flying V!
At the turn, I understood totally why they were doing that, as the headwind was a bitch! I caught up to the rabbit in front of me who seemed to be struggling and offered to be his windbreaker, but he only managed to keep up with me for half a click before walking again. Poor bugger.
Off the beach and back into the resort and a finish on the beach around the lagoon. As usual, I jumped back into the water to cool off, but as the water was so warm it was not refreshing in the least! For once I wished that it was like Terrigal in mid-winter which is so spannerish that one’s nuts wind up in one’s small intestines!
So my first offroad tri was over and I loved it! Admittedly, this event is a double header so I’ll be back tomorrow morning to do it all again, so perhaps this time tomorrow night my love for such events will have waned a bit! Nevertheless, unless I wake up in the morning and my calves are like very painful rocks or my arms have fallen off I’ll be back there to back up – even if I cannot replicate today’s time!
The summary:
Swim: 500m in 9:40
MTB: 11.8km in 48:30. Avg speed 14.6km/h. Avg HR 159BPM
Run: 5.85km in 34:20. Avg pace 5:53/km. Avg HR 160BPM
TOTAL: 1:35:30.
Full details at Garmin Connect
PART TWO
Despite going to bed with a slightly tight right calf, I awoke at 5am the following morning feeling pretty good. As I packed the car, I didn’t feel any worse for wear than if I had just done a regular training session the previous day as opposed to an actual sprint triathlon. I headed over to Twin Waters and checked in again, then went in search of a coffee. The buffet restaurant was open so I paid $28 for a cup, and feeling a bit silly about that I also had some cereal and a bacon & egg bagel. Still very pricey for $28, but then again the surplus dollars were being injected into the Queensland economy so I didn’t mind. I might have regrets when the wife checks the credit card statement though…
The Sunday morning race not only saw a lot of people backing up from the evening before, but also the short-course people just doing the one-day event, and all the little kiddies on K-mart bikes doing a teaser race. The kids took off early, then they let us long course people hit the water. This time since I knew in all modestly I was one of the more stronger swimmers I made sure I was at the front of the pack to hit the water, and was again one of the first to clamber out after swimming around the Twin Waters lagoon. There was one dude who was a bloody strong swimmer who went way off course and had to do a 90 degree turn 50m to the left of the second buoy to get back on track, and still managed to finish around the same time as me!
Leaping onto trusty Mr Mountain Bike again, I pushed it a bit harder than the day previously, and since I knew the track a bit better I was able to knock a minute and a bit off each lap. This is not to say that there weren’t oodles of faster mountain bikers overtaking me every step of the way making me wish that the swim leg was longer and had more a bearing on the outcome of the race. The first two laps I just cut my losses from yesterday’s race and took the B-line over the log rather than risking the plank bridge, but on my third lap I thought I’d sack up and give it one last go. Success! I handled the up ramp and the down ramp and rode away feeling like I had just won the entire race, only to slip out and hit the dirt less than a minute later. Obviously my Jedi reflexes had not recovered from the day before…
Nevertheless, I managed to jump off the bike around three or four minutes quicker than the day before.
Back into transition and out on the run, I concentrated just on putting one foot in front of the other and breathing. That’s always the key. I was determined not to let my good swim and bike efforts be in vain, so I pushed it out a bit harder than the day before, and headed over to the beach. At about the halfway mark a nasty little shorebreak surge lapped up onto the nice hard sand I was running on and washed over my feet. Possibly because I had my Vibrams up tighter than the day before, some sand got lodged in between the inside of both feet and the shoes rather than draining through, and started grinding away the skin there. I didn’t think it was too bad and knew I only had 15 minutes to go so I just soldiered on.
I ran down to the end of the beach and headed back, thanking the Flying Spaghetti Monster that the wind had swung around and was now blowing directly onshore and across the run rather than giving us the Mother Of All Headwinds. I ambled up, noting that I was managing to stay ahead of many people who were still heading up to the turn but who had been ahead of me the day before. One lass was simply hooning along about 500m behind me, and I knew that she at least would catch me before the finish.
Back into Twin Waters and with the finish line in sight, the hooning lass passed me but I didn’t really care. I was just glad that I was able to cross the line five minutes quicker than the day before. I didn’t bother jumping back into the lagoon to cool down as I knew the warm water really wouldn’t be that refreshing, but instead headed back to transition to get my gear together and get ready for the 11 hour drive home.
Day 2 Summary
Swim: 500m in 9:10
MTB: 11.8km in 44:00. Avg speed 15.9km/h. Avg HR 155BPM
Run: 5.85km in 33:20. Avg pace 5:36/km. Avg HR 154BPM
TOTAL: 1:29:30.
Full details at Garmin Connect
The final verdict? For me, offroad triathlon is much more enjoyable than ‘traditional’ triathlon. It’s just something about a bike leg where there are turns and bends and logs and trees jumping out in front of you that appeals to me much more than just turning the cranks over along a straight road. This, combined with the fact that regular triathlon running is along a flat, even surface as opposed to stuff that moves means that I’ll be doing more and more off the offroad stuff as time goes on. I will still do the occasional onroad sprint or maybe Olympic-distance triathlon, but more as a cross-training session for my new passion.
Bring on the Bay Adventure!
