I started with tumble turns at the deep end and touch turns at the shallow end, but after a couple of tumbles that were ok, but not quite my best, I decided that the extra breath from touch turns was worth more. As with Huntly I ended up doing pretty much a straight time trial. The one guy ahead of me kept a decent pace to about half way but was always too far ahead to draft from. Then he must have had a couple of bad turns or slowed for a couple of laps and I was onto him and past him without getting any real benefit.
My official swim time is 13:08. But that includes the section through the changing rooms to the timing mats for transition. Garmin swim has me at 12:56. Either way it is a PB swim, but I am going to lean on garmin as being accurate enough to claim a sub-13 and take that as my target for the year completed. This means that Westhill in 2 weeks I can afford to go for a lot more tumble turns and if the time comes out slower I can still be happy with having completed my target for the year.
Transition was clean and tidy. Not spectacular, but no mistakes.
The rain had been on heavy whilst we were in the pool so the roads were wet but the rain seemed to have stopped. I mounted and got settled in pretty quickly. The bike route for Inverurie is fairly lumpy and with the wet roads I was a bit nervous on my TT bike. This was then made much worse when a torrential storm started. It absolutely bucketed down for the section from Chapel of Garioch all the way to Blairdaff. This meant cycling lines were hard to choose as avoiding potential potholes under the river was pretty much guesswork.
The basic story with the bike was the same as usual, every time I went uphill someone passed me but every time it turned downhill or even onto a flattish straight I was managing to make all the places back. Even though I was being quite nervous and defensive on the high speed sections I was still going faster than the racers around me.
I actually felt great on the bike though despite the rain. T2 was pretty clean as well, despite my now drenched socks squelching into my running shoes. A quick glance at my watch and it said my bike plus transition was under the hour mark. Initially I thought this was a mistake so I ignored it. It turned out to be right as I was 7 minutes faster than any of my previous bike times for this course.
The rain had been on heavy whilst we were in the pool so the roads were wet but the rain seemed to have stopped. I mounted and got settled in pretty quickly. The bike route for Inverurie is fairly lumpy and with the wet roads I was a bit nervous on my TT bike. This was then made much worse when a torrential storm started. It absolutely bucketed down for the section from Chapel of Garioch all the way to Blairdaff. This meant cycling lines were hard to choose as avoiding potential potholes under the river was pretty much guesswork.
The basic story with the bike was the same as usual, every time I went uphill someone passed me but every time it turned downhill or even onto a flattish straight I was managing to make all the places back. Even though I was being quite nervous and defensive on the high speed sections I was still going faster than the racers around me.
I actually felt great on the bike though despite the rain. T2 was pretty clean as well, despite my now drenched socks squelching into my running shoes. A quick glance at my watch and it said my bike plus transition was under the hour mark. Initially I thought this was a mistake so I ignored it. It turned out to be right as I was 7 minutes faster than any of my previous bike times for this course.
Out on to the run and the rain had eased to just a light drizzle. There were a couple of people just ahead of me that I felt I could get to. I actually managed to pass them within the first half mile or so. I could see another couple of people ahead but they were moving pretty much at the same speed as me or easing away and I couldn't get to them. On the second lap I also had a couple of people from the final heat come onto their first lap. I was surprised at how I was managing to almost stay with them. It was a struggle but the drizzle eased off and I was managing to move my running style so I felt like I was actually running rather than just slogging along to get to the end of a race like normal.
I actually had a fantastic run. Almost a minute under my previous best run for this course.
Hugely faster than my previous attempts at this race, despite the weather. I had hoped to go under 1hr 40 and when the rain started I thought this might be quite tough, but I really am in great shape at the minute and managed to carve a huge chunk of my previous bike times and finished in 1hr 35:14.
I actually had a fantastic run. Almost a minute under my previous best run for this course.
Hugely faster than my previous attempts at this race, despite the weather. I had hoped to go under 1hr 40 and when the rain started I thought this might be quite tough, but I really am in great shape at the minute and managed to carve a huge chunk of my previous bike times and finished in 1hr 35:14.
Split times | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Total time | Pos. male | Speed | Pace | Split time | Speed split time | Pace split time | |
![]() | 13:08 | 17![]() | 3.43 km/h | 17:30 min/km | 13:08 | 3.43 km/h | 17:30 min/km |
![]() | 15:44 | 29![]() | - | - | 2:36 | - | - |
![]() | 1:14:43 | 14![]() | 23.89 km/h | 2:30 min/km | 58:59 | 29.50 km/h | 2:02 min/km |
![]() | 1:15:31 | 14 ![]() | - | - | 48.0 | - | - |
![]() | 1:35:14 | 12 ![]() | 21.89 km/h | 2:44 min/km | 19:43 | 15.22 km/h | 3:56 min/km |