Beaulieu Duathlon

Excellent fun, great day out. Well, great morning out!
Haven't got the official times yet, but unofficial, around 2 hours 5 minutes for the lot, which was 5 minutes off goal pace, and 10 minutes off ideal.
However, great fun nonetheless.
Was an early start and did not have great preparation last night, as the clocks went forward, my little boy decided to have a restless night and I couldn't sleep well, plus had not eaten great yesterday either. Up at 5:30, prepared drinks etc, and packed up the car. Ate shreddies, toast, gel and couple of nutrigrain bars and a banana.
Off we went for a 50 minute drive to Beaulieu. Race start at 9am. First lesson learned, must do proper warm up and get my legs moving and heartrate up. 10 minutes into the bike, into a strong and bitter headwind, calves started to cramp up, purely due to the cold. Lesson 2, should have worn leg warmers!! I have been doing in training and they are very comfy, but for some reason, decided not to do so today. There were 45 competitors, some very serious athletes on some very serious machines, and the run set off round a trail, all off road. Two 5km laps, not the most interesting of courses, but nice and undulating, and had to work hard. That said, here comes lesson number 3 - get pace right at start. Actually to be fair, my pace at the start was good and I planned to build it up, but then I got talking to a nice chap who had done Xterra triathlon in Maui last year and had done Half Ironman UK and was out today for a bit of a social, so I ran alongside until the start of the second lap, whereupon I looked at my watch to realise I was 5 minutes down on where I wanted to be! Too slow, too much chat not enough fat!!
So I bid farewell and decided to put foot to floor and make an effort to claw back some time, which I did very well. I think I was through 5km in 28 minutes, very poor, but I ended up finishing the 10k in around 49, so 21 minutes for second 5km pretty good.
Transition was reasonably quick, decided against shoes in bike and just ran to mount line with them on feet, stopped to hop on bike and then off we went, got off to a flyer, felt fantastic on the bike, and felt good the whole way round. In fact I could have gone a whole lot faster were in not for the cramp, really stopped me hammering it. Even into the wind I was passing other competitors. Went passed maybe 12-15 competitors in all and made up a lot of time. My word, the Scott Plasma is a quick bike, and I highly recommend Continental's triathlon tyres, very light and low resistance.

So two 15km laps and back into transition. Lesson number 4, do not take feet out of shoes on bike too soon. Took em out then realised there was a small climb to get up and couldn't generate a lot of speed, which probably cost me almost 2 minutes. Bike time was around 50 minutes for 30km, so very pleased with that time, as the headwind section really slowed me down, and I didn't really get into as higher gear as I should have. But on a positive not my average cadence was good , up at 89 rpm. Excellent, just need to push that cadence in a higher gear and I will be motoring, really getting my bike splits down.

Nice quick change into running shoes in transition 2, but my calves at this point were very sore, and not enjoying it at this point. First time of running off the bike that I felt really out of sorts. But that lasted maybe 5 minutes and I eventually got into my stride and kept good pace, even though legs hurting a bit. Passed by only one runner with 2km to go, and finished strong.
2 hours and 5 minutes, rough estimate as I forgot to stop my watch on the line.

Duathlons are hard. Very hard on the legs, but this will stand me in good stead for June's Ironman 70.3. I know I've got the bike endurance, as I got stronger the longer I was out there. Plus my 3rd run split was still good, around 24 minutes I think. And was good to get that run distance in my legs. Bit of sports massage this week should sort them out. Very easy week ahead into next Sundays sprint tri in Hungerford.

On the whole, was very positive day today, training has paid off, and I can see where I went wrong, where I can improve, what I need to do better for race prep and how to pace myself. I know I can afford to go a lot harder in all areas, as my aerobic fitness is excellent, recovery is very good, and I was very strong on the bike today, ripped up the one hill climb twice into a headwind without getting out of the saddle, always a nice feeling.
Also it is nice to see what you did well, and I can take a lot from this first race of the season and apply it to the rest of the year's races, and training as well.

Nutrition:

1 power gel and 500ml of SIS electrolyte drink 15-20 minutes before race start. Power gel and water when setting off on bike. 750 ml SIS electrolyte on bike( helped with the cramp), 750 ml SIS Energy drink. 1 power gel towards end of bike. Water from drinks table in transition, 250 ml SIS electrolyte. Nothing through to the finish. 1 cup of tea!! ( and I don't drink it, but it was good!) and then 750 ml SIS Recovery drink, water when home. Just about got the nutrition right, but will look at alternative to the power gels, very sticky, sweet and sit not great on stomach. Alright in training, but when at full race pace, not the best for me to take on board. I am trying Torq energy and electrolyte drink in training at the moment, pleasant taste and not at all sweet, will try their bars as well.

Official results http://www.racenewforest.co.uk/Results_Beaulieu%20Duath07.htm