We were camping at St David's for the week, so I googled St Daivds Triathlon and found this was being run on the first Sunday we were there - perfect! Noisy neighbours prevented sleep until gone midnight, up at 6am. Had porridge, grapes and yogurt as normal (and had had fish and chips the night before for tea). Had a gel about 30 mins before I swam

Swim

After waiting over an hour from registration to my alloted time of 8:58 for the swim, they were running about 10 mins behind. I stayed with Charlotte and the boys and finally went down to get wet in the baby pool before queing up for my turn... but as I walked into the pool area I heard a 'there he is' and I was almost straight into it. The lady said I had enough time to get wet in the baby pool (which was lovely and warm), passed me a cap and I went over to the wating lane counter and got into the pool (not so warm, but normal). The lady counted 3,2,1 and I was off. Cant remember swimming especially well, certainly dont recall concentrating on my stroke or making sure I pulled htrough etc, but I looked at my watch at 100m and it was 1:24 - equal to my best ever time, so I knew I was swimming well and carried on. After about 8 lengths I caught the swimmer in front, (there were 2 other people in my line besides me) and touched his feet but at the wall they didnt stop, so for the next length I was stuck behind them, couldnt overtake as the third swimmer was coming the other way. At the next wall the person was told to wait and I overtook him. I finished the swim in 6:10 (according to the 910xt) and quickly got out, and ran over to the exit, outside, slipped on the now wet flag stones, anf ran around the building a bit warily of slipping again. Out onto the carpark, and into t1 and found my bike.

t1

I had planned to put socks on so sat down and pulled them on, but it took a long time over wet feet and ankles, the socks just didnt want to slide up nicely. I got my shoes on, helmt, sunglasses, grabbed a gel and put it between my teeth and ran off to the mount line. Putting the socks on took the most time by far.

bike

Onto the bike I couldnt clip my left foot in for a few trys but finally got it and was off. I pressed start on the Edge 305 as that had the course plotted into it. I cycled for mabe 2 miles with the gel between my teeth before I could finally let off a little and open it. Already overtaking several riders I started going up the several undulating hills. All along the way I overtook people, no one overtook me for the entire ride. The last mile or 2 of the loop were down a long, wide, straight dual carriageway. There were no cars so I let rip, pedalling all the way, and hit 41 mph. Into the 2nd lap I was slowing down a bit but carried on. I drank occassionally but not enough, I was working hard enough that drinking was a bit awkward. Again hit 41 mph down the hill and then up the hill back to the leisure centre was much slower.

t2

T2 was fine, dismounted fine, racked the bike, swapped shoes, took helmet and glasses off, grabbed last gel and ran off. no issues.

run

Almost the whole of the first mile was downhill, a bit steep in places so feet were slapping down quite hard. The watch wasnt on the right page so I didnt know my pace and didnt press the right button to change it. When I did it was in km, which means nothing to me. It flahed up 6 something for the first mile, which felt good, and then it was a flat mile out onto the breakwater and back. 2nd mile was sub 7 to I think, but then I hit the steps back up - nearly reduced me to walking, very tough on the legs and breathing, and it took a long while to get back up to speed. Finally a little flat back to the leisure centre and I was done. Result came out and I was 5th, out of 98 starters. Very pleased with that, and 4th was 45 seconds ahead so it wasnt like I just missed out. Thinking back I could have pushed harder on the bike, but the run was very tough. Need to try biking and running without socks, that would save 20-30 seconds...