Just Before the "Big One" .............

The Ice Still Hasn't Melted on Loch Tay by August

The nerves are starting to jangle now as I approach the big one.  As mentioned previously I face 80% of the total challenge mileage this weekend as I take on the Aberfeldy Middle (yes, there are Long ones) Distance Triathlon which is half of the Ironman distance.  So as a re-cap I will swim 1.9km, bike 90km and then run a half-marathon (21.1km).  The Daily Record Ironman column uses the following description......."This is a half Ironman distance thrash and will be a real test of my fitness and mental determination.  The event is set in deepest darkest Perthshire and takes competitors through some of the most picturesque parts of Scotland.  It is widely regarded as one of the harder days on the triathlon calendar - with a 1.9km swim in the balmy waters of Loch Tay, followed by a 'sticky' 60 mile bike ride before finishing with an undulating half-marathon past Harry Potter author JK Rowlings palatial pad."

Catering Choice of Champs

Preparations haven't been perfect this week as I have been suffering from a serious illness that has adversely impacted my training.  Now I know when I am getting ill and this week the symptoms went from relatively benign to life-threatening within hours - when the nose runs I can normally get by with a persistent manly sniff, in more serious situations I may have to deploy the back of the hand (possibly a sleeve) but this week it all went ballistic and I had to reach for the hankies.  A more fragile man would probably have ended up in the ER and would call it pneumonia but I sniffed in the face of adversity.  My diet has also been challenging since Shakey and I Big Mac'd after Ayr and final race fuelling today has been sub-optimal including a sausage roll, a Tunnocks Tea Cake with too many Americanos and some out of date Walkers Crisps.  I have managed to carb load in the evenings though for most of the week and my new favourite pasta is now Tripoline - a pasta with ruffles - camp but tasty! 

I am now starting to look forward to some seriously bad eating next week when the big event is over.  And having managed to get to a couple of fringe shows this week (and the Fringe is a very different experience when you are sober) I am developing my usual unhealthy fixation with Nastro Azzuro while I am training hard for an event.  After the Great Scottish Swim on the 21st I expect to go seriously off the rails for a few hours (possibly days)!!

Pam has volunteered to marshall at the event this weekend which is very altruistic.  However, I think she has other less charitable reasons - the free event t-shirt that marshalls get, an invite to join me at the pre-race pasta party on Saturday night and I think she may have misunderstood me when I said that the marshalls at these events deserve a medal.  I suspect she may have illusions of driving me home all blinged up!!

For those worrying about why Shakey isn't joining me for this event.  Well to be honest she is starting to feel her age, has a dodgy hip and is quite frankly just not fit enough.  And secondly, after Ayr last weekend she has discovered that she has spiders living under her skin and has developed a very irritating itch.  She will be back next weekend, hopfeully, less her new friends for the Great Scottish Swim.  In the meantime, she is showing solidarity and is spending this evening "taking one for the team" by having my share of beer at the Spiegeltent as well as her own.

Another aspect of less than perfect prep tonight was the lawn again.  I am pretty sure Chris Hoy didn't get sent out to the back green by his mum just before he headed to Beijing but Pam said the grass was a disgrace and to make my way out and cut it.  Once the scyth had got it down to knee height it was pretty straightforward to trim after that.  The remaining stubble then became a pretty good base to gather all of my gear for the weekend.  In the interests of not shredding my more delicate moving parts packing involves all sorts of ointments and options for changing into at the transitions during the event.  And to ensure I have a fair chance of walking into the office under my own steam on Monday I have packed compression clothes (in fact, lets call it what it is - extreme lycra!) for afterwards which apparently aid recovery.  I am not sure there will be enough space in Pam's 4WD to get everything in for the weekend.  Bear in mind for a night away Pam will need shoe "options" that would cover the whole lawn.

If my eyes are working the run course will be beautiful

For a quick preview of Sunday it goes like this......8am race briefing in Kenmore (pictured at top), 0820 enter frigid waters of Loch Tay (currently boasting a sultry 12C) for "warm up", 0830 we're off for a 1.9k swim.  Then on to the bike for a 90k jolly over the Schiehallion Road, a loop of Loch Rannoch and then into Aberfeldy.  After a brief warm-up we start climbing for about 6 miles then it is flat for about 40miles and then we do the climb again on the way back.  At the moment I am still planning to ride Jezebel (aka the Temptress) this weekend because she is fast as anything on the flats but feisty and hard work on the climbs - I may have a last minute change of bikes in the morning if my legs are remotely tired or I just chicken out.  Following the bike we start the run along the River Tay in Aberfeldy on what is euphemistically described as an "undulating" course.

Stock saved from fire at fetish shop

I'm a big enough boy that I can admit to a few fears.  Firstly the old one armed swim - the water is cold and I am slightly concerned about getting cramp in the functioning arm.  Secondly, the hills in the bike - I am pretty rubbish going up them ................ and I tend to break limbs coming down them.  And I always hurt my legs in some manner when I am running......or lose toe nails.  And then there is the nutrition - I will use 6-7000 calories during the course of the event and, to avoid the wall, I need to be taking in about 60 grammes of carbs per hour.  With all that synthetic high energy food being forced into my stomach while I cycle and run there is every chance that I will develop the trots, throw up etc etc etc.  The weather forecast currently has the temp between 20 and 24C and with the wind at zero mph - perfect conditions for dehydration.  Oh, excellent exactly what my tender, rebelling stomach will really need at that point will be gallons of water chucked on top with artificially effervescent electrolytes.

This is such a big challenge that my only aim is to finish.  I am hoping to get in about 7 hours after I start with all limbs intact. 

This afternoon I passed through the £3000 mark with the fundraising which will make all of that so worthwhile.  Thanks again for all the support so far.  Yes, if you haven't yet had the opportunity you can still sponsor me.

That's it.  The next update will be post event.  

Stage One - Ayr Open Water Triathlon

Take a seat.  This is a long one.

At last, it's all underway!  After a final long training ride on Saturday evening I took the opportunity for an early night.  Honestly by then I needed it - travelling to a triathlon is like planning a moon-landing - bike rack, bike, watch, water bottles, pump, repair kit, wetsuit, cap, goggles, trainers, cycling shoes, socks shorts and vest, shades, bike helmet, gels, bananas and energy bars, number belt, race licence, mobile, money, towels, warm clothes, lube and sun screen.  Now if only I had used the sun screen............

If you have been following the blog you will be aware that Sunday was the ultimate grudge match - Phelps versus Bolt, swimmer versus runner as Stumpy and Shakey went head to head in a battle of wills and a triathlon for the first time.  In the interests of balanced reportage I have magnanimously allowed the Shakester to write her own perspective of the race (no doubt she will win that version by miles).  Did we kill each other on the drive through, were any new injuries incurred, who won?  The answer to all these questions and more will follow.

Before that, though, did you know that the Daily Mail costs 50p?  As I have now written 8 of these blogs I think that has been a damned fine return on your kind donations as I reckon I have covered more news than the Daily Mail ever does!  I have been frequently asked why I have taken on the challenge and apart from obvious personal reasons I was so incensed by an article in the Daily Mail a couple of years ago that I wanted to raise awareness of the issue and overcome bigoted, ill-informed opinions.  The article that forced me to break my shoulder, tear my calf and stub my toe (damn near fatally) is here - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1093668/Even-daughters-lunchtime-walnut-cake-banned-Why-allergy-hysteria-just---Nuts.html.  Now heaven forbid chubby little Petronella can't gorge herself on walnut cake after her goats cheese and pesto pieces but is it really unreasonable for schools to provide life-saving guidance to parents to allow children with severe alllergies to live a normal life??  Perhaps it is time to read something else while the Daily Mail encourages tripe like this to be published in it's editorial.

Anyways, back to the racing.  A 0730 rendezvous outside Markies called for an indecently early Sunday morning.  The only other drivers on the roads had their windows down and were obviously weaving their way home from the pub but Shakey and I just stank of Powerade and Deep Heat.  Remarkably, despite our excessively competitive relationship we managed to not talk about who was going to win for the whole 2hr journey.  On arrival we managed to park about two counties away and made our way to the transition area with sherpas and pack horse to carry all the gear.  We were still an hour early, we were nervous and there were only two portaloos.......

We got our transition areas set up and wandered on to the bridge to survey the swim.  Ducks and swans frollicked in the shallows of the river and, other than their forced smiles, gave no clue of the frigid waters that lay below.  Fifteen minutes to go and, in the blazing sun, the comedy started as clowns of all shapes and sizes wrestled with their rubber suits.  The techniques adopted varied from the stork-like one legged approach to lying on the back and pulling the suit up your legs with all your might.  No-one retained any dignity.  In my shiny new Daffyd top (which is sleeveless) I sported the 2010 tourist tan from hours on the bike which looked like I was wearing a fresh white t-shirt under my tri-top.

As the temperature rose the delegates from the S&M conference gathered outside

There was a quick race briefing which mentioned road re-surfacing, danger, falling off, abrasive skin injuries, broken bodies and I started to suffer flashbacks to the last bike crash.  I made a mental note to go slow on the new road.  Unsportingly, nobody mentioned the impending water hazard.  As we went in to the polar ice flow to "warm up"  I saw some seasoned campaigners emit silent screams and curl into foetal positions - only then did it become apparent that rivers are colder than lochs!  Shakey and I timidly made our way forward with the crowd and, had I been able to breath, I would have muttered some kind words of comfort and reassurance.  Instead I emitted a squeal like a 4 year old girl that had just been handed a pink bike with handlebar streamers and stabilizers.  The look on 77 people's faces gave away that all and sundry were deploying the internal central heating inside their wetsuits and slowly the water temperature rose a couple of degrees. 

The World Pooh Sticks Championships proved challenging this year 

The start felt like a washing machine on a spin cycle - I counted being kicked twice in the head before losing consciousness and then I had the feeling of dread as someone started to swim up my back - they came right over the top treating me to a prolonged dooking in glacial water.  As I resurfaced I gathered my thoughts, considered discretion as the better part of valour and moved from one armed crawl to breastroke.  Shakey may have drowned at the start but by this point a great white shark on weight watchers wouldn't have made me turn around to face the 50 or so swimmers behind me closing in fast like a shoal of pirhanas.   Bizarrely the water was only waist deep so at the turn buoy everyone stood up and jogged - being economically legged I thought that they were all giants.  On the way down the second leg I passed Shakey and shouted encouragement - the response was either very swearey or an involuntary reaction to hypothermia - regardless, a race is a race and I pushed on.  By the third lap I had some space and my fear of shoulder dislocation passed; I turned on the after-burners with a two-armed front crawl, and despite an alarming tendon ping as my arm came over the top I motored past a couple of dozen tiring swimmers and exited the water to a big cheering crowd on the bridge and the shore.

With no need to do the Mel Gibson shoulder dislocation a la Lethal Weapon 2, the wetsuit came off a treat and I started the bike leg.  And then I went up a hill for miles and miles.  Despite coming back to the same place there didn't seem to be as much downhill as up - how does that work?  Now at this point the error of my ways with the sunscreen was becoming apparent as I cut through the Ayrshire late morning like a scarlet exocet.  Whatever else happened I was going to have some new tan lines.  Well, the road resurfacing was as scary as promised and even the mentalist bikists slowed themselves down for a couple of miles but then we were on the home straight and the race was back on.  The ride back to was pleasant with great support from the marshalls and a large crowd at the transition really gave a lift before setting off on the run.  All the time I was looking over my shoulder looking for old Shakey because I knew I needed to have 6 minutes on her at the start of the run to have any chance of victory.

Now, I have discovered that one of the most depressing things in life is meeting people approaching the finish line as you are setting off on your run in a triathlon.  And they looked fresher than I felt!!  Within 1k we hit Horrible Hill which lived up to it's billing.  One fellow runner promised me he would puke if it went on any longer and another fella took the opportunity for a pee stop.  Unusually, I really enjoyed the run although my calves we sore as anything and I even managed a sprint for the spectators as the crowd got thicker towards the finish line.  And then I waited for Shakey, and waited, and waited.  I even went to the river to see if she "hadn't made it" but there was no sign of the Coastguard.  Sometime later my stubble had grown a couple of inches, I had developed a deep tan, I had showered and had my tea and then off along the sea front I saw the familiar loping stride picking off runners as she neared the finish line.  She finished elegantly and then, good friend that I am, I chucked a cup of water at her and had to listen to her blah, blah, blah about her cold tootsies.

The winning margin in my report was 9m 45s where I put down most of the lead in the swim but unexpectedly held on for a 25min 5km in the run.  Disappointingly the Ayr club were not offering T-shirts as campaign honours nor was there bling to wear to McDonalds for lunch.  Instead they gave us a number belt which is a bit like a suspender belt but much less interesting.  When we got back to the transition it was like Shakey had just got in from a night at Scruffy Murphys and there was a trail of swim cap, goggles, wetsuit, cycling shoes, towel, socks, bike, toast and crisps (I may have exaggerated the last two) strewn over about 20metres squared.  Compared to my neatly folded wetsuit and cycling shoes placed parallely together it was an absolute pikey disgrace.

We watched a bit of the prize giving and then thought we should head back on the 4 mile walk to the car.  Apparently my red House of Fraser carrier bag was an affront to Shakey's high standards of triathlon style and she refused to walk with me.  Maybe it was the carrier bag or maybe she just had to shed a tear on her own......

If you are interested on another perspective of the race (ie from the back of the field) then you should read on.

So after months of training (AND whining about a sore calf, sore ankle, sore shoulder, sore toe, sore hand, sore foot, sore head etc etc) Dougie (AKA Stumpy) finally started his August challenge on Sunday..... And I rather foolishly decided to join him for the ride. Unfortunately neither of us buy into “it’s the taking part that counts” so to say things got a bit heated in the run up to the big day is a slight understatement. It's amazing really that we were actually still talking on Sunday morning.

A departure time of 7.30am meant a quiet evening on Saturday. Despite numerous friends assurances that pints of magners in the Spiegeltent counted as carb loading, I managed to fight the urge to go out and spent the evening milling into pasta on my sofa watching Tonights the Night with John Barrowman. (I won’t be staying in on a Saturday ever again.)

The 90 mile journey to Ayr was surprisingly cordial with both of us stifling the urge to wind the other up. Now I would like to say this was a last ditch effort at good sportsmanship on both our behalfs but it wasn’t…. We were simply still a bit stunned at getting out of bed at 6.30am on a Sunday for something other than a trip to the kitchen for water to treat the hangover. We arrived at our destination fairly calm and relaxed..... and then we saw how far the transition area was from the car park.... Did these people not realise we literally only had 750m swim, 20km cycle and 5km run in our legs???

As we made the trek from the car to the transition area it slowly dawned on us that this was not quite the amateur affair we were hoping for. Stumpy, with his red plastic house of fraser bag, and me, with my suped up BMX (thankfully I had taken the stabilisers off of it on Saturday!!), were essentially rocking up to compete in Formula 1 in a clapped out Nissan Micra. After setting out our kit in the transition area we did a quick recce of the portaloos (I would soon realise why the organisers had decided 2 portaloos were sufficient for a 100 strong crowd) and the river we were about to launch ourselves into. For the 15th time that morning I asked myself “What the feck have I gotten myself into?!?”. It was then back to the transition area to lube up and don the wetsuits. Now for anyone looking for a few laughs on a Sunday morning I would recommend looking up your local triathlon events, as even the Fringe can’t compete with the comedy value of 100 people contorting themselves to get into rubber suits and caps.... Priceless.

At 11am we were summoned to the side of the river for the pre race briefing. This consisted of a man with a microphone yelling at us not to drown, get hit by a car or trip over our laces…. Oh and he also informed us that Ayr council, in their infinite wisdom, had decided to start resurfacing a 2 mile stretch of road so there was a good chance we would come a cropper at this point of the cycle…. Marvellous. We were then sent packing down into the arctic waters to “warm up” before kick off. When I heard the screams from those first in I decided the sensible option was to scramble back up the sand bank onto the safety of the grass. My escape was thwarted though by something gripping my arm and dragging me in. At first I thought it was one of the swams attacking me but then I noticed the yellow cap and realised it was stumpy…. For an old boy with a broken shoulder he was freakishly strong. So that was that there was no escaping now. As we stood in the river fighting hypothermia I slowly realised 2 things

1 – the combination of wetsuits and ice cold water meant there was method to the 2 portaloo madness - Use your imagination

2 – paddling in the sea in Spain 3 weeks before, and a 20min dip in Loch Ore Meadows does not qualify as sufficient training for a 750m swim in a river in Ayr

The whistle then blew and we were off… Or at least everyone else was. Now having only learned to swim properly in the last 6 months it’s fair to say that swimming is not my strong point, so I was prepared for a less than Olympic performance in the water. I was not however prepared for the kick I got in the face, the hundred odd gallons of water I swallowed or losing all feeling in my hands and feet. The swim leg of the race consisted of four 187.5 metre lengths of the river…. About 20m into the first length I considered calling over the rescue canoe to drag me out, but the fear of the swans (they can break your arm with their wing you know) and the shame of being labelled a DNF (ala stumpy in the 2010 Great Edinburgh Run in May) took over and I managed to complete this section of the race (albeit I was one of the last out of the water).

As I stumbled towards the transition area it dawned on me that if I was to claw back some of the dignity lost in the river and catch sight of Stumpy I was going to have to venture into unknown territory on the bike…. i.e take my hands of the brakes. This might seem a small thing to anyone else but given I have managed to fall off the stupid thing whilst stationery the idea of falling of it whilst moving terrifies me. Add to this my propensity for injuring myself (most recently of which a fractured coccyx…. Fancy medical term for broken arse) the idea of cycling 20km was rapidly losing it’s appeal. Nonetheless I battled on and after wrestling myself out of the wetsuit and into helmet/cycling shoes I set off. The race blurb on the triathlon website had indicated that this was not a particularly hilly cycle…. They'd lied. I figured though that as the cycle was a loop out and back with “breath taking scenery” the uphills and downhills would balance out….. they didn’t. Or at least that’s what it felt like. Oh and I didn’t notice the alleged “breath taking scenery" as my vision was blurred from the exertion of dragging myself up endless hills whilst simulataneously trying to avoid the Ayr boy racers playing chicken in their Subaru Imprezzas. Miraculously though I managed to catch a few of my opponents on the bike and actually began to enjoy the ride. The enjoyment was shortlived though as I arrived back into the transition zone to see the first of the male competitors crossing the finish line! I am now convinced that some of these guys have gills and so some sort of genetic testing should be done to validate their 9 minute swim times!!

Nonetheless as I was a mere 5km from competing my first open water triathlon I ploughed on with the run. Thankfully I’d finally gotten to the part which I could do…. Or so I thought. Having done a fair amount of running over the last couple of years, 5km is generally not particularly stressful. However after swimming (if you could call it that) 750m and cycling 20km a 5km run feels like trekking across the Andes in a pair of stilettos (Not that I or anyone else for that matter has ever done that but you get the idea). It took about a kilometre or so for the jelly legs to subside and me to regain control of my limbs (My feet finally began to thaw out from the swim now too which was a bonus). According to the race blurb this wasn't going to be a particularly hilly course.... They'd lied... Again. About 1 and a half kilometres in chalked on the ground were warnings of "Horrible Hill Up Ahead"..... They'd conveniently forgotten that from the pre race brief. Halfway up this mountain I had to jump into a ditch as the marshalls had decided to let one of the boy racers from earlier drive up it. This was not shaping up to be a record breaking 5km for me. But as I got to the top, I spied some opponents ahead of me and finally got a second wind. I managed to speed up and again miraculously overtook a few of my fellow competitors but unfortunately none of them were Stumpy. The last 1km of the run was through a housing estate (again not quite the "breath taking scenery" Ayr triathlon club had been shouting about, but thankfully the residents were out in their gardens cheering us on. As I came up the final stretch I finally spied Stumpy loitering in his lycra at the finish line. The police were about to issue a ticket for indecent exposure but fortunately I got there just in time to explain why he was terrorising the good folk of Ayr with the S+M type ensemble.

Unfortunately the story doesn't have a happy ending (i.e I didn't win) but I've taken comfort in the fact that this is the first (and last) time Stumpy has beaten me in an official race (although I question how official this even is as there was no medals at the end) so you should too. I've declined Stumpy's kind offer of joining him for his Half Ironman next weekend but I'll be wading into Strathcylde park with him the week after for another dose of hypothermia.

How interesting!  Anyway, Shakey has decided that as she is joining me for the last and first event and is also doing the NY Marathon that she has done as much as me in the challenge.  As I have pointed out I did 20% of my challenge mileage this weekend and will do 1% in the last weekend (and it is not anal to have calculated that if you are an ex-accountant!).  Which means that next weekend is the big one with a 1.9k swim, 90k bike and then a half marathon and hopefully home for tea (which may be a tasty IV drip) on Sunday evening.  An update will no doubt folllow.

I am delighted that I have now raised almost £2.8k but I will still be fundraising for another fortnight if you haven't had the opportunity yet!





   

The Eve of the Challenge

With the first leg of the challenge on Sunday morning the nerves are frayed and doubts are preying on my mind.  On my 8 mile run tonight it did cross my mind what a damned stupid challenge this is - and then I would trip over a kerb and remind myself that I can only concentrate on one thing at a time and that should be avoiding a face plant.  As promised in the last blog I have a big revelation relating to my horrific shoulder injury that was brought to my attention earlier in the week.  While still enjoying the anaesthetic (stella and kronenbourg) after the bike crash I was taken advantage of.  Despite being in the early stages of shock from my brutally broken shoulder I was mounted, possibly without my consent, and was so traumatised by events that I have blanked the memory for two months.  Only photographic evidence has convinced me that I had the ability to support another human while in that condition.

Shakey retains Stig like disguise

In the first of a series of guest contributions while I complete the events over the next few weeks I have enlisted the help of Pam as self-styled long suffering wife, support crew and now bloggist.  As technical analysis of my new swimming technique is sparse below I will give you a brief synopsis.  Yes, one arm swimming is possible in both butterfly and front crawl style although I am slightly concerned by the prospect of cramp in the good arm.  Breastroke with both arms is no problem.  Shakey was squeezed into the rubber suit and then squealed about the cold, the dirt and the crawlies.  While executing a gallant rescue while she was in distress I stubbed my toe on a rock and had to make an emergency medical appointment.  Now, I can say for sure that a stubbed toe (with broken nail) is sorer than a broken shoulder but it doesn't feel that "ironman" going into the beauticians in Cairneyhill for what turned out to be a pedicure.  Anyway, over to Pam........

Penguins v Ducks
Monday night slobbing in front of the TV watching Penguin Island was disrupted by the need for wet suit testing.  As the self appointed coach/support crew/photographer/medic/PR it was my duty to sit at the side of Loch Ore with finger poised over the emergency call button on my phone. Two creatures from the deep waded into the Loch with a lot of moaning about the jaggy stones. Blah blah blah - toughen up if you can’t handle some stones how are you going to get through the next 3 weeks. Oh did I mention I am also in charge of team psychology/mental toughness?
Thankfully it was a still night and no matter where the creatures went I could hear their inane chatter (how to breathe, marathons, hypothermia, man eating fish - that sort of nonsense).  So with that audible but incredibly dull reassurance I could actually fit in a few games of Harbour Master and Angry Birds on the iphone without worrying about whether they were drowning. Some other bloke from the boat club was doing a more thorough job of watching them as he shouted at them to get back to where you were allowed to swim and suitably chastised, they actually did what Mr Health and Safety had asked them to do.

In one magical moment I looked up and they were swimming in the only patch of sun that was shining on the Loch. It was a tad surreal and I was quite worried at this point. It was as if angels were coming for them and the emergency button was almost pressed as I feared there had been a fatal incident involving the large swans.  But with the uneviable choice of having to mount a rescue or eavesdrop on something infinitely more interesting I was quickly distracted by the arrival of some chavvy parents and kids with their 4 legged Heinz 57. The discussion on why Heinz wasn’t trying to kill the ducks was way too interesting to remember that a swan attack was in progress.  Their conclusion was that Heinz was gay! (I may has paraphrased that - I think it was because he was soft and gentle!).

After that distraction some pictures of the very much alive ducks were required.  I am really quite proud of my efforts. Oh yes, back to the swim session.  Apparently, they hadn't drowned or been beaten to death by marauding swans but were now getting close to the shore and good support team that I am, moved their flip flops down to where they were.  I know it sounds an inconvenience but to be honest I was quite glad to get up and do something as my arse was getting sore sitting on the concrete playing games.

Apparently Monday’s episode of Penguin Island was very sad and emotional so probably best that I was with the ducks.  If Team Sky want to headhunt me for next year's Tour de France I think I can quickly adapt from swim support to pro cycling.  Job done!

So, it's probably unlikely that a career in sports journalism beckons for Pam.  Anyway, despite being on friendly terms in training there is a real grudge match between Shakey and I at the weekend as we go head to head in the Ayr Triathlon.  Never before have two so obnoxiously competitive individuals ever gone head to head in the same event.  The tale of the tape......

Believe it or not money is actually being placed on this grudge match with 25% of the takings going to the Anaphylaxis Campaign.  Let me know through the comments if you would like to have a wager.  The form briefly is as follows.....

The Paddle
Stumpy currently has a broken shoulder but despite this handicap should emerge victorious as Shakey swims like a house brick

The Peddle
Stumpy has the fear on descents since breaking his arm in a ferocious high speed downhill accident (but didn't really feel anything) but Shakey is threatening to release the brakes on the downhills and may even go one handed if she has to wipe her nose.

The Waddle
Stumpy runs like Shrek and Shakey runs like a gazelle but will have to take a loo break at some point on the course.

We independently estimated our times and came up with a one minute gap over the 90 minute event.......obviously with me winning.

I will update with a race report on Monday and will start thinking about the half ironman then.  If you haven't had the opportunity to sponsor me yet there is still time......

4 Weeks to Go

So, it is now 4 weeks to go until the first event of the challenge. To re-cap it all looks like this.....

8th August - Ayr Sprint Triathlon (750m river swim, 20km bike and 5km run)
15th August - Aberfeldy Half-Marathon (1.9km loch swim, 90km bike and 21.1km run)
21st August - Great Scottish Swim (1 mile open water swim)

It doesn't really look too bad written down but by the time I start the half-marathon in Aberfeldy I suspect I will be suffering from total body collapse. Since I swapped the pleasures of fine alcohol (think Guinness and Jaeger bombs rather than Montrachet) and kebab (grilled chicken of course) in January last year for healthier pursuits I have run over one thousand miles and cycled nearly two thousand in preparation for these events.

Since the start of this year the mileage and time commitment has been substantial despite a spectacular collection of injuries.

The Bike - 1300 miles done, with one spectacular crash near the end of a 60miler
The Run - 350 miles done - 280 in the 2 months before the Rome Marathon and a measly 71 in the 5 months since
The Swim - 115 miles done. I use every excuse not to swim having spent my whole childhood with my head submerged in verruca infested water with vaseline soaked cotton wool in my ears. Luckily, I now have a good excuse not to swim - more later!

Pam has been very patient with all the training time and, like this week, "took one for the team" by selflessly working in the Dominican Republic so that I could concentrate on my training. While I was out biking in the hosing rain Pam had to endure a warmish PinaColada next to the pool and the pool boy even smeared her shades when he was cleaning them.

The key training element to the triathlon is the "brick" - basically running straight after you get off the bike which is a sensation similar to wellying back a bottle of sambuca blind-folded, being spun around for a minute and then sent off for a run. Tonight me and my old training partner "Shakey" did a 25k bike and 8k run in the dinging rain. Thankfully I had a Yorkie in the afternoon which I think was the only thing that got me to the end of a sodden, hilly run. Shakey and I aren't the most accomplished of bikists but these fellas make us feel a bit better!

So, "what's it all about?" you may ask. Well, in all my couch potato years I spent a lot of time sponsoring others but haven't really done anything myself. I decided that to make up time I would really put myself on the line to raise money for a great cause. It's not a well known or "sexy" charity but I am doing all of this for The Anaphylaxis Campaign which supports a cause that I feel very passionately about. I will write more in the blog but in the meantime you can learn a bit more on my justgiving page............

http://www.justgiving.com/Daft-Dougie