By Vince on 28/08/2007 14:08

“What have you done?”  Caroline says, looking at me, not quite cross yet.

‘What do you mean?  I haven’t done anything, it wasn’t me, I didn’t mean to...I ...I...’.   I could feel my cheeks flushing with heat.  Adrenaline surging into my muscles.  It was going to be fight or flight and I’ve always been much more of a flyer than a fighter.

‘What have you done?....oh my god, why are you on the ironman uk website?  We only got back from Lanzarote yesterday.’  She looked over my shoulder at the laptop and shoved me to the side.

‘I couldn’t help it.’  I sobbed into my hands.  Hanging my head in shame.  ‘I....I....love it too much.’  I fell to my knees and grabbed her legs, sobbing against her thigh.  ‘It....it.....completes me.’

‘Ok....ok....relax.  At least this one’s in England.  Hang on...I thought I completed you?  And what about your son?....doesn’t he...’

...

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By Vince on 26/06/2007 12:28

So the organizers tout the UK 70.3 race as the ‘Hardest half ironman in the world’.

I thought, yeah, yeah, whatever, how hard can it be?  I just finished Ironman Lanzarote for chrissakes.  Well, I don’t know if it’s the hardest, but it definitely smashed me up plenty.

There were quite a few Ful-on folk at this race, I know that John Rawlins was particularly focused on putting a hurtlock on his age group and a bit of friendly smack talk the previous week let me know he was gunning for me as well.

My race crew on this trip consisted of my lovely lady wife, Caroline, my pal Sam, and his soon to be betrothed, Muireann.  The Leo unit was relieved from support duty and left with his more than willing grandparents.

So here’s the first tip, the M4, M5 route down to Exmoor is all kinds of rubbish and mere mention of this route to those in the know (possibly everyone down at the race) was met with head shaking, laughter and ‘Here’s what you should’ve done…’.  7 hours in traffic was simply delightful...

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By Vince on 29/05/2007 12:07

'So Vince, I hear you’re an ironman, that’s pretty cool.'

Oh no, I’m thinking, here we go again. It’s another NTP (non tri pal) who’s been misinformed.

'Er…well no, actually I’m sort of half an ironman.'

‘What the hell does that mean?  Did you drop out?’

‘Nope, I’ve done a couple of half ironman races.  It’s…well…it’s only half.’

As this sentence yet again reluctantly slips between my lips, my shoulders slump as the standard response of  ‘oh, well that’s still pretty good I suppose.’ Grates like nails down a blackboard.

‘So how’s Leo?’ They quickly move on, seeing steam blast from my ears and nostrils.

‘Yeah he’s fine.’

So I decided in December that I had to get this ironmonkey off my back, I gotta do an ironman, this half stuff is great, but until I get the full one done it’s always gonna be...

‘oh yeah Vince... yeah I know him, he’s that half ironman guy.’

Ok so which one.  Well most of the European and American ones were pretty much booked...

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By Vince on 02/05/2007 07:22

Ashbourne Duathlon.

‘Let’s do the Ashbourne Duathlon, it’ll be a good sharpener for the Ironman’

‘But Duathlon is a bit rubbish, Stu.’

‘Yeah, I know, but I did it a couple of years ago and it’s a really hard course, loads of hills and the run  is pretty hard, so it’s worth it. Think of it like a good training session.’

‘Is it gnarly?’

‘yep’

‘Ok, I’m in.’

Don’t know if you all decide races like this, but racing can get dull if you pick the ones with easy peasy courses. Murky water followed by long flat loops of biking and running gets old real quick.

Have you noticed how triathletes start ramping up the excuses the closer it gets to a  race?

‘So, I haven’t like done any training since blah blah, because of this thing with my blah blah and actually the Doc says there’s no way I should even be like walking on it, but I’m just gonna give it a go and see’.

Of course Stu and I had our own similar banter as we struggled up the M1 for five and half hours on a Friday afternoon heading toward Ashbourne, the North.

...

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By Vince on 16/02/2007 11:24

Those of you who have had the opportunity to laugh at my distressed splashing efforts at swimming better suck up those memories because those days may well be over.  Oh yes, Vince the bobbing cork/splashing fool/wind-up frog with deffective paddle will soon, with the help of Swim For Tri, be reborn as aqua man, hydro dude or just simply H2-Oh my god that was fast.

Newbie triathletes, we just can’t get enough biking and running.  It’s the law of returns we love.  Stick more in, try harder and you get more out, you go faster.  Throw that attitude in the pool and you get more tired and go slower. 

Let’s just admit it newbies, fishes aside, we all just slog through the swim because we have to.  It’s the biking and running where the real racing begins.  The only reason we don’t just stick with duathlon, is it’s just not really very cool and there’s less kit to buy.

The thing is, the swim sets up the rest of your race.  If you’re like me, you know you’ll never be first out of the water,...

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