Triathlon 46 - 52x52 Challenge

Friday 28/10/22

Number 46

Swim – 39.59

Bike – 1.25.32

Run – 59.27

That was an interesting one!

To start with it was so different to last week. Whereas last week it was beyond a struggle to start and finish, this week I simply cracked on and powered through. I’m certainly feeling tired now, perhaps more than usual, but the actual Tri whilst not easy was not overly hard. Once again it shows that if the mind is in the right place then the body will follow. I’m at work right now(11am ish) and have only one meeting, so perhaps by 2pm ish I’ll call it a day and head home for a little old man afternoon nap.

But let’s go back to the start, to 6am. It was naturally pitch black out there and the wind was starting to blow and the rain starting to spit. I was at the beach in trunks, hat & goggles and wading into a mid tide (so not deep but not shallow) and being hit constantly in the lower regions by annoying little waves. Having got through that bit I dived under and started swimming out. I have to say (and I know I’ve said it before) but swimming out into depth in the pitch black is not for the faint hearted, it really isn’t. Anyhow there I am about 500 metres out and heading around the end of the Palace Pier when something strikes me in the forehead. It stopped me in my tracks I can tell you. I wasn’t concussed or anything, but it was a shock nonetheless. For a split second my mind told me it was something alive and attacking me. But a second or two later my mind calmed and the fact that nothing was biting away at me it was evident that the object was probably just a small piece of floating wood or such thing. I continued my swim and went all the way to the beach and then turned around and went all the way back around again, which to be quite honest took more nerve than the first time around as I kept expecting to be banged in the head again – which I wasn’t. Now of course it was just a piece of wood, but if you don’t mind I would like to retell the story and say it was a sea monster. The reason being that if it was a sea monster it makes me sound far braver than I am. Anyhow that was the swim. The bike and the run followed, both in decent times and both drama free. Considering the swim is the shortest part of the Triathlon by far it really is the most exciting, the most dangerous and the most interesting to talk about!

With number 46 done and dusted I now have just 6 more to go and if I am to finish by the end of November I have 5 weeks to do them in. The end is slowly creeping into sight!

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