Junior Tri Race report and some other things including sheep and rain….

More on the sheep later but first a report from last week’s racing…..

Brilliant racing for the 3rd junior tri of the season last Saturday. Unbelievably, given the lead up weather and the forecast for the following day, we had bright sunshine and  perfect conditions for the outside pool. Tristart girls were first up and set the tone for the close races to follow with Heidi Taylor notching win number 2 for the year followed home by Charlotte Gilmour with a great bike and Jess Baker in 3rd. In the boys race, Lloyd Armstrong and Max Bungay had a great tussle with Max briefly taking the lead on the bike section (or at least that’s what he told us) with the fastest split of the day, but Lloyd came thorugh on the run to win by a few seconds. Charlie Riches came in 3rd confirming what an extroadinary improvement he has made since his first race in May.

On to the tristar 1 race and Rachel Packard dominated the girls winning by a clear margin from India Still with Annie Bungay in 3rd. In the boys race, possibly performance of the day from Ryan Symmington stepping up in age group for the first time but still storming to the win ahead of a competitive field. Lennon Harding-Wade pipped Tom Horsman for 2nd but sportsman of the day definitely goes to Tom who happily excepted the result after he had finished ahead of Lennon but Lennon’s time had to be adjusted due to a lap counting problem in the swim.

Tristar 2 was an all boys affair as apparently all the girls were off doing their grammar school test. Priorities!! George Robson showed off his new found running pedigree to add to his strong bike and swim to win from George Baugniet and William Baker from the first wave. Finallly, in the Tristar 3 race, Lucy Brain once again showed everyone how to do it after clocking under 4 minutes for the 300m swim she tore up the bike and the run to post the fastest time. Johnathan Greenwood won the boys race followed by Stephen Woolley and Jake Adams with Leanne Symmington finishing 2nd girl. 

In an attempt at steriotyping, which I for one cannot condone, John Skilton went all the way to Wales to race the Gower Triathlon apparently so that he could nearly get knocked off his bike by a sheep. Now I don’t want to tempt fate, but this story would be a lot funnier if the sheep had jumped out just a few seconds later. Having led his mate Nigel out of the swim, John continued the recent TriPurbeck tradition of having a good old pfaff in transition before Nigel reeled him in on the bike. Still, at least John didn’t drop his bike on the M4 eh Nige?

In not so idyllic conditions, Derek continued his prep for the World Champs with an age group win in the Dorney Lake sprint. Here is Derek’s report…..

 Where did the Olympic weather go?
I don’t think the legacy should just be for the younger generations and so I was inspired to enter the Human Race Tri at Eton Dorney last weekend.  It seems only days since I was sitting on the lakeside in the sunshine watching the rowing, and Saturday gave me hope.  But for Sunday the temperature had dropped to 9 degrees (at least Celsius), the wind was blowing across the flat and exposed course and it was raining – the warmest place was in the lake. Still, 260 hardy souls made it to 7 wave starts and I think most finished. Sharon was on hand to support and had a rather self satisfied air about herself when reminding me how glad she was that I hadn’t persuaded her to enter.  I guess the autumn weather is too much for us oldies because only one other in my age group turned up and he swam like a fish.  But fortunately he was as effective as a fish on land and I managed to beat him, turning in a time to get me 40th out of 260, which was just as well, because much longer on the course and I would have frozen solid.  Now bring on the winter training and prepare for the warmer weather!