My Triathlon Journey

March 2023

March became more of a quiet racing month for me. I had a few national and UK cross-country races left and the was cyclocross season over, plus I was hit with covid. I had to pull out the UK Inter-Counties XC due to being left with little strength and fitness thanks to Covid in the race week. The end of the month built into the transition into my triathlon season beginning on the first weekend of April, where I would compete in the British Triathlon Super Series Performance Assessments.

Covid

I was hoping to compete in the UK Inter Counties Cross Country at Loughborough towards the middle of the month but pulled out due to being struck with Covid on the Monday of the race-week. I was feeling better towards the end of the week but it was not worth competing due to having not trained at all in the week. I had qualified 1st after winning the Sussex Championships so then shifted my focus to English Schools the weekend after. I did quite a light week of training as I didn’t want to tire myself into the race, plus considering I was ill most of the beginning of the previous week.

English Schools XC – Wollaton Park

I travelled up on the Friday to race on the Saturday so I only had a short journey to do on race day. I qualified 1st after winning Sussex Schools in January so had the front pen spot (start pics at bottom of page) and had a better chance of getting away quickly.

I raced my first national competition at Wollaton Park in early 2020 for the English National Cross Country Championships as a year-down Under13. I came 11th on the incredibly muddy, wet and waterlogged course. The course had been overflowed from the neighbouring lake and had caused a mini lake in itself across the course. (If you search ‘English National Cross Country 2020 course/falls’ or something similar on Youtube you’ll be able to see how muddy and wet the course got, especially in the later races)

I had a better start and got away well, an improvement from last year despite being a lower year this time, but the pace still remained high. With a small lap than two larger, I dropped back a bit on the smaller, still pushing hard but just being overtaken by really fast runners and was still trying to stay as far up through the field as I could. After two laps I started properly making places again, picking of each person one by one, after staring the final lap in around 35th. The end of the larger lap consisted of a slight uphill drag and then a short steep hill, with the final lap going into a long, fast downhill into the finish, whilst the rest of the course was pretty much flat. I’d moved through by the last lap and was in around 24th when I reached the uphill drag. I wanted to make the top 20 and with my Sussex teammate just behind it made me go harder, in a way, in order to try and stay with him or ahead. By the top of the hill I was 22nd or so with a few others close and around me. I ran hard with all of the little I had left, trying to carry my speed into the finish. I overtook a few, trying to stay with my teammate, and crossed 19th a foot/ stride or so behind him. I’m glad he caught up and came by as I think it helped me to go faster and gain those last few places. I was really happy I managed to scrape into the top 20, especially with the previous week being ill with covid. I’m glad to have capped off my 22-23 cross-country season on a high and felt I had given it my all.

Some photos from the race (credit ac_phots on instagram):