Bude Sea Triathlon 2007 – Chocolate cake bites back!

The sunshine of Cornwall greeted the triathlete’s at Bude on Sunday 27th June 2007. A sprint race where the explosive 500m sea swim is followed by a hilly leg sapping 18km bike and finished off with a canal path 5km run.

For the local club – Somerset Rc Tri – there were 3 competing….. Jonathan Ayres, Malcolm Greenslade & Paul Croker all having done the event several times before. All 3 triathletes were competing in the over 40’s race in the 3rd of 3 swim starts with a very generous current pushing the 3 to quick swim splits. Greenslade the strongest swimmer of the trio cruised effortlessly from the off with his more excitable club mate Ayres right behind, both reaching the first bouy and the turn back to shore at the top end of the field and right in contention. Greenslade finished the swim in a fantastic 1st place being the only athlete to duck below the 10 miniute barrier with 9:46 and started the bike with no one to chase, Ayres was close behind jumping on his bike in 5th with 10:17 right in the mix ready for the ensuing bike chase. Croker lost a bit of ground on his club mates with a 12:43 swim coming out on to the bike in a mid-order position.

Ayres managed to pass Greenslade on one of the many climbs on the bike (with the course reverting to the hillier anti-clockwise direction) but the pair found other faster riders too strong as they both passed and took time out of the club mates as Ayres in particular underperformed having perhaps taken the ill advised, last minute, decision to race despite a head cold, and far too much chocolate cake 20 minutes prior to racing. Ayres clocking 31:22 compared to Greenslade’s 32:46 with both guys very much still in contention in the top ten. Croker with his strongest discipline behind him still managed a solid 36:53 split on the bike.

The chocolate cake came back to haunt Ayres with crippling stomach cramps almost preventing him from finishing the run, but managed 7th place but was 2 minutes down on his previous run time on the course with a 22:11 clocking. Bringing him home in an overall time of 1:03:50, some 4 minutes behind the eventual winner. Greeenslade although adopting a more sensible fuelling approach lost ground to his greedier club mate and finished his run in 25:48 for a 1:08:20 total time which gave him 20th place overall. Croker completed the club’s efforts with a 29:55 run and 1:19:31 finishing time. For a thoroughly enjoyable day, where despite the weather being grim both travelling there and back were perfect conditions during the race itself.  Oh how the sun shines on the righteous!