Trials and Tribulations at BUCS Sprint ‘16

On Sunday 1st May, seventeen of Imperial’s bravest triathletes descended upon the sleepy town of Calne, Wiltshire to compete in the 2016 BUCS Sprint Triathlon. Gathered outside SAF at the ungodly hour of 5:45am, some quick Imperial brains spotted that there were actually only sixteen recruits present; we were missing our secret weapon, scholarship athlete Alistair Wallace. A few panicked phone calls later and it became clear that he had slept through his alarm and was not going to make the rendez-vous. We departed one man down, hoping that he would be able to make his own way to the race.

The rest of the journey went smoothly, even those in the bus driven by Jonny “fast and furious” Singh survived their trip relatively unscathed. Once we had arrived in Calne, the plan was simple. The 500 odd student triathletes would be set off in half hour waves, with the slowest swimmers starting first. They would then complete a 750m swim, 25km bike and 5km run as quickly as possible.

Matt Douthwaite and club captain Sam Jackson fearlessly led the march into battle, setting off in the first wave of the day. Despite concerns from Luis, the TriIC swim coach, about Matt’s abilities in the pool, this runner-turned-triathlete put in a solid performance and was the first of the two out of the pool. Once on dry land, Matt found himself in much more familiar territory, storming the bike and run to finish second in his wave with Imperial’s fastest run time of the day. Meanwhile Sam was having a slightly more eventful race. His super quick first transition turned out to be more hasty than speedy as he realised part way into the bike that he had failed to attach his race number. Whilst zooming past the marshals, hoping they wouldn’t notice this omission, an unfortunately placed speed bump relieved the captain of his water bottle as it flew out of his bottle cage on to the other side of the road. No longer weighed down by these unnecessary pieces of kit, Sam put in decent bike and run times to finish solidly overall.

Next up were Lawrence Tse and John Foden-Shroff competing in wave number two. As some of the few Imperial athletes to have already competed in triathlons, Lawrence and John managed to complete their races with no mishaps, both finishing with highly respectable overall times.

These two were followed by the third wave of Imperial triathletes including Jonny Singh who had somehow managed to find himself setting off at the same time as half the Imperial women’s squad. He quickly overtook teammate Lily Battershill in the pool before putting in the fastest Imperial bike time of the day to finish fourth out of the Imperial men.

Sadly Lily’s race didn’t go quite as smoothly. In the pool, the wayward foot of a fellow (non-Imperial) competitor connected with her goggles to leave her with a shiny black eye. She bravely soldiered on to the bike, her strongest discipline. Sadly, about halfway round the course, she experienced a race-stopping puncture. After a teary twenty minutes spent sat by the side of the road, she was rescued by some passing cyclists who kindly patched up her wheel and set her on her way. She was massively disappointed by this turn of events but eventually cheered up, especially after disappearing for a short time in the afternoon to be consoled by team mate Jonny.

Leanne Lyons and Anna Lawson were having much more successful races. Having recently joined the triathlon club from running backgrounds, they both put in decent times on the swim and bike but excelled on the run, each completing the 5km in under 23 minutes, no mean feat after having already been racing for over an hour!

The next Imperial triathletes to set off were Edmund Jones, Alice Spencer and Madeleine Whybrow. Ed was the first of the three to leave the pool but fell into a spot of misfortune when one of his aero bars fell off part way into the bike, leaving him with a lopsided aero position and very odd looking handlebars. Not letting this faze him, he completed a solid bike and run time to finish fifth out of the Imperial men.

Next to finish in the pool was Alice but sadly her speedy swim was not matched by the rest of her race where she was left a little disappointed by her bike and run. Last but not least, Madeleine left the pool, keen to put the swim behind her to get on with her beloved bike. True to form, she put down the fastest bike time of the Imperial women finishing solidly overall. The next Imperial athlete to compete was Marcel Admiraal, swimming in a wave on his own. This was his fourth BUCS Sprint Triathlon and his experience served him well as he completed a great race, scoring a personal best in the process.

The sixth wave containing Imperial competitors set off at midday and featured Greg Jones and Freya Espir. Despite being a very inexperienced cyclist, Greg absolutely stormed all three legs of the race, with notably quick swim and run times. His bike went less smoothly, however, as he spent the first couple of kilometres working out how to change down a gear before taking a tumble after an unfortunate encounter with a roundabout at high speed. Despite these upsets, he still put down a great time, finishing third out of the Imperial men.

Freya was having even more trouble in her race. Slipping on a corner on her way out of the pool, she started the bike with a few injuries but carried on regardless. However, a missed turning and some dubious directions from a marshal saw Freya complete an extra 5km on the bike. Impressively, she completed the rest of the race although was obviously a little disappointed with her time!

Up next was next year’s captain and resident French heart-throb Tom Bartissol. Despite a slow second transition, during which it took him several attempts to complete the usually simple task of putting shoes on, Tom’s overall time was very impressive and he placed a strong second out of the Imperial men.

Last but not least, Alistair Wallace and Jessica Prior were racing in one of the final waves of the day. Borrowed from the swimming club for the weekend, Jess turned out to be the true star of the day.  Both her run and swim were the fastest of all the Imperial girls. However, even more impressive was her bike. Despite it being the longest distance that she had ever cycled, she smashed the 25km, beating most of her teammates and bringing in the fastest overall time of the Imperial women. For Alastair, however, most of the drama had taken place before he had even reached the start line. After missing the first checkpoint, the experienced triathlete had travelled to Wiltshire via train, bus and taxi. All had gone smoothly until he reached Calne, where he realised that he had left his bike on the train. After some negotiations with the train company, his bike was on its way back to London and he was paired up with one of the club bikes for the race. He went on to put down strong swim and run times, earning him a solid first place out of the Imperial athletes.

Overall, the day saw some promising performances from a mostly inexperienced squad. The team triumphed despite the (numerous) mishaps and we are already looking forward to the rest of the triathlon season and the chance to learn from our mistakes and to improve on our performances.