Cholmondeley Castle Standard Duathlon

10k run | 42k bike | 5k run

CHOLMONDELEY CASTLE, United Kingdom
23.06.2024
by Castle Race Series

Thank you to the British Triathlon for allowing me to race at Castleraceseries Cholmondeley Standard Duathlon.

Although I haven’t looked at the course, I made a rough plan to run the first 10k as close as possible to 4mn/km, cycle the 40k as close as possible to the hour, and run the last 5k as fast as the first 10k.

Nutritionally, I went Veloforte all the way, with porridge three hours before the start, 500ml of electrolytes between breakfast and the start, a gel five minutes before the start, another one in T1, chews 45 minutes on the bike, a sip of electrolytes every 10 minutes on the bike, and a gel in T2 (which I skipped).

Brian’s race briefing was excellent, as usual. Until he mentioned that it was a race qualifier, and probably most of the best duathletes were participating. no pressure

I started the run steadily and maintained a good pace, catching the fast starters slowly, one by one, but not all. I would say 50% of the course was on grass, with a big hill at km 4 & 8. So, a bit off the 40mn mark. I’m not very good at measuring 12m on the bike, so I make sure I’m always in the front to avoid penalties. But, after pushing at 300W to overtake two racers, I went back to 240W ish and got overtaken by one without seeing him ever again. 1h10mn later, I was in T2, with one thing only in mind, the hill at km 4! 23mn later, I was happily crossing the line in 2h18mn15s—big congratulations to the commentator for nailing my name.

I stayed around for a while, refuelling at a nice #plantbased stand, listening to live music, cheering on other competitors, and visiting the Castle’s gardens, waiting for the results.

I’ve never been lucky with podiums: I won the London ultra duathlon, no podium, I was 3rd in the Castle Chantilly Gauntlet, no photographer, I was 1st in AG at a Do3 70.3, 2nd and 3rd had fled the event … And on that one, on the day I won my age group, only the top 3 overall were awarded 😂

Let’s finish with a special mention to my coach Nath, NL Fitness , who’s been incredible since I started working with her in January, and Huckson for their fantastic trisuit.