Ocean Lava Triathlon Race Report: Coached Athlete Tom Foster

Coached triathlete Tom Foster raced the Ocean Lava Wales Triathlon last week, here's his race report from the west Wales race, enjoy! 

After a busy couple of weekends it was good to finally settle and focus for the two weeks leading up to the Activity Wales Ocean Lava Triathlon. This half-iron distance event is a tough one, the swim is often very cold (as I can testify to last year!) the bike is undulating (that’s Welsh for hilly) and the run, well on the first running of this event in 2013 there was a feature known as the ‘killer hill’ from the old harbour in Fishguard up to the town, this feature has been removed, to most people’s delight, but to my disappointment. Although, it turns out my dismay was unfounded.

I was staying at my folk’s holiday home in Mathry the night before this race, it’s pretty much ideal being only 15 mins from the transition and race start and also on the bike route making it a good vantage point for my parents to have a cup of tea in hand and cheer the race as it goes past.

James McNab (fellow WhittleFitter) was staying with me the night before the race, it’s always great to have someone to chat general race rubbish to before a race. It makes some people nervous, but I find it helpful as there is more often than not something that may have slipped your mind that you get reminded about.

Race Morning arrived, a leisurely 08:00 get up for the 11:00 start; I am all about these later starts my races have had this year, makes the whole experience a lot more pleasurable for competitor and family alike! So following a leisurely breakfast we headed down to the race start to set up in transition. Between James and myself we only had 2 minor hiccups, James broke the valve from an inner tube (good bit of puncture repair practice) and I thought I had lost my timing chip (resulting in some ‘animated’ conversation on the phone with my parents), only to find it attached to the Velcro inside my wetsuit.  That drama aside, I still had plenty of time to acclimatise to the water and get warmed up. This was really pleasing as last year the water seemed very cold and I was not in a good way coming out of the swim – no such issues this time!

Lining up on the start line, I positioned myself towards the front with James ‘Butch’ Stephens in front of me, the intention being to swim on his feet for as long as I could hold on for. The klaxon sounded, and away we went. They say ‘No plan survives first contact’ – this proved to be true as Butch set off like a wind milling torpedo towards the first buoy (to say ‘wind milling’ is a bit of a disservice, he just has massive arms).  I eventually settled on someone else’s feet,  the pace a little faster than what I was comfortable with for 1900m but I was keen to push myself to stay in touch with the leading group. Coming out of the swim after the first lap, I could see Ollie Simon probably 3 minutes clear of me and 2 minutes on the next person, that was the last I was going to be seeing of him! 33:25 for the swim, not my fastest, but it’s never going to be on that course because of the long Australian exit.

With no issues in T1 I was out on the bike and making up places in no time, my plan was to push quite hard on the bike 230-240w average for the course (according to bestbikesplit.com this would give me a bike time of around 2 h 33 mins) The course rolls its way south west towards St Davids, so naturally this was into a fairly significant headwind! By the time I had reached Mathry I had caught a group of riders on a small climb (its natural to bunch a bit on a climb especially into the wind), I made the pass and crested the hill only to find 3 of them sticking to my wheel. This continued for a couple of kilometers and was starting to bug me as I was pushing harder than planned just to drop them, eventually on a rise out of a village I dug in and eked (is this even a word?!) out a gap. I held the gap for the next 5-6 km, only for the 3 of them, blatantly riding as a group, to come back to my wheel.  I was hoping the referee on the motorbike had spotted them but they seemed undeterred. This continued all the way into St Davids until I decided to let them waste their energy by pushing hard around the narrow country lanes of the return leg and I would ride my own race behind them. I came back into Mathry in 7th position (thanks parents for the update, need to buy you a white board to give splits next time!), ‘the draft crew’ and a few others ahead of me, I stuck to racing my own race, stuck to my nutrition (Torq Gel with some Torq energy every 30 mins), knowing that my run strength would allow me to make up most time lost to cheats on the bike. However, to my surprise I caught the group again, this time I just stuck to my power target and sailed past them, no response. Clearly the effort of gripping each other’s wheels had sapped them. (Cue a smile) I rolled into T2 in 3rd place having caught one other athlete on the last leg of the bike. Time of 2:37:06 – Pretty close to the prediction, especially as the wind was stronger than forecast and the roads really rough in places.

T2 was another short affair; rack bike, helmet off, shoes on. Out on to the run course, 4 laps of just over 5km. My plan was to try and average 4.10 min/km for the route, given the hills and wind this was going to be a tough ask. On the return leg of the breakwater section I could see the small group behind me probably 2-3 minutes back. I kept pressing hard to consolidate my 3rd place and hopefully challenge for 2nd. I reached the first climb and really wasn’t feeling great, worrying that I had given too much on the bike. Luckily I started to feel a lot better once I had done one downhill section, letting me open out my legs and relax a little. A few more climbs along the coastal path (I say a few, despite the fact the ‘killer hill’ no longer features, the course is still hilly) then I just set about ticking off the laps. I could see on the breakwater that I was putting time into 4th place, but I was also losing time on 2nd. The pattern continued onto my last lap, I heard Ollie being announced as the winner as I headed up into the town for the last time, so I relaxed quite a lot and just put my head down to the finish. Run 1:27:31 – faster than my target pace and considering my work on the bike combined with the terrain, not too bad at all!

I’m really pleased to have reached the podium again, this time at ‘Half-Iron’ distance. Again I managed to execute a pre-determined race plan and raced ethically to achieve a good result. I was vindicated for sticking to my guns on the bike as the drafters were promptly busted according to the results sheet. Credit to Ollie and Rich who finished 1st and 2nd respectively, great performances from them. Thanks again to WhittleFit, working to get me into form in time for this one, looking forward to a good spell of training ahead of the ETU Middle Distance Championships in October!

A huge well done to Tom who had an amazing race, finishing 3rd overall in a very, very competitive fast field!