Coed y Brenin off road Duathlon -Ifan Richards Race report

I woke up on Sunday morning to the sound of gale force winds and heavy rain battering the bedroom window!!! "Great" I thought just what the doctor ordered!!! I didn't mind this weather at all, having raced all summer in hot humid conditions this was welcomed with open arms.

I met up with Dylan Jones at the visitor centre. We arrived in good time to sign on and suss out the competition, knowing that a few of the entrys were very good bikers. After signing on we got changed and took the bikes in to the transition area. Being new to multisport I was having a laugh to myself at the fiddly little things involved, having raced Mtb XC/endurance and Mountain running/road running it was either or as regards to equipment, but multisport is something I want to do and give a 100% so told myself "get your head round it and get on with it" so did just that.

Having racked the bike and set up my bike shoes and gear for the bike section, I let Dyl get on with his own thing as from here on he was another competitor hahaha!! (you know the score Dyl) I set off for a good warm up as I was quite stiff from the North Wales league 10k Cross Country race the previous day.All competitors were called up to the start line for the pre race briefing, we lined up and off went the gun!!

The run was only a 2 miler so I knew that the hammer needed to be put down from the off so instantly I picked the pace up and found myself with a lead straight away. I reached the one mile marker in 5min 23sec so knew the pace was high but felt comfortable. At the 1 mile point there was a sharp hairpin corner and the road ramped up fiercly for 600mtrs at a max gradient of 25%!!!!!! that ground the pace right down, having climbed, the route turned left down a technical descent and carried on down to the transition area, run1 was completed in 12min 27sec which gave me a 22sec lead in to transition. I had a good transition and was now on the bike.

The bike section was tougher than previous years, still 20k in distance but with 2000ft of ascent!!! and tough technical singletrack sections that tested the skills and cocentration of the athletes to the max. Eventually as I thought my lead on the short run was eaten up after 1.5 miles on the bike by Paul Robinson (Goldtec) but I knew he was flying as I was almost on the rivet. I kept my pace for the next 7 miles and the next athlete Phil Wade (Bath Amphibians) caught me on a tough technical ascent, again not through lack of effort on my part as I knew their quality on the bike was immense, and on feel and time I was up on both my recee's of the bike section so kept going knowing that it must be Dyl that was behind. I kept the speed up and arived in T2 in 3rd position with a bike time of 58 minutes 11 seconds, with the splits shouted over the PA system I had nearly 4 minutes to make up on the leader and 2 minutes to make up on 2nd place!! a massive task over only a 2 mile course!!

Run 2 (repeat of run 1) went well and was very happy with my run off the bike as it's something I only used to do once a year!! But this year I was physically and mentally prepared for it due to Cerist's awsome bike/run sessions. I kept good pace and was preparing myself for the second time up the steep hill. Much harder than the first time but knowing that Dyl was breathing down my neck kept me going!! Descended the path and gave a sprint for the line to finish, the second run time of 13 minutes 55 seconds.

I finished the race 3rd overall in a time of 01:24:27. Thouroughly enjoyed it and was very proud to represent Cerist Tri for the first time. Dyl had a fantastic race to and finished strongly in 4th overall so a good day for Cerist.