Post Race Blog

What a weekend!  Cascais was just buzzing with competitors and supporting families.  What an end to the summer here and it was a scorcher, close to 30ºC.

For myself, I took 9 minutes off my time from last year, improving in all three disciplines and with that long T1, I am pretty pleased with my performance.  But I didn't make the roll-down for the World Championships.  Too much quality in the field and I needed to take 10 minutes off my time probably.  I can learn from this and continue to make improvement to my swim and bike which will give me confidence to push harder and run faster.

The swim was manic, there were too many people in the water. A constant battle against elbows, hands, feet and bodies throughout the swim but I still produced a 33:38.  The bay had a small swell so when we were at the furthest point from the beach, you certainly noticed it and made it a little bit more difficult. But the conditions were pretty much perfect.

The bike was good.  For me, it is an amazing course that challenges you all the way round.  Disappointing to see large groups of riders and few penalties being given out but again, there were so many people of the course.  I felt I could ahve pushed more on the climb upto Malveira and on the Guincho coast road back to Cascais but I also didn't want to ruin the run. Completed the bike in 02:36.

The run was great.  Through a few hills in and I'm a happy chappy.  I was aiming for a 01:30 and ran a 01:30:52. It was hot, it was hard but the local support was amazing and really spurred me on, especially my son and wife plus my parents and their friends.  I also bumped into a Spaniard that I last raced with two years ago and we finished together, which was a great way to complete a bit of sunday morning racing.

And finally, I managed to swim, bike and run in sections with my training partner from London, Mutchie, who came out for the second year running.  This was pretty cool to race together and I look forward to the next one together.

This week has been resting and sleeping but back to training on the trails this weekend ahead of the final Portugal Sky Race in 2 weekends time.  Wish me luck!

Seeya,

Wes