Scottish High Performance Triathlon Team - Im back in the Shire
April 17th, 2009 by Gavin
My first day back in the Shire (Stirling) and its back to business. My brother and I got the boat back yesterday - he told me his joke about the Psychiatrist, the 4 Women deemed OCD (obessive complusive disorder) and a child named Dick …. I laughed out loud, tooted my car horn and shook my fist out the window passing through Irvine - thats how funny it was. I then attempted to phone my flatmate who is originally from Irvine (it wasn’t going to be a complementry call) but alas my phone is still broken.
Back in the pool this morning this morning with the Scottish High Performance Triathlon Team in the University of Stirling
and it was a bit of a shock to the system - it has been 6 months since I swam long course - the main set was 500,400,300,200,100 and back up, holding pace. The total distance was 5,9KM but as im a bit OCD (or maybe something like the joke, a Dick) about these things so I had to swim an extra 100 to make 6 - it either ends on .5 of a KM or you swim to finish the KM ! anything else just isn’t Cricket.
Another shock to the system was the 6 months of mail that had built up whilst I was away and the fact that there are no longer any spoons - I was nearly forced to eat a can of creamed rice with my fingers . . . .nearly - in November there was at least 12 spoons in this house, ill find them eventually, have a rant about it and then buy new ones - its my usual home coming routine.
Another routine I find myself in is reading the issues of 220 triathlon magazine that come through the door - this time it took around 8 minutes to get through 6 issues but a little longer to get through the new Triathlon Plus, its the way forward.
I have been into town and done some shopping, been to the bank and un packed - the sun is out and the Indians are playing music in the town center - I asked them which tribe they were with, ‘red dot’ or ‘feather’ - ‘feather’ they said, my personal favourite.
Alls that left for the day is to build my Specialized Tarmac training bike and hit the road (and maybe a run, a bit of spoon searching, cleaning and some Green Tea, caramalized humous and bread)
2 Responses to “Scottish High Performance Triathlon Team - Im back in the Shire”
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June 25th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
Hey Gavin,
I don’t do triathlon yet but am planning on starting and i have decided you shall be the inspiration. Bit random but it looked fun. I have done Pentathlon and Tetrathlon since i was very young but it only appealed to me after reading 202. Anyway, i have a really rubbish bike which is a road bike from about 40years ald. can you borrow bikes for competitions? and how do you guess your times if you have never done it before? would be greatefull if you could reply in some way or another. Thanks.
Gregor (15)
June 25th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
Hi Gregor
great to hear that your looking forward to taking up triathlon . . . .
competitions do not hire out bikes - not that I am aware of anyway - but when you are just starting out having the best equipment is not necessary - you will probably need a westuit though if you are to race in the open water - you can pick up a 2nd hand one quite cheaply to get you going . . .
times are not so important in triathlon as every course is different - distances, terrain, location etc
my simple advice at this stage is to enter as many races as you can, train consistently and enjoy yourself
good luck
gav