The Day I Was Going to kill Fiona Gallacher : The Eyemouth Triathlon.

The day started quite well, left my daughter at my mothers and with the warm glow of anticipation in the pit of my stomach I headed to Fiona’s as she was taking her car. On arrival at Fiona’s house I transferred my bike into the car and we were off, with the obligatory bag of mints for the journey. On the way down I made comment about how good it was to be competing again, no matter what level, and how I’d forgotten how the pre-race jitters felt.

We decided to drive in on what we thought the route for the cycle would be. No signs - maybe wrong road. I hoped it was the wrong road, as you want to have seen the hills. Down to the sports center, tiny transition area outside, still no signs, perhaps that was the cycle route, Oh no!.  Into the sports center a bit of a muddle, but registered no problem. I was number 8 this has great significance to me, as that was my number when I played with the Livingston panthers, good omen I thought…….. Ha!

I was quite nervous as we prepared our kit the bike helmet etc. I decided to use my cycle gloves, as it was chilly that day. I was entered in the short triathlon, which was 400m swim, 6 mile cycle and 2 mile run. The swim was very good, as there were only 3 in our lane. Up and out to the transition area to find, or should I say not to find my gloves as they had blown away, my helmet at the other end of the transition area and my tee-shirt soaked, what a great start to the cycle. Once I had gathered my things together (later to find my transition took over 2 minutes) I was out on my bike soggier than I would have liked. I was cycling all of 30 seconds when we hit the first of many hills. I decided about ½ a mile into the cycle I was going to kill Fiona hence the title of this peace. ¾ of the way up the first hill I decided I was just going to turn around and that would be it. Low and behold I saw the top of the hill at 0.99 of a mile on my odometer, I made the decision to finish the cycle but I was not, no way! doing the run. The rest of the cycle was much the same. On the way back to the center the mile hill was down, down, down yes!  Well rested, I thought……….. I’ve come this far I might as well keep going, what a fool. Dumped my bike et al. and started to, or rather tried to run first on sand then up 30 feet of steps then along an undulating cliff side, one false move and you were fish bait. Under foot it varied from grass to ploughed field. I think you could call it orienteering; a compass and map would not have been out of place.

You might think after reading this I did not enjoy myself; I have to tell you I did. To have finished the course after thinking of jacking it in so early in the cycle. This made me feel great, even to the point I spent £5 on a tee shirt to say I did Eyemouth Triathlon. Our club had a great turnout, there were 10 of us in total, there would have been more but a few were unable to attend. The day was a great success, but I would not recommend it for a come and tri. If you are looking for a challenge at the end of the season then that is the triathlon to do, but remember your compass and map.

Cate Lindsay.