British Triathlon Training Camp

I can't believe that I was so nervous about attending my first training weekend with the BTF Paratriathlon Squad, when everyone was so welcoming and friendly. I fumbled around with my kit, lost my ipod shuffle, had too many bags, and worried about looking stupid, but nobody judged me (except perhaps the coaches, who were busy making notes on our performances all weekend...)

Saturday was a particularly busy day for me as I had squad training and a set of tests for a sport study by Scott Murray for his MSc. We started off with two hours in the pool with one hour of drills, followed by a speed set and video analysis. I can't wait to see myself swim, as I need that mental picture to see what I need to improve on.

After lunch we had track, but I was advised to rest before my test so I got to watch Nikki on the track-she looked really fluid, with a completely different style to both Jane and I, much more propulsion.

Scott was measuring lactate threshold by taking us through a simulated race, using handbikes on the track, followed by a 5km run. It was awful going round and round the track on the bike on my own plus the fact that we were doing nearly 25km as on the outside lane. I was finding it hard to maintain my pace of 18kmh which I'd decided might be my possible race pace. I'd done 6 warm-up laps, had blood taken, then was 12.6km through when we had to abandon it because they wanted to close the track. Gutted. I ended up missing the morning cycle ride, as well as what would have been a useful track session.

Up at 5:30am after a terrible nights sleep, no breakfast and at the track for 7am to share the track with Jimmy, who was also taking part. I knew I couldn't maintain any kind of race pace so settled on a constant 15kmh with Jimmy's ipod blaring out and me singing badly. Managed the two last laps at 18kmh, but my time was an appalling 1:33.52 (24.6km), but then told I couldn't do 5km run as Jonathan, our Manager, didn't want me to and a track meet was due to start.

Went back to the Hotel for breakfast and straight to my room to lie down and watch the London Marathon with Layla. We had a maximal weight test in the gym after lunch which was interesting. I managed to lift fairly evenly left and right which surprised me and bench pressed 35kg, with a seated cable row of 35kg with my right arm.

Jonathan gave me a GBR tri suit to try on (sure it was meant to be motivational) and I have to admit to taking a picture of myself in it. It did look good...