June racing so far………..

It’s already been a super busy racing month for the team with lots of excellent performances

While we were still on the ways back from the camp in France, Kevin and Salam were taking on the Cotswold 113 and nailing down a 10 year pb for Kevin and a podium place for Salam Gav raced the Blenheim sprint with a big group from Tripurbeck and had a great race finishing 9th in age group out of over 200!

The following weekend, Michaela took on the epic challenge of a 24hour enduro running event finishing an excellent 7th overall. At the other end of the distance scale, Linda, Katie and David were racing the Windsor Sprint Triathlon – a qualifier for the 2025 World Championships. David opted for a championship specific option of riding his race road bike even though this was a non-drafting qualifier but despite being up against a load of TT bikes, he had a storming race and a fastest run split to finish 4th in his age group – qualification to be confirmed. Katie had a good blast in her first race of the year finishing 13th on a competitive age group but special mention to Linda who had a tough run in to the event but pulled it out of the bag on race day to secure a podium spot and automatic qualification Meanwhile Joe was busy winning the County Schools 1500m in a new record time (record that has stood since 1978!).

Over slightly longer distances, Ellis had a fab race at Warsaw 70.3 – super strong thoughout and Ella was competing in her second only 70.3 event at Challenge Wales. Despite picking up a bug at the end of our training camp in the alps, Ella absolutely smashed it, finishing 7th overall including the pros and 3rd AG racer overall – brilliant racing and only going to get faster…….

On to the following weekend and Emma raced the ETU European Championship standard distance duathlon in Portugal. After a good first run, she absolutely stormed the 40k bike giving her enough of a buffer to hold off some fast finishing rivals and secure an excellent 3rd place finish and a first major championship medal. Absolutely brilliant Back at home Gav and Jonny were competing in an unexpected duathlon after the swim was cancelled due to the weather at the Eastbourne Triathlon World champs qualifier. This didn’t suit either of the chaps – but they toughed it out with some strong races although I think its fair to say neither of them enjoyed the extra run. That’s racing in the UK for you! Back in the sunshine, over in Nice Katherine produced an excellent 6th place finish in her AG at 70.3 Nice with a really well executed race and qualified for the 70.3 World Championships later this year in New Zealand And while all this was going on, Kevin was putting together an excellent race at Ironman Austria – it’s a long day out and a massive achievement with brilliant race execution.

Finally, this past weekend, Shelagh has been working towards her 6.5km round Brownsea Island swim and despite some shoulder issues in recent weeks she absolutely nailed it – completing the course in an excellent  2hours23min. Elissa had a strong run in the Exbury 10k although it was super hot and tough! We were over in Austria with Fran racing Challenge Walchsee – it’s a fab race that we have been wanting to do for along time and we would highly recommend it. After a bit of a detour on the swim, Fran managed to put herself a little further back than we would like, but her speedy bike legs were there and she managed to secure a 5min lead off the bike. A bit of a pfaff in transition knocked 90sec off that lead – I think just to raise my stress levels! – but Fran put in probably the strongest run leg she has done since the hip operation and held off a fast finishing ex pro athlete to take the AG win