So, a little after the fact, but we entered four mixed teams into the open category at the Triathlon Relays in Nottingham on the 28th August. Teams were selected and organised by our triathlon exec rep, Nathan Smith, and named Elevation, Tempo, Zone 4 and Slipstream.
Teams BRAT Zone 4 comprising Ben Carter, Annie Byrne, Claire Fudge and Colin Bailey put in impressive splits across the board to finish in a total time of 3:36:32.
Things were very tight between Elevation (Chris Davy, Richard Bailey, Hannah Funnel, Helen Pike) and Tempo (Nathan Smith, Claire Keene, Richard Attwell, Josh Farrell) up until the run, with Elevation starting the final set of 4x5k runs with a very slender lead of less than two minutes. There was no match here really, though, and Tempo showed off their running form to finish in 3:51:30, with Elevation crossing the line in 4:04:21.
Team Slipsream (Sandeep Dhami, Adrian O’Leary, Paul Cannon and Rachel Brown) completed the course in an overall time of 4:26:48, aided on their way somewhat with a world record breaking 5k split of 10:49, from Paul Cannon on the anchor leg…
All in all a great morning of racing, followed by a very enjoyable catch up in Harborne afterwards where everybody made sure they were fully rehydrated from the day’s efforts….
MOMENT OF THE DAY:
A big shout out has to go to Claire Keene who didn’t think twice before coming to another athlete’s assistance on the bike leg when the competitor’s chain snapped right in front of the BRAT camp. As the athlete was standing there saying, ‘What do I do?’, with her (and her whole team’s) race potentially over, Claire grabbed her own bike, and ran down to donate it to the stranded athlete. By a twist of fate, it was roughly the right size, and she had the same cleats/pedals, so off she went to complete her bike leg. She was very grateful indeed. A true moment of sporting generosity from Claire!