Lakesman 140.6 - Lindsay Straughton

Me again…… not entirely sure where to start this time…….

When I signed up with Coach Paul in March 2021, I told him that I firstly needed to conquer my LakesMan half demons but secondly would like to complete a 140.6 in 2022, exactly which race to be determined.

On a high from finishing the LakesMan half in June 2021, in a time that exceeded my expectations (see my race report from 12 months ago!) I decided that if I was going to go the whole way I would probably need the support of family and friends to get me round the run. LakesMan is my local race and I quite literally live on both the half and full bike routes, so it made sense to enter the LakesMan full as soon as entries opened.

and so began a year of preparation and training!

After a summer of pre-training, day 1 of LakesMan 140.6 training proper was due to begin on 8th November…. guess who caught Covid 48 hours earlier! (See Covid Recovery’ blog). “Base phase” was in reality “getting back to pre-Covid fitness phase”. At this point I was a little downhearted, I knew where I wanted to be come June 2022 but felt like I had lost out on 9-10 weeks of productive training….. Coach Paul told me not to be so daft and it would all be fine (and we know Coach is always right!)

Early on in 2022 I was seeing improvements in my bike and run pace, but frustratingly I wasn’t seeing any improvements to my swim, even 2 weeks out while I was regularly bashing out 4km swims at race pace in the pool, I just could not translate that to open water!

Coach Paul and I had several discussions about my target finish time and as always we had differing opinions, but have I mentioned that he’s always right? Having looked through the 2021 results I’d also said that it would be nice if I could get somewhere near the top 10 female finishers and potentially top 4 in my age group, obviously depending who else turned up on race day. Coach Paul’s response? “You can win your AG.” I laughed hard.

In the run up to race day I felt pretty calm while others around me were having pre-race jitters, but I had already had my meltdown 3 weeks prior when Coach Paul made me cycle the 180km bike route proper…. in 30mph+ winds. It was my rock bottom moment and yes, there were tears on that coast road.

Race morning was pretty uneventful, all was calm in Lindsay world and I even took a few moments to float on my back starfish style looking up at the mountains while everyone was entering the water.

As soon as the mass start kicked off I settled into what felt a comfortable pace and despite being bashed and dunked a couple of times I managed to find several pairs of feet to stay on. When the guy I was drafting at the half way point began to slow I just latched on to someone else!

My target time for the swim was 1:30, so imagine my surprise when I got out and my watch said 1:22!!! A 3.8km PB at a pace/100m that I hadn’t even been able to manage in the pool. One of my best friends was a swim marshall and she grabbed me in a bear hug “OMG that was soooo fast!” Yeah ok but you need to let me go get on my bike now lol

Out onto the bike. No rain forecast, overcast (my ideal conditions) and a ‘slight breeze’ that a few people were making noises about before the start but in all honesty, I knew nothing could be worse that the horrific ride I’d had 3 weeks earlier!

I was using Best Bike Split and following the power targets for each segment – absolutely fabulous bit of tech and I would highly recommend. I loved very single minute of the bike and was like a one woman party - shouting at marshalls, cheering on fellow racers and even chatting with a motorbike marshall at one point!

My amazing husband came out to the special needs station and handed me a ham sarnie and some cheese XL crisps in a zip lock bag (we definitely need to work on our handoff though!) which I devoured while doing the loop back. He was behind me for a little while in the van and said all he could see were bits of crisps flying about as I was shoving handfuls in my mouth.

Early on a spectator had shouted and told me I was 7th lady. By the time I got back to Keswick I had passed 3 others so knew coming in to T2 (25 seconds under target time!) that I was 4th.

Not entirely sure what happened in T2, it was pretty slow for me but I can’t really work out what I did wrong. I think it could have been people yelling to tell me I was in 4th that threw me off my routine and a couple of times I dithered!

On to the run. I had accidentally hit the button on my watch during the bike and started T2, but I let it run thinking that I would just press it again at the start of the run. This was fine except that it didn’t pick up the GPS straightaway, so for the first 2 laps I was running blind and had no idea whether I was doing my target pace or what distance I had done. The best I could do was run to what I knew was my race pace heart rate, walk at a couple of feed stations and hope this would be enough to hit the 3km run/100m walk plan and keep me on pace.

I was passed by a lady on lap 1 and to be honest she was like lightning, I knew she would do well and she went on to finish 3rd! Lap 4 was where I hit the wall….. nothing hurt as such but while my brain was shouting “move legs!” my legs were simply saying “no thanks, we’re good as we are”.

I managed to hold 5th place until the very last lap and despite picking up my pace I was overtaken. But in all honesty, I really wasn’t that bothered because I was still on track to hit my overall finish time and actually, it hadn’t been as painful as I had been preparing myself for. Turned out I was still enjoying myself, who knew!

Coming down that finish chute with my husband, son and friends on one side and the SEC tribe on the other all screaming and shouting at me was pretty amazing.

One of the first things Coach Paul said (with a smug look on his face) was “you won your age group”. Have I mentioned that he’s always right?

So, my first ever 140.6 stats:

Swim – 1:22, 3.8km PB

Bike – 6:09, 180km PB (what headwind??)

Run – 4:22, marathon PB (by well over an hour)

Finish time – 12:07

6th place female overall

AG Winner.