As Viceroys gathered at Thorpe Park for their annual Club Championships, even the marshalls commented on the contrast in atmosphere to a normal calm and serious tri as the banter began as soon as they were together, with searching questions such, ‘What does Lisa’s hat look like?!’ and ‘WHERE’S THEO?’ But as soon as the whistle went, friendships were put aside and the race was on.

Chairman and AG World Champion Yeoman, as expected, broke away on the swim – but perhaps less predicatable – Matt Storr stayed with him for the full 750m, their swim times a staggering 10.30 and 10.31. Mark went on to claim the title of Club Champion (again) and Matt achieved the accolade of 8th in his AG.

Further back on the swim course Jon and Andrea (who have both developed the ‘zig zag’ style of swimming) swam at the same pace, bouncing off and in to each other for 750m. Paul Mayer peaked during the first 200m of his swim but had a fantastic T1 of 45 seconds and a run PB of 22.32. Simon Tack raced a course PB by 2 minutes 30, recovering from a difficult swim, which not getting his wet suit done up properly meant he felt like he was being strangled after 200m – or is this just a chivalrous excuse for coming out of the water about 3 secoonds behind Lara, who admittedly he would really like to have beaten.

As Viceroys moved from the swim to T1, many started to question the accuracy of the timing systems with many superhuman T1 times, Simon Tack’s recorded T1? 18 seconds! ‘It was a farce. I put my helmet and shades on and started to get on the bike and realised I hadn’t taken my wet suit off.’

As if being chicked by Lara in the swim wasn’t enough, about 7k in to the bike route, Colette overtook Simon – although he did claw his way back again!

Julian did a PB on the run – 21:22 and ‘I even ran with the chairman for a bit (about 50 yards but he was a lap ahead of me)’. Andrew Moody racked up a course PB, knocking a staggering 5 minutes off last year’s time – a fantastic debut as a newby Viceroy. Mick Tumilty clocked a course PB and a 5k PB, as did Andrew Hedges, with a sprint PB of 1.13.54 and a 5k PB of 19.36. Caroline MacKinnon claimed a PB by 3 minutes

But these were not the end of Viceroys’ achievements for the day: Mark Yeoman was 1st Viceroy home, 1st in AG and 2nd overall; Scott Forsyth was 2nd Viceroy home, 1st vet Viceroy, 3rd in AG and 4th overall; Andy Tugwell was 3rd Viceroy home and 3rd in his AG. Colette Kitterhing was 1st Viceroy home for the ladies and 1st in her AG; Lara Clay ws 2nd Viceroy lady and 3rd in her AG; Suzy Blandford was 3rd Viceroy lady and 1st in her AG; Lisa Yeoman was 1st Viceroy vet and 10th in her AG.

Viceroys dominated the 40-49 AG category, with 5 of the top 10 places going to our boys (Yeoman, Forsyth, Hinsley, Essex, Cosgrove). James Turner (6), Kevin Dargue (7) and John Kellet (9) also walked away with top 10 places in their AG categories. Our ladies too smashed their AG categories (Colette and Suzy 1st, Debbie 2nd, Lara 3rd, Caroline 5th) making us all proud to have been part of a great morning at Thorpe Park.