Viceroys took the new Redhill Sprint Tri by force and although it’s (apparently) not always about the winning, it certainly was for Viceroys at the inaugural Redhill Sprint Triathlon. We came away with 4 men in the top 10: Mark Yeoman (2^nd Place, 1^st in AG), Mike Essex (4^th Place, 2^nd in AG), James Turner (7^th Place, 6^th in AG), Steve Hobson (9^th Place, 5^th in AG). Lara Clay was 2^nd in her AG and 9^th lady overall and Andrew Whelband claimed 3^rd fastest female bike time!

 So how did some of our team achieve such feats? 

‘I was off in the second wave,’ begins Chairman Mark Yeoman, ‘this being my 5th in as number weeks I saw this as a training race. I swam okay by my standards with a low 10 for 750m (2nd fastest). The swim exit was a steep 30m run up the slipway to the lake – ouch. Quickly into T1 my focus was to catch as many of the first wave (10mins head start – aka James ‘Have I told you I’ve done Alcatraz?) as possible.’ Lara too was having a great swim, coming 14^th overall out of the water.

The bike course was a brutal hilly affair (‘horrific’ stated Lara) and one that was hidden in the course profile in the race pack. I was making good ground but certainly not as fast as the previous weeks. Half way my chain dropped and jammed on a hill. I tried to re-catch it but that wasn’t working – with the fear of falling over I hopped off and tried to release it. It took a whole and after flipping the bike over I yanked the chan free only to cut my finger severely. Blood was gushing out and rule 5 kicked in. as I rode on I was covering myself and the bike in blood. Resigned to this I rode safely back to transition (still 2nd fastest split).

Andrea I did her best time for 750m at a tri yet:  ‘I know I’d been doing faster times at the lake so was a bit disappointed with my time and that only got worse in T1 as my wetsuit got tangled on my timing chip and it resulted in what can only be describe as a comical battle between wetsuit and woman as I tried to wrestle it off but just kept making it worse & somehow ended up getting the wetsuit wrapped around the chip a few times – epic T1 failure, sorry coach!  So a glacial time later, I finally got on my bike to discover they really did mean it was a hilly course as we were straight into one!  I should mention at this point as I’m doing the Ride100 in a few weeks I’d done 97.5 miles Saturday, hence my legs weren’t very appreciative of not only getting on a bike again but going up a climb straight away!  They eventually woke up though and I started to get going and overtake people (and dodge the potholes!) and get into a rhythm.

Towards the end of the course I got a glimpse of pink in the distance so got my head down in an attempt to catch who turned out to be Lara, but couldn’t quite manage it and came into transition just as she was heading out for the run.  There I had another transition failure as when I racked my bike, in my attempt to make up for my dismal T1 failure, I racked a little too quickly & my bike nudged the one next to it & it somehow started a chain reaction of bike tangle of all the bikes around me, so had to stop & sort that out before I could get going on the run – epic T2 failure, sorry coach!

I had a pink target in the distance however to focus on and gradually got to within a stone’s throwing distance of Lara by the end of the first lap, but at that point Lara found her running legs & went off like a F1 car into the distance while my efforts on the bike the day before caught up with me & it was a case of getting round to the finish line as best I could!  Afterwards we all admired Mark’s blood-splattered bike & impressively bandaged finger before cheering him & Mike on at the presentation ceremony and then heading home for a nap! 

Highlight of the day – 3^rd fastest female bike time.  Low point – everything but the bike! J  Lesson learnt – either tuck the timing chip under the wetsuit or take it off before wetsuit removal & then re-attach after!’