5am on a Sunday morning, it’s dark, cold and raining. While most are nursing hangovers or sleeping, I’m sat in my car running through my mental checklist: bike, bike shoes, running shoes, helmet, dog, angry fiancée, tick! And we’re off to Chilham Castle. I’m doing the Duathlon which consists of a 5km run, 27km bike ride and 2.5km cross country run back to back and I have talked my fiancée into doing a 5km cross-country race with the dog at the same time. As I’m being put through a year of wedding organising I can dish out my own type of pain on her through hideous fitness!
I line up with the rest of the Lycra clad niche group of likeminded people who believe that doing a running race is improved by a bike race in the middle of it. The gun goes and I power off hoping to beat my personal best. After 5 minutes of running I realise that I’ve over cooked my legs training in the week and I’m in for 25 minutes of pure hell! I finish the run and I don my pointy aero helmet and jump on my bike.
