Cardiff Triathlon 2024 – My Bike saves the day!

Phew! What a fast and tough race that was, take a dive into my weekend racing Round 3 of the Welsh Super Series at Cardiff Bay, organised by Always Aim High Events!

8th overall today at Round 3 of the Welsh Super Series at Cardiff Bay 🤘🏻🏁

Had a big job on my hands after an awful swim, coming out of the water in 77th I knew I had to make damage on the bike to get back up to the top! 🏊‍♂️

Bike was unreal, a course that suited me down to the ground! Roundabouts, sharp turns and fast straights basically made it like a Crit course for 3 laps! Lots of power surges instead of consistently, got myself back up to 13th ready for hopefully a good run 🚲

THE BEST RUN OFF THE BIKE OF MY LIFE! Managed to keep the pressure on and run pretty fast throughout with a 35minute split. For the first time ever, I didn’t get passed on the run and I actually gained 5 positions 🏃🏻 🔥

Although my swim needs some major work, there is so many positives to take away from Cardiff.

Lots of love to @alwaysaimhighevents7942 for a fantastic and well organised event, @welshtriathlon4050 for the super series and all the hundreds of Marshall’s that stood on the side of the road for hours in some grim conditions 🌧️ 👏🏼

Great crowd as always on a lapped bike and run course meant that motivation was at an all-time high 📈

Swim: 28mins
Bike: 58mins (close to fastest time of the day)
Run: 35mins
Overall: 2:05:04 (8th overall / 6th Age Group)

📸: @byrd_clickz

As always, a thanks to my channel sponsors:
@RibbleCyclesChannel
@sbrclothingdesign8548
@Peatys
@SkratchTV
@YellowJerseyUk1
TopstepTri Coaching

[Music] welcome everyone we’re here for round three the world Super Series in Cardiff organized by always aim high events uh we’re here on the Saturday just signed on we got all our stuff ready to uh go tomorrow bike is looking very good pedal cover just did a bit of a service for me so thank you very much over there just all wrapped up for today is 4:00 so we’re going to go back chill out get some food for a noie start tomorrow 7:00 it’s me and Johnny we’re having a good time early bed early bed tonight so keep following our journey we’re going to have a good race tomorrow uh weather’s looking great Co is looking fast so uh it’s going to be a good day so haven’t looked at this myself yet all the spr ambassadors ISS year have got custom triceps uh designed this with my partner Alex a couple of months ago finally delivered for tomorrow so big reveal Johnny’s first one to see this so look boy and on the back look five flatliners and Lou from YouTu W it’s going to stand out lovely that is that’s going to turn a few heads matches the bike nice doesn’t it mhm take that Happy Days stand up tomorrow thank you spr that’s great thank you very much it’s uh it’s always a pleasure representing the brand that looks after you and a brand that is local as well the guys are from Cil uh they’ they’ve helped out the club massively as well fa flatliners so um yeah thank you and uh I look forward to representing the brand for another season the boys [Music] morning everyone it’s uh4 to 5 currently we’re just uh been awake for about 45 minutes had some breakfast nice and early feeling good we had some good food last night so very good very good food I think yeah so um didn’t have to eat much this morning so yeah looking forward to it weather seems nice not too cold out there but uh I think we’re in for a good morning of race in not only in the standard distance but across all uh disciplines today from 7.3 all the way through to Super Sprint and then also the world qualifies after us as well so yeah we did a little wacky yesterday as well with the bike course just wanted to make sure over the speed bumps and portals uh just to make sure the bike course here is very much like a crit course full of turns roundabouts uh some things to look out for so you got to be wary at all times so it was good just to get a little ride in yesterday and uh s that out and get signed on nice and early so yep we’re just going to pack our cars up get the last things done and then head off so should be a good day looking forward to uh getting underway [Music] [Music] [Music] okay bike’s oiling transition everything’s ready it is raining didn’t uh think it would this morning should have checked the Met Office weather Johnny’s freezing cold not surprised but uh yeah just trying to get some shelter and keep warm so I don’t know how it’s going to go today I think the the Root’s going to be slippery but it should be okay and uh new suit’s looking good we’re all ready to go trying to keep warm and get ready so you ready John questioning my life decisions n it should be a good day just want to get out there now as soon as we get out and started get nice and warm so yeah it’s just a waiting around now so um yeah just want to get started so transition is about to close going to get ready for the start of the standard race which goes off in about half hour uh feeling good feeling fresh uh I got known to have the GoPro today unfortunately so hopefully we get some clips from people out on course but uh if not catch you after the end so let’s go do this [Music] I’m [Music] he [Music] fight race congratulations ree well done race I was top 10 I think which is good po swim really bad swim 27 minutes really good bike strong average just over 24 mil hour and probably had the best run I’ve ever had in my life it was the first time where actually I was passing people whil whilst running and not just getting past so um really good but go get my stuff have a coffee and we’ll have a deep brief after [Music] wi us for to this is B ladies and gentlemen is your congratulations behind wow that was a [Music] so where do we start I think I’ll start off by saying this is my new house got a new new house with my partner and as you can see we’ve started to rip things out so stuff like this may not look perfect but it’s going to change over time and hopefully uh you’ll see some of that in some of the videos but uh this is my Turbo section at the moment so uh yeah not like what I had back at my parents house so uh back to today back to the racing back to the whole event um always aim high uh always put on a fantastic event um from start to finish from registration yesterday from the event Expo and setup to the race it was all superb um the efficiency starting on time and volunteers there was no issues in terms of uh cars or people out on course um yeah very very well run uh I personally don’t like doing uh open road uh events so I will always pay the extra money to do a closed Road event um and it was yeah really good you could say the road surface wasn’t the best and there was a lot of uh round about and speed bumps and some Pooles but you can only do what you can with what you given um and yeah it was fine you know I I I certainly made the most of it I am an experienced cyclist so really uh went at it at the bike and I’ll talk a little bit of that um in this video but um coming back to the event yeah just thank you very much to those guys thanks to the marshals the volunteers first a it was just quality I I I don’t think anything went wrong in gyms of someone’s race or something like that so um yeah very good the day started very cold and very wet I didn’t look at the Met Office report but maybe I should have luckily I took a jacket but otherwise uh you were going to get very cold very very quickly so um yeah just came out of nowhere everyone sort of ran for shelter um and yeah just made sure that it passed it looked a bit touch and go with the water and sort the swim course because you actually couldn’t see any of the boys that Miss in really quickly but luckily uh that managed to disappear ready for the 70.3 start and then we had an hour after that so um yeah pleasantly lucky about that water temperature was just over 20° it was actually warmer in the water than out so that was quite uh nice and a bit of a change um and it was fresh water as well so Cardiff Bay is actually a freshwater um area so um that was really nice as well I don’t know if I like fresh water over salt water or anything like that at the moment so um but yes uh it was just nice to get in some nice warm water for a change and not be Freez and cold or gasping up for for air for a couple of minutes so um that was nice let’s go on to the race so my race started out quite bad uh it was a really poor swim for me I think um I I I think this comes back to basically what I’m doing at the moment you know I’ve just bought a house quite busy want to start doing this place so all the the workouts I’ve been doing a very short sharp intense I think I’d be working with GTO a top T try to get some uh longer swims in or maybe if it’s not longer swims some more intensity with less break or um you know couple of 400 m efforts more than just you know the one twos and threes kind of thing so just adding some more volume and some longer swims with some sort of intensity I think that will help uh my swim time was I think like 28 minutes um which is really bad came out the water like 77th which is like really down down a lot of time on the leaders as well so um if I want to be up there for vichi and and European Champs I need to get better than that and I know that now uh really pushed hard and I I knew I had to come out the water that far behind uh I think I had one of the fastest bike uh times on the day so thank you bike obviously did his job um yeah I was super confident on that course that course is literally like crit course uh so there is roundabouts sharp turns speed bumps some bits of uh road which were quite rough so you know I I was so into that that’s my kind of course um staying in the TT bars for nearly all of it so that was really good fun really enjoyed um just had to be careful cuz there was some narrow bits on it but like I said you can only do what you couldn’t do as as an event organizer so that was fine uh managed to come off the bike 13th over overall so um made up a ton of places which uh which was really good so I was happy with that and I actually came in to transition not feeling that bad I thought I was going to be worse cuz I was chasing the time so um yeah did did did quite well there actually um transition was a bit bad I would say um I was looking for my shoes cuz the transition is so big it was just so hard to get a sight of where my bike racking was um put my wet suit over my shoes so I couldn’t see them and then my number was so faded on the rack that I actually couldn’t find where I was so I lost about probably 30 seconds Max not the end of the world um but yeah had a good Dismount as well actually I don’t think anyone caught it the RAC Marshall did come up to me and said if I had that on video I would love to have it and keep it because it was so well uh timed and perfectly done so um another good transition there um I hope everyone liked that uh as soon as I got then my racking also s did uh manag to get my shoes on I actually wore socks for the run as well I always do if it’s over 5K just cuz I don’t want to risk anything yeah I’ve got everything on started going um I know I wanted to hold a good Pace um and I knew that the Run was short here didn’t know by how much but I thought it was going to be like 9 and 1 12K and I think it was just under that um so went off pretty hard and I knew that there was people that I could potentially chase down so that was nice um managed to do 35 minute run which you know 9 and. 4K pretty happy with that that was looking to be a sub 401K anyway which was really good um I think my first 5k was like 19 minutes 30 or something like that so um I was really controlling myself really well wasn’t going too far into the red but I was just holding on my threshold which was good um and I was actually picking people off and I was really surprised about that coming off the half marathon and having a PB with 123 um I knew that I could run and I knew that I was strong um so I was really hoping to have a good run which I did it’s the first ever time I think where I’ve done a run and not been past myself um so that was quite refreshing normally I go so hard on the bike that I start to drop off uh so not be past which um like I said do never happened for me before was uh a big S success and a big goal that I went to achieve of Cardiff and I was actually picking people off um like like I said I was passing people and I felt really good about it and that motivated me to get the next person and the next person um and the Run course was really nice as well um I remember doing it a couple of years ago for the 70.3 and it was five laps and it was quite tough um but I knew two laps I knew I could just go all out and give it my all um nice couple little Rises couple little like um like small descents so you could just SU surge little bit of a rest and then predominantly flat so it was really nice it was a two laap course um I should have said the bike was three um but the Run was two and then the turn round point was by the senth uh which is the government building if you’re know from Wales uh but that was really nice cuz you’ve got to see people people CH your name um so had a lot of support as well so really enjoyed that um and yeah came to the Finish felt really strong I thought I was going to be in like top 15 uh um so I knew I had a good I had a good race I could have been better obviously with a swim but um yeah across the line managed to regather my thoughts speak to a lot of friends and uh I think I managed p8 overall so um really happy with that I think there’s a big gap if I want I get to that sort of top five which I have to work on and to be honest my bike was quicker than a lot of them and my run was pretty much on par or slightly behind so I know that all all the time I need to make up is in the swim that’s not going to be an overnight fix and I understand that and it doesn’t come easy so um need to start getting back in the pool and not just relying on the lake which I’ve done for the last 2 or 3 weeks overall really happy with my time really happy with the event like I said what can I take away from this uh my swim needs work my bike is strong my running is really strong at the moment so better than it’s ever been before same as my bike so um yeah really good Takens away from this um drop your comments uh below about about any questions around Cardiff how your race was I’d like to hear about that um I’m looking for a race to do in August as well I’m keeping July 3 just cuz I got so much going on uh personally with the house and family commitments and things like that but if I can’t find a race in August my next race will be Bala on the 1st of September and then I’m away for vishi for European champ so I’m trying to find something in August so if you think there’s a race you’d like me to do go to have a give it a go um drop it in the comments August is that time to do it so um yeah like I said thanks for watching the video thank you to all the volunteers always aim high events competitors Spectators you make those events happen so de hope you like the video watch it on s4c in a couple of weeks time and um hopefully see you out there on the bike running or at the lake very soon thank you