After trying, and failing, to start my multisport season at the British Elite Duathlon Champs at the end of March, my first race of the 2015 season came this weekend at a standard distance European Cup event in Melilla, a small Spanish territory in Morocco, North Africa. The organizers of the Duathlon champs were forced to alter the event on the day (to a straight 10km run race) after gale force winds and heavy rain were deemed to make it unsafe on the motor racing circuit at Rockingham.
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| Malaga beach. |
Also competing in Melilla were two of my Leeds-based training partners, Gordon Benson and Elliot Smales, so we traveled together, and it wasn't the most straight forward place to get to! It required a flight from Leeds to Malaga on Friday afternoon, a night spent in Malaga, before catching an eight hour ferry across the Med on Saturday lunchtime, unfortunately arriving just after the race briefing on Saturday evening. The TD of the race was thankfully very helpful and had a quick chat with us, highlighting the main things we needed to know, so after a late meal in a nearby restaurant it was time for bed.
Race day morning was surprisingly relaxed as the Men's elite race wasn't until 6pm, so we headed out for a little leg stretcher jog and caught some of the Junior women's, and were able to check out the majority of the course. After a big breakfast (to make sure I got round) it was a long day of waiting in the hotel room and keeping hydrated. We did briefly venture out just to check our bikes were running ok, and went up into some kind of old, stone fortress up on the cliffs which was cool, and had great views out over the Mediterranean Sea.
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| On the run to T1 in about 10th position. |
Finally it was time to head down to the athlete lounge area and register, and then set up in the transition area; after a long wait to be allowed into the transition area we had to rush to warm up, wetsuit up and get to the beach, which was about 500m away from transition area. Having missed the race briefing, the three of us were given the penalty of being last in the line up, regardless of ranking, meaning we had no choice of where to stand on the start line; we ended up all together, on the right of the start. The swim course was interesting in that the water was relatively shallow, and so the first 80m or so was a combination of running and dolphin diving in a splashing mass of around 60 men! As the 'L' shaped, two lap swim course had both left and right hand turns it meant position within the group was constantly changing and at some points I felt like I was in the top 5 or 6, and at others I thought I was miles off the front! But after another round of all the dolphin dives and running in knee-deep water, I emerged out in a solid 10th, 11 seconds behind the leader, and only 5 behind second place. I felt surprisingly good on the long run to transition and was quickly out on the flat, but quite technical, eight-lap bike course, where I felt quite good and made my way up towards the front.
Despite a group of around 20 forming, there were only 5 or 6 who wanted to contribute to the pace,
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| The breakaway heroes! |
so after a couple of laps we were joined by around 20 further athletes! On the third lap I saw two athletes attack out of the group, so after waiting a little while and seeing them begin to ride further away I chased the pair down with an Italian just behind, and the four of us began to work together. Not long after one more Spanish athlete bridged across the gap and the five of us fully committed to the breakaway, eventually reaching T2 with a 69 second advantage. I had a quick transition, and was first out onto the run course, but with very heavy legs, with over 25km of hard riding in the break taking its toll!
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| Leading the breakaway up to the dismount line. |
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| Heavy legs a few hundred metres into the run! |
The two Spaniards and the Italian went off very quickly, and I tried to relax into my running as much as possible, but after only one 2.5km lap Gordon lead the chase pack past me at a blistering pace to which I had no response. Over the course of the run I began to feel better and better with each lap, (my 4th lap being my quickest!) and pulled a few places back from people who had gone off too fast, and I overtook the Italian from the break who was really suffering. I sprinted past two people in the last couple of hundred metres and was happy to finish 21st, 12 positions better than my ranking before the race. Although I felt like I must've been further back than I was, I was later frustrated to find out I was just 5 seconds away from a top 20 which would have scored me ITU ranking points!
I met up with Gordon in the finish area to find out he had manage to lead the chase up to the leading Spaniard from our breakaway, and had out sprinted him to win the race; Elliot also had a good race to finish 38th, originally ranked 58th, and out splitting me on the run by two seconds! Full results are available
here.
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| Elliot and myself after watching medal ceremony |
The morning after the race we went for an easy recovery run, and headed inland a bit, away from the seafront where much of the race had taken place. We saw quite a change in a very short distance and got lost in some sort of industrial estate or street market. There were lots of Moroccons buying large packs of goods and carrying them on their backs as they returned across the border out of the Spanish territory. Some had toilet rolls, various foods, clothes, drinks and even bleach, and although we must have looked very out of place, and at times felt a little uneasy, it was very interesting and eye opening, and then suddenly we popped back out onto the seafront which again looked very much more Spanish. The journey back being similar to the outward trip meant we were very chilled out and enjoyed a couple of beers after the race on Sunday evening and Monday evening in Malaga, before finally arriving back in Leeds on Tuesday evening, to resume the training up until my next race in two weeks time at the British University Sprint Distance champs, an event I won in 2013, but was forced to miss in 2014 due to injury! I'd like to thank all my sponsors for their continued support, Funkytrunks, Blueseventy, Leisure Lakes Bikes and OTEsports in particular for this trip! Credit for race photos:
H-Trainer.
