Shrewsbury Quadrathlon 2018
A lovely warm sunshine day with slightly cloudy and no wind, what could be better! A excellent day’s racing at the 7th Shrewsbury Quadrathon, the Event just gets better each year and has always sold out …. a true testament to the Event organizers SYTri and Phil Holden who took over from Gill Otto as SYTri Quad leader!
The start list was looking strong, with top quadrathletes and plenty of very good age groupers, as ever there were plenty of newcomers and the familiar faces we see in Shrewsbury every year, so without a doubt there was going to be some great racing ahead! We had been told that the water temperature was a chilly 14ºC, which was quite a shock after the warm weather and the non wet suit swim at Box End Quad!
The Men’s race: Alan Cole (6.17) and Steve King (6.08) soon broke away, with Steve moving ahead in the final 100m to exit first, James Block came in 3rd (6.54), followed by strong swims from Nigel Unwin, Bryce Dyer and Cliff Odgers.
James Block posted the fastest kayak time of 20:36 with Steve King posting the 2nd fastest time just 12 seconds slower at 20:48, by this time they were 3 minutes ahead of everyone else in the kayak leg. Nigel Unwin was 3rd in 23:35 and Iain Wood newcomer, produced an excellent split 23.52 in a barge of a kayak compared to the sleek K1’s up front! Alan, and Bryce both had strong kayak legs and were still in touch for a podium place.
Steve was holding 1st place, with James, Nigel and Alan chasing him, then Bryce pushing his huge 62-tooth chain ring was flying and posted the fastest bike split by far with a time of 34:46 for the 14 mile course – very fast in anyone’s books! So onto the run they went in the position they came off the bikes, Steve, James, Bryce, Nigel and Alan, they were all running well and no one managed to break up this order so that is how they finished!
Steve King posted the fastest run split of 19:16. His fast swim, super-fast kayak and then fast bike and run meant he easily took the overall win for the 7th time in a row! There were some excellent Age group performances with 3 Vet 60 athletes in the top 10! Iain Wood winning his first Vet 60 Quadrathlon. Nigel Unwin took Vet 50 (role down from James Block in 2nd) and Alan Cole took Vet 40 (role down from Bryce Dyer in 3rd). Good to see so many other BQA members flying the flag, racing well, and producing some excellent times. (see below)
Special mention must go to John MacLeod who won the Vet 70 category, he has raced at 3 Quadrathlons this year and is our first ever Vet 70 British Quadrathlon Trophy Winner … Well Done John!
The Ladies race: was equally exciting, a good field of 15 women. Jacqueline Davies went into the lead after a very fast swim (7.36)and was out of the water ahead of Timea Harris (8.01) crossly followed by Natalie Abbott (8.21) and Jean Ashley (8.24).
Jacq was in her kayak first, with Jean and Timea close behind. Jean moved into 2nd place, as Timea was having trouble getting in her kayak. Jean started to close the gap, but was joined by Timea, after the turn buoy they paddled together chasing down Jacq. Timea (25.48) moved ahead slightly, Jacq (26.14) stayed in 2nd place, with Jean just behind producing the fastest kayak split (25.36).
Jacq and Timea went into transition together, followed by Jean. Jacq was on the bike and away she had a brilliant bike producing the fastest split (44:46). Other great rides were from Mary White (45.00) and Natalie Abbott (45.01). Jean maintained her 2nd place, meanwhile Natalie was chasing them both down.
Jacq was first on the run, a good 2 mins ahead of Jean, each lap Jean having to work hard started to get closer … then on the 2nd lap running very fast Natalie shot past Jean and then Jacq, Natalie had the fastest run split (20.41) to take her first ever Quadrathlon Win, a fantastic performance! Meanwhile Jean with only about 800m to go over took Jacq and moved into 2nd place, Jacq was 3rd with Mary White Vet 60 putting in another fantastic performance coming 4th. Timea came 5th with Margaret Huyton also Vet 60 in 6th place! Like the men’s event 3 vet 60’s in the top 10 … looks like we are all ripening as we get older!! Again other great performances from BQA members Mandy Greenaway 7th, Anne Collins 8th and Donna Chappill 9th and Liz Angood 11th.
A superb day, everyone enjoying the lovely weather and friendly atmosphere, as always its a real good feel good factor event, superbly organized and its always great to chat and catch up with everyone’s race stories afterwards! Phil Holden certainly did the BQA Proud and gave a lovely presentation, with great recognition to our Age Groupers too …. everyone finished with a smile and I heard so many positive compliments I’m sure the race will be full again next season!
Big Thanks Phil & SYTri its been a GRAND DAY OUT!
Men Winners
1st Steve King Vet 40- I:25:22
2nd James Block Vet 50- I:28:17
3rd Bryce Dyer Vet 40- I:28:38
4th Nigel Unwin (role down) Prize winner Vet 50– I:30:48
5th Alan Cole (role down) Prize winner Vet 40– I:31:28
6th Iain Wood Prize winner Vet 60– I:36:02
21st John MacLeod Prize Winner Vet 70– 2:11:17
Congratulations to our BQA Members
7th Nicholas Farnell- I:38:07
9th Michael Toomey- I:42:03
10th David Finch- I:43:45
12th Cliff Odgers- I:46:46
13th Peter Chappill- I:46:49
15th John Kavanagh- I:48:01
16th Lance Ball- I:50:21
17th Jeff Chappill- I:53:46
18th Kev Lovett- I:56:08
22nd Alistair Bates- 2:27:14
DNF Wayne Smith … hope your calf gets better soon!
Ladies Prize Winners & BQA Members
1st Natalie Abbott Vet 50- I:25:22
2nd Jean Ashley Vet 60- I:25:22
3rd Jacqueline Davies Vet 50- I:25:22
4th Mary White (role down) Prize winner Vet 60
5th Timea Harris Prize Winner Senior 6th Margaret Huyton- 2:01:05
7th Mandy Greenaway (role down)Prize winner Vet 50–2:01:45
8th Anne Collins- 2:03:07
9th Donna Chappill- 2:03:47 10th Julie Dean First Local Female- 2:06:09
11th Liz Angood- 2:06:16
12 Charlotte Martindale Prize winner Vet 40– 2:08:03
Complete Results Shrewsbury Quadrathlon Results 2018
Great video of Shrewsbury Sprint Tri & Quadrathlon, not a lot of Kayaks in there but plenty of Happy Smiling Quadrathletes!
A big thanks to Russel Breyer for his detailed race report and his shorter version below! 🙂 Short version:
The swim was a one lap triangle, then off on the bike (briefly, does anyone know why German races tend to be bike, paddle, whilst ours are more often paddle, bike?).
And that was it. The presentations, which included World Cup prizes, were almost longer than the race, and seemed mostly to involve Helen R smiling gamely from a podium whilst various people showered her with more trophies and prizes than she could reasonably be expected to hold on her own. Her second world class performance of the day!
RACE 4 – 2nd September – Shrewsbury Sprint Quad – Only a handful of spaces left! This race just keeps getting stronger and stronger, an excellent fast, flat sprint race, running on the back of a very popular Triathlon. A great day out with a superb race atmosphere, with lots of support especially on the 3 lap run course around the Showground! A real ‘feel good friendly race’ instigated and organized by one of our very passionate quadrathletes along with SYTri … one not to be missed! 
RACE 5 – 9th September – Fabian4 Conwy Mountain Triathlon– The long-awaited Fabian4 Dyffryn Conwy Mountain Challenge is back for 2018. Last year’s event (2016) was the best yet, & here at Fabian4, we’re already working hard to make sure that next year’s is even better! Where else can you find a well-organised, non-commercial, realistically-priced, serious sea to summit adventure, much of it taking place in Snowdonia National Park. All the profits will be donated, as always, to the Snowdonia Society. 
RACE 6 – 16th September – National Championships- Awesome Foursome Quad – This is one of our longest running established Quadrathlons, in beautiful Cornwall in the surfing town of Bude. It never ceases to amaze me, I have raced it in all weathers …. it is always a brilliant exciting and challenging race and a great end the race season! Swimming in the sea, there’s plenty of hills on the bike, a historic canal for the kayak and amazing coastal views on the run! It’s one of those addictive races that keeps drawing you back. The race is on a Saturday so plenty of time for sun, sand and surf too! 
If anyone is having a holiday in Bude there will be another event the following Sunday September 23rd ‘The Cornish Nutcracker’ and it’s an eight Hill hill-climb series on the coastal roads between Bude and Boscastle and back, including Millook in both directions, certainly one to test those legs – 100% of money goes to Bude Surf Life Saving Club!
The Box End Quadrathlon was always going hot, with the high temperatures we’d been having, but the racing too was certainly a scorcher too! Ettiene Stott, the 2012 Olympic Gold Medalist in C2 Slalom was going to be competing along with current WQF Champion leader, Ferenc Csima from Hungary. With World and British Trophy series points up for grabs we had a lot of top class athletes racing, plus plenty of newcomers and as ever our strong back bone of committed Quadrathletes flying the BQA Flag!
We all headed into the lake, the first ever compulsory non wetsuit swim in I can remember, we waited for the Quadkids to walk up the lake to get at their start positions, and at 8.00am we were off! Ferenc Csima and Alan Cole moved into the lead a good minute ahead of the next group, Alan pushed hard and came out in first place 11.19 with Ferenc just 10 seconds behind. Michael Mason, Steve Rust, Alasdair Bruce and Helen Russell all came in around the 12.30 – 12.45, with Bryce Dyer in 13.16 & Etienne Stott 14.01.
The run was 5km following the exact same route as the bike with little shade and getting hotter! Extra water had been put out, by this time everyone was digging deep. There was no stopping Michael he went onto win after an amazing run split of 19.49, taking 1st place in a total of 1.35.36. Ferenc held 2nd place with comfortably and finished in 1.40.39. Alan pulled away from Bryce with a good run split of 22.16 and finished 3rd 1.41.56. Bryce held onto 4th place 1.44.00, Etienne was catching producing the 2nd fastest run split of the day 22.13, finishing 5th 1.44.38.
It was the final of the QuadKidz Trophy and big Congratulations to our 2018 National Champions, with Max Underwood Frost and Hermione Ball taking the Boys and Girls Titles, both doing all 3 races in the Series. I am hoping for a race report from them shortly! Well done to all those QuadKidz who have taken part in the series, we hope to see you and your friends next year!
Race day was forecast to be an absolute scorcher (we weren’t disappointed!) and 43 intrepid quad ladies turned up with a plethora of gear, racked their bikes and paddles and put their kayaks in number order, helped by the wonderful kayak boys Dave, Cliff, Mark and Simon. After a very entertaining race briefing from Colin Wilson (it is worth entering the race just for this bit alone!) and group warm up for all the quadrathletes and triathletes, we walked together to the swim start upstream. At 08:20, after a quick rendition of Oggy Oggy Oggy, the foghorn blew and we were off.
Finally onto the run section where the positions would change once again. Jac and Adele were the first ones out, but Jenny I, posting the fastest run split of the day (22:09) romped home and was the only Quad lady to finish in under 2 hours (1:58:31). Much to her amazement, Jac finished second (2:00:38) but as in the previous year was being chased down by Adele (2:01:22). Louise, with the 2nd fastest run (22:45) of the day moved back up into 4th (2:04:16) with Gill finishing in 5th (2:05:09). Ali was 6th (2:05:42), Mary (2:07:04) and Jenny S was 8th (2:07:08).
On Behalf of the BQA I Just wanted to say a Huge Thank You ‘Chester Tri’ for an amazing ‘Deva Divas Quadrathlon! We certainly shared ‘The Quad Passion’ we had 43 ladies on the start line, at least 30 of them first timmers! The atmosphere was brilliant the camaraderie and racing superb, these girls just had the Best day Ever!
The 2nd Deva Divas Quadrathlon’ is almost here ….. another special day for ‘British Quadrathlon’ as this year we have 50 Ladies take to the water for the ‘Only Ladies Quadrathlon in the World’ This race also has the backing of the WQF (World Quadrathlon Association) the BQA and ‘British Canoeing’ they wish you all a great and enjoyable race!
DEAR DEVA DEVAS
Our 2017 QuadKidz Champions at the Prize Giving at Box End in 2017! Could it be you in 2018? Check out the Quadkidz Rankings with just 1 final race to go! 
The Quadkidz Barnton Training Weekend, has proved to be a great success with so many positive comments coming in. A big thanks to Lance and Hermione for this report!
Race day.
After 2 laps Holly approached the transition and dismounted very professionally putting any of my dismounts to complete shame.
Hermione had a good run and had closed down the gap to 40 seconds. If only there had been a second run lap! Meanwhile Izzy had the fastest run of all, so finished in a close third. If only there had been 3 laps for the run!
We also had great support from a local citizen radio team which help communicate to the turn marshals where the athletes were and when to expect them at the turns. They also assisted is getting help to a young lady who tapped wheels with another competitor and fell off her bike. They communicate the issue to their base station and moments later a ambulance squad was dispatched to help her. She was badly bruised and fractured her arm.
Thank-you Len on behalf of the World Quadrathlon Federation for putting the USA on the World Quad Map, keep sharing the passion and spreading the word!