Brigg Sprint Final Race of the Season!

Jules Taylor – As usual , I rocked up Saturday evening  , and went for a nice jog to check the run part of the race out. Into the town for pizza , then curled up in the van for a bit of Netflix before tomorrows race. Seeing as my last race was in 35degree heat in Hungary, I was not looking forward to getting in the river at all…..cold water and a fear of open water swim starts was not sitting well.

Race morning having a good chat with Oli , we both nearly missed the start as we were talking so much! So in we went swiftly!

Suddenly, with about two minutes to go before we started I had a massive change of plan. Normally I hang back a bit , and stay away from others, but for whatever reason decided to go for it. I had been putting some strong swim sets together in training, so best put them to the test and try and stay near the head of the pack , what could possibly go wrong! First few minutes went by fairly comfortably  and Oli was alongside me still, so upped the effort and a few minutes later was leading the swim! I had never been in this position before, and it felt really good. Up and round the turn point, heading back, and with a couple of hundred meters to go I had someone on my feet, slowly they caught and passed me and were out just before me, not sure who it was as I didn’t recognise them.

Into transition, a swift change, first onto the bike and I even made the decision to put socks on due to the low temperature!

More new territory, leading the bike. Not once did I look back, and just focused on how cold I was getting, I couldn’t feel my hands even though my feet were toasty!

Spinning well, cruising the little elevations, and soon the turn around was close. But then I could hear what I had been waiting for …. the sound of Oli, the unmistakable sound of a disc wheel being ridden fast. He flew past me, round the turn around, and he was off. I was already riding hard,  but knew the bike was Oli’s trump card, along with his run, so I just had to dig a bit deeper and see what I could do.

Always keeping him in sight, I managed to not lose too much ground 2-300 meters probably the biggest gap. I never ride with any pace/HR info/bike computer, so when I feel totally at the max, breathing as hard as I can, I just ease up slightly and that’s where it stayed back to transition. Oli was just exiting T2 as I racked my bike, so it was a very slick T2 for me , and we both put our kayaks in at the same time….game on!!

This was playing out exactly as I had imagined, my aces were my swim and kayak, and Oli’s were the bike and run, so both in the kayak together was the perfect race midpoint.

Unfortunately Oli had a issue with his rudder which he had to sort out, so yet again I found myself in the lead. A lot of vegetation in the river was not good, but again head down and I just keep going, all went smoothly up to the bridge turn point . Safely round and then I could see Oli, and with him was Erik Meilak, a new name in Quadrathlon. He had a nice fast K1, so earlier I had googled him for any athletic info and he was a very good kayaker ….. so I upped my effort again! Just before the finish as I expected Erik came by for first off the kayak section, and into T3. As I went into transition Erik was nowhere to be seen so he must have been very smooth and quick onto the run .

I hadn’t seen Oli after the kayak get out, but I knew I couldn’t ease up one bit as his running was always strong. I maxed out a few times before the turn point so had to back off a little, it was at least a minute after the turn Oli came by, so I had about a 2 minute lead on him with about 2km to go, so long as I kept the current pace up I should be ok. I hadn’t noticed Erik go by but a there was a few fast runners from the Triathlon at one point before the turn,  so he must have been amongst them. Running back through the town to the finish I glanced back and couldn’t see Oli, so relaxed a little, and onto the finish line, so pleased I’d had a brilliant race!

Second place overall , and subject to the time adjustments for the roadworks on the bike section, I really hoped I had done enough for the BQA Trophy Series Win. Due to the roadworks it turned out to be a real headache for the organisers working out the results …but in the end, I had done enough…woohoo! This was everything I thought it would be, a fantastic hard race, with no sure outcome untill the end. A great win for Erik at his first Quadrathlon hopefully we will see him a lot more next year. Many thanks to Oli for a great seasons racing and pushing me to what were definitely my limits and well done to everyone racing today, plenty of smiles around at the finish!

Its always worth the long drives to race at Lincsquads events I look forward to racing every one. This was yet again a really enjoyable  well organised, and so friendly thank you to you all!

After ditching stupid thoughts of doing 24/36 hr runs this year and changing my plans in the Spring to focus on Quadrathlons this year,  I never imagined I would of had such a great year

World Age Group Champion Middle distance .

National Champion Overall

World Age Group Champion Long Course .

National Trophy Series Champion.

See you all next year!

Jules x

 

Helen Recchia – Firstly, thank you, to Lincs squad and all the volunteers for organising and enabling the event to go ahead. Thank you for everyone for being so friendly and encouraging. The morning was freezing 6 degrees! It was with some trepidation that I checked in, (thinking why am I doing this?) still unsure at that time whether it was a river or pool swim. River it was, (the triathletes had the pool) the Duck weed covered river looked so inviting! The good news, the river was a toasty 13 degrees a lot warmer than the air.  Off we set at 8.30am, I am a slow front crawler a lot of breaststrokers are quicker, exited the swim by rolling onto the platform like a beached whale and into transition. Wetsuit came off quickly, air temperature still freezing, fleece on, so glad I took it, helmet on, socks, shoes (don’t do clipped in), puncture repair kit round waist, number with timer to back, couldn’t coordinate putting my gloves on, my hands were too cold (big mistake).

 

Helen Recchia – My Quadrathlon journey

My sporting background is from racket sports mainly (apart from the few bits you did at school) but gave those up in my forties. I have always been interested in walking and the outdoors.

I think it was in 2011 my daughter wanted to swim the length of Coniston but needed a Kayak support, she said you can do that! The same day I signed up for a Beginners course at Malton & Norton Canoe club, spending the next few weeks doing the course upside down in the river Derwent! My kayaking journey had begun. I got involved in flatwater racing ‘The Hasler’ events for my club. I managed over the years to get promoted to Division 7. The races were hard but fun and I have met such a great bunch of people. I even got involved for a short period of time with Canoe polo. A torn shoulder ligament stopped me kayaking for a while and it was hard to get back into it. This year has been my first full year back kayaking. At the beginning of 2024 I was demoted down from 7 to Division 9, but managed by the end of the season to creep back up to Division 8.

About the same time 2011, I was encouraged to do more swimming by some friends. I was able to swim front crawl but not very well, 25m was a struggle. Slowly I improved. Then I ventured into open water swimming, it took about 4 years to settle into that and in 2015 I swum the mile in Windermere. In 2015 I also did my first super sprint Triathlon the run was terrible I thought I was going to collapse.

I had always hated running possibly because I was just never fit enough but with work, I did a race for life my first 5K, I thought never again! …..I still went back for more. A friend suggested we cycle the coast to coast, (around the same time I had been cycling back and forwards to work about 16 miles a day) so I thought why not? we did it in 3 days just fantastic. Parkruns came along, well how could I resist!

My first Quadrathlon was at Manvers a sprint distance, a fantastic setting for an event, I got to the end of it but thought never again! Well for a day anyway. So planned to try and do 3 of the events the next year, injured my shoulder so did the Triathlon at Manvers instead. I couldn’t kayak but I wanted to do The Brigg Bomber so I entered a Ladies team, everyone loved it, and all said they would like to do it again, I did the swim leg. Then Covid hit putting everyone out of action. Post Covid I entered The Brigg Bomber again, another Ladies team, this time I did the run leg, again all loved it. I announced to the team that I would like to do it as an individual.

2024 was my first full Brigg Bomber and a first for that distance. Sadly, my shoulder does not like the kayaking, so I am hanging up my kayak, I Still hope to enter a Ladies team next year, but my main emphasis will be Triathlons.

To all out there give Quadrathlon a go you will never know until you try, it is just amazing what you can achieve.