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So today 6th September should of been the wonderful Shrewsbury Sprint Quadrathlon, unfortunately like all our Quadrathlons this season sadly Covid cancelled. However not to be disheartened and as always #makingthemost members of the BQA got their Quadrathlon Heads on, and did their own virtual quadrathlons! 

Jean and Lance took to the water in Chester and completed a long version of the Sprint quad including an extended kayak and bike, the weather was beautiful and it brought back many memories of all those fantastic races organized by SYTri … we gave it our best shot and we can’t wait to be back in September 2021!

Meanwhile Pete Chappill from Lincsquad was actually in Shrewsbury for the weekend this was his 3rd Repli-quad event of the season ‘The famous Shrews-bearly’ this is Pete’s wonderful race report! 

The start and finish for this event were at Wingfield caravan park in Montford Bridge close to Shrewsbury and right on the river bank.
The river was swollen and flowing fast so for the 500m swim I tasted what a decent swimmer feels like finishing in around 6 minutes. Had it been against the flow I would still be there.
The kayak leg was out against the flow and provided some wobbly moments at the turn. The return leg was 2 mins quicker and a lot easier.
Onto the bike and out towards the monument junction on the actual Quad course. This section was a lot more undulating than the section from the showground. Turning left placed me on the actual route up to the turn and back to the monument. The return to the site was again undulating with a variable wind direction and about 16 degrees of warmth.
The run had to be limited for me as it was the first since an injury 7 weeks ago. 10 minutes out and 10 minutes back proved to be a good test for gait maintenance and a good sign for the next event in a weeks time, the Bude-ifull.
The usual screaming crowd was at the finish. However numbers were limited to one in order to remain covid safe.
All though these events are not the same with people passing me spurring me on it does act as a normalisation in these frustrating times! Fantastic effort Pete … we look forward to the Bude-ifull Report next weekend!

As always Pete is very passionate about the ‘The tee shirt tour’ so full marks for his one -off original race Tech-TShirt, and at this rate Pete you must be on for a Trophy Prize!!

I hope all our Quadrathlon friends are keeping fit and motivated, its been a crazy year and I’m certainly missing our friendly banter and smiling faces! One Virtual Race Left … ‘The Awesome Foursome’ …..please post a photo on our facebook page if your out and about next weekend and raise a glass on your own T-shirt Tour to our Wonderful Sport!  Love from Your Fairy Quadmother XX

Covid-19 Replic-Quad Series Round 2 ….the avid followers of Quadrathlon will know that round 1 was the Adventure Bomber.

So Lincsquaders were out in action on Sunday 14^th June, it was the turn of the Dearne Valley event which was covid cancelled.  In the spirit of the sport and adhering to the latest guidelines Kev Lovett, Donna, Jeff, and Pete Chappill commenced a similar distance course at a local venue.

At 08.30 the Dearnish Valley Quadrathlon set off with the 800m swim, (The tape measure got wet and snapped part way around so estimated distance). The weather was kind with a light breeze from the east. The transition was on a small piece of grass and had a long run out with the bike onto a 2 laps “P” shaped technical course with “s” bends and climbs. Kev had ridden the course in the week and blamed a chill on the fact that his wife beat him. Jeff and Donna utilised their ability to have no social distancing with Jeff drafting and changed the direction of the second lap as it was more scenic. Once again I complied with the rules and let Kev make some space up front.

The transition was back to the grass having to carry the bike through the gate. To simulate Dearne it was a deep water start in the kayak. This allowed Donna the opportunity to practice her high brace.5 “ish” laps around the perimeter of the lake made the 4kms route. The shapely course, plenty of turns and cross winds made for some interesting moments as did the deep water exit.

The run course which was a square and undulating one with 2 laps around the surrounding estate followed by a lap of honour around the lake.

That’s the second event of this series completed with the prospect of at least two local age group champions. Thanks go to Dawn, Tracy, and Ben for transition security and ensuring that social distancing was maintained.

The next event should have been Box End which has been rescheduled to September! We will schedule a Repli-Quad in July to try and keep some normality to this year’s calendar and there are valuable points for the local age group championships! ….. Thanks to Pete Chappill for his great report!

Meanwhile over in Chester Lance Ball and Jean Ashley were replicating Dearne Valley, thinking of Mark Benton and all at Manvers Lake we took to the River Dee to keep sharing our Quad Passion, and doing our own ‘Social distancing Quad’.

Perfect conditions as we started our swim in the River Dee at 9.30am this morning, though slightly cooler than expected due to a heavy thunderstorm the day before! 24 miles #swimkayakbikerun from start to finish around similar distance to Dearne Valley (though I probably made the Kayak leg slightly longer just because the river was so calm and I love that bit the best!! ) Once again we were using our separate cars as our transition areas, a bit of a squash and its a good job we weren’t timing our transitions! We had a very fast out and back bike, followed by our steady run , not quite race pace as we did have enough breath to keep chatting!  We made up our own ‘Banter’ – not quite the same as Mark‘s commentary and the cheering from the Manvers Team, but we got out there and smashed all 4 disciplines!

Other BQA Members were out at Manvers Lake, well done to Bob Mawson, Dave and Caz Jones also flying the BQA flag!

Sending Love to all our Quadrathlon Buddies, and especially thinking of ‘The Manvers Team’ 💜 #makingthemost