Entering a race should be simple.. right?

Over the last few years I have entered many races; from sportives to swimathons the list is long and the experiences mainly good.  But while some race organisers simply open their entry pages and welcome you to join on a first come first served basis, others seem to make the whole process unnecessarily difficult. 

We currently have situations where online entry is promoted as opening on a certain day at a certain time and then when it does, promptly crashes due to the number of people trying to enter at once.  Registering is by a process of luck rather than orderly queue.  This scenario seems to happen consistently with limited participant events, which are largely run by well-meaning volunteers but who don’t have the IT solutions in place to cope with the volume of interest.  

Last year I secured an entry to the Dart 10k swim.  This involved taking the morning of work, getting up early and submitting my form a couple of dozen times before it managed to connect with the server and tick me in.  This year, the same situation with the Brownsea Island Swim but without luck. As frustrating as this is, it is a shame for the organisers because it puts people off reapplying and in the absence of holding a reserve list, the same situation will happen year in year out.

In contrast to this some mass participation events ask you to pre-register interest prior to opening.  I am getting a little suspicious of this approach.  For example, Velo South is a new cycling event launched to take place this year.  The organisers had 15,000 spaces and it attracted 30,000 pre-registered entrants without announcing the entry cost. My guess was it would be high and it was, funnily enough it did not sell out immediately even with that registered interest level. 

Organised cycling events on closed roads are fun to take part in but not if the entry fees are high.   Choose your events carefully and make sure you are not paying for the privilege of something you could do yourself, without paying to take part.

Finally, a word of caution when entering races.  Check the terms and conditions carefully and in particular the refund policy.  With so many events cancelled this year because of snow and extreme weather I am reading about many people who are finding themselves out of pocket as some organisers choose not to refund entry fees.  There is actually a statutory legal duty for race organisers to refund entries so if you find yourself in a situation where they say they will not I would be tempted to press them a little further and be very visible on social media in publicising your responses.

Happy racing!

Trains and bicycles - a match made in heaven?

Plans for trains to have dedicated carriages for bicycles and sports equipment are currently being discussed in Scotland as a way to alleviate seasonal cramming and space issues.   During the summer months trains servicing popular cycling routes are absolutely packed with passengers and so the idea of introducing a bike carriage, similar to the old guard van, seems a sensible one.

I have often fancied taking my bicycle on the train one way and cycling back so I thought I would find out how easy it is to do this locally.   A quick bit of research suggests it pays to plan ahead.  There are only two spaces for bikes on most trains which means you should reserve them.  There is no charge, you simply book it when you purchase your ticket which you can do online.  However, you must make a reservation on a GWR train and you can’t travel at peak times, unless you have a folding bike.  GWR states pre-booking needs to happen two hours before travel, so if you pitch up hoping to get the next train then you may be in for a bit of a wait.  This is the same if you are travelling with Virgin Trains.  While trains to Wales with operator Arriva recommend booking they are clearly a bit more relaxed about it and Cross Country sounds by far the cycling friendliest.  Cross Country will let you reserve your bike space by tweeting them or using facebook messenger and promises to respond within 30 minutes.  Its website has a detailed page dedicated to helping cyclists with everything from parking your bike securely to hire points at stations.  

It is slightly harder if you intend to travel with a tandem as some trains won’t accept them at all and others classify it as two bike spaces.  Ideally, if you are regularly going by train the message is to use a folding bike, then you can travel at peak times and you can also use a replacement bus if you are unlucky enough to need too.

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised with our local train operators bicycle policies, although I have not used them so I can’t truly say if they are just as good in practice, I am now able to plan my first bicycle-train adventure.

• @lindatodd74 

The cold is no excuse not to train

When it’s cold it can be hard to keep motivating yourself to exercise outside.  Yet I find there is nothing nicer than a bright cold day to get out the house and just run your socks off.  The first step is always the hardest but if you wear a couple of layers to keep your core warm you will find you quickly adjust to the temperature.  If it is really chilly, I always run with a pair of light gloves on and a lightweight hat or beanie as I find cold fingers and a cold head hard to cope with on a long run.    With minus temperatures overnight you also need to watch out for black ice on the pavements and the roads when you set off, I have almost got caught out a couple of times over the last week.  Remember to also continue to drink little and often on your runs as even when it’s cold you get similarly dehydrated without realising it. 

At this time of year, I am not out cycling on the roads, I am tucked up inside on my turbo trainer which is set up in my garage.  I know lots of cyclists are out still in this weather, but I am too worried about skidding off and injuring myself so I am assigned to a couple of hours in my garage on a Saturday morning for now. It was freezing in the garage at the weekend but after a quick spin for five minutes I had a sweat on.  The trick to long cycling in the garage on a static trainer is to relieve the boredom which thanks to the wonder of technology and gadgets is easily done.    While I play music and videos I especially love to ride on Zwift, which is a turbo trainer game that you link your turbo up to your computer and lets you ride with other cyclists in a virtual environment.  It may sound nerdy, and admittedly it probably is but don’t knock it until you have tried it, it really is a fun way to exercise.

If you are still  not convinced to running outside or cycling in your garage then there are lots of warm gyms around Bath that will welcome you with open arms.  No excuses now, as it is far too early in the year to break those resolutions.  

Keeping motivated all year round

Now is the time many of us start thinking about New Year Resolutions.  According to a Neilson poll, planning fitness or weight related goals are most common ones we made last year and also the ones that we found hardest to keep past January.   

Keeping motivated all year round is not always easy.  A key reason we fail is that we are apparently overly ambitious or unrealistic in what we resolve to change.  I don’t necessarily agree.  For me the best motivator is to always have an ambitious goal committed to and preferably one that scares the pants off me.  The knowledge of needing to prepare and train for weeks in advance or risk failure is enough to get me out of my warm bed on a morning and keep my training plan on track.  I also have a habit of writing my goals somewhere I can see them regularly, it helps keep them at the front of my mind.

Even although I enjoy training, without a goal it lacks focus and becomes far too easy for me to skip a session.   I always set my goals early and next year I have signed up for two long distance triathlons.  As the first is in May I am already working on my base training and have a training plan in place to match my goals.   Committing to meeting up and training with others helps too as it is harder to let someone down, finding a coach that monitors your progress and makes you accountable is also a good way to keep on track.

Making progress can be frustrating at times particularly when gains are small or something does not quite go as planned.  But keep visualising your target, whether that is becoming a faster runner, pulling another notch in on your belt in or finishing a race that you never thought a year ago was possible for you to start, keep that goal in mind and it will keep you moving in the right direction throughout the year and avoid being just another failed January fad.

@lindatodd74

Coping with rude remarks when running

The other morning while out running, I received a few rude remarks from a group of boys.  I shrugged them off and ran on but later it got me thinking about how comments like that could affect people to the extent they may avoid running.  Lets face it being sensitive about our body image is fairly common and for some people so much of an issue, it puts them off exercising in public.  I am a member of a Women only Facebook group where training advice is shared as well as the forum acting as a support network. I asked a question in the Group to find out how many had experienced anything similar.  I got a huge response.  Incidents are occurring regularly and what is more it’s happening globally.  This situation means many women won’t run on their own at all now because of fear of verbal or physical abuse while others admit to always carrying weapons as well as their water bottles.

Researching this further on specific runner forums it is not only women that experience this, men do too and very often it is the men who are on the receiving end of physical abuse.  Since being beeped at, wolf-whistled and jeered at when we run outside is frequent, then we need to be prepared to handle it.  Shouting back or sticking two fingers up only fuels the situation and I found the consensus among runners is to ignore the comments, don’t react or show that it has affected you and try to avoid confrontation.  If you are nervous then run with a friend, join a running group or find running routes where there are likely to be lots of other runners around. 

I usually run on my own and in reasonably quiet areas but I have found that if you smile at people as you run towards them it is usually returned and may help disarm them if they are feeling less than warm towards you.  Granted that tactic would probably not have stopped the group that decided to comment on my Chris Hoy-like thighs the other day, but you can’t win them all.  

@lindatodd74

Focusing on my swimming

I have always loved the water.  Thanks to my mum, I was introduced to swimming lessons when I was 4 years old and I progressed well as a club swimmer.  My 'racing' stroke was breaststroke and I was always a pretty rubbish front crawl swimmer so years later when I took up triathlon and got back in the pool I died off after one length. 

Swimming is all about technique.  You have to get in the pool regularly,  as in a minimum of three times a week, to improve and maintain it.   It has taken hours and hours both in the pool and in open water, and while it has paid off there is always room for improvement.

I had a swim analysis in January in an endless pool which included a video analysis that critiqued my stroke and basically showed that I needed to improve my body position, stop my arms crossing, slow down my arm cadence, improve my kick,...and god so many other things but anyway I took away the report and after a couple of months gradually saw my swimming pace get significantly faster from around 2.15 / 100m to around 2.00/ 100m in the pool and a bit faster in open water when helped by the buoyancy of a wetsuit.  I completed my 3.8k race swim in 1.21 and was really happy with that.  

However, this month I realised despite all my efforts my speed had stopped improving.   My coach Paul offered to get in the pool with me and take a look.  That one hour session was really helpful.  He immediately identified that while my body position was fine in the water I was not getting a good enough catch and pull to my swim.

The catch and pull technique is something that has been explained to me before by swimming coaches but generally quite hard to understand.  That is maybe because they have been explaining it usually while standing above me at the side of the pool and not in it actually demonstrating what they mean.  

Essentially, it is all about getting a good entry point for your hand and keeping a high elbow through the pull phase as well as engaging your lats.  www.swimsmooth.com has a really good explanation of this.

I also found this short film by Olympic Chloe Sutton one of the best ones that explains how to get a good catch and pull https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1OY_yQBiXM&t=452s

Since the session with Paul I have been in the pool working on specific drills that will help my technique and while it still feels a bit unnatural to swim this way I am already seeing improvements in my time.  My lunchtime swim today was 1.56 / 100m.

So my advice for anyone keen to make some improvements would be to find an experienced coach to preferably join you for a swim and look at your swim technique, then get some drills to correct your stroke incorporated into your pool sessions so that you can maximise swimming throughout the off season.

Happy swimming!

Lx

Finding a cycling spirit

A sobering thought for this time of year is that most fatal cycling accidents occur in the dark, with the most dangerous hours for a cyclist reported as between 8.00am-9.00am and 3.00pm-6.00pm.  While these facts are unlikely to inspire more people to ride bikes during the darker months, it raises questions on how we can improve road safety generally. 

Sustrans suggested safety is linked to building more segregated on-road cycle routes when it published a survey this week showing significant public support exists for them.  That is all well and good where there is space to do so, but in Bath and many other towns and cities, there is very little room to change the road infrastructure. Yet cycle friendly cities exist elsewhere, even in densely populated places with busy roads and where they have similar challenges to Bath. Osaka in Japan is an interesting example. It does not have miles of bike lanes, nor does it have a modern infrastructure or a bike sharing system but it is considered to be one of the most bike friendly cities in the world because the Japanese culture has instilled a cycling spirit in its 2.6 million residents. 

This makes me think that simply looking to spend money on cycling infrastructure is approaching the problem the wrong way.  Whatever we introduce to improve cycling safety will only work if we collectively as road users are prepared to change our behaviour.  We need to find a way to shift the “them and us” attitude that exists between cyclists and drivers, we need to make better decisions as road users and we need to rid our roads of rage.  Finding our cycling spirit in Bath is surely worth striving for and investing in. And right now, we need to invest in being visible to one another. Even when there are streetlights cyclists are often not easily seen.  Ride 

with your lights on day and night and wear some bright high visibility gear and drive cautiously and keenly. 

Road safety is the responsibility of both drivers and cyclists and to sensibly adjust to the road conditions, not least at this dark time of year.