# The Outlaw Triathlon



## Chris Hobson (Jul 25, 2017)

When I was first diagnosed as a diabetic in May 2013 at the age of 54, I was advised by the medical profession that it would be beneficial for me to take regular exercise. That I took up the sport of triathlon was partly due to the activities that I had done in the past. I used to cycle to work in all weathers during the eighties, a twenty mile round trip. I also used to go swimming quite regularly but only doing sixty lengths of breast stroke, I swam just to keep fit, at that time I didn't have any ambitions to become a better swimmer. After being diagnosed, I took up doing parkruns, this was a significant step toward my becoming a triathlete because running was something that I hadn't done so much in the past. I don't think that anyone can disagree that combining swimming, cycling and running is going to give you a pretty awesome all round fitness level. It also needs mentioning that some of the world's top triathletes actually had to learn to ride a bike or learn to swim in order to start to compete. I think that a really important thing for me to emphasise at this point is that exercising becomes progressively easier the more that you do. I can still remember when I thought that 5K parkruns were hard, so you can imagine how ludicrous the idea that I would one day complete an ironman would have seemed at that time. However, I can also remember when I did the Lincoln 10K and finished thinking 'was that it?'. This was the point when I realised that 10K runs had become too easy for me, this is a really important point, there is nothing particularly special about me, in fact quite the opposite. When I was at school I was one of those kids who was totally rubbish at games and PE, the loathing of Rugby and Football that was instilled into me at that time has lasted to this day.

I did my first triathlon in 2014, it was a sprint triathlon at York. Sixteen lengths of a heated swimming pool, a 20K bike ride and a 5K run. By this point I was fit enough for this not to be too big a deal, I was still pretty knackered when I crossed the finish line though. I then did a few more sprint distance triathlons, a standard distance one at Allerthorpe near York and, in 2016, the half ironman 70.3 triathlon at Castle Howard known as The Gauntlet. As I was building up to The Gauntlet, I did sometimes get the feeling that I might have bitten off more than I could chew. As it turned out, my preparation had been pretty good and the event wasn't quite as tough as I had expected. I did finish outside my target time though.

I think that completing a 70.3 triathlon is quite a significant milestone, not just for me but for any triathlete. Once I had done a half iron, the idea that I might be able to complete a full one was no longer quite so absurd. On the face of it, the ironman distance triathlon does seem absurd, I realise this when I see the look of incredulity on people's faces when I explain to them the distances involved. The whole thing started in Hawaii in the late nineteen seventies, with a bar room argument about endurance sports generally. Were long distance swimmers tougher than marathon runners? Someone mentioned that cyclists should also be included and a man called John Collins suggested staging an event that included all three. Collins proposed that the 2.4 mile Waikiki Rough Water Swim, the 112 mile Round the Island bike race and the 26.2 mile Honolulu Marathon be combined into a single event and whoever won it would be declared the Iron Man. Initially the idea was thought to be ridiculous, but Collins apparently found twelve people who were prepared to give it a shot and the first one took place in Hawaii on February 18th 1978. It was won by Gordon Haller in eleven hours and forty seven minutes and the Ironman World Championships are now held at Kona in Hawaii every year. Ironman is now an international franchise which means that other organisers of ironman distance events aren't allowed to call them ironman and have to call them other names such as the Outlaw. The Outlaw is the event that I decided to enter. This event takes place in July every year at the National Water Sports centre near Nottingham.

http://www.nwscnotts.com/

Saturday 22nd of July 2017, my wife Liz and myself were making our way to Nottingham in our trusty old Saab 9-3 estate with all my gear in the back and my bike on a rack on the top. Because an event of this length has to start pretty early, you have to register and get set up on the day before the race. We were directed by some marshals to our parking spot and I set off with my bike and my kit bag to find the registration tent. In front of the tent there is a notice board with an alphabetical listing of the twelve hundred participants. I found my name on the list and discovered that my race number was 1158. Inside the tent I found the appropriate table and was handed a large white plastic drawstring bag containing two other similar bags, race numbers, lots of stickers with my number on them and an Outlaw rucksack. I attached a sticker to the seat post of my bike, went off to the fenced area to find the numbered spot on the bike storage racks to hang up my bike and then went into the transition tent to find my peg and to sort out all my gear for the following day. All my stuff had to be sorted into three bags, the swim to bike transition bag, the bike to run transition bag and the everything else bag that eventually goes on a different hook out of the way. Bike, helmet and transition bags all have to have their stickers on so that I would know which ones were mine. There are also some transfers for my arms and legs which I would put on later in the Hotel. Some of the marshals were amused to see me acting out my transitions in order to make sure that I had everything in the correct bags. Wetsuit, timing chip and baby oil in one. Cycling top, cycling shoes dusted with talcum powder, socks dusted with talcum powder, helmet and number belt in the next. Running shoes with elastic laces would go in the other bag but I'm wearing them at present so that would have to wait until tomorrow.

My next stop was the race briefing tent where participants are filled in on the course layout, any rules that are specific to that event, basically everything that you need to know to do the whole thing without getting it wrong. I was a little bit concerned about the cut off times for the swim and the bike. The event starts at 06:00 the swim has to be completed by 08:00 and you have to be out on your bike by 08:15 at the latest. You then have until 16:00 to finish the bike course. Due to the fact that there were some road closures and stuff that would have to be cleared away promptly, these cut off times would be strictly enforced. Because my training had been interrupted, first by a really stinky cold and then by a sore throat and cough, I hadn't actually done the full distances in training and wasn't absolutely sure how long it would take me. I thought that I would be OK but just not quite certain. Once the briefing was out of the way, I went off to find Liz and we went off to an M&S food shop to grab some sandwiches before going off to a nearby Travelodge. I put my number transfers onto my legs and arms then sorted out my race day nutrition and packed it in a shopping bag before getting off to bed nice and early.

At four in the morning, our alarms went off and it was time to get myself ready for the coming challenge. I put my tri-suit on and covered any exposed skin with sun cream. I then put my regular clothes on over the top of it and downed some coffee and a huge bowl of muesli We then set off on the short drive to the Water Sports Centre. It was only as we were actually entering the car park that I started to feel nervous and get butterflies in the tum. Any nerves soon disappeared as I had to get busy organising my nutrition, dividing it up between my transition bags and my bike, then putting on my timing chip and wetsuit. Standing by the boating lake I noticed that the weather was pretty much ideal, cloudy but dry with very little wind. Soon it was time to lower myself into the water and find a spot where my feet could reach the bottom so I could begin dipping the neckline of my wetsuit under the surface to let the cold water seep in. At the left hand side of the lake were the people who are expecting to do the swim in under an hour. I was down by the right hand side of the lake with the ones who are expecting to take more than ninety minutes. It surprised me that I was feeling totally calm and not the slightest bit nervous. I was shivering and my teeth were chattering as I had entered the water a little too early and got a little bit cold waiting for the off. Eventually the spectators were counting down the last ten seconds before the horn went off and we were away.

The boating lake is about two kilometres long and maybe half a kilometre wide so the swim is just straight out and back. The slower swimmers had to make their way over to the left hand side of the lake before reaching the first marker buoy and then everyone had to swim down the left hand side, turn right at a marker buoy at the far end, right again at another buoy and then back down the other side. Despite swimming breast stroke I was making fairly good progress and actually moving slowly up the field. I did switch to front crawl for a while on the outward leg once I had found a bit of space so that I could be sure of not crashing into anyone or getting kicked in the face. About half way between the two far end marker buoys I checked my watch and saw that it had taken me about forty-five minutes to get to the halfway point. The cycle leg starts with a lap around the lake and, as I was some way into the return swim, the faster swimmers began riding past us on their bikes. Eventually I made it to the exit ramp where there were marshals to help us out of the water and to help us out of our wetsuits. The swim had taken me about ninety minutes, this meant that even if the bike ride took me eight hours, I would still have about half an hour to spare. I walked briskly into the transition tent, unhooked my T1 bag and tipped the contents out onto the floor. In between donning socks, shoes and helmet I downed a breakfast milkshake and a banana. I then stuffed my wetsuit into the transition bag and headed out towards the bike racks.

I unhooked my bike from the rack and wheeled it to the mount line jumped on and was away for my lap of the lake. On the return part of the lap I noticed that there were quite a few people still swimming. The bike course consists of two big loops, you go round the first loop, onto the second loop and then back around the first loop again. On the bike I was carrying assorted cereal bars and Clif Shot blocks, my nutrition strategy was to have something to eat about every ten miles. Cereal bars are pretty difficult to swallow when you are exercising but I did manage to keep to the plan. At the feed stations I grabbed a banana whenever I didn't need a fresh drink bottle. During the first half of the bike ride I was continually being passed by quicker cyclists or, as I liked to call them, slower swimmers. Later, as the riders got more spread out, this happened less often. Toward the end, I started passing quite a few that had started to drop off the pace a bit. I pushed myself a little over the last twelve miles or so because I was pretty fed up with riding a bike by this time and just wanted to get it finished. My bike computer must have been over estimating slightly because it clocked 114 miles for the course, this of course meant that when it said I was finished I still had two miles to go. Finally I made it back into the bike storage area and a volunteer took my bike away and racked it. The bike course had taken me about seven and a half hours so my worries about cut off times had been groundless. Into the transition tent, helmet off, cycling top off, shoes swapped, a milk shake and a banana, a quick visit to the portaloo for a widdle and I'm heading for the running course.

There were a couple of nice ladies with sun cream at the start of the run course so I got another coating before setting off. At this point I was feeling pretty tired and was wondering how the hell I was going to run a marathon. I told my self that all I had to do was just keep putting one foot in front of the other until I got there and that there was no rush as I had more than seven hours to do it in. The run course goes around the boating lake, out and back along the bank of the river Trent, around the boating lake, out and back again and around the boating lake and then one more lap of the boating lake to finish. Each time that you lap the lake you get a wrist band so that when you have collected three wristbands it means that you have about five kilometres to go. Each time I went through a feed station I had a little walk as I ate a jaffa cake or a piece of banana just to give my legs a little rest. Towards the end of the run I started walking a little more often but I still tried to keep the walks fairly short. As I got more and more tired the walks did start to get longer though. My legs weren't really hurting that much, my knees and feet felt a bit sore but nothing serious, it just seemed to take so much effort to keep running. I was finding that bananas were much easier to swallow than jaffa cakes so I started to eat more of them.

Towards the end of the penultimate lap of the lake I was resigned to walking the rest of the course when I quite suddenly felt a fairly urgent need for the loo. At this point I realised that I still had it in me to run after all, I got my third wristband and dashed into the portaloo. Back out onto the course and I have just a parkrun to go, I thought that I would have to walk it but I really just wanted to get it finished and so I managed to run almost all of it. I had done my first 140.6 triathlon just ten minutes inside my target time.

There were massages and hot food available at the end but I just wanted to get back to the hotel and have a soak in the bath. After I got out of the bath I suddenly felt very faint and nauseous, I knew that I needed to eat something and tried to choke down some crisps but could hardly swallow. Instead I drank another breakfast milk shake which instantly made me feel better. I then settled down and ate some fruit, some crisps and had a cup of coffee. The next morning my legs were a little stiff but nowhere near as bad as I had expected. We had a lovely cooked breakfast in the pub next to the Travelodge and then made our way home.

Anyone who has attempted to follow the link to the National Water Sports Centre will have found that the link was not working. This was because I had mis-spelled the web address. This has now been fixed. C.H.


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## Wirrallass (Jul 25, 2017)

As you know, I have been following your progress to date in preparation for the Outlaw and have just read your very interesting write-up of Saturdays events. What you did Chris was absolutely amazing - and tho there were times when you felt you couldn't or wouldn't continue, you found the inner strength & motivation to plough on wiith the course. Brave man and every credit to you for finishing the Outlaw Tri within your target time. This just has to be your best achievement to date so very very well done. Hats off to you. I'm wondering what you will endeavour to participate in next or have you had enough of pushing yourself to the limits? Somehow I don't think you're ready to hang up your bike & wet suit just yet but I stand to be corrected! Again very well done Chris  - now go & take things easy for a while & enjoy celebrating your victory with Liz.
WL


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## Martin Canty (Jul 25, 2017)

Thank you for your write-up.... It's pretty amazing how you can push your body to do not one but three significant events consecutively. Well done.

As a volunteer for endurance events, and having several friends who are endurance athletes, I am always amazed at the determination of these athletes and the way they will push through literally anything.... I had to pull a runner off the Holcomb Valley Trail run last year as she had fallen & broken her wrist; she was determined to go on but we had to explain how rough the course was & the likehood of falling again was quite high.


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## Copepod (Jul 25, 2017)

Well done Outlaw Chris! A great write up, too!


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## Northerner (Jul 25, 2017)

That's an amazing achievement Chris, well done! And a terrific write-up too, it's like I was there!  Hope you recover well, and quickly


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## Matt Cycle (Jul 25, 2017)

Well done Chris. Epic event.  No blood glucose testing during it?


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## Chris Hobson (Jul 25, 2017)

Thank you all for your messages of support, it means a lot. Regarding future iron type events, I'm currently at the 'never again' stage and I don't want to see another banana as long as I live. I'm already entered in the Hull marathon which is in September, after the Outlaw that should be a doddle. On the ultra distance front, Liz and I are planning to do an Endure 24 event as a pair next year. Basically this involves taking it in turns to run a five mile course and seeing how far you can run in twenty four hours.

When it comes to the determination needed to finish an event like this, I think that a lot of the motivation comes from the fact that however tired you feel and however much your legs hurt, non of it compares to just how miserable you would feel after not finishing. Bad enough to be pulled aside by the officials for missing the cut off times or for looking as though you are about to die. But to fail to finish because you just gave up, that would be almost unbearable.

One thing that I didn't mention, because it wasn't really relevant to my story, was the tandem in the corner of the bike racking area. It was yellow and it was the poshest most hi-tech tandem that I have ever seen in my life. The presence of a tandem means that there is a blind person doing the event.

Edit:
Having now watched the event on TV, I see that the tandem was white and not yellow. I find it strange how my old git memory has played such a trick on me.


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## Chris Hobson (Jul 25, 2017)

"No blood glucose testing during it?"

Sorry I missed that, our posts crossed. Being a very fit type 2 I have been advised by my nurse that I only need to test roughly once a week. I do this and my score is almost always between six and eight. I tested on Monday and was around thirteen, a little high but no need to panic. Tested again today and scored around ten. so it would appear that I am gradually returning to normal. I have to admit that during the event I had to cast caution to the wind with regard to going too high. There was simply no way that I could know how many carbs were in the energy drinks and gel blocks or how many carbs I was burning off. The organisers do make provision for people with special dietary requirements. You have to supply your own stuff in clearly marked bags and it is then sent out to the feed stations so that you can collect it on your way around the course.


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## Copepod (Jul 26, 2017)

Ah yes, the special needs table at feed stations... Once used by a woman who needed to express breast milk, after she'd been told that doing so on the bike wasn't safe, during a Challenge triathlon (full Ironman distance, trademark!)


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## Chris Hobson (Jul 26, 2017)

Update.
I had wisely booked a week off work thinking that I would need time to recover. I have been drinking slightly more beer than I should but I love the stuff and have had to give it up for nearly seven months. I have spent my time resting, doing a few household chores and ferrying my daughter around. Today, Wednesday, I went for a swim and did 1,500 meters, the stiffness in my legs has almost gone. My body's internal clock is taking a while to return to normal, I'm waking up at around five in the morning now.

I have been spending quite a bit of time analysing all the stats on my results page and doing my best to put a positive spin on them. I'm close the top one third when it comes to transitions, but at this distance, a lot of competitors tend to take their time and to ensure maximum comfort for the next stage. Relatively I am a much better swimmer than I thought I was and it is cycling that seems to be  my weak spot over the longer distances. Is it worth mentioning that my bike cost £800 and some people's bikes cost £8,000, not that I think that a super duper bike would have made me that much faster. Anyway, I don't think that 918 out of 1018 finishers is bad going for an old git, especially if you include the whole field of 1,200 starters, the DNFs and the DQs. That makes 282 competitors that I managed to beat. I was pretty awful in my age group, OK I am now close to the top end of it but 36th out of 42 is not that good. Having said all that I'm still elated that I actually did it,  I'm a 140.6 triathlon finisher, not too many people can claim that.

Tomorrow I am going shopping to buy a suit as my niece is getting married on Sunday and I have to look respectable. I'm not that much of a suit person really, the last time that I wore one was when I got married in 1994. That suit was quite a nice one and would have done the job although it would presumably be terribly unfashionable. Unfortunately I sent it to the charity shop because I got too fat to fit into it. The fact that I would now be able to fit into it is slightly annoying I suppose. I also sent umpteen pairs of jeans to the charity shop because I never imagined that I would fit into them ever again.


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## Martin Canty (Jul 26, 2017)

Chris Hobson said:


> Unfortunately I sent it to the charity shop because I got too fat to fit into it


I probably bought my current suit about 18 years ago & was shocked to find that it was way too big in the waist when I attended a friends wedding last year.... Lucky I had a smallish belt to hold the pants up... Next stop alterations shop


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## Chris Hobson (Jul 27, 2017)

I got weighed this morning and I am now down to 70kg. When I started my build up early in the year I was 76kg so I've lost six kilos over about the last four months, I think that is about thirteen pounds in old money. My body has gone all wiry and knotty and I do look slightly as if I need a good feed. Still, it's a big improvement on the pear shaped blob that I was five years ago.


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## Northerner (Jul 27, 2017)

Chris, you're an Iron Man now!


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## Chris Hobson (Jul 27, 2017)

I've never been much of a fan of the comic book superhero genre to be honest. I suppose I'm showing my age when I say that the word Ironman makes me think of Black Sabbath. I've always been slightly amused by the way that their lyrics would never quite scan so that Ozzy would always have to torture them slightly to make them fit the tune.


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## Chris Hobson (Aug 12, 2017)

Three weeks on and I am still taking stock a little. I have allowed myself a bit of recovery time but I now have to get my finger out as there are several running events pending. The fact that these events are booked in advance has an important role in getting me motivated to keep training.

There were one or two details that I forgot to mention in my write up. On the bike ride I passed a junction while the marshals were helping someone with his bike and I missed the turn. I was alerted by the marshals, some spectators and several other competitors shouting at me and looped back and got back on course. Only later did I reflect on what a disaster it would have been had I not heard the shouting and got lost.

The battery on my GPS watch expired part way through the run. I had already completed a lap of the course so I do have a map of the route on my computer but It didn't record a time and distance.

On the run there was a guy at one of the feed stations who did a sort of interview about how I was feeling. My response was that I was feeling pretty tired and that my knees and feet were hurting a bit but that otherwise I was feeling OK. I may have misread the situation but it appeared to me that this guy was there to spot contestants that were becoming incoherent due to exhaustion.

My memory of the run now seems to be weirdly distorted. I was running and walking for five and a half hours but I have no recollection of it having taken so long.

There was some kind of a cock up with regard to the finishers tee shirts meaning that by the time I got to the finish there were only L and XL sizes left. I was promised that a medium would be sent to me in the post. The promised shirt arrived today just as I was considering sending an email reminder. I will now be wearing it until it starts to smell.

I think that it is interesting that the ironman seems to have replaced the marathon as the ultimate endurance event that is nevertheless still within the abilities of the ordinary athlete who is looking for a challenge. Twenty years ago running twenty six miles was considered to be pretty impressive. The popularity of the event has gradually made it seem less and less of an acheivement even though it definitely still is. I have to say that I found the Hull Marathon tougher than the Half Ironman that I did earlier in the year. Where does the dedicated endurance athlete go once the ironman becomes too easy? Amazingly there are events designed to cater for these people. Ultra runs of over 120 miles, often through mountainous areas or baking deserts. Double ironmans, 4.8 mile swim, 224 mile bike ride and 52.4 mile run. Doing five ironmans in five days. The Arch to Arc challenge, which involves running from Marble Arch in London to Dover, Swimming the Channel and then cycling from Calais to the Arc De Triumph in Paris.

The obvious question that inevitably comes from people who don't go in for this kind of thing is just Why? It appears that none of those who do go in for this kind of thing actually know why either.


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