After I crossed the finish line of my half-iron triathlon I got a lot of congratulatory tweets. Some asked what was next. I staggered to the hospitality tent, ate a veggie sausage in a burger bun and drank a massive coffee . That’s what was next and all I cared about at that moment.

A few people had asked what races I’ll do in 2014, but other than London marathon, which I’ve been working towards for years now, I hadn’t planned anything beyond the finish line at The Gauntlet. Even the journey home hadn’t been thought through. I crammed myself, my soggy wetsuit and my bike into Katie’s car (thank you!), followed by a train and the back of a black cab.

A £30 taxi fare with the faint smell of wee emanating from my wetsuit later and I was left to reply to those tweets. What next?

Some of the messages I received called me inspiring. It was nice to read, but I don’t really see myself that way. That’s the thing about inspiration though – it comes from all sorts of places. Sometimes everyday people around you who are taking on new challenges and doing them to the best of their ability – however slow – can be inspiring.

I replied to one tweet from Kat with: “It’s amazing what you can when you accept the high chance of failure and do it anyway.”

I knew when I started this triathlon stuff that there was a good chance I wouldn’t be able to do it – that my swim would go badly, that my bike would get a puncture or a broken chain, that I would miss the cut-off times and be forced to pull-out of the race. But I carried on regardless.

As I cycled round the bike course I asked myself what was next. Did I really want to put myself through doing a race twice the distance? Could I do it? For the last 10 miles of the bike as I sobbed my way up hills, the answer was no. As I found my running legs and pegged it round the run course, that no became a maybe. And as I sat on my sofa a week later taking a week off from any running, cycling or swimming, it became a yes.

There are no ‘easy’ half-ironman events, but it turns out that the one I did was particularly hard. That gives me hope for what’s about to come. Because next summer I’ll be lining up to start Ironman UK in Bolton – a race that is said to have one of the most challenging Ironman bike courses in Europe.

The distance of the race makes me feel physically sick, the months of training required are pretty daunting and the cut-off times for the bike leg make the chances of me failing pretty high. But I’m going to give it a go anyway. Because I’m not scared of failure and there’s no challenge in attempting stuff you know you can do.