A year ago I did my first ever triathlon followed a few weeks later by my first Olympic distance triathlon. As I cycled round Marlow Oly Tri I didn’t like triathlon very much. It was a challenge to be completed rather than an event to be enjoyed.

I’ve learnt a lot about swimming, cycling and triathlon generally since then. A couple of months ago I was writing something on that race in Marlow and it made me want to go back and do it again. I felt like I had some wrongs to right – the biggest one being remembering to have fun. So when the World Tri London came on my radar, it looked like the perfect opportunity.

The race is part of the ITU World Triathlon Series where the best athletes in the world battle it out. They raced on the Saturday and on the Sunday there’s an open event for anyone to enter with Olympic, Sprint and Super Sprint distance options. My triathlon mentor Katie and I headed to Hyde Park to watch the pros race, get excited and pick up our race packs.

The next morning, at the very civilised time of 10.10am, we were lining up on the pontoon where we’d watched the Brownlees dive into the Serpentine from the day before. We weren’t allowed to dive so we plopped into the water rather ungracefully and were asked to hold onto the side until the horn signalled for our wave to start.

As the horn sounded I counted to 10 and waited for the splashing to move away from me before starting to swim. Waves set off every 10 minutes and I was concerned I might get run over by the speedy swimmers of the wave behind. But then there were a pair of feet in front of my goggles, and then another. I caught up with the pack.

I wanted a swim PB. Whatever else happened during the race didn’t matter, a swim PB was my only goal. I didn’t want to swim in the pack, but I didn’t want to slow down either. So I got stuck in and carried on swimming. We swam a 1500m rectangular lap and then I was running up the exit ramp, this time with other swimmers around me. I knew I’d swam faster than last time.

I jumped on my bike ready for five laps of a course that took us in a C-shape with two hairpin turns at either end. There were speed bumps, there were sharp turns and there was a bit of gradient to keep it interesting. There were also lots of other cyclists around with different waves setting off after their swim. It made a nice change to cycle with other triathletes, even though most of them were overtaking me.

I saw Katie going the opposite direction, and then cycling past me asking if I had any Fig Rolls. And then I didn’t see her again and knew she’d finished and was already onto the run. By the fifth lap the course was familiar which made the turns, the (small) climbs and the (marginal) decents  much quicker. I had a speedometer on my bike and knew I was quicker than Marlow but didn’t know by how much.

Then came the run. Four laps of the Serpentine. It was nice to be off the bike. For the first few steps anyway. Then my legs complained. My hips complained. My calves complained. But I’d been here before. I knew I’d feel better after the first lap was over. And I did. Marginally. 

I was cheered on after every lap by the Serpentine RC cheering squad. I wasn’t wearing club colours but they recognised me as one of their own and gave me a big shout. The laps ticked off, running past the finish line three times before being able to turn left on the blue carpet and attempt a sprint finish.

I knew from the clock that (because of all the various start times) was showing the time of day that it was a PB. I knew it was a big PB. But what mattered was that I’d improved on last year;s race in other ways. I hadn’t been scared of the swim. I hadn’t had to stop during it. I’d smiled, I’d enjoyed it and I’d decided that Bolton won’t be the end of my triathlons.

But if you want to know the scores on the doors, here they are: Swim 32.22; Bike 1.23.20; Run 50.11.  Overall time 2:55:47. A 37 minute PB.

Thanks to PruHealth for giving me my spot in the World Tri London. It was a seamless and well organised event. It’s not a cheap race but the location and atmosphere is really great.