Real Life Triathlon: Kim Cotton's Road to Henley (Part 1)
Created On: 05 January 2011
Yesterday we featured one of the winners of the
Challenge Henley free places competition and today we hear
from the other, Kim Cotton.
Challenge Henley Triathlon is a new long distance
event covering a 3.8km swim, 180km bike and a 42km
run.
Kim has competed in one sprint triathlon to date so
knows the step up to long distance will be tough and as a single
mum finding training time will be challenging too.
Kim's first instalment of her progress is below and
she will be keeping us updated on her progress through her
training and racing over the coming months on her road to
Henley.
With Christmas and New Year
celebrations out of the way, it's time to crack on with training.
My battle to win the Henley place seems a distant memory - along
with my once improved fitness levels! The frivolities have
definitely taken their toll, and I will have plenty of work to do
over the next few months, but it's good to be focussed on something
again after injury and cancelled races at the end of last year.
Over the holiday I've managed to
cobble a training plan together that I hope will get me round the
course in time. It looks pretty daunting at the moment. The only
triathlon I've taken part in so far was a sprint, so long distance
is currently way beyond comprehension, but I'm reminding myself I
felt like that when I entered my first marathon, and now I've
completed 3.
Being an overweight single mum with
the running speed of a snail I have plenty of worries about the
race - trying to fit training in round looking after the kids,
coping with school holidays and no childcare, being fast enough to
meet the cut-offs etc, but I'm more than up for the challenge and
am ready to show it can be done. I hope!
So, the year starts with the aim to
shift the rest of the excess weight as I concentrate on building up
general all round base fitness in each discipline, plus teaching
myself to crawl more than 2 lengths at a time without drowning!
Once I've done the Brighton marathon on 10th April I
will increase the swim and bike elements and add in some open water
swims. So that will mean the fun of trying to find a wetsuit for a
short fat person....
Kim will continue to update us
with her progress but you can also follow her on her blog
HERE.
Tags: news,lifestyle,beginners,women,justracing,life
