Swakopmund Desert Triathlon

I’ve heard a lot about Swakopmund. I’ve always regarded the Namibians’ regard of Swakopmund as an “African Valhalla” as somewhat of an exaggeration. My experience of Namibia had been limited to the south of the country. A bleak landscape to say the least, which had led me to be of the opinion that the Namibian’s weren’t “used to much”.

How wrong I was. I drove around Swakopmund thinking that the descriptions of the jewel had been understated. I don’t think that any description on my part would do it justice.  Swakop needs to be seen to be believed. It needs to be felt.

I’d known about the Desert Triathlon – but the logistics of actually going seemed to be excessive. 1300km from Upington! This year the social networks had moved it to the front of my mind. Together with circumstances requiring a business trip to Windhoek round about the same time and with me boasting a “reasonable” level of fitness for this time of the year so I thought I’d give it a go.

I’m not a big fan of cold water and had seen the swim leg of this triathlon as a necessary evil. I’d brought all sorts of neoprene protective gear to help me survive it.  I was thus delighted when my “day before the race swim” turned out to be nowhere near as bad as I thought. On the contrary  - it had been great!

The same could not be said of the bike though – I’d decided, at the last minute, to build up my new TT frame that had been lying around for some time. Not the cleverest thing I’ve ever done.  And so it came to be that at 7pm the night before the race I was making last minute adjustments.

Race day was a relaxed affair. This was how I remember triathlons being when I started doing them some 20 odd years ago. Before the mass participation events that are the Ironman and 70.3’s. The transition area was relaxed and everybody laid their equipment out around their bikes without some over zealous officials enforcing the letter of law.

The race started on time with all 30 odd participants for the ultra event standing obediently behind a line drawn in the sand by the organiser’s foot. But only after Paddy Murphy after seeing my open water “face mask” mistook me for a crayfish diver and kindly pointed out where the reef was.  Smart arse!  The water turned out to be even nicer than the previous day and I settled into a comfortable rhythm. I abandoned any attempts to get onto the feet of anybody as the uber swimmers like Raoul, Glen and Paddy put me firmly in my place – a distant second group. I felt myself getting stronger as the swim progressed and was slightly disappointed to have to stop after only 4 laps. My Garmin said I’d done 2.2km in 28min giving me a pace of 1min17/100m. In my wildest dreams! I can now say with certainty that other users of the 910XT’s open water swim function shouldn’t feel too flattered by the results.  28min for 1.9km is closer to my abilities.

The bike started with a short stretch to get out of town and then a right turn sent us out behind the dunes that a run parallel to the coast line. The road is not tarred (paved) but is instead salt surface that is rock hard and, with minimal maintenance, is as smooth as the bottom of your bath. We headed out on this road for about 20km turned round and headed back the way we’d come to transition only to do it all over again.

Before the race I’d made a few calculations as to the power output I’d need to maintain to hit my target time of 2hr30 (Hunter and Coggan p212) – so I had a plan! For some reason (and I need to look into this) I was unable to maintain power outputs that I’d felt to be quite conservative. I was able to see the leaders heading back to town and gauge how far down I was.  Not that I was ever going to challenge them  - but it’s nice to be able to see exactly how far behind you are. On the second lap I was particularly despondent to see that I was going backwards very quickly – turned out the front 3 blokes and turned early and reduced the distance they covered by some 5k’s.

I reached T2 with a bit of an attitude.  I was disappointed with my average bike leg and 21k’s seemed like a “taai toffie”. Fortunately cycling legs and running legs are two different things. To me anyway. All of a sudden I felt better and I ran to see if I could catch at least one of the other vets ahead of me.  Turns out I couldn’t – but at least I closed the gap by some 10 minutes. And once again I was reminded that a happy day out in a triathlon depends on the run.

I finished the day after after 4hrs52min – giving me a 7^th spot overall and the 3^rd Vet. Although I should add that the guy just ahead of me was actually a frikken master (50+). The evergreen Paddy Murphy!

 Never the less I was so stoked to have been part of of such an awesome event. And dare I say it - but if I had to choose between the FNB Desert Triathlon and the 70.3 in EL, I'd choose Swakopmund. It wouldn't even be close.

Training Peaks File (Swim Leg)

Training Peaks File (Bike Leg)

Training Peaks File (Run Leg)