Saturday the 19th of august I participated in the 3rd race of the Belgian T3 triathlon series, only 6 days after my first race at the ETU Cup at Wuustwezel.
The swimstart was chaotic and very narrow, which cost me some time. After 100m I managed to pull away from the fight and could start pacing properly. At this time, the guys who’ve had a good start were already gapping the rest of the field. I was down approximately 15 seconds. The rest of the swim I could keep this 15 second gap and didn’t lose much more time. I exited the water with a 20 second deficit on the front pack. I had a good transition and rode hard on the bike on my own for the first kilometers. But then I realized I couldn’t catch the front pack, so unfortunately I had to wait for the 2nd pack. There was little cooperation and we only lost more time on the front group. Me and teammate Tim Van Hemel tried several times to keep the pace rich and to get things going in our group. Sadly enough without result. By the time we reached transition 2, the gap was already more than 1 minute. The run itself wasn’t bad nor good. I had to pace myself and couldn’t go flat out. I finished as 2nd guy of our bike group, after teammate Tim Van Hemel, and 9th overall.
The swim wasn’t super but already better than last race, which makes me confident I just need some more races to practice because my swimming fitness is good! My run on the other hand wasn’t very good, but no worries there.
