RUGBY Triathlon Club swarmed Tenby at the weekend with 17 members completing the Long Course Weekend set in the Pembrokeshire countryside.
The event wa an iron distance triathlon split over three days with the 2.4-mile Wales Swim on Friday night, 112-mile Wales Sportive on the Saturday followed by the Wales Marathon on the Sunday.
Joining the full weekenders, 11 other athletes raced across the weekend completing a mixture of different distances in the swim, bike and run.
Although the distances may have been smaller the hills weren’t with some truly gruelling climbs on the bike and in the marathon and half marathon.
Being in the Pembrokshire countryside, though, many of the climbs rewarded them with the most spectacular coastal views, the redeeming consequence to 3threbrutal days out.
With too many entrants to list there were some stand out performances from the Rugby Tri contingent.
Ali Moult finished sixth female in the 112-mile Wales Sportive in 6:05:08, and tenth female on the marathon in 3:41:25.
Anthony Smith lead the marathoners home in 3:42:22 with Tony Johnson (5:48:25) finishing third in his age group and Keith Edwards (4:11:27) finishing sixth in his.
In the half marathon David Phillips finished fifth in his age group with a time of 1:40:24.
Jason Mortimer (38:57) was sixth in his age group in the 1.2-mile swim.
Keith Edwards may have placed higher in the 2.4-mile swim if he hadn’t had a collision with a canoe.
There were other athletes who raced further than they had ever done before over the weekend with some genuinely epic personal accomplishments.
The event allows athletes of all abilities to race together and with the generosity of former club members Alan and Emma Richards in hosting the Rugby Tri tribe everyone had an amazing weekend in Tenby.
John Langley completed the iron distance in once day at Ironman UK in Bolton in a great time of 13:58:02.
This was Johns first Ironman with a bit of an uncertain build up.
The bike course had to be changed and shortened slightly to 95 miles rather than 112 miles due to the fires effecting the North East.
There was also uncertainty until the day before as to whether a build-up of blue-green algae in the water would mean the swim would have to be cancelled.
Luckily, the swim did go ahead and John is now an Ironman.
In North Wales, Laura McCrystal ran the Snowdonia Scott Trail Marathon.
This is one of the toughest marathons in the UK with over 5,000ft of elevation including climbing to the peak of Snowdon.
Unfortunately, the conditions at the top of Snowdon weren’t similar to those on the beach at Tenby and the cold misty weather made the hard going even harder work.
Smashing a second place at the ITU Multisport World Championships in Odense, Denmark, Mike Smallwood added a silver medal at the aquabike to his bulging trophy cabinet.
Smallwood started well on the 3km swim but was overtaken by an Australian on the second lap of the 121km bike course who he would eventually finish second to.
Mel and Emma Plumridge raced at the Bideford Sprint Triathlon in Devon which started with a very misty river swim.
Eventually the suns intensity broke through quickly raising the temperature on the very hilly course to add to the challenge of the day.
Mel finished in 1:35:51 and Emma just behind in 1:37:36.
