Sperrin Half Ironman*

Iron Enthusiast

Anyone else thinking about give the Sperrin Half IM a bash?

I'm considering signing up but don't know alot about the area etc.. Has anyone here raced or trained around the Lough Rae before?

I emailed the organiser with a few Q's (i'm a bit wary after Eireman) and he got back to me straight away and seemed to have everything well in hand.

Race details below, but you'll need to scroll to the end of the page for the text:

http://www.runireland.com/events/2010-05-08/sperrin-half-ironman

Interested to hear others thoughts

too much trifle

done a duathlon around lough fae recently , organised by tri-limits it was only a small turn out, had no complaints,
i know they have organised other du's & tri's in recent years and i havent heard any bad comments,
the area is fairly hilly/rolling and the du. cycle was only 10 mile so i can only comment on that, it was a good, fast down hill for 5 mile and [obviously] up hill for the back 5, wind in your face etc.

tridying

yeah after eireman i am very cautious about irish long distance tri's the bloody weather is the big thing!! the water will be very cold ..

Izoard

I'd be all over this, if it stacks up.

Would be perfect timing for me to get an HIM in before the main event...

Have mailed the organiser for a bit more detail.

nutts_77

Have signed up for the Half Iron Man in Swinford at the end of July. Am hoping that it will be a well run event, unlike others that had problems...

Izoard

As this appears to be the only Half available in the May/June time frame, I'm in...

griffin100

yeah after eireman i am very cautious about irish long distance tri's

Yeah me too, that said a lake swim is not that weather dependent although it could be a long cold day as it is in May!! I think I'll still do it if I can get a pass. What about the rest of the IM loggers?

Izoard

About to hit the "commit" button on this.

Any other takers?

griffin100

About to hit the "commit" button on this.

Any other takers?

I'm in delicate negotiations with herself about this one - more triathlon expense - but I reckon I've negotitated a settlement and will be entering today or tomorrow.

Izoard

griffin100 wrote: »

I'm in delicate negotiations with herself about this one - more triathlon expense - but I reckon I've negotitated a settlement and will be entering today or tomorrow.

Good man - Similarly, I've had to abandon the Mt. Leinster Challenge a week later as a trade off - missin' that cake stop already:)

tridying

yeah i am in .... is anyone else finding this addiction very expensive? race entry alone is hitting €1k wife not talking ... well nearly not.

griffin100

I'm in (at last).

Anyone sort out cheap accomadation yet (other than the hotels listed on the website)?

Izoard

griffin100 wrote: »

I'm in (at last).

Anyone sort out cheap accomadation yet (other than the hotels listed on the website)?

Good man.

I've no clue about the area so booked into the Glenavon Hotel.
The Greenvale was booked out, although I'm not sure that was connected to the HIM:p

Dropped a note to the organizer as I was getting a bit twitchy about the lack of activity on the web site with just over a week to go...seems to be still on track....

Iron Enthusiast

I'm officially signed up now as well and so are a couple of other people I know! (so thats 3 at least:o)

I had a look at the hotels listed but they were a bit pricey or had a night-club attached (beware hotels with rooms over nightclubs!)

Ended up googling B&Bs around cookstown and found several places that looked grand. Ultimately booked into a B&B for £25 a night - delighted! (i've been spending a fortune on race entries etc like you guys as well!, so having to start being sensible)

What kind of times are people hoping for?

griffin100

Still trying to decide whether or not I actually need to stay in a nice hotel with a restaurent (and a bar ) as opposed to a B&B. Having spent £85 on entry the answer should be clear....

Predicted times.....it depends on the course. The website describes the bike and run route as flat and fast. The Garman download of the bike route on the website though looks anythink but flat. Overall I'd like to come in around the 5.30hrs mark excluding transitions.

Something around:
42-43 min swim (depends on how I deal with my first OW swim of the year)
2.50-55hr bike (depends on the hills)
1.50-55hr run

Some key decisions to be made before next week, the chief one being do I do 90km in a tri suit or put on some bib shorts in T1.

Izoard

I only have the 6hr 20 result in Groomsport '08 to go by.
Tough swim and run, easy cycle that day, so not sure how that maps to this course.

I might follow Griffin's plan of bib shorts etc., as this is exactly what I'll be doing at the IM (3 "outfits" - built for comfort rather than speed )

Iron Enthusiast

Will definitely go with Bib shorts for IM but not 100% about doing it for Sperrin.

Am doing JH this weekend so will use the bike leg as a tester for cycling in wet tri shorts with little padding (now that i've written that it doesn't sound too pleasant..) I guess throwing on Bib shorts in Sperrin would only ad an extra minute in transition, but would you keep them on for the run portion? If not thats another 45 seconds in the bike-run transition. Hard one to call?

I know what you mean by the Sperrin bike course, the Garmin profile appears to have a decent amount of ascent for a 'flat' course.

I also only have Groomsport'08 as a benchmark but my result there was really really bad, just like my fitness. Hoping that all the hard work this year will pay off, especially considering the Sperrin HIM was a last minute thing!:pac:

griffin100

Looks like its going to be a very small field - less than 40 if the e-mail from the organisers yesterday is anything to go by. I should be ok for a top 50 finish then.

No chip timing is a pain but with such a small field they should be able to give roughly accurate splits.

At this stage weather looks like it might be ok - http://news.bbc.co.uk/weather/forecast/2713

I think I might try the cycle in a tri suit. It's not the cycling in a wet tri suit that bothers me as it will dry in minutes, its the distinct lack of padding in my tri suit to protect my undercarraige during a 90kms bike ride. Last year for Eireman I threw a pair of cycling shorts over my tri suit for the bike and I was fine. I've done a few OD's in a tri suit with no problems but I've never done more than 20kms on the TT bike in a tri suit (and it has a nasty looking saddle.) I could stick on a pair of bib shorts in T1 but its very difficult to get them on over wet legs and torso. For the IM I will change into bib shorts and cycling jersey but for this 'shorter' race I'll chance the tri suit with copious amounts of KY jelly- I'm sure I'll find out quickly if it was a wise decision.

Starting to get excited about this now, it'll be a good test of fitness. I never thought I'd get to the stage when the distances involved in a HIM didn't phase me. 1.9km swim - no bother......90kms bike - a nice spin....21kms run - actually this bit bothers me, I haven't gone further than 11 miles this year yet so I'm interested to see how I fare - especially after a spectacular long bike-run boink this weekend gone. At the very least it gives a good excuse for an easy taper week as per Finks HIM week.

Izoard

Any word on registration? I lobed a note off, but given the numbers, I'm wondering if we can do this on the morning of?

Am generating huge amounts of gunk from my chest at the moment, so dreading this TBH...:(

griffin100

From the Facebook site:

Registration for the race will take place at Lough Fea from 7-9pm the night before (Friday 7th May). At the sign on participants will receive their race numbers, chip and goodie bag – this will also be a good opportunity to check out some of the race course. Transition opens at 7am Saturday 8th May with the race starting at 9am. The deadline for entering the race will be the 30th April – no entries will be accepted on the day.

Am generating huge amounts of gunk from my chest at the moment, so dreading this TBH...

Hope this clears up for ya. Look at it this way, the longer you're out there, the better value for money you get:)

Izoard

Good luck to all for this one!

Still feel completly under the weather, but hey, how hard can it be, eh?:)

Hope to catch up with a few boardsies...I'll be on a white Trek E7, dressed head-to-toe in thermal gear!

griffin100

Good luck to all for this one!

Still feel completly under the weather, but hey, how hard can it be, eh?

Hope to catch up with a few boardsies...I'll be on a white Trek E7, dressed head-to-toe in thermal gear!

I watch out for you as you pass lap me on the second bike lap given how far ahead of me you will be exiting the water:D

I'll be on a Giant Trinity, I'm easy to spot, I'll be the only person on a blue bike with red tyres:cool:

Good luck to all. Heres hoping that the swim will not be as cold as I'm imagining.

Izoard

Cracking day out...I think these guys have great raw materials for an early season HIM, which should really appeal to the IMers.

Finished in 5:38 or 5:39, so very happy given my previous in Groomsport was 6:20!

We might have to asterisk the swim though, it seemed very short and as much as I'd like to highlight a 33min swim, I don't think it was 1.9km.

Griffin I spotted your bike in the rack a couple of times (even saw it in the back of a Volvo, I think...), but didn't see you near it!

I'll do a report in my training log, but thumbs up from me!

S. Goodspeed

Agree with Izoard, great day out, very glad I did it. Weather was beautiful which always helps. Agree the swim was fast/short but given the temperature I was glad to get out of it when I did! Bike course was very challenging, obviously the open (and very busy) roads weren't ideal but it just means everyone has to behave responsibly. Run was interesting as well. I think the lowish numbers really made it more enjoyable, everything was more relaxed and there was no need to the standard half hour race briefing on drafting, transition rules etc.

Only negatives would be the price (a bit steep but I'd pay it again so ...), lack of a lead canoe for the swim (the buoys were very small and the rising sun made navigation hard) and marshalling/sign posting on the bike course ( I had no issues although a couple of lads missed a key turn and did an extra few km, in fairness I can understand why they missed it as well)

I'd also like to give a good word for the organiser, I know a few people had a problem making the registration on the Friday evening so he just set it up for Saturday morning as well ( this is something the organisers of a certain munster half ironman would do well to replicate but I've no doubt they won't )

griffin100

What a day. Great relaxed atmosphere and a tough course. I came in in 5.46 so happy enough apart from a slow run. Did a 34 min swim which is quite a pb for 1.9kms. I asked the organisers about the swim afterwards and they swore it was 1.9km and was checked with a GPS. They did say there was quite a current behind us on the return leg..... Seen your bike a few times Iozard but everytime i went over you weren't around. I think i might have passed you on the first bike lap. Will do a proper report on monday when i get to my laptop in work, on mobile at the minute.

zico10

Did anyone get an accurate measure of all three legs? Just like griffin100, I thought my swim time for 1,900m was very quick. From chatting to people after the race the general feeling seemed to be that both bike and run legs were a little short as well. Excellent race though and I wouldn't fault organisers for it.

metal dog

well done all, lots of good times there:)

griffin100

Did anyone get an accurate measure of all three legs? Just like griffin100, I thought my swim time for 1,900m was very quick. From chatting to people after the race the general feeling seemed to be that both bike and run legs were a little short as well. Excellent race though and I wouldn't fault organisers for it.

Like I said I spoke to the main organiser after the race and he was adamant that the swim was 1.9kms as he had GPS'd it that morning - I specifically asked about the distance as my 33-34 minute swim was well under my hoped for time. He said that there was a current pushing us back in on the return leg, hence the need to have a canoe at each buoy to hold them steady - this might also explain the lack of a lead canoe for the faster swimmers. That said, I'm still trying to work out (a) how a lake had such a strong current and (b) why this current didn't slow me on the out leg..........The swim course certainly didn't look short from the shore.

The bike lap is given as 43.38kms on the website so I reckon the two laps plus the extra bit between T1 and T2 was about 87kms so not too far off 90kms. Its pretty difficult to get a multi lap bike course on open roads to be exactly 90kms I would think.

I hope the run was not short given how slow I was on it:) It cant have been that far off as all they had to do was to position the turnaround point further up that hill - which seemed to go on forever.

My race report is on my training log but overall I think this was a great event. The lake swim was fantastic; the bike route was one of the tougest I've ever raced on; the run route was scenic and tough. The marshals were all cheerful and full of craic. Some minor issues about the confusion over the spit transition and the lateness of this information getting to people but this was not a big issue in the end as they delayed the start of the race to deal with this. If the swim or run was short then obviosuly this is an issue. The only real concern I had was that some of the bike route surface was absolute sh*te - I was fully expecting to puncture and was surprised that I only seen one puncture in the whole day - and some of the route through the towns was very congested - that said thats not the fault of the organisers.

Oh and a great goody bag with a nice Cat Eye bike light. Nice trophy at the end and a good quality race shirt (even if it does look like a darts team jersey:D).

Well done to the organisers. If I'm ever fit enough to do an early season HIM again I'll be back.

tracto

Agree with all of the above, great race, great atmosphere, great food etc. Any sign of results though? They are always a nice addition to any race. reckon they messed them up with their manual system? :rolleyes:

Izoard

tracto wrote: »

Agree with all of the above, great race, great atmosphere, great food etc. Any sign of results though? They are always a nice addition to any race. reckon they messed them up with their manual system? :rolleyes:

You might be waiting there...however, my Garmin reckons I did a 4.5km swim in 33mins, so well chuffed with that:D

catweazle

While I have you there Izoard....did you wear the 310 under the wetsuit when you swam. I was wondering is it noticeable swimming as it is an awful big yolk but i like the idea of having it on from the start too

Izoard

catweazle wrote: »

While I have you there Izoard....did you wear the 310 under the wetsuit when you swam. I was wondering is it noticeable swimming as it is an awful big yolk but i like the idea of having it on from the start too

I din't put it under the suit because:
a) it wouldn't pick up a signal (it obviously didn't know where it was in any event...)
b) would be subject to some random button pressing from the suit

I didn't notice it on the swim, but then again, I was too busy worrying about the family jewels that seem to have crept up toward my innards in the "brisk" conditions...:)

Honestly, I didn't notice it throughout...still looks cack though!

griffin100

The results are up but I cant make head nor tail of the splits. My swim seems correct, but apparently I did a 2.73 bike I also seemed to have gained about 18 minutes and 10 places with my overall time:) This is a surpise because after the race I was talking to the results coordinator and he had the correct splits and overall time for me. Its no big deal but I do like spending half a day staring at results sheets trying to identify where I could improve and comparing my times to others but I cant do this here as I cant understand the figures (I assume I'm not the only one who does this?).

Izoard

Crazy talk!

The swim looks OK, but the bike and run make no sense, although the overall is OK.

I'll go with the Garmin splits (33m/3hr 09m/1hr 50m + ~6 min T1/T2)

tracto

Splits are a complete joke unfortunately. Not showing the run and bike times in hours:mins:secs is particularly sloppy/lazy even if they were correct which they clearly are not. Bike times seem to be 20-30min faster than actual for a lot of people anyway.

Agree that its a shame not being able to compare splits with other people. I appreciate that it manual recording it error prone but using some common sense when it came to plugging in the times (which they obviously did) would have made them look less ridiculous.

btw Is it correct that Liam only won by a minute or so? It looked like he was much further ahead when I saw him.

Notwitch

Results look odd but, for me anyway, the swim time is accurate to when I left the water. If you open up col E on the spreadsheet you will see the actual bike split in hours and minutes (including t1 i reckon based on when I shouted out my number). I think the run time col actually includes the swim time so when you subtract that you get run time including t2. The final time for me is also accurate. All that work to find out what I already knew!!

This seems accurate for most but looks odd for the number 2 guy - so perhaps Liam did win by more - it looked to me like he was further ahead.

p.s. a great day out!

tracto

Notwitch wrote: »

Results look odd but, for me anyway, the swim time is accurate to when I left the water. If you open up col E on the spreadsheet you will see the actual bike split in hours and minutes (including t1 i reckon based on when I shouted out my number). I think the run time col actually includes the swim time so when you subtract that you get run time including t2. The final time for me is also accurate. All that work to find out what I already knew!!

This seems accurate for most but looks odd for the number 2 guy - so perhaps Liam did win by more - it looked to me like he was further ahead.

p.s. a great day out!

Cheers for that Notwich, looks like they mistook that hidden column as a swim/bike combined time for some reason and they just plugged the run time to balance it out. Still some one or two odd looking ones but makes a lot more sense now!

Roaster26

Thanks Notwich, my results make sense now!