Hyderabad triathlon 2014

Another one added :)

A triathlon was a dream and I got to fulfil this in hyderabad, thanks to GHAC (great hyderabad adventure club). They have been organizing this event since few years abut I missed. This time I took the challenge, the sprint category with 20km cycling, 5km running and 750mtr swim. I knew the toughest part is going to be swimming so I wanted to practice it, but all my plans with friends were going down. With a week to go, I got hold of a friend and did pracctice for about 450mtr at a
stretch that certainly increased my confidence.

The D-day was on Oct-12. There were some glitches in organizing and I couldn't get the start time of my event, which was 8am, but I reached at 6am. My full enthusiasm went little down and i
actually came back to my room to take a nap for an hour. Now I reached back, further delay and the ride started at 8.30am.

my companion..

That was swift, as i did a non stop and finished in about 55min (including a huge steep climb near microsoft office). Now was time to run, just single stop and i pulled that to in about 26mins. It was going all well as i sprinted the last 200metres of my run (the biggest mistake as you will see later).

Now was time to swim. After some delay to get a free lane at pool I got a middle lane in a 7ft deep pool (standard olympic with 50mtr each lap). I jumped in and hardly after 15-20mtr the anxiety of swimming in a deep pool hit me and I was almost drowning. I swam across to reach a side, rested for a while and then finished my first 100mtr. Back at start pointed i requested the organizer to give me a side lane but they refused. I said i will quit then but thankfully a guy about to finish asked my to come on side and swim. That was more comfortable to swim along an edge, but now the big disaster. I got really bad cramps in my thighs (the contracting muscle was clerly visible). I had to go out of pool to fix it (among the threat of getting disqualified). Thanks to a coach's suggestion i drank  some water and continued. I knew i may have been disqualified but to finish was my aim. It took me close to an hour to finish those 750mtrs, after resting on each side after each lap.

The tough swim. Expressions captured perfectly.

It was a super feeling of accomplishment once I finished it. I was super happy and I hung around for a while to meet some friends, eat some free food and pose around. Recovering out it of took few days.

Finishers!