The Bank Holiday weekend saw the sun shining and plenty of Tritons dusted off their trisuits and turned in sizzling performances in local races.

Two of our top Junior members got the ball rolling. On Saturday Brett Baker took an excellent 5^th place in Tristar 2 at the Ealing Aquathlon just 6 seconds off the podium. The following day Tom Simpson won the Tristar 2 race at the Hillingdon Duathlon in dominant fashion, getting his quest for IRC Squad selection off to the best possible start.

On Monday, Tritons were in blistering form at both the Tonbridge Lions Triathlon and the Thames Turbo sprint Tri. Malcolm Davies and Debbie Coyle made light of a hilly and technical bike course at Tonbridge with Malcolm recording the day’s fastest bike split by over 4 minutes and taking the overall win. Not far behind, Debbie bagged top spot on the women’s podium and an amazing 5^th overall. It’s particularly pleasing to see Malcolm racing (and winning!) again after his horrific injury last year. Meanwhile, Adam Tanner thrashed the sprint race taking 7^th overall and missing a podium spot by only a minute.

Over in Hampton Shelley Jones, Chris Eggleton, Jim Kirkland and Zoe Pierson were flying the Tritons flag in a field of 450, including a number of GB athletes. Despite pile-ups in the pool and several traffic light stops on the bike leg the Tritons smashed the field with Shelley and Jim taking 1^st and 3^rd in their respective age groups. Chris raced to 18^th overall and Zoe an AG top 10, and both Chris and Zoe recording PBs for this event.

Club stalwarts Rob Baker and Bruno Mahsoudi found themselves rubbing shoulders with some of the sports top names last week at the Volcano International standard distance triathlon in Lanzarotte. Unfazed by the hot, windy conditions and hilly course, the current and former pros in the field inspired our boys to some stellar performances. Bruno’s 2:33 saw him place 3^rd in AG and 85^th overall, whilst Rob stormed round in 2:14 to come 2^nd in AG and 17^th overall. Rob also experienced a career highlight of catching and passing Bella Bayliss on the bike and holding her off on the run. I can only hope he’s stopped talking about it by the Annual Dinner next January.

As a club we have been discussing with GLL about the use of Charlton Lido with a view to us establishing the Lido as our “home”, as well as trying to secure better deals for our members to utilise the facilities. With special thanks to Ed, Steve and Jim for all their hard work we are now in a position to make this a reality. On the general club forum there is a sticky/post with the proposal and a link to a survey that we wish all members to complete so that we can gauge the support for this ambitious plan which we feel can take the club to the next level. Click here to go directly to the post. 

Congratualtions to Joshua Solly, one of our new junior members who started the season with a bang last weekend by getting a place on the podium at the Basildon Aquathlon. Josh has stepped up an age group to Tristar 1 this year so is racing longer distances and against boys a year older but still came 3rd in a big field and only 18 seconds behind the winner.

Well done Josh! 

Well for the Tritons who pounded the Paddock Wood Half Marathon this weekend it was certainly a case of cup half full, even if their bodies were more than half empty at the finish line!

On a really scenic course that takes the competitors out into the Kent countryside, only one hill of note but with a few steep humpback bridges in the last 5 km that really sap the legs, don't be fooled into thinking its an easy flat course.

However, showing that early season run training has paid off the Tritons gave a really good account of themselves over the 13.1 mile course.

Keith Sanders (1:18) and Louise Walker (1:38) narrowly missed out on pb's, while Steve Walker (1:23) and Shelley Jones (1:32) claimed new pb's with Shelley knocking a whopping 15 mins off her previous best time.

Solid runs from Jim Kirkland (1:45) and Tina Tage (1:41) showed they are well prepared for their upcoming marathons. 

A well organised race on a lovely course, highly recommended.