Here’s how it all began.....
Back in December British Triathlon were advertising for athletes to become guides to help visually impaired para-triathletes reach Rio – the ‘Guide to Gold’ campaign. I applied, and from 40-50 applicants 10 of us were selected to attend an assessment day in Loughborough. This was a gruelling day consisting of 2 bike tests, 2 swim tests, physio screening, an interview and a 3Km run on track. I felt I had a solid all round performance, falling not short of my PB’s, and I generally had a great day. We had the chance to meet some of the athletes and everyone was so friendly. I was definitely in my element up there, even for only a day. I had an email a week later with some great news saying I’d been selected – Christmas came a few days early! I had been invited to the 2 week training camp as a ‘confirmation phase’ to check it’s actually what I wanted to go ahead and do.
On 18th January I left the cold British weather and flew to Lanzarote with a few talent ID squad members, performance athletes, 5 guides and 4 coaches. Four female guides had been selected from the assessment day and one of the very experienced male guides came out to help. There are 3 visually impaired athletes (VI’s) and the idea was to swap around over the 2 week period so we all got to experience training with each VI. So.....challenge #1 – riding a tandem bike! I think you get the same response from everyone when you say you haven’t ridden a tandem bike before – ooohh dear! But I feel my first ride went quite well. Riding around on the tandem with no-one on the back is a piece of cake. Challenge #2 – riding a tandem with someone on the back ;-) Thankfully my first ride was with a VI who was very confident and unphased by a new guide. After a very wobbly start and some reassurance from Alison I made good progress. Alison is a bit of a speed merchant, so she was keen to pedal, and pedal fast. Tandems can pick up quite a bit of speed and I sometimes felt I wanted to pedal backwards to counteract her action. Obviously there are still brakes on the tandems, yes! However, her support and calm nature helped my confidence grow quickly and I was doing U turns (often called dead turns) after about 20 mins. She may have been crapping herself on the back but I couldn’t see or tell! I was fine! My confidence grew throughout the 2 weeks and I started to love the descents on the tandem bike. Apparently they’re faster on the flat and downhill but going uphill required some serious hard work! Alison and Jack (the male guide) reached 47.5mph downhill on one ride! These girls are by no means slow. In fact, Rhiannon, who has come from both the British swimming and cycling squads, is much faster than me in the pool! We all got the opportunity train as individuals as well as guiding the VI’s.
Week 2 became a bit like Groundhog Day as the training schedule was a repeat of the first week. So I thought I’d inject some fun into the camp and introduced everyone to the game Human Cluedo. This could be the most antisocial game known to mankind but it’s a great icebreaker if ever you need one! Everyone puts their name, an object and a location into some hats and each person draws out one of each. Then to ‘kill’ that person you have to ensure the person is holding the object in that location – challenge #4. Once you've done this then you acquire their mission to kill. The aim of the game is to find your killer, i.e. ‘kill’ as many people as possible. Simple. Or in some cases, not so. One person was required to kill someone with haggis in the swimming pool, but believe it or not this was actually achieved. This game provided endless entertainment throughout the week but you become suspicious of everyone and everything. I've never seen people scarper so quickly when someone walks into a room and it was impossible to walk around the cafe with a towel without being asked questions! Great fun nonetheless.
I learnt so much over the 2 weeks and enjoyed almost every minute of it! The whole squad made me feel at home and I made some great new friends. It was a good laugh and I feel very lucky. I've finally found this sport that I absolutely love and now I get to compete knowing that I’m helping the VI’s reach their ultimate goal..... I am loving life!
One of the boys on the camp was wearing a t-shirt with this brilliant phrase on it! This is for all the triathlete partners out there ;-)