We all know someone who’s been affected by cancer and this year five of Surrey Harmony’s most athletic members decided to take on the ultimate challenge to raise funds for Breast Cancer Care.
The ‘athletes’ (and we use that term loosely) took part in a Triathlon at Dorny Lake, the venue for the Olympic Rowing competition in 2012. The lake is 2000 meters long and the girls were challenged with swimming in, cycling round or running alongside it… or even all 3! Thankfully it’s nice and flat.
The day started at 10am as Ann, Jackie and Lorraine participated in the team challenge. Baritone Section Leader Ann managed the 800m swim in a fantastic 17 minutes 50 seconds, but forgot to run out of the water to hand to Jackie. Nevertheless Jackie (choosing the stage where she could sit down) cycled the 30km round the lake in 1 hour, 14 mins and 22 seconds. Not bad considering her mountain bike was so heavy it nearly broke the bike rack. Finally, Assistant Director Lorraine ran the last 7.5km in a very respectable 43 minutes and 20 seconds.
Then it was over to the serious athletes as Belinda and Louise each took on the whole triathlon. They entered the “sprint” event, a 400m swim, followed by a 20km cycle and finally a 5km run… any one of which would be enough to reduce this web editor to a wheezing wreck. Front row member Belinda says “getting prepared for your first triathlon is all in the organisation and time is lost in the switch between the disciplines. Little things can really throw you so all of the stage prep we do as part of Surrey Harmony is invaluable”.
The race was not without its extra challenges. Louise’s race started with a brutal swim as her goggles were kicked off and her marriage nearly ended in divorce when she discovered that her husband had removed the speedometer from her bike, leaving her to follow Belinda’s race plan of “don’t let anyone with a better bike get past you”. Meanwhile Belinda was dealing with a contact lens crisis on the pontoon, spurring a fellow racer to run to her aid shouting “let me through, I am an optician!”. Unfortunately the offending lens was nowhere to be found and Belinda was forced to race Cyclops style. It was later found split in 2 and hiding in the deep recesses of Belinda’s eye socket.
So how did they fair? Louise finished 156th out of 498 with a brilliant time of 1 hour, 23 mins, 57 secs and Trithalon veteran Belinda came 118th with 1 hour, 22 min and 4 sec. Most importantly though, the team has raised £400 for Breast Cancer Care. It’s not too late to sponsor them, just visit http://www.justgiving.com/Surrey-Harmony-triathlon-team