The Brutal....

The Brutal extreme triathlon: All that it takes is.... 

An Ironman thats not an Ironman. An Ironman where you can judge the hardiness of the competitor by the length of their beard. Ironmen have silly tattoos. Brutal competitors have the most awesome beards - the longer the beard, the longer the race you were doing - 1/2 distance, full distance, double or (gulp..) triple.

Neither Clare or I were sporting beards, so we were destined to do only the full Brutal. Stuart, well he had a beard but frankly it was pretty pathetic so he too was only doing the full. We were the babies of the race, spending the whole time in total awe of the Double and Triple Brutal competitors. They had proper beards.

The Brutal, recognised as the second hardest full distance race in the world http://www.220triathlon.com/training/iron-distance-triathlons-the-11-toughest/10816-10.html , but also quite possibly the most chilled out relaxed friendly full distance race in the world -  we were standing on the finish line waiting (and waiting.....) for Stuart to descend off of Snowdon and finish - Sunday morning 2am came and went, 3am came and went. The published cut-off time was 4am and were starting to fret a bit. I causally asked Claire the organiser about cut-off and whether there were any reports of a guy called Stuart having died on his way up the hill (yes Stuart, you were awol long enough that you may actually have died...) to which she replied causally "nah, I don't think he's died and cut-off, meh, well, I'm here until Wednesday...." 

Anyway, back to the race. I first became aware of the Brutal a few years ago when three of us at work entered the double as a team - I was going to do the bike leg, but then I got sick and the runner got injured so that was that. Then last year Ed did the double with Clare as support, and the seed was sown. Clare was always going to enter too and, well, Stuart was completely unaware that he was going to do The Brutal as his first ever proper triathlon until he logged into his email to find a confirmation of entry..... Thankfully he soon stopped hating on myself and his wife for that one.... Sorry mate...

Roll forward and its race day morning, standing by a rather fresh Lake Padern, wetsuit, booties, gloves, thermal hat. There we are, trying to get used to the "refreshing" water, standing around chatting through chattering teeth and a siren randomly goes off as we chat. Oh bugger, thats probably the start siren... 

I struggle in cold water, even in full thermals it was proper cold and my body and breathing took a good few minutes to adjust. I then started to get persistent cold water cramps in my calves, they spent about an hour of the swim cramped which was really rather unpleasant. 

3.8km swim done and into transition. Clare has hot steaming tea but isn't functioning at all due to the cold. Shes shouting at herself. Stuart is basically wandering around like a very cold lost soul, his wife Leanne generally trying to usher him in the right direction. I get tea too, gotta have a tea in transition, its the done thing. Clare gets angry as I arrive after her and leave before her. That anger seemed to serve her well as the day went on....

Onto the bike, 4 laps of 46km, such a pretty pretty bike course, just food for the soul all the way round. Having jumped both Stuart and Clare in T1 I knew they were both behind me when I came across a nasty nasty accident, poor guy had lost control, laying on the road with a pool of thick blood under his head, just utterly horrible.  Knowing there was nothing I could do (he was being well tended too), and that it wasn't anyone I knew all I could do was keep going, thankful to see ambulances, police cars and air ambulance on their way. It made for a very solemn hour or two and I had said to myself I would stop riding if the worst had happened - but news filtered through that he had been later seen sitting up. Organiser Claire later confirmed he had a fractured skull and broken ribs but was fundamentally OK and was being operated on. Thankyou, whoever was looking after him.

The bike I was deliberately taking at a very measured pace, albeit every hour or so Clare would come cruising past me, saying "I'm not racing you...". No, no, of course you weren't. Actually I don't think we were racing, we were both being very measured, both keeping each other honest. We both started the bike a couple of minutes apart and finished a couple of minutes apart (with me ahead, just to be clear.....). I checked in a few times with Leanne to see how Stuart was doing and was warmly pleased to hear how well he was getting on. 185km bike done. 

And onto the marathon run, three laps around Lake Padern (no, for the record, those laps are not flat...) then just the small matter of up and down Snowdon to finish off the marathon. I knew I needed a good half hour head start on Clare as we started Snowdon, we are pretty evenly matched on the flat, I have more strength on the climbs but shes a damn pixie on technical descents.  Out of T2 though and its like "er, where are my running legs...", my pace is well off where it should be - I'm running nice and smoothly and on my toes but the pace just isn't there - in hindsight I think the severe calf cramps from the swim had caused some damage - thats life, it ain't called The Brutal for nothing. 

Three lake laps done and dusted, mountain bag slung on the back and a mandatory check with medics before we head off to Snowdon. My ascent of snowdon started less than impressively, I got lost on Llanberis high street..... having been pointed in the right direction up we go. I can honestly say I loved every second of going up Snowdon, it was really really cool seeing a trail of headtorches waaaay up the hill, seeing the starry sky, seeing the voles, the sheep, hearing the owls, seeing Clare the little pixie bounding down the hill whilst I was still 1km from the top. NO NO, that bit was not cool, that bit was really rather annoying....

Managed to jog down Snowdon which after 15 hours of racing I never thought I'd be able to do, was very happy with that. Crossed paths with Stuart near the bottom and wished him well and thats it, crossed the line at 16 hours, an hour inside the time I reckoned it would take me, and amazingly finishing 28th out of 70, thats by far my best ever result. Pixie feet had a storming Snowdon leg and without knowing it jumped the two females ahead of her, crossing the line as first female home by a good half an hour. 

Stuart, well, he had a nice gentle stroll up and down Snowdon, finishing on the 20 hour mark. Not too shabby my friend for your first proper triathlon, huge kudos to you.

And that was it. Except of course it wasn't. Because there were plenty of people left out on course sporting very admirable beards.... Having done the full its quite unfathomable to think that they will be racing for a further 20, 30, 40, 50 hours to come....

The Brutal extreme triathlon. All that it takes is.... all that you've got. 

And once you've given it all that you've got you stand there the next day thinking "yeah, I reckon the Double would be a fun thing to do next year....."

Photos(including the recce):
 https://www.dropbox.com/sh/dzlo0hlubycogio/AACx5djRKFFE0poQq60tKvWya?dl=0