Cotswold Classic July 10th 2022

Good evening all, I hope everyone’s feeling nice and ready for racing next weekend ?
Race weekend is only 7 days away, so hopefully you’ve all taken the time to read through the race info pack :
https://www.113events.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/CC2022-–-Race-Information-Sheet.pdf
If you’ve missed any of our previous newsletters, you can find all of those at www.113events.com/news

In this 2nd instalment of the pre race emails, I’ll cover the following :

Race Weekend Planning / Swimming
Race bibs and bike stickers
Live results
Food and drink on site
Weather and prep

Race Weekend Planning
I know that now we’re a week out from the race, you’ll now be starting to plan your weekend properly, so I wanted to get out some info on what’s on and when.
If you’re either local or down for the weekend, on Saturday, there’ll be a few non compulsory things going on:

You will be able to have a swim* in the lake on their marked 400/750/1500m courses (the 1500m course is basically our course with a small dog leg section we use to make up the distance)
You have to book this directly with the lake guys, which you can do at https://www.lake32.co.uk/product/payg-swimming/
*Please be mindful that the lake owners have a rule where you can only swim (outside of race days) with a Towfloat, so you’ll either need your own or to rent one from them – You won’t need this on race day

We will have a window where you can register early to save you having to do it Sunday morning. This will be by the finish line area, and will be from 14:00 – 16:00

Finally, we will have a briefing on the Saturday at 16:00 next to the Swim exit. This isn’t compulsory, and your compulsory briefing will come out via a youtube link in the next few days in the pre race newsletter #3
I want to call this a newbies briefing, but it’s not just for newbies, it’s for everyone that maybe hasn’t raced with us before, or is new to middle distance triathlon. It’ll take about 45mins to an hour and we’ll go through all the various bits of the race in detail and answer any questions you might have along the way. It’ll be really informal, and we’ll try and make it at least semi entertaining so you’re not all falling asleep. Myself and Dave will host it and the aim is to just go through all the little bits of the race and the where’s and when’s of what to do (or not to do) on race day to make sure you get the most out of your experience

The Main Competitor carpark (Upper one on the pic below) will be open from 13:00 – 18:00 on Saturday the 9th and costs £2 to park on the Saturday, and £5 to park on the Sunday. On the Saturday, you can also buy Sunday’s parking ticket to save yourself a few minutes early Sunday morning too.

So just to summarise those Saturday times :
Main Competitor Car park open 13:00-18:00
Early registration window – 14:00-16:00
Saturday briefing 16:00-17:00ish

Please note that the southern Overflow car park will not be open on Saturday the 9th, only race day.

Race bibs and bike stickers
By now, 99% of you should have received your race bib and bike sticker in an envelope in the post.
If you were one of our late entries, or you have a foreign postal address, your race bibs and bike stickers will be available to collect on either the Saturday early registration Window, or Sunday morning registration by transition.
If your pack has not arrived by this Tuesday, please can you email to Mary@dbmax.co.uk and she will arrange for a replacement to be available to collect as above
Live results
Our timing partner for the event, DBMax, will have a live results page up and running during the race
This will show the moment at which you start, when you finish any of the Swim, bike or run segments of the race, as well as the point you cross various timing mats on the bike and run course as well as the finish
We’ll have a link up during race weekend that your friends and family can track you on here :
https://www.113events.com/cotswold-classic/results/

Food and drink on site
Lots of people having been asking what provisions we have for spectator (and competitor post race) food and drink on site. Around the start finish area, the lake guys have a nice little cafe that does a whole load of healthy (and unhealthy) burgers, jacket potatoes etc as well as some really nice homemade cakes and coffee’s. They will also have a BBQ going beside the cafe and there’s going to be a burger van too and a couple of smaller stalls. If you’re family/freinds are looking for something to do whilst you’re out on the bike course, the Beach and Country park, which houses our transition and you will walk through from the main car park to the start, has another nice Cafe and a pizza place which does stone cooked Pizzas to order and a few other bits and bobs. The run course goes right by their cafe/shop too as the Park contains about 40% of our run course.
They’ve also got a really cool ‘Total Wipeout’ type course in the water if your family wanted something else to do during the day – Info on the Beach and Country park – https://www.cotswoldcountryparkandbeach.com

Weather and prep
If you are to believe the accuracy of Weather forecasting, it looks like we’re going to have a bit of a mini heatwave over the coming week (looking out my office window at the rain right now makes that pretty hard to believe I might add)

The water temperature is around 20deg right now, so a good week fo sunshine would see this up around 22 on race morning. This is Wetsuit optional temperature, and I can’t see that changing by race day.
The lake is little shallow at the moment (short version of the long story is the 70 or so lakes in the Waterpark are mainly interlinked and fresh water fed, and a new quarry next door to a lake upstream from the one we race at, has a blockage currently, so lake 32 is currently a couple of feet shallower than normal). This is good news for the less confident swimmers amongst you as it’ll mean there’s more places you can stand up, although might mean a slight tweak to the course layout, which we’ll keep everyone posted on if required
It’s worth noting that the bike course aid station is around 23miles into the bike lap if you’re planning on using it, so if it’s very warm on race day, you’ll want to ensure you have enough water/gels on your bike at the start of the race to get you to that distance. You have two laps on the bike course, so two stops of aid available.
The run course has 3 aid stations per lap (each lap is 4.3miles) and full info on what’s at each station is in the race info pack.

Right, that’s it from me for tonight. The next you’ll hear from me is early to mid next week with a link to the race info pack as well as some reminders of what to bring on race weekend for registration etc

We’re here to help, so if you get any questions or there’s anything we can help with, please just ask

Cheers and happy tapering, and we’ll look forward to welcoming you all along to our race next weekend

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events Team
graeme@113events.com
07595 591612

Cotswold Classic Middle Distance Tri – 10th July 22

Morning all. We’re just over 3 weeks out from the race now, so it’s now getting closer.
Hopefully by now, you’ve all read the last newsletter and digested the race information pack
If not, you can find that here : https://www.113events.com/cotswold-classic-2022-pre-race-newsletter-1/

In this latest instalment of the pre race newsletters, I’ll cover the following:

Start List with waves and numbers
Getting your pack in the post
Course conditions, rules/regulations and kit advice
Marshal Request 

Start List with waves and numbers
Up until the selection window closed on Monday, I had around 700 requests for waves and numbers, and I think I’ve managed to get about 99.9% into their selected groups, waves and numbers
The start list with your waves and numbers is now fixed, and you can find it here :
https://www.113events.com/cotswold-classic/cotswold-classic-start-list/
I’m afraid that now this is finalised, we can’t change things around

Getting your pack in the post
The master list is now also with the printing and posting company, so packs will start to get posted out in about a week. In your pack will be your race bib (race number) and a bike sticker. The bike stickers have a habit of getting lodged in the bottom of the envelope, so please can you make sure you fish it out before throwing the envelope away.
They get posted out in batches, so don’t worry if your mates have theirs and yours hasn’t arrived yet as the arrival will be spread out over 10 or so days
They should all be with you by Wednesday of race week (Wednesday 6th July), but if they’re not, please email mary@dbamx.co.uk and she can arrange a replacement to be waiting for you race weekend.
If you have a non UK address, or you’ve arranged this with us already, your pack will be available to collect on race morning also.

Course conditions, rules/regulations and kit advice
You’re probably now all at the stage where you’re starting to consider your options of what to bring on race weekend, so I wanted to spend a short amount of time explaining the courses etc so aid those decisions.
Transition is on grass, so with that in mind, it’s worth having a large plastic bag to keep your stuff up off the grass as it’s possible it’ll either be wet with morning dew, or if we’re unlucky, raining.
The BTF rules don’t allow plastic boxes in transition, and it has to be a soft bag of some description (a large rucksack is fine). If you have a plastic box that you always bring your stuff into transition in, we can still find you somewhere in the corner where you can stash it, but you won’t be allowed to have it by your bike and kit in the racking area. I normally recommend that people bring something like a bin bag, sports direct/ikea bag to keep their stuff in as it’ll mean if it does rain, you have somewhere to keep your bike and run socks and shoes in whilst you’re racing as I know from poor experience that coming back into T2 and having to tip water out your running shoes and squelching for the first mile really does suck.
We get about 5% of our competitors that do a full change in T1 or T2, and that’s totally fine too. We don’t have changing tents as there simply isn’t space, so what most do is get changed under a towel or a swim robe. The BTF rules say that you’re not allowed to expose yourself or get naked in transition, and how we interpret that is that if you’re attempting to be discrete, that’s totally fine. If you’re doing naked lunges down the racking or a big front to back sawing motion with a towel, that’s really not (I’ve seen both at our races in the past)

The weather this week has been pretty scorching down at the lake as we enjoy this short heatwave, so the water temperature is now around 21deg, which puts us firmly within the Wetsuit optional range.
I appreciate us triathletes love a Wetsuit, so this will mean that you all pretty much wear one, so I just wanted to let you know that based on current temps, you can opt not to wear one if you don’t want to wear one.

The run from transition to the mount line is about 60m and we’ll carpet it so that you can run either barefooted or in cycling shoes without the worry of mud/stones clogging up your cleats.

The bike course is two 28mile laps. The road surface is largely pretty decent, although being England there are a few potholes around the course, which you can quite easily navigate around as long as you keep your eyes open.
We had our Cotswold 113 race a couple of weeks ago, so we went out and marked them with Yellow Paint, and will do this again just before the July Classic race (a few examples as below)

If you’re considering tyre choice, I’ll give you my suggestion as an example as I live/ride in this area a lot mainly around our course: I weigh 80kg, and on my road bike, I run a 28mm tubeless tyre inflated around 70psi.
If you’re lucky enough to have both road and TT bike options, this is a TT bike course all day long. It’s relatively well sheltered from the wind so is perfectly suitable for a deep rim or disc rear if you have that option available to you (most don’t, but I appreciate that those that do want to know if it’s ok for the course style or not)
The bike Course aid station is about 24miles into the lap, so you’ll want to bring enough nutrition and drink to get yourself to this point if you’re planning on using the aid station on either or both laps.
The race is non drafting, and we’re going to be very hot on issuing penalties for this as I’ve read on a facebook group about a certain club planning on working together to get a fast time, so please bear this in mind and remember to follow the rules please.

The run course is three laps, and around 50% tarmac, 45% hard packed lake paths and 5% grass. It deals with rain really well as the lake path sections are under trees and very hard packed, so unless we get 2 weeks of rain running up the race, it’s a road shoe course rather than an off road shoe course. I’ll keep everyone posted on this nearer the time with condition updates in the following pre race newsletters

Marshal Request 
We can really do with a handful more paid marshals on the day please, so if you have anyone coming along with you that could get involved in the fun side of the race, we’d welcome them to the team.
Marshals can camp for free very close to the race start, we’ll keep them in free icecreams, hot food and hot drinks during the day, and they get paid too (£20 cash or a £40 113 Voucher)
If you have anyone coming along that could be part of our team, please just drop me an email at graeme@113events.com

Right, that’s it for me for this newsletter
We’re looking forward to welcoming you along to our start line in a few weeks, but please just get in touch if there’s anything we can help with in the run up to the race, it’s what we’re here for
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be sending out a couple more pre race emails, which will include info on swimming on race weekend before the race day, non compulsory briefing and early registration window on Saturday the 9th, as well as a video link for the compulsory briefing.
If you didn’t read it from the last newsletter, please please please read the race info pack :
https://www.113events.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/CC2022-–-Race-Information-Sheet.pdf

Cheers, and happy training

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
graeme@113events.com
07595 591612

Cotswold Classic – July 10th – Pre race newsletter #1

Good morning all, I hope everyone’s well and ready to come racing with us in just over 4 weeks.
Now the start list is fixed and we’re fully in the run up to race day, I’ll start to get the final bits of info out to you all over the next few weeks to ensure everyone’s up to speed and ready to race.
Although I’ll try and keep all the following newsletters fairly brief, this one’s gonna be a long one, so please grab a seat and a coffee and prepare yourself for a marathon

In this email, I’ll cover the following:

Race fixed and final info
Race information pack
Swim start format and info
Planning your race weekend
Marshal request
Familiarisation day

Race fixed and final info
The start list for the race is now fixed and submitted to insurers etc, so I can no longer offer name swaps and deferrals I’m afraid, sorry
However, as we’re posting out our registration packs, I wanted to use this as a reminder that if any of you have moved house since you entered the race, please can you send me your new address this week please and I’ll ensure your race pack goes to the correct address. You can see your registered address on your entry confirmation email, unless you’ve instructed a change since.
The race packs will start to get sent around 2 weeks out from the race, and will be on your doorstep sometime before Tuesday of race week. If your registered address is not a UK address, your pack will be waiting for you on race weekend with the registration guys.

Race information pack
You can find a link to the race information pack here :
https://www.113events.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/CC2022-–-Race-Information-Sheet.pdf
This contains absolutely everything you need to know about the race, and it’s really important that you take the time to read it please. It’s your pack for your race, so if there’s anything else you think needs to be covered, please just ask and we’ll add it in.
I’m afraid you’re going to get bored of me sending you this as I’m going to add the link into all the pre race emails, but it’s amazing how many people don’t read it and end up either not knowing something important about the day, or turning up with the wrong stuff.

Swim start format and info 
The race will start on July 10th at 05:55 and starts will run until 07:00
During Covid times, we moved from a series of waved mass starts to a rolling start window where a competitor starts every 4-5 seconds. This was very popular with the vast majority of competitors, and something we’ll continue with
However, I’m also conscious that there’s still a minority that like a mass start so they can see who they’re racing against on the course and not just against the clock. For this reason, we’ll cater for both options, and start the race at 05:55 with a small mass start for those that want it (more info on this later in this email) followed by 6 x 10min windows for rolling start waves :
05:55 Mass Start (limited numbers)
06:00-06:10 Wave 1
06:10-06:20 Wave 2
06:20-06:30 Wave 3
06:30-06:40 Wave 4
06:40-06:50 Wave 5
06:50-07:00 Wave 6

You will now have a short window in which you can choose a specific wave and/or race number, but please can I ask that you carefully read the following advice and guidelines before getting your request in :

To front-load the information, all our waves have roughly the same average swim time, so it’s certainly not fastest guys off first, and slowest last.
For choosing a wave, I want to give you some examples of why you might want a specific wave
You might be the next Michael Phelps and want clear water ahead of you, so would want either the mass start or wave 1.
You might feel you’re the slower end of the field, and not want to be the last person out on the run course, so would want an earlier wave with 1 or 2
You might be a more nervous swimmer, and want to see a few waves go off before you start to settle your nerves so would want a middle wave
You might want an extra 45mins in bed, so would want a later wave
You might want to be home in time for Songs of Praise, so would want an early wave

You don’t need to choose a specific wave, and many don’t. How it will then work, is once all the requests are in, we’ll backfill the remainder of the places in each wave alphabetically.

You can also now choose a specific race number or ask for a random group of sequential numbers so that you and your friends are racked in transition next to each other.
Numbers get snapped up very quickly and I’ll get over 700 requests, so when requesting, please also ask for a 2nd, 3rd or even 4th choice if you have them for a specific number (numbers 69, 666 and things like 33, 111 etc, or years of birth are most popular).
The transition works sequentially, and as you always enter/exit at opposite ends, there’s no racing advantage to a low or high number. If asking for a random group of numbers to be racked with your club mates, please read the following request process:
I will need not just their names, but also their Dates of Birth and registered email addresses as we often get duplicates of seemingly unique names, not just John Smith’s and Ann Browns.
Please check with them first as very often we get requests for someone to be racked with their friends in [for example] wave 3, when some of those mates have already asked to be with some other clubs in wave 6.
Please get the request right first time and not try and add more people in later as I won’t be able to accommodate that (ie, I’ll allocated you numbers 456-462 for your group, so 463 won’t be available later to add someone else in, as I’ll have allocated 463-478 to the next group)

I really like that we can offer this as I feel that it’s valued, and I literally have to block out 30-40 hours staring at an excel document in order to do this, so please can I ask that you make my life easier and get it right first time, check your mates actually don’t want to be racked with other mates in an other wave, and that the people you’re asking to be racked with and go off in the same wave as, have actually entered the race as this happens an awful lot too, and I’m left scratching my head trying to find a Dave Jones, when he’s not actually entered the race in the first place.

You can choose any number from 10-700inc and any wave from the mass start to waves 1-6.
Relay teams can choose a wave, but not a number as they’re racked separately to the solo entries.
The window for choosing a Wave and/or a race number opens now, and will close on Monday night (June 13th)
You can make your request by emailing Graeme@113events.com using ‘Waves and Numbers’ as the email title
As I’ll get around 6-700 request, please accept that I can’t respond to each and every email, so you’ll need to await the start list being published end of next week

Planning your race weekend
I know we’re now approaching the time where you want to start finalising the planing of your weekend.
It’s important to note that if you only want to come along on Sunday, that’s totally fine as we do all our racking on Sunday morning, and although you will need to sign in Sunday morning, your registration pack will come out in the post beforehand.
However, we do have Saturday stuff on if you wanted to make a weekend of it:
On the Saturday, there will be an option to have a swim which I will send booking info out on around 2 weeks out from the race
We will also have a Saturday briefing which isn’t compulsory*, but is useful to attend if you’re new to Triathlon or you’ve not raced with us before. The Saturday briefing will be very informal, and we’ll take around 45mins to an hour to talk through the race bit by bit and myself and Dave will try and make it as entertaining as possible to give you some advice and examples on what to expect and how to race and we’ll answer any questions you might have.
Also, on the Saturday afternoon, we’ll have a time slot in which you can sign on/register early which will save you time on Sunday morning. At the same time, you can buy Sunday’s parking tickets too, which will also save you a load of time Sunday morning too, so if nothing else, turning up Saturday might get you 20mins longer in Bed Sunday.
We’ll get finalised times for Saturday’s stuff out in a couple of weeks, but realistically, it’s going to be something like Early registration window 2-3pm and briefing 3-4pm
* A compulsory race briefing will be sent out as a video link during the early part of race week

Marshal request 
As anyone that’s every organised races will know, getting marshals is one of the hardest bits of the race and the bit you get let down on the most, especially if the weather forecast isn’t looking favourable like last weekend’s race.
We have around 180-200 paid marshals and helpers on the day
We have a mega bunch of regular guys and girls that help out at our race each time, and we backfill the rest of the positions with friends, family etc of competitors. We still have around 20 places that need filling, so if you have anyone that is coming along with you and wants to see the race from the more fun side, we’d absolutely love them on the team and would welcome them in with open arms
All marshals get paid too, and they can choose from either £20 cash or a £40 113 Events Voucher, and we’ll get them a free team shirt and kitted up with everything they need as well as partnering them up if required and taken through a full briefing, and keep them in free hot food, drinks and ice creams all day.
There’s free camping on Site for marshals too, so if you’re planning on coming along in a camper, and can bring a marshal to stay with you, you can stay on site for free around 150m from the start area.
All we ask is that they’re over 16 and know their left from their right, and we’ll brief them up on everything they need to know, and if they’re less experienced, put them with someone who knows the drills.
The two shifts are
Bike Team – 05:15 briefing, finish around 11:30
Run Team – 07:15 briefing, finish around 14:30

Please email graeme@113events.com

Familiarisation day
For those of you that have entered the race in the last few weeks, you will have missed the newsletter on this Sunday’s free of charge familiarisation day, where we’ll take you for a leisurely paced lap of the Bike and run courses (bike is 2 laps on race day, so 28miles per lap, and run is 3 laps on race day, so 4.33miles per lap) so you can see where you’re racing on on the day.
It kicks off with a single bike lap around 9am, and the run lap around 11:30 and the emphasis is very much on leisurely paced, so no one should get dropped (Think circa 14-15mph on the bike, and 10-11min miles on the run)
If you’re interested in attending this Sunday, we have a handful of spots left, so please drop me an email

Right, that’s it from me for today. Sorry this has been a long one, and hope that you’re all still awake ?

We really are here to help and to make sure you all get the most from the race, so if there’s anything we can help with, anything you want advice on or you just want to talk about whether the Sub7/8 race last weekend is relevant or not to triathlon (this seems to be a hot topic right now) please just drop me an email or give me a call

Cheers and happy training

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events Team
graeme@113events.com
07595 591612

Cotswold113 2022 – Post race email

Good evening all. I hope you’ve all dried out, warmed up and have your feet firmly up with a beer in your hand right now ?
Those were some truly tough conditions for racing, so well done to all of you that finished today.

Most importantly, thank you all very much for coming to race with us this year. It’s a tough time in the industry with more race places than competitors in British Middle distance races, so we’re truly appreciative that you’ve all chosen to come racing with 113 events this year, and we hope that we delivered to your expectations and more.

I suspect you’re all very bored of my emails now, so I’ll keep this one pretty brief, and cover all the bits you’re interested in knowing and in this final 11322 email I’ll cover the following :

How fast you went
How you looked doing it
Fancy another go
See it from the other side
Tell us what you thought and win a free slot in 23
Next year’s races
Lost property 

How fast you went
This, I’m sure, is probably the only bit of this email you care about, so here’s a link to today’s results :
https://dbmaxresults.co.uk/results.aspx?CId=16421&RId=370
We have trophies for our age groups of 1st-3rd in M/F 18-49 and 1st-3rd M/F 50+ plus a Relay team winner
As we didn’t hold a prize giving today, we’ll get those posted out in a next couple of weeks, and well done to all of you that did so great in those categories

How you looked doing it
I’ll pre-warn you, from my years of racing experience, no one ever looks quite as serene or majestic in their pics as they might have imagined themselves, and blowing cheeks, gurning and running snot are pretty par for the course.
Anyway, we use Whitton Photo’s and he’ll have the pics up in a couple of days at :
https://www.charleswhittonphotography.com/cotswold-113-tri-5622
We pre pay for a download pic per competitor for you, and any others that you want to download, get printed on a mug etc, are available to buy through his site too

Fancy another go
Did you know that we effectively re-run this race in 5weeks on July 10th under the name Cotswold Classic Middle Distance Tri ? It’s identical to the June 113, but on our normal bike course (56m) as there’s no jubilee that weekend effecting road closures, and (touch wood) is likely to be far warmer than today.
We still have some spaces at that race, and online entries close at Midnight tomorrow night (Monday June 6th) through https://www.113events.com/cotswold-classic/ although we can still squeeze people in until the end of the week if you email me.
We run a combo entry discount at the start of the year where you can enter both races together for a £40 saving, so if any of you that had entered the 113 and now want to do the Classic too, can capitalise on that discount still if you drop me an email and I’ll send you back a discount code to cover that saving on a Classic Entry.

See it from the other side
If you don’t fancy racing again straight away, but are around on July 10th, we’d absolutely love you on our merry team of marshals for the day, and you can get paid for it too. As you’ve seen today, it’s fun being a marshal for the most part (even standing in the rain early morning), and we have a great bunch of guys on our team that really try and interact with the competitors and make the day both fun and safe for them. You also get an invite to our post race beer, where, if like today (from the top picture), we all sit like zombies and stare longingly into a pint of beer and crave our beds
If you’re interested, drop me an email at graeme@113events.com

Tell us what you thought and win a free slot in 23
We value your opinion on how you thought the race went today, as well as in the run up to today from the point you entered, so would really welcome your feedback and thoughts on the race experience as a whole.
So much so, that we’ll offer up a couple of free slots for the 2023 Cotswold113 to 2 random names selected from those of you that could please complete the following short survey.
https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/Y6GKHKX
As a team, we see a fair amount of the race, but you guys that are out racing over the full day see so much more than we do, and how the race made you feel and what you liked/didn’t like is super important for us so that we can continually improve and make our races the very best they can be
Please don’t pull any punches on the feedback, and don’t feel like you might offend us with your responses. The only way we can really see what works and what doesn’t is by hearing from you all, so we’d really appreciate if you could please take 10mins to complete the survey about and let us know how you really think it all went.
For us as team 113, competitor experience is everything and as great as it is to see Smiling faces at the finish line, we strive to make that experience even better, and we can only do this by you passing on your thoughts and experience on the race as whole.

Next year’s races
Although the 2022 season is barely just beginning, we’re well into the planning stages for 2023.
Over the past 10 years, we pretty much just duplicated the June 113 with the July (previously August) Cotswold Classic Middle Distance. This has worked to an extent as the later date often suits some guys better. However, I think it’s important if we’re going to survive a slow period in the industry, that we change things around and try and make the two races a little different to each other with the Cotswold Classic V2
Don’t worry, we’re not trying to reinvent the wheel with the Classic, but from 2023, we’re working on a completely new bike course, which is much more ‘Rolling’ in nature than the very flat Cotswold 113. The course we are planning heads West rather than east, and although will still be a very fast course, has a few rolling hills and will take in a very different end of the Cotswolds and different scenery. It’ll also do away with the out and back sections. I suspect the run course will still remain largely the same, but we’re working on a couple of options for that too, but will of course be very flat still as there’s not a hill for 6 or 7 miles of the lake anyway.
The dates for next year’s races are provisionally set as June 4th and July 9th, and entries to both races will open online through 113events.com on August 1st this year.

Lost property 
As with all our races, we get loads of stuff left behind that we’ve had handed in or picked up today.
Myelf, Dave and Kevin will be at the lake tomorrow from mid morning if you’re still in the area and want to pop in, and I’ll be down there again Wednesday too showing competitors around the 22 Classic route (I’m working away on my other ‘Job’ Tuesday – Just for a break if nothing else)
Also, we have a competitor who’s lost a wetsuit, so please can you take 5 mins just to check your kit bag as you may have picked up the wrong one at the end of the day by accident – We also have 3 Wetsuits that weren’t collected at the end of the day for those of you that are also missing one.

Right, that’s it from me. Like many of you, we’ve all been up since 2am, so my bed is calling
Thanks again for putting your trust in racing with us, and we truly appreciate you coming along to the 113 start line today and making today so much fun for the 113 Team.

Hope to see you all again soon

Cheers

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
graeme@113events.com
07595 591612

Pre race email #3

Hey all, I hope you’re all nice and ready for Sunday’s race ?
This will be the last you’re likely to hear from me before the weekend, so I wanted to get the last few bits of info from our drip feed out to you just so you can get the final few bits ready to go racing on Sunday.
In this email I’ll cover the following :

What to bring this weekend for just about everything
Live tracker and results link
Rain and morning prep
Queens Jubilee celebrations
Allergy Change

What to bring this weekend for just about everything
I appreciate there’s always a million things on your minds on race morning, and it’s very easy to forget things, so I wanted a get a quick reminder out of what to remember to bring and do on the morning in order that you’ll need them so, hopefully, no one forgets things (I won’t remind you to bring wetsuit, bike and running kit, as if you’re the type of person to forget to bring your bike, I’m not sure an email reminder is going to help you)
Firstly, when you arrive at the car park in the morning, please have cash (Sunday parking is £5) ready to pay as it’ll speed up the process of getting some 700 or so cars parked within a 90 min window through one gate into a field. There’ll be a queue for the carpark, so please also leave plenty of time too.
If you’re coming along on Saturday, you can buy your Sunday parking pass for the main car park then too, which will speed up the Sunday process even more.
Before you leave your car, please ensure you have your race bib to hand and your bike sticker positioned on your bike. When you get to transition, you will need to register. For this, you will need either your 2022 BTF membership card complete with a photo, or another form of official photo ID (Passport, driving license, NHS card etc) and £5 cash for  BTF Day license. Without either of these, you will not be allowed to race, and our BTF ref will be keeping a very strict eye on us for this, so we cannot make any exceptions at all. If you are in a relay team, one person can register for all members, but will need all of their BTF cards, or photo ID’s and £5 cash each.
If you don’t want to bring your passport etc with you, a photo on a phone is fine as is a printed off version of a photocopy. Once you have registered, you will be given a wrist band (or multiple wrist bands if you’ve registered for a relay) It’s also worth noting, that you will be checked into transition at this point, so must have your bike sticker on your bike, your race bib showing, and your helmet on your head and fastened. The latter is so that we can check that your helmet does actually fit your head (roughly by eye) and that your chin strap isn’t hanging down by your nipples and will actually keep your helmet on your head if you’re unlucky enough to have a spill) – Like the ID’s, this is a BTF rule and we get watched very carefully that we are checking this.
You will save yourself a lot of time to turn up to check in with your id etc, and your helmet already on your head please
Once you’re in transition, you will find your numbered spot in the racking, and at your spot will be your timing chip and swim hat.
The bike course aid station is at 25ish miles into the course, so have enough aid/drink to get yourself started to that distance. You don’t have to use the aid station if you don’t want, and many don’t, but please be ready for the first 25miles if you’re planning on using it.

The water temp today was a very nice 19deg, so we’re firmly within the wetsuit optional range and this won’t change much by Sunday, maybe 1deg either way at most.

Live tracker and results link
Our timing partners, DBmax have a link up and running for live timing and results
This shows within a couple of seconds when you have started the race, and have either finished a swim, bike or run section, or crossed any of the intermediate timing mats as well as the finish line, so can be used as a tracker too.
The link to this is at https://www.113events.com/cotswold-113/results/
We have two types of race categories, ours and the BTF’s 5yr age slots
We have Trophies and prizes for our age categories (M/F 18-49 & M/F 50+ and Relay) and these are posted out after the race. Historically, we used to hold a prize giving after the race, but I appreciate it’s not much fun for the very fastest guys and girls to have to hang around what might be 4-5 hours after they’ve finished, as I didn’t want to run the prize giving until after the last finisher was in (This was my own rule as I didn’t want people to still be out on the course and see prize giving happening, and feel in any way that the race was finished without that and no one cared about them still being out there)

Rain and Morning Prep
The various UK weather forecasts are now almost all agreeing that it looks like it’s going to rain on Sunday for at least a good chunk of the race, if not all of it. With that in mind, please can I remind you all that transition is on grass, so please bring a large plastic bag to keep all your stuff a) up off wet grass, and b) out of the rain.
Also, with transition shutting for 6am, and many of you not starting until the 06:50 wave, there’s going to be some standing around. If you have a coat with you that you want to wear pre race over your wetsuit, we will have a 3×3 gazebo near to the swim start where you can drop anything you want and collect after the race. it’s going to be unmanned during the day, so you leave anything in there at your own risk, but will be in the finishers area so will only be accessible by competitor.
For other stuff (Car keys etc), you can leave them, if you wish, in transition with your bike, which is far more secure as it’s competitors only and constantly manned.
Also, the walk from transition to the swim start/toilets is on grass and hard packed stone. You can walk on it bare footed, but if you have sensitive feet or just don’t like walking barefooted, please feel free to bring some old flip flops, trainers, hotel slippers etc, and leave them on the shore by the swim start. That’s only 5m from the overall finish line, so you can either grab them after the race, or if you don’t want them back, leave them there and we’ll dump them in the skip on Sunday night.
As I said in the previous email, rain on the bike course does have a habit of washing crap onto the roads, so the chances of getting a puncture are increased somewhat. Please have the necessary tube and kit to repair it yourself on the day, as although we’ll have motorbike support riders on the course as well as the BTF moto Ref’s, the support guys can take a fair while to get to you if they’re very busy, so please don’t just rely on them. There will also be a mechanic with basic tools at the bike course aid station.
Also as previous mentioned, it’s always worth having wet weather kit and not needing it, rather than needing it and not having it.
Pulling on dry socks after the bike to head off on the run is one of Triathlon life’s real pleasures too, so I’d always recommend to people to have some dry socks and run shoes in a bag with a small towel for the end of the bike segment.

Queens Jubilee celebrations 
Sunday is the queens Jubilee day, and although it’s caused us no end of headaches in getting this race sorted for the day, it’s also a pretty cool day to celebrate
We will have bunting all around the finish chute, and we even have a ‘Royal Red’ finish line carpet instead of our normal bright 113 Red carpet, so we’ll try and get in the Royal Spirit as much as we can. We will also have spot prizes for the most patriotic competitors and spectators, so don’t forget to try and wear some Red, White and Blue.

Allergy Change
It’s worth mentioning that we have a competitor (Actually 2) who have a very serious Peanut allergies, so we are now withdrawing the Salted Peanuts from the aid station as we just can’t gaurentee eliminating cross contamination for the other stuff on that run station (people tend to grab one thing and then grab something else too, often with then same hand). I’m currently double checking that Jamaican Ginger cake, Bananas, Chocolate chip cookies, Salt and Vinegar Discos, Jelly Babies and all the normal High5 drinks/gels and flat coke don’t have traces, but I’m pretty sure they don’t so we should be able to keep everything else other than the peanuts

Right, I’m pretty sure that’s the last time you’ll have to put up with emails now before race day, but please give me a call if you need anything from me between now and Sunday, and we’ll look forward to seeing many of your smiling faces at the Briefing on Saturday at 15:00 and the rest of you with your race faces at registration on Sunday morning

Cheers

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
Graeme@113events.com
07595 591612

June 5th – Competitor Pre race newsletter #2

Good afternoon all
We’re just a few days away from race day, so we’re now just getting the last few bits of info out to you all to be totally ready for Sunday’s race, and we can’t wait to welcome you all to our start line
I’ll try to keep this one fairly brief as I know you’re all getting ready for racing too, and don’t want to be reading through war and peace length waffle on this sunny Tuesday afternoon.

In this email, I’ll cover the following

Online Video briefing
Bike course info
Competitor and Spectator parking arrangements Sunday
Food and drink on site
Weather and prep

Online Video briefing 
Here’s a link to the online video briefing for everyone to watch where you can see myself and Dave’s faces for Radio.
Those that have raced with us before will be slightly shocked at how quiet ‘Noisy’ Dave is, but the poor guy actually gets really camera shy, much to my amusement 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8-zbxntWRc

I know that you’re all wondering why Dave and myself haven’t been snapped up by the global modelling industry with our dashing good looks, but you can now see why our faces for radio are best suited to organising events

Please can I also ask again that you all take the time to read the race information pack, as this contains everything you need to know about the race – https://www.113events.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/1132022-–-Race-Information-Sheetvs2.pdf

Bike course
As you have seen from our last competitor newsletter, we’ve got a slight tweak to the bike course for this weekend’s race as a result of the Queens jubilee celebrations.
Like you might expect with an occasion like the Jubilee, there’s a chance the roads might be a little busier than normal for a Sunday, and although we start intentionally early for all our races in order to beat any traffic  that might come on the roads mid morning onwards, this Sunday might see an increase over the very quiet roads we’re used to.
We have around 80 bike Marshals, Police and traffic Management contractors on the course, and the latter two are positioned at some of the busier/Key junctions to stop any other road traffic to give you right of way and to keep the flow of your riding. However, it’s really important that you be prepared to slow down if they don’t feel it’s safe to stop cars to let you pass or they just feel you’re approaching too fast for the conditions.

I’m going to have a quick 2 minute rant now in order to prepare you too, so please accept my apologies in advance.

Over the last few year’s, our sport in the UK and beyond has seen a fairly rapid decline in cycling standards at Triathlons. I appreciate this is really only a very small number of competitors spoiling for the majority that cycle really well, but as I’m quite good friends with some of the organisers of the UK’s bigger middle distance races, I know they’re seeing this too and worse than us in many cases.
At 113 Events, we are slightly different to many other organisers in that we spend a massive amount of time, money and effort into building up good relationships with all the local residents on our courses, and we don’t just steamroll our way through their villages without their blessing. I would really really like to keep those relationships going, and some of the riding standards I’ve seen at other Middle distance races in the UK, and in a couple of small cases, at our races in the last couple of years, have been truly terrible and shocking.
In order to hammer home my point, I want to give you a couple of quick examples :
1) A cyclist cut a left hand turn by hopping up a curb onto the path to undertake a slower cyclist and went into the path of a mother with a baby in a pushchair walking along, who they then shouted at to get out their way.
2) A Cyclist got impatient waiting behind a car that was awaiting a chance to overtake a slower cyclist. They then proceeded to undertake the car and shout abuse through their window – That driver was a late 80yr old women.
Both of these incidents resulted in instant DQ, and in one instance, I lifetime ban from 113 Events (the other sent the recipient some flowers through us and a long letter of apology). Both of those incidents were also by seemingly decent people, who just got the red mist as they were chasing a specific time to beat their PB or to qualify for a BTF Euro Spot, which resulted in them somehow forgetting common courtesy and general decency.
It’s really important for triathlon as a whole to be represented well in the open view of the public road, and I want to ask that small minority of competitors who appear to become ‘head down idiots’ endangering themselves and others around them, really have a long think before they act like this. We will have 5 moto referees, 4 moto marshals and a number of our core team placed around the course. If we see, or hear of, any discourteous riding to either other road road users or other competitors, you will get instantly DQ’d and you will not be allowed to continue the race.
It’s massively important to me that our races cast a positive shadow on the local community, and that the locals continue to welcome us in with open arms. This type of behaviour jeopardises that, and will not be tolerated in any way, shape or form.
I appreciate this is only a very small minorty of maybe a couple of competitors per race, and that we just ask that everyone rides with their eyes open and their moral compasses engaged, but those that do appear to want to be fast at all costs, tarnish it for everyone else.
Sorry, rant over 🙂

It’s also worth reminding you that our races, inline with the BTF rules, are non drafting. I appreciate that the new version of the Highway code allows you to ride two abreast on the road when you’re out riding with mates, but for the purpose of our race, it’s single file only unless overtaking, and the person being overtaken then needs to drop back to the correct drafting distance straight away please. We keep a keen eye on clubs as we often see them trying to work as a peloton only dropping back when they hear a motorbike ref (this happens way more than you might imagine), and any drafting will result initially in a time penalty, and secondly (without us having to give you warning) a DQ and non continuation of the race for that individual or group of individuals.

Anyway, back on track
We’ve been out this week and marked potholes and imperfections on the bike course. Largely, the course is in good condition, but with this being the UK, there’s a handful of potholes that don’t mix well with Carbon wheels.
The ones I’ve spotted have been marked with a Yellow Line before them to make them a bit easier to spot. I ride this course pretty often and they’re all really easy to spot and here’s a few examples taken yesterday on my phone

Competitor and Spectator parking arrangements Sunday

On Sunday morning, we will have two car parks. The main car park is the one shown at the north of the picture above, and is the quickest one to walk to transition from. The overflow carpark is for when the main car park is starting to fill up and also for any spectators that are coming along.
Both carparks get pretty full very quickly if people don’t park sensibly, so please can I ask that you park nice and close to the car beside you, and follow the instruction of the marshals guiding you in. They’re both fields, so if you were planning on coming in a Lamborghini, I’d suggest you consider bringing something else. You can park a normal car no problem, but for the very lowest of sports cars, just be mindful that it is a field, not a smooth tarmac car park.
Both car parks are £5 per car payable in cash only please and on Sunday morning will be open from a little before 4am
For those of you that are coming along to site on Saturday to have a look around or attend the briefing at 15:00, the northern Main car park will be the only one that is open on Satruday, and this will open at 14:00 and shut at 18:00.
Car parking on Saturday is £2, and you can buy Sunday’s pass at the same time to save messing around early in the morning on way to race.
The main competitor car park will shut at around 06:00 on Sunday morning as we want to avoid having spectators trying to drive past the mount/dismount line, so should head to the southern ‘Competitor Overflow and Spectator’ car park as that will be open for the duration of the race.
Please also ask any spectators coming after around 08:00 that if coming from the A417/9 direction (as most will) that they’ll be driving along the bike course and to be mindful of bikes please
We get lots of request to ask if Dogs are allowed on site if coming with spectators, and that’s no problem at all as long as they’re kept on a lead please.

Food and Drink on site
Lots of people having been asking what provisions we have for spectator (and competitor post race) food and drink on site. Around the start finish area, the lake guys have a nice little cafe that does a whole load of healthy (and unhealthy) burgers, jacket potatoes etc as well as some really nice homemade cakes and coffee’s. They will also have a BBQ going beside the cafe and there’s going to be a burger van too and a couple of smaller stalls. If you’re family/freinds are looking or something to do whilst you’re out on the bike course, the Beach and Country park, which houses our transition and you will walk through from the main car park to the start, has another nice Cafe and a pizza place which does stone cooked Pizzas to order and a few other bits and bobs. The run course goes right by their cafe/shop too as the Park contains about 40% of our run course.
They’ve also got a really cool ‘Total Wipeout’ type course in the water if your family wanted something else to do during the day – Info on the Beach and Country park – https://www.cotswoldcountryparkandbeach.com

Weather and preparation
If you are to believe the accuracy of BBC Weather forecasting, it looks like we may well be getting wet during the race (not just in the swim)

With that in mind, I’d suggest a few things to prepare for this :
1) Bring a large plastic bag (bin bag or similar) to put your stuff in under your bike in transition, or to keep it up off Wet grass
2) Bring some waterproof kit for the bike and run, and a change of socks as getting on the run and pulling running shoes over really wet socks from the bike sucks
3) Bring an extra tube for the bike as heavy rain can often wash crap onto the road
4) We’re pretty relaxed with the rules around dropping off extra items of clothing with marshals and loved ones around the course, so you’re better off to have more layers than you need and shed them, then not have enough and get cold

Right, that’s it from me for today. The next you’ll hear from me is a short mail towards the end of the week with a quick reminder of what to bring with you on the day, and any updates that might happen between now and then
We’re here to help, so if you get any questions or we can help with anything, please just give me a ring as I’ll be down the lake during the day all week getting everything built and ready, so won’t have much access to emails during the day – I’m on 07595 591612

Cheers and happy tapering

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
Graeme@113evens.com
07595 591612

Not long to go now….

Good evening all, I hope this email finds you all comfortably into your final 10 days of taper before the race on June 5th
I appreciate Tapering is probably the most boring part of the whole training cycle, so I wanted to get the first of the ‘Pre race emails’ out to you now to get some info over to you in readiness for a week on Sunday’s race

In this email I’ll cover the following :

Start List with Waves and Numbers
Race Bib packs
Race information pack and updated bike course info
Marshal request
What to Bring on the day
Saturday Stuff (Swimming and Newbies briefing)

Start List with Waves and Numbers
Those of you that follow our Twitter and Facebook pages will have already seen these, but the start list for the June 5th Cotswold 113 is now online at https://www.113events.com/cotswold-113/start-list/
We got a record 820 requests for Waves and Numbers for this race, and I’m pretty sure I managed to sort out at 98% of them, so hopefully you’ll all find yourself in your requested wave and racked with your mates

Race Bib Packs
By now, many of you will have received your race pack in the post which includes your race bib (2x Bibs for relay teams) and a bike sticker. The bike stickers can quite easily get lodged in the bottom of the envelope, so please check you’ve retrieved it before throwing the envelope away.
The packs are posted in Batches, so don’t worry if you’ve not received yours just yet and it should still come later this week or even next Monday.
If, for any reason, it’s not turned up by next Tuesday, please drop an email to Mary@dbmax.co.uk and she can sort for a replacement to be ready for you when you arrive in the morning for race day.

Race information pack and updated bike course info 
We sent the race information pack link out to you all about a month ago, and to date, it’s only been downloaded a little over 600 times. That means that there’s around 350-400 of you that haven’t downloaded it yet, so please can I ask that you all take the time to have a read through it as it contains some pretty important info about the race, including the updated bike course : https://www.113events.com/cotswold-113/downloads/
Bike Course update: The Queens Jubilee bank holidays hadn’t been announced at the time we fixed the dates for this year’s race (we fix them 2-3 years out), and to say it’s been a pain in the neck for us in the last 8 weeks would be an understatement (to give you some context, organising races in 2020’s Covid time was actually less hassle)
Anyway, we’ve managed 99% of the problems it’s thrown at us, but I’m afraid the one issue we couldn’t work around has resulted in a very small tweak to the bike course. The bike course now has to take a slight Diversion around a section in South Cerney on the outward section of the lap, and effects around a mile and a half of the course. It’s not a huge course/distance change, and we’ve tried our very hardest to avoid this, but has been unavoidable this time I’m afraid, despite our best efforts and pulling out of what little hair I have left.
It’ll obviously still all be signed/marshalled on the day, and you’ll barely notice any difference if you’ve raced with us before as it’s such a small change (it’s actually the same part of a route we used in 2020)
On the positive, it makes the course flow a bit better and will no doubt increase your average speed due to the reduction in turns, although it is very marginally longer.
You can see a ‘Mapmyride’ link to the new bike course maps in the race info pack listed above and from their you can download .gpx files.

Marshal request
Another of the many issues the Jubilee weekend has thrown up is availability of our usual pool of amazing marshals. I know you Guys & Gilrs all have some amazing people coming along with you or know amazing people that like to cheer and be involved, and we’re still short about 15 of the usual 200 or so we normally have, so if you have anyone that would like to see the race from the more fun side, and get fed and paid for their time, we would absolutely welcome them on to our team for the day pretty please 🙂
All we ask is that they’re over 16 and know their left from their right, and we can get them kitted up and take them through a brief as well as making the day fun for them in assisting you all in going fast and enjoying yourself during the swim, bike and run. We have both Bike and Run roles available and would love to hear from you if you have anyone that would be able to get involved – email me at graeme@113events.com
Pay is £20 cash or a £40 113 Events Voucher, and we’ll keep them in hot drinks. burgers and ice creams all day.

What to Bring on the day
Obviously, you’re going to need your own Swim, Bike and run kit (we have had people turn up in the past expecting that is was all supplied by us, and not just on one occasion either). In terms of Kit preparation, I’ll give you my advice as follows if any of you are unsure:
The Water temperature today was a little under 19deg. The forecast for the next 10 days is pretty decent, so I expect race morning to have a water temperature of between mid 19’s and low 21’s. This puts us firmly within the ‘Wetsuit optional’ range within the BTF rules. What this actually means is that 99.99% of you will wear a wetsuit as Triathletes love a Wetty, but the option not to wear one is there if you choose so. We provide you with a silicone swim hat, so you don’t need to bother about packing one of those (unless you have your own bright orange lucky one, in which case that’s fine as it’ll match ours).

As we start pretty early in the day, the air temperature can be pretty chilly, and although I know a lot of you are hardened triathletes that race in all weathers, it’s well worth bringing bike kit for all Weathers and, if needs be, just leaving it in transition. Or, at least, just having a set of arm warmers to keep your temp up for the first few miles that you can then either pull down your arm, or stash in a pocket.

For the run course, it’s a tarmac shoe course all day long for everyone but the most unsteady runner on anything other than tarmac (our course is about 50% tarmac, and the rest is either very short grass but mainly hard packed lake paths)
You will pass back by transition on each lap, so you can always nip in and drop off a coat if you find you’re starting to cook in the sun even though you potentially started in the rain, or vice versa.

Transition is on Grass. Hopefully, it’s not going to rain on race day or the day before, but as this is England, it’s worth preparing for the worse. With that in mind, it’s always advisable to bring a large plastic bag to either lay your kit out on to keep it up off the grass, or to tuck it into if it looks like it’s raining. BTF Transition rules do not allow plastic or rigid boxes, so most people use either a rucksack to bring their stuff with them in, and have a bin bag, Ikea style bag or something similar to lay their kit out on.

In terms of coming to register in the morning, we follow the BTF rules as follows :
You will need either a 2022 BTF Photocard ID (with your pic on it) as either an actual card, a photocopy on a sheet of paper or a picture on your phone is fine as the BTF now offer an online membership card.
If you’re not a BTF member, you will need some other form of photo ID (Ie. Driving license, passport or something else formal, not a library card – again, a photocopy or pic on your phone is fine) and £5 cash only for a BTF Day License. The phone signal is patchy by transition, so we can’t take anything other than cash I’m afraid.

We’re very closely watched by the BTF Referees for sign in, so if you don’t have a BTF card, or ID and cash for a BTF membership, you simply will not be allowed to race, and we have to be really strict on this

For relay teams, all members of the team will need a BTF Card or ID and cash for a day license, although one person can bring the other members stuff and register for the whole team – If you’re unsure, just call me – 07595 591612

Parking is in a field a few minutes walk from transition, and is £5 cash also please (this goes to the farmer, who in fairness, normally donates a good chunk of it to a charity)

Saturday Stuff
Although we do all our registering and racking on the Sunday morning, I’m conscious that many of you will be in the area and at a loose end on the Saturday.
For those of you that fancy riding the course on the Saturday, we try and have the course marked out by around tea time.
If you wanted to have a Swim on the Saturday, the guys that run the lake we race at have agreed to have a session on the Saturday where you can swim a lap of our course between 16:00 and 17:00
You can book this directly through them now at https://www.lake32.co.uk/product/113-test-course/
Alternatively, they will have their normal 400/750/1500 (the 1500 is basically our course without a small extension) that you can book to swim any time on the Saturday. Their normal booking system opens 7days in advance, so you can book a swim there for the 4th  June on the website from this Saturday onwards (https://www.lake32.co.uk/product/payg-swimming/)
Please note that in line with their rules, any Swimming there other than race days, has a mandatory tow float rule, and they hire them on the day if you don’t have one – You obviously don’t need one for our race day, but will if you wanted to swim on the Saturday

One of the casualties of Covid times was our Saturday registration and briefings. The move away from Saturday registration was universally very popular, but I want to bring back the option for the Saturday Briefing as a non compulsory (i want to call it Newbies, but it’s not just for Newbies) Briefing.
We will run that this year on the Saturday at 15:00, which will take around 45-50mins, and we’ll talk through the race in full, covering all the little details that anyone that’s either newer to Triathlon or hasn’t raced with us before might not be aware of. It’ll be pretty informal, and myself and Dave will stand on a small hill with a Microphone and a Speaker over by the Swim exit and talk everyone through the race stage by stage. We’ll try and make it entertaining, although can’t promise signing and dancing, but will go through all the rules, what not to do and what to do, and just guide people through the day as a whole so that you can get the most from your race without worrying about things.

If you’re coming along on the Saturday for the briefing, Parking* is only £2 that day in the competitor carpark, and you can buy Sunday’s parking ticket at the same time to save time in the morning.
No need to book, just turn up and ask anyone in a Red 113 Shirt to direct you towards the Swim exit/transition

*If you’ve booked swimming with the lake, you can use their carpark as they’ll check you in, so this is for people attending the briefing only and our car park will be open from 14:00

Right, that’s it from today’s email, The next you’ll hear from me will be early next week with a youtube link to a video of our compulsory briefing, some info on start/wave procedures, and any updates to the weekend or things that are worth considering in your final week before the race

We really are here to help, so if you get any questions, or there’s anything we can help with, please just ask by giving me a call or dropping me an email.

Cheers and Happy training

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
graeme@113events.com
07595 591612

Cotswold Classic – May Competitor Newsletter

Good morning all, I hope this email finds you all well ?
Race season has finally arrived, so as we’re only a couple of months away from this year’s Cotswold Classic on July 10th, I wanted to get the latest instalment of our newsletter out to you all to bring you up to speed with the race, and to get some info out to you all
If you’ve entered the race in the last couple of months, it’s worth bringing yourself up to date on the last competitor newsletter for the Classic, which went out in back in Feb – https://www.113events.com/2022-113-classic-competitor-newsletter/

In this email today, I’ll cover the following :

Familiarisation day – June 12th
Marshal request
What to expect and when 

Familiarisation day
We will hold our Cotswold Classic Familiarisation day on June 12th at the lake.
These are a great chance to come along and get a taste of what’s in store for you on race day, with a guided lap of the bike and a guided lap of the run, and to meet our team and other competitors
The emphasis on the day is on leisurely pace, so don’t worry if you don’t feel like you’re the fastest out there and the pace should be good for everyone (We average about 14mph on the bike, and 10-11min miles on the run)
The day will start out at 09:00 with a guided lap of the bike course (28miles for a lap / 2 laps on race day) where we’ll split off into a couple of groups and take a lap of the course with a few stops to point out aid stations etc.
This normally takes a couple of hours, and we’ll then head off for a lap of the run course around 11:30 after a short break to get changed, have a drink and ask any questions you might have. The run lap is 4.3miles (3 laps on race day) and like the bike, will have a number of stops to point out where transition is, swim exit and aid stations as well as best points for spectators and the finish line itself.
For those of you that haven’t raced with us before, or don’t know the area, this is a great chance to settle some nerves and ask as many questions to me and the team as you like about all the little details.
We only run Bike and run as guided laps, as the variety of paces in the swim is too broad to be able to safely take a large group around the 1,900m lap, but if you wanted to Swim that day too, you will be able to book a swim slot with the lake guys nearer the time (I’ll get the link out to everyone that’s signed up when swim slots are available to book)
The bike and the run are completely free too, and there’s no charge for the day.
All we ask is that you book yourself on please, as we use this to get a handle on numbers as well as giving us a direct route for communication with everyone that’s coming along on the day with directions, instructions etc.
These are a great chance for us to meet you all too in a slightly more relaxed format, as everyone seems to have their game faces on over race weekend.
The booking system is open now at www.entrycentral.com/CCfamday
If you can’t make the 12th June, and you are able to get down Midweek, I can always take some time away from my desk and show small groups around. Weekend’s are a write off for me with various other races and kids duties, but I can generally get out for a few hours on a Midweek morning with a bit of planning if anyone wants to come and see the course, but can’t make the 12th – Please go easy on me though as my 10hr Ironman days are a long time gone now (10yrs and over 10kg’s ago)

Marshal request
As anyone that’s ever organised a race will know, getting marshals is one of the hardest parts of the job, and we still have a fair few paid roles available out of the 200 positions for the race on July 10th
We pay all our marshals and really look after them, and you can choose from either £20 cash or a £40 113 Events Voucher, plus we’ll give you a team technical shirt, and keep you in ice creams, burgers and hot/cold drinks all day
We’ll take all the marshals through a full briefing with our course managers, and pair up anyone that’s not done it before with someone more experienced.
All we ask is that marshals are over 16, know their left from their right and are enthusiastic.
It’s a fun day out too, and we’ll make sure you have a good laugh all day as happy marshals are good marshals.
We have free parking and camping for marshals too
The two basic shifts are
Bike course – 05:30 Briefing finish around 11:30ish
Run Course – 07:30 Briefing finish around 14:00ish

If you have anyone coming along that would like to get involved, please drop me an email at graeme@113events.com and we’ll certainly welcome them to the team

What to expect and when 
Over the course of the next few weeks, I’ll drip feed information out about the race
The next email you’ll get from me will be in a couple of weeks with a link to the race information pack. This contains all the info on everything about the race from when you first arrive on race morning, right through to when you leave at the end of the day.
After that, around the start of June, you’ll have a window in which you can choose a specific wave and/or race number.
These will be on a first come first served basis following this email, so please don’t ask just yet as I can’t allocate either waves or numbers until the race is fixed and closed and we have the start list in an excel format on my computer.
That email will be around the start of June, and will have all the info on how to choose then and what dates the window for choosing are.
Closer to race day, we’ll get updates out on course condition, and around a week out from the race, you will get a link to the briefing video.
As we are posting out race packs, these will arrive on your doorstep around a week out from the race, and will contain your number bib and a bike sticker.

In the meantime, we’re here to help, so if you get any questions or there’s anything we can help with, please just ask
We’ll look forward to seeing many of you at the Familiarisation day on June 12th, so happy training and get yourself out enjoying the good weather we’re experiencing right now

Cheers

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
tel 07595 591612
email graeme@113events.com 

Cotswold 113 – 5th June 2022

Good morning all, I hope this email finds everyone well and getting ready for the summer’s race season ?
We’re a little over 2 months away from race day now, so I just wanted to send everyone out a quick email with some updates and news about the race
For those of you that have entered the race in the last few weeks, please head to the following link to catch up on February’s newsletter for lots of info about the race :
https://www.113events.com/2022-113-classic-competitor-newsletter/

I’ll try not to make this one too long, so in this email, I’ll cover the following :

1) Familiarisation day
2) Getting family/friends involved
3) Course conditions and preparation advice
4) FAQ’s

1) Familiarisation day
Our Cotswold 113 Familiarisation day is going to be held on the 24th April.
This is a free of charge day, where we take you for a leisurely spin around a single lap of the bike and run courses (Bike lap is 28miles and run lap is 4.3 miles)
The emphasis on the day is leisurely, and the average pace is likely to be something like 14-15mph on the bike and 10-11min miles on the run. We’ll have plenty of stops for regrouping and to explain how things work on the day too.
These days are a great chance to come and see the course, meet the 113 team and to meet other competitors. From our side too, it’s a great chance to  meet people in a less stressful environment than race weekend too, so we’re really looking forward to it our end.
We can’t, I’m afraid, do a guided lap of the swim course for a number of reasons (Apart from it not actually being that popular in previous years). These are mainly due to the variety of paces, and resulting in the faster guys/girls sometimes having to tread water in much colder temperatures for 5mins plus to wait for the regrouping, and people getting very cold.
You can however, book a swim slot with the lake guys directly on the day and swim their traditional 1,500m loop, which is very similar in layout to our 1,900m race day loop, at any time during that day or any other day if you wanted to get a taste for the water (Not literally, I hope)
Their website for booking swimming is https://www.lake32.co.uk
The day will start at 09:00 with the guided bike lap, and will go off in a few groups at short intervals. Realistically, that will take about 2hours. We’ll then have a shortish break for people to get changed and put their bikes away, before heading off for a lap of the run course around 11:30 which will take about an hour.
Although the day itself is really quite informal, we still need to use a booking system so we can get a handle on numbers and to get group emails out to you all with instructions, directions etc, so if you’d like to come along on the day, please can I ask that you head to the following link and get booked in :
https://www.entrycentral.com/113famday
Our familiarisation days tend to be most popular with first timers to the distance, so if that’s you and you’re worried you’re alone in that position, you really aren’t as we get loads of first timers to Middle Distance (and to triathlon) so you can meet a few others and settle your nerves.

If you can’t make this day, but still want to see the course, there’s still options too
I live close to the lake and work from home, so am happy to nip out for a few hours during the week to show people around in small groups. My racing days are long gone, and my pace is best described now days as Sedate, but as long as you’re not looking to go around fast, I’ll happily show you around a lap of the bike and run courses, and in reality, I really need the motivation to get out and bike/run instead of staring at my laptop all day.
I generally can’t do weekends as I’m tied up with either other peoples events or my son’s racing, but can do weekday mornings with enough planning. Get in touch

2) Getting family/friends involved
As anyone who’s ever organised races will tell you, getting marshals is one of the hardest and most frustrating part of the job. We have around 180 paid positions on race day, and we still have a number we need to fill.
If you have anyone planning on coming along to watch on race day, we’d absolutely welcome them to our team of merry boys and girls in Red, and will ensure they have a really fun day, as a happy marshal is a great marshal.
We pay all our marshals too, and they can choose from either £20 cash or a £40 113 Event Voucher
We’ll also take them through a full briefing, kit them up in everything they need along with an event team shirt and keep them in free burgers, ice creams and hot/cold drinks during the day.
We have free parking and camping for marshals on site too
If you have anyone planning to come along that would like to get involved, please drop me an email at graeme@113events.com
Marshals also get an invite to the end of day team beer too 🙂

3) Course conditions and preparation advice
Now is about the time I suspect you’re starting to think about what kit to bring with you on the day, so I wanted to get some early pointers out now:
The main swim will start in waves at 06:00. The sun will still be fairly low at that point, and as the course is effectively circular, there’ll be a section near the start where you’ll be swimming towards the sun. With that in mind, it’s worth having tinted goggles if it is a clear day and you’re in an earlier wave.
We work in line with the BTF rules on Wetsuits, whereby they’re optional between the temperatures of 13 and 24deg (Compulsory below 13, and not allowed above 24)
In our 21x Middle Distance races so far in this lake, we have always been in the ‘Wetsuit optional’ range of water temperature, and are fully expecting the same again this year – It’s been pretty close to the upper range later in the season, but in early June should be just fine.
The bike course is very flat, so if you are lucky enough to have aero bike options, these are definitely worth considering. Largely, the course is sheltered from the wind (ie, it’s not on open plains) and if any wind is coming from the normal South/Western Direction, you’ll have a slight tailwind on the outward section, and more of a head wind coming back in. It’s a not a particularly windy area of the country, so you’ll get standard weather roulette as you would with any Summer bike ride in the UK.
Most of the course has really decent road surfaces, but there are of course, a few potholes as this is the UK. We pester the council constantly on these, but their budgets prevent them from fixing them all, so we’ll head out in the days before the race and spray paint the worst ones in whatever brightly coloured paint we can get hold of and put signs up in the worst sections. Mainly, the course is OK though.

The run course is made up of a mixture of Tarmac (about 50%), Grass (5%) and hard packed lake paths (45%)
The hard packed lake paths are largely under shade of the trees, and handle wet weather very well. It’s a road shoe course all day long, unless we have 2 weeks of solid rain beforehand, and even then, it’s only really an off road shoe course for those of you out towards the very end that have had several hundred pairs of feet churning the ground up before you.
It’s worth bringing both options just in case, and you can always nip back into transition after your first lap if you think you’ve made the wrong kit decision.

4) FAQ’s
We always get a load of questions running up to the race, and although you’re more than welcome to give me a call or drop me an email, I thought Id answer a few of them here just in case you didn’t want to ask.
Can I cross the line with my family ?
Absolutely, of course. We do ask that you’re considerate to people behind you who are also finishing, but you are more than welcome to come down the red carpet with your family. Having had an incident a few years back, we do ask that you please ensure you are grabbing your own baby in the finish chute as we’ve had someone grab a baby from the wrong mother, who promptly got really quite angry and jumped over the fence to chase said competitor running across the line with a baby that wasn’t their own. She was then followed by another slightly confused mother (the chap in questions wife) with the correct baby. As much as it was funny for us, I’m not sure either mother saw the funny side, so we don’t want a repetition of that please 🙂
Can I get fully changed in transition ?
We don’t have changing tents for this, and we ask that if you want to get fully changed (as some people do) that you try and do it discreetly under a towel please. The BTF rules say no nakedness, and our interpretation of that is that if you’re trying to be discreet as possible and rushing, that’s fine. If you’re either doing full sawing motion tackle drying or naked lunges down the racking, that’s not, and when the referees have picked themselves off the floor, you’re likely to get a penalty.
Can I bring my own drinks or food for the run aid stations ?
Yes. If you don’t fancy what we have on offer at the aid stations (please see previous newsletter for info), please come along to transition on race morning with anything you want to have on the stations in a plastic bag clearly marked with your race number and the station you want it on, and give it to the registration team so we can get it out to that aid station to be waiting for you when you get there.

Right, that’s it from me for today
We’re here to help, so if there’s anything else you need from us, have any questions or there’s anything we can help with, please just ask as it’s what I’m here for

The next email you’ll get from me will be in the next couple of weeks with a link to the full race information, so in the meantime, get out there and enjoy the good weather to get the miles in, and we’ll look forward to seeing some of you at the Familiarisation day, and the rest on race weekend

Cheers

Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team 
graeme@113events.com
07595 591612