The following email went out to all Cotswold Classic 2019 Competitors today:
Less than 2 months to go
Good morning all, I hope everyone’s well ?
We’re less than two months to go until this year’s Cotswold Classic Middle Distance Tri on August 4th, so I wanted to get some info out to all of you in advance of the race
I’m very conscious that if I send you all too much info in one go, very few of you will actually read it all, so I’ll be drip feeding it out in the run up to the race over a few emails.
I can waffle on a bit in my emails, so I’ll keep this one relatively short as it’s Monday morning and you’re all probably half asleep.
In this email, I’ll cover the following:
Race information pack and weekend planning
Familiarisation day on July 7th
Being on our team
Race info pack and weekend planning.
For those of you that have signed up recently, and missed our previous emails, you can download the race info pack here : https://www.113events.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/CC2019-–-Race-Information-Sheet.docx
Please please please, take the time to read this as this contains everything you need to know about race weekend. It’s your info pack, so if you think we’ve missed anything out, please just ask and we’ll add it in.
We hold our registration on the afternoon of Saturday the 3rd of august between 12:00 and 17:00.
You can get someone to register for you if you can’t get there yourself, or if you’re passing Swindon in the days before the race, we’re aiming to have the packs ready by around Wednesday night of race week, so you’re welcome to come by and collect. Our kettle is always on, and if you’re lucky, there might even be some biscuits too (If I haven’t eaten them all myself)
All our racking is done on Sunday morning between 04:00 and 06:00, so you won’t need to bring your bike and kit with you on the Saturday.
The race will start in 6 waves going off at 10 minute intervals from 06:00.
In the next few weeks, you’ll get an email from me, which, if you want, will give you the chance to choose a specific wave and/or race number. Please don’t ask for a wave or number until this email comes out, as in the interest of fairness to all, I will only arrange those after that email lands in your inbox (This will be in the next couple of weeks) and they’ll be on a first come first served basis.
Familiarisation day on July 7th
On July the 7th, we’ll be holding our Course Familiarisation day, which is a great chance for you to come get a guided lap of the Swim, Bike and Run courses you’ll be racing on on the 4th August.
The emphasis of the day is very much ‘leisurely paced’ and should be suitable for everyone, so if you’re a more experienced athlete and you were hoping to use this as a training day, be prepared for a much slower than usual pace.
Typically, we’ll swim in a large group with plenty of stops to regroup or ask questions, and we’ll average around 2min/100m. The swim is a single lap on race day, so we’ll swim 1,900m on the Familiarisation day, but there is a spot around the half way mark that comes close to the entrance, so you’d be welcome to just swim half and then drop out if you wanted. Our course won’t be marked out on the day, but the lake will have their usual 400m/750m/1500m swim loops out, so you’d be welcome to just come along and swim some of their loops instead if you liked.
The bike course is 2 laps on the day, so we’ll be cycling around 28miles for a single lap at an average pace of around 15mph with a few stops to regroup and to point out aid stations etc.
For those of you that followed our June 9th Cotswold113 race, we used a temporary bike course for that race due to a badger set induced road closure, but are expecting to revert back to our normal course for the August Classic. It’s entirely possible that the Kempsford road might not be fixed by July 7th, so we’ll have a short detour around it if that’s the case, and cover around 95% of the course.
The run is 3 laps on race day, so we’ll cover a single 4.33 mile loop on the Familiarisation day, which we’ll do at an average of around 10min/mile with a few stops along the way.
We’ll have a good chunk of our team there, so it’s a great chance for you all to meet other competitors, and to ask us any questions you might have. It’s also a great chance for us to meet some of you in a more relaxed environment as you’ll all have your game faces on over race weekend, so we barely get a grunt from most of you 🙂
You can dip in and out of any of the three disciplines, and the bike and run course are completely free of charge, but if you want to Swim, the lake guys will ask you for £5 day membership on the gate payable in cash.
The day will start off with the Swim at 08:00, the bike will start at 10:00, and the run normally around 12:30, and as I mentioned above, you’re welcome to do all or any of them as you please.
If you want to attend, please can you book on at www.entrycentral.com/113events and book the event marked ‘Fam Day Classic’
It all sounds very formal having to book on, but we use this as a way of gauging numbers, and also to be able to communicate final info to you in the run up to July 7th. If you have friends and family that are coming to see you on race day, and want to see the courses themselves, they’re welcome to book on to attend too
Being on our team
As anyone that’s ever organised events will know, one of the hardest bits of race organisation is getting marshals.
We have around 190 paid positions on race day, and we’re always after filling roles from the competitors friends and family if you have anyone coming with you that could get involved please.
All our marshals get paid too, and they can choose from £20 cash or a £40 113 events voucher to use at our future races, and they all get an event shirt and we’ll keep them in hot food and drink on the day too.
They don’t need any experience at all, and we’ll take them through a full briefing and supply them with anything they need, and pair them up where possible so they won’t be stuck somewhere on their own.
Due to insurances, we can only have over 16’s marshalling on our course, but if they have kids with them, we can of course get the kids a team shirt, and they’re welcome to enjoy the free burgers and ice creams that marshals get during the day (We’d put the adult marshal on the run course too, so the kids with them are not on a road)
There are two main shifts, which start with a sign on, kitting up and briefing:
05:45-11:45ish Bike Course
07:45-14:30ish Run Course
There’s free parking and camping for Marshals too
If you have club mates, family, friends or enemies that you could pressgang to get involved, please ask them to drop me an email at graeme@113events.com
Right, that’s it from me
I’ll get a few more emails out over the next few weeks, but if you get any questions or need anything from us, please just ask as we’re here to help
Hope to see many of you on July 7th
Cheers
Graeme, Nicci and the 113 Events team
tel 07595 591612
email graeme@113events.com