The following pre race newsletter went out to all Cotswold Classic 2022 Competitors tonight ;
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