Oliver wins at Bro Ddyfi for Pembrokeshire (From Western Telegraph)

Oliver wins at Bro Ddyfi for Pembrokeshire

Three members of Pembrokeshire Triathlon Club recently travelled to Machynlleth in mid-Wales to compete in the annual Bro Ddyfi triathlon.

Renowned as a hard course, conditions at this years event proved to be good for competitors with a good tide for the swim, little wind on the bike leg and not too hot for the run.

Bro Ddyfi is unusual in that it involves two transition areas. Starting at 9.10am with two waves at intervals of one minute, the 106 athletes tackled a 1500m swim in the Dyfi estuary at Aberdyfi.

Upon leaving the water, bikes were collected from transition one to embark on an extremely scenic 40km course taking in views of Cardigan Bay towards Tywyn, before heading inland through Snowdonia, past Tal-y-llyn in the shadow of Cadair Idris, and then through Corris before finishing at Machynlleth.

Bikes were left in transition two at the Leisure Centre to embark on the 10km out-and-back run, except that the times revealed the course must have been more like 11km.

Pembrokeshire Triathlon Club was immediately the focus of attention, with Oliver Simon swimming superbly to lead by nearly two and half minutes going out onto the bike course in 20mins 9secs.

Not too far behind was Roger Devonald in third place in 22:41, and Richard Thompson had a good swim to leave the water in 60th place in 29:53.

Onto the bike and Oliver was out on his own, although Roger closed the gap a little heading on to the run in second place. It was to be Olivers day though, keeping a clear lead over the chasing pack during the run, and coming home first in 2hrs 10mins 48secs, a good three minutes ahead of the rest.

Roger lost a few places on the run, but still came home an excellent sixth in 2:15:21. Richard improved his position considerably on the bike and run, improving to 23rd place in 2:30:21.

On the day Pembrokeshire was awarded third place in the team category, but a subsequent check revealed an error and Pembrokeshire had actually won the team event on the basis of the performances from the three lads.

This is the second team win of the year, following victory in the Pembrokeshire Triathlon at Fishguard in June.

All in all a good day for Pembrokeshire Triathlon Club, and for the individual athletes concerned.

Russell Turner, from hails from Tenby but now lives in London and races for the Thames Turbo club, came in an excellent 51st in 2:39:04.

Anyone interested in triathlon is welcome to come and join the club at one of its training sessions, which cater for people of all abilities. Structured sessions are as follows: multi-storey car park in Haverfordwest for running on Tuesdays (7.20pm start); Haverfordwest Pool for swimming on Tuesdays (9pm start); and the Meads in Milford Haven for swimming on Thursdays (6.30pm start). Club members also organise a number of informal sessions during the week.

For more information on triathlon and the activities of Pembrokeshire Triathlon Club, please contact Clair Davies (01437) 765453 or David Astins (01437) 710463.