What's your biggest challenge?

One of the things I like best about triathlon and endurance sport is that there is always some sort of challenge that needs to be faced and solved... or endured, at least. The physical challenges are, of course, the most obvious examples; however, often more difficult are the mental challenges that swimming, biking and running can throw up. Then, maybe toughest of all, are the logistical challenges.

You have an early meeting but need to fit in an hour on the bike…

You need to pack swim kit, work clothes, running gear and a change of clothes to meet some friends for a drink and need to get it all into one bag…

You have a brick session – an early long ride (likely to be cold) followed by a medium distance run (likely to be hot by then); how many changes of kit, water bottles, sports drinks, energy gels and bananas do you need to get you through and where will you keep them..?

To me, triathlon often seems like less of an endurance sport and more of a complex puzzle.

While living in Dubai, the toughest equation to solve often involved the year’s biggest races being in or around summer when temperatures in the UAE were tipping over from ‘Megan Fox’ to ‘Jessica Alba’ on the hotness scale (which is way more fun than a thermometer). Therefore, the solution to the training quandary often involved very early mornings, pre-frozen water bottles and cooler boxes left in the car.

Ahhhh... let's just take a minute here... OK, carry on reading.

Recently, I’ve been faced with a completely different problem:

The cold is an issue, of course – especially where cycling is concerned – but the bigger problem is that it has snowed two or three times in the past week or so, without once getting out of minus temperatures, so you can imagine how precarious the roads, bike paths and pavements are at the moment.

This doesn’t matter too much for cycling – it’s still very early in the season and a few half hours here and there on the home trainer will do the trick for now – however, having begun my training for the Rotterdam Marathon, it most definitely does affect my running.

And, so, I’ve had to hit the gym – an obvious solution, maybe, but I have always had a hate-hate-hate relationship with the treadmill. After 10 minutes, I’m bored senseless. But the training schedule says what it says and won’t wait for the roads to dry and temperatures to rise and so, yesterday, I headed for the gym ably supported by my MP3 player and an iPad with a couple of shows on it and, for the first time, I blasted out a steady half marathon (21.1kms) on the treadmill.

And this is where the logistical, the physical and the mental all collide – OK, it was just a mid-paced training run but I managed to knock out almost two hours on the treadmill – my sworn enemy! – and the motivation and positive energy I got from achieving that were enormous. Life threw me a curve ball, and I adapted and just got her done – winning the logistical, physical and mental battles all at once. And that, as much as anything, is what triathlon training is all about. While everyone else says "I think I'll skip my run/gym visit today", we just have to man (or woman) up and get 'er done. 

And, to my mind at least, this is a pretty good lesson to apply to life on the whole.

RAK it up to experience

Sometimes, you go into a race feeling nervous, undertrained, achey, unsure, and you cross the finish line in a cracking new PB after a performance that almost felt easy. Other times, the opposite happens; in short, this weekend was a bit of a disaster for me.

As you’ll know if you read my last post, I was happy and confident going into this weekend’s half marathon in Ras Al Khaimah, feeling fit and hoping to go sub-1.30 for the first time. The first clue that not everything would go perfectly came on Wednesday, when I woke with a bit of man flu and, later in the day, started having quite bad stomach aches.

Thursday, neither of these things had become any worse although I only got a couple of hours’ sleep on Wednesday night and that is usually a decent sign that illness is on its way for me. Friday morning, I woke at 4, got ready, picked up my friend Lou who was also racing, and drove to RAK (an hour or so north of Dubai). I didn’t feel good, but I didn’t feel bad. I thought I’d be OK.

Let’s skip now to the 16km mark. At the Creek Striders half marathon in December, that I was less well prepared for, the 16km mark is where it really started to hurt. Here in RAK, sticking to the required 4.15/km pace, it’s now been really, really hurting for, well... hmmm... er, divide by two, carry the one... approximately 15.9kms. It’s a horror show.

Reasons for the horror show:

a)      There’s a sandstorm blowing in. While this, helpfully, obscures the view of RAK city, it makes running unpleasant and breathing even more so. And running into the wind is tiring.

b)      Due to big swimmers’ thighs that have a natural propensity for chaffing, I’ve usually run in lycra shorts in the past but, recently, slimmerline Matt has been fine in normal running shorts. This is the wrong choice. At the 4km mark, there’s actual blood... I’ll not go into any more detail in case you’re eating.

c)       The tummy bug is paying a return visit and my stomach now feels like I’ve done 16 pints and 16 rounds with Ricky Hatton – not 16kms of a run.

d)      Whether it’s a combination of the above or something else entirely, I’m feeling flat.

So, I stop to do a little mini chunder at the roadside and then start to define victory as making it to a portaloo. By this point, I know the sub-1.30 is out of the question and feel so sore and despondent that I think about  pulling out entirely. But quitting sucks. Plus, I’m right at the furthest point from the start/finish, so there’s only one way back. I have to walk a little longer but then break into a jog.

I’m fine on around 5min/kms but then I do a little mental calculation and work out that a PB could still be on the cards anyway. So I jog my way back in to a 1.33 finish and, I think, a PB by a few seconds. I jog straight through the finish line. I jog past the medals and the drinks. I jog past the young lass removing timing chips from shoes. And I jog to the nearest portaloo. Then I jog to the car where a pair of tracksuit bottoms await. And then, knowing that Lou will be another 20-30 minutes behind, I put the car seat back, curl into a foetal position and nap. It’s pathetic. And I’m sure any ladies reading this will mock horrifically... but I’m in real pain!

But wait, didn’t I say the whole weekend was a bit of a disaster – not just Friday morning? Ah, how observant you are! So, I crawl into bed early on Friday night, sleep like the dead, and awake at 6.20 on Saturday morning. I stand up, sheepishly, testing my body for aches and pains. Sore legs – of course. Stomach feels like I’ve been on the receiving end of a gangland beating? Oh yes. But...

And so I head down to the beach for the morning sea swim session with the rest of the team (or the ones who aren’t over in Sri Lanka absolutely destroying the rest of the field in the inaugural IM 70.3 over there). Everyone’s in good spirits and, as ever, that lifts mine too.

Meanwhile, somewhere up above, Mother Nature scratches her matronly hair-do. “I’ve given him a cold, a stomach bug, stirred up a sand storm and gave him thighs that could chafe in a vat of Vaseline, but he’s still not getting the message. What do I need to do to make this idiot stop?” she ponders.

After just four laps of the buoys (we’re aiming for 12 in total – each lap being around 250-300m), Mother Nature has decided to drop all semblance of subtlety and makes her next move... a jelly fish stings me all over the face. It’s tough to scream like a little girl when your face is underwater, but I think the sound I make goes something like: “GNHHHHHHHHHHHEEEUUTHYYYYYYYAAAAAEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!”

Being a bonafide moron I do, of course, attempt another lap but by now my eyes are watering so much my goggles won’t stay on. I admit defeat and head to Starbucks to make an early start on the team breakfast. With the wind once again running riot outside, I decide against the steady bike ride I had pencilled in – it would have surely lead to riding into a ditch – and swap it for a steady two hour spin on the turbo trainer instead.

And so to Sunday morning. I awake with a head that is purplish in colour and perfectly spherical. Whether this is a reaction to the jelly fish that tried to snog me or the hideous bout of man flu that landed on my head during the night, I really can’t tell and am passed caring.

Message received. Time for a few days off, I think!

Tomorrow... racing, RAK and the big MP3 question

Ever heard the song Tomorrow by 90s Manchester Indie poppers James (aye, them of Sit Down fame)? It’s a proper tune (or ‘choooon’ as I believe all the cool cats are saying nowadays). If not, check it out; if so, wrap your sound conches around it again – you’ll not regret it, promise.

So, what’s the reason for this random musical interlude (is it an interlude if it comes right at the beginning? Maybe an Introlude...)? Well, I’ll tell you... I’m racing tomorrow, and I’m pretty excited about it.

It’s the RAK Half Marathon and, aside from being one of the UAE’s biggest events (popular, well attended, fantastically organised), it also means I’ll be lining up with (OK, quite a bit behind) some of the biggest stars of distance running, like Olympic favourites Mary Keitany and Geoffrey Mutai.

Mary and Geoffrey: world-class runners in spite of sounding like a middle aged couple who run the village pub.

It’s quite a ‘loopy’ course is RAK, which is great as it means you get to see plenty of the greats in full flow. And what a sight that is – although not because they look incredibly fast, but quite the opposite; like anyone who’s world-class in any field, they make it look so easy. Relaxed, fluid, controlled – they tick off their sub 3 minute kilometres.

Looking at the sweating, panting mess of cramps and agony that I – and everyone around me – have become, it’s insane to think we’re even doing the same sport as these elites. Then again, looking at their ‘5ft-nowt 30 kilos when wet right through’ frames, it’s insane to think we’re even the same species.

Me and Geoffrey Mutai. He's a lovely kid.

So, ambitions for tomorrow. Last year I did 1:36. A few months ago, based on not much long running at all, I did a 1:33 at the CreekStriders Half. RAK is, undoubtedly, a fast course, so my target is sub-1:30 for the first time. I’m certainly not taking that for granted but am also quietly confident – my triathlon programme has included a weekly 20-26km run for the past 7 weeks or so and I feel like I’m running pretty well. I’m trying to also back myself a bit this time – I think my lack of confidence in my running actually means I run within myself a little from time to time. This time, I’m going to leave it all out there, like a forgetful flasher. The pain cave has been located – I plan to set up camp within for most the race.

Insofar as strategy goes, it’s 4:15s all the way. I suspect that, by the last 2km, I’ll be holding on for dear life if I even make it that far holding the 4:15s, but if not then I’ll use whatever I have left. Us triathletes rarely need a excuse to bust out the technology or spend a few quid on some high-end geekery, but it’s for races like this that my Garmin 310xt really comes into its own, telling me my exact pace at the time and average pace overall. If you’re a runner (or triathlete) who doesn’t have a GPS watch, then I’d really recommend it as both a training and racing aid.  

So, looks like I have it all under control, right? Wrong. I have one big dilemma. While I love a bit of MP3 action for training (I think there’s a whole post on favourite training podcasts to come soon), I’m usually resolutely against using them for racing. For a start, you’re not allowed them in the vast majority of triathlons. But it’s also something about being in the moment, feeding off the atmosphere and hearing the breathing and steps of all the runners around you... I think of that mental challenge as every bit as important as the physical one. On the other hand, while RAK is a nice course for seeing the top dogs do their thing, RAK city makes Warsaw look like Florence. If it were a young lass at a school disco, it’d be the one who never got a snog at the end. If it were a dog, it’d be this guy...

“U. G. L. Y. It ain’t got no alibi, RAK’s ugly, hu-huh...” as Daphne and Celeste almost once wisely philosophised. (OK, how many of you actually sung that in your heads while reading it... come on, admit it!)

So, a little distraction goes a long way. But is it right, or even helpful, to drown out the sounds of the race? Hmm... I’m not so sure. If I do, it’ll have to be music rather than podcasts and, unlike every gym on earth that seems to be convinced everybody likes working out to dreadful Eurotrance, I love a bit of high tempo indie rock and roll when I’m running.

[Note to all aspiring writers out there, Master class # 1 coming up: always bookend with an allusion to what you mentioned at the beginning... now, pay attention.]

So, Bullet withButterfly Wings (Smashing Pumkins) is always on the MP3, as is my all time fave song ever in the history of the world ever full stop amen, The Rat (The Walkmen):

Love a bit of Born ToRun (Frankie or Bruce, doesn’t matter which...), The Bucket (KoL back when they were good... remember?), Moving to New York (The Wombats), and pretty much anything by The Vaccines or The Libertines. Oh, and you know what other tune I like (there you go...you got there before me, didn’t you)?

Ever heard the song Tomorrow by 90s Manchester Indie poppers James (aye, them of Sit Down fame)? It’s a proper tune...

[Tadaaaaaa!]

It's all getting a little racey...

Chuffin' Nora. You wait for a race for two months then a whole cheaply-printed, bound-to-fall-apart goodie bag full of them comes along at once. No matter. Unlike Mel Gibson, Republicans and you're average Daily Mail reader, I'm a fan of all races; a chock-a-block schedule positively bursting at the seams with competition and dripping in race juice can only be a good thing.

Especially as I've not raced since the Creek Striders Half at the beginning of December. On one hand, I'm interested to see if January's BIG mileage month will reflect on speed and fitness. At the same time, I feel like all those base kilometres are probably in need of some higher intensity efforts on top of them, and where better to push hard than in a race?

So, what's on the schedule? Why, thank you for asking, allow me to explain:

First up is the Skins Al Mamzar triathlon on 3 Feb. This is an event I wouldn't usually do because it's been of a questionable quality in the past, but I haven't raced an Olympic distance tri for a year and just fancy it. Previously, as I said, the organisational element wasn't A1 but there was another race in this series a couple of months ago and everyone who raced reported that it had improved considerably. The only problem being swim times that suggested a swim course that was at least 3-400m short. I reckon I could look at a body of water and guess a 1,500m swim more accurately that that so, in these days of Garmins and Google Earth, this sort of error margin is really pretty unacceptable (listening Ironman UK?). It looks like that hss been sorted for this race but, worst case scenario, it's a good hit-out and my bike and run times will be directly comparable with last year's race.

The good thing about a course that's well short and a bit of a draft-fest? Guaranteed PB! Even if it is one I'll never come close to again.

Anyway, one week later is the Wadi Bih run. This is one of those super-cool little events that a few pissed-up mentalists started a couple of decades ago and has taken off. Like techno and Flight of the Conchords, or Wales.

Basically, teams of five tackle the 72k course that runs through the famous Wadi Bih (a wadi is a dried-up river bed here in Middle Earth). You take it in turns to jump out of your support vehicle and take your leg of the relay – some sections are 5k long, others are 2k straight uphill. It's basically all good fun and, although there are a few teams who take it seriously and try to win, they are - and I'm going to be very careful not to generalise here - usually a bunch of charmless knobs. It's one of the few events I've not raced here so I was happy as a tornado in a trailer park to be asked to form part of one of Nike's media teams. I'm sure there'll be more about this event in future blogs.

So, we jump to 17 March and the RAK Half Marathon. Not much to report about this quite yet but I'll be looking to break 1:30 for the first time there. The last race of February will be the Aerofit Sprint Tri – one of our regular series of sprint triathlons. Again, it'll be interesting to see if all this hard training is turning my muscles into hardcore turbo triathlon speed machines or just squelchy pain sponges. One good thing about having a regular series, like the Aerofit, is that I know exactly how I do there – what position I'll finish and who'll overtake me where. It's a little depressing when I write it out like that, but that helps me to gauge if/where improvements have been made relative to other racers.

Finally, it's the first of my three big races for the year ahead – Abu Dhabi International Triathlon. Last year's race was top-notch, even if it was hotter and windier than storm season in Hell (Hell as in that place really far down South – where the boy Satan lives – not the towns in Michigan, Norway, The Cayman Islands, tho they could be quite hot and windy too for all I know. Actually, I'm pretty sure the one in Norway won't be that hot.).

Again, this is very much a race against myself. I'm doing what ADIT calls the 'short' race: 1,500m swim (an actual 1,500m too!), a whopping 100km bike and a 10km run. Last year's race was the first time (or maybe second?) I'd ever ridden 100km, I got hydration and nutrition all wrong and the conditions multiplied that. So, unsurprisingly, I bonked big time on the run. I'd like to put that right this year and knock a whopping big chunk of time off too – that'd show me that I'm on course for IM Austria (check out the fancy new website for that event, by the way!).

And there you have it... I'll leave it at that for now as my intention is to post far more often now. I'll try to get something up here to irritate/educate/frustrate every couple of days at least, so I don't want to shoot my load straight off the bat, to awkwardly mix some rather odd analogies.

Take care kids, and happy racing, training or whatever it is you do to avoid having to watch X Factor with t'other half. 

Big fat blow-out and a spot of catch up

Another month has passed and another disappointing lack of blogging from a young Mr Warnock. But new year, new leaf. And I feel the creative juices, not to mention motivation, welling up inside me once again. But before I go about entertaining you like a monkey in a waistcoat playing the cymbals, making you laugh more than a fat woman falling of a swing, and educating you more enjoyably than a school with Stephen Fry as the headmaster (how cool would that be?), I figure we’ve some catching up to do, you and me.

Firstly the Creek Striders Half Marathon that I spoke about last time. In short, what an event. The course looped up and around the creekside roads of Dubai, up and over some of Dubai’s iconic bridges, and sections of the course actually went through the souks in Bur Dubai – best road race I’ve ever done (admittedly, that’s not many). It was also a great atmosphere with a huge fry-up breakfast afterwards. In terms of performance, I did 1:33 – a 3 minute PB ona  far harder course than the PB was set on. Given that I’d not done much long running at all, I was pretty happy with that. In February, I’ll be racing the RAK HalfMarathon – the flat and fast race in which I set my previous PB and, as my current programme does feature a weekly long run (26kms), I’m gunning to go sub 1:30 for the first time there.

Xmas and New Year were both perfectly pleasant but, to be honest, having returned to the UK for my nan’s funeral just a week before, I wasn’t feeling too festive. I missed my family a lot and couldn’t stop thinking how tough it must have been for my mum and dad. This translated into a lack of motivation on the training front too – I missed more sessions at the end of December than I think I’ve missed all year, but I wasn’t too fussed. Did manage an Xmas morning sea swim with some of the T2A gang, which was a highlight.

Just after Christmas, my friend Janey (actually an ex but we’ve stayed quite close) came to visit on her way back from Thailand, and we had a really nice time – with a few other friends joining for a couple of days too. I took a few days off work, took all four days off training, ate too much, drank every night and it was lovely. I was sad to see them go as it’d been such a welcome break and diversion, but I dropped them at the airport at 5am on Friday morning and went straight to join in with the Dubai Roadsters 120k-er – and absolutely loved every kilometre of it. The motivation came flooding back – it’s a ride I’ve not done for quite a while and I was amazed at how much easier I found the pace, how I could join in all the sprints, and how easily I could motor up the few little climbs that used to leave me trailing far behind. Progress is the greatest form of motivation, when you can see it that clearly. The highlight of that ride was joining the ‘fast group’ for the last 45kms and averaging in excess of 40kph (assisted by a large peloton and tailwind, but still...) and being led out by former Ironman World Champion Faris Al Sultan who is sponsored by Abu Dhabi and does quite a bit of his winter training here in the UAE. Mercifully, he actually wore full shorts and a long-sleeved bike jersey...

He'd have been cold wearing this...

Since then, I’ve not really looked back. Coach sent me my Jan schedule through and it’s by far the biggest I’ve ever done – way more kms than I was doing in peak Ironman training even (tho more favourable conditions than Dubai in August help with that) and it’s just what I needed. It’s basically a base training month with very little intensity, but I’m loving getting all these kilometres in my legs, especially on the bike which I have a bit of a like-hatehatehate relationship with at times. 

I think the other reason for the motivation racing back faster than a drunk to last orders is that a few big races are now in sight – before, they were very much on the horizon but I’m almost able to start counting the weeks down now. That helps a lot.

Other than all the training, life is generally consisting of a monumental SHITLOAD (sorry ma, but it really is a shitload!) of work as we race to get products out for the end of the financial year. In the office for 56 hours last week; in the pool, on the bike and on the road for another 20...doesn’t leave much time for much else, tho I don’t mind that so much right now.

So, there we go, you’re all up-to-date, au courant, al dia, with what’s going on here. Hasta pronto, amigos.

Long time no post

And after I promised too..! Last time I left my meandering, ill-considered keyboard taps on this here blog, I apologised for not having posted more regularly of late and gave my word that, from that point on, readers would be able to tuck into my thought pies more often. And I failed. At the first attempt. But, with a New Year a-comin, it seems like maybe I can get a bit of a headstart and turn over a new digital leaf. From now on, dear blog readers, from now on...

There’s really only two explanations for my woeful and wilful dereliction of blogging duties, isn’t there: that I’ve been busier than an Essex girl on a Saturday night and haven’t had the chance to whack out a blog; or that life’s been so remarkably uneventful that writing about it would have been as pointless as a Tiger Woods marriage vow. So which has it been? Well, both actually.

On one hand, work has been off the charts mental, and I’m currently managing five guide books as well as an editorial team and overseeing all of their projects. Meanwhile, there’s been the small matter of moving house and all the sheer, unadulterated pain in the arse-ness that involves. Oh, plus 12-14 hours a week of training. But that’s the other hand...training has been going well but it’s really just been a case of keeping on keeping on. I’m still loving being part of the Tri2Aspire team and am still convinced of its benefits, in terms of motivation, enjoyment and improvement.

After a month of ‘longer miles’ in November, my attention has turned to quite a lot of shorter, higher intensity efforts for December which I’m hoping will build speed and strength ready for next year. Next May, I’m going to be racing the British Sprint Championship in Emberton in an attempt to make the UK age group team for the World Championships in New Zealand. Then it’s Ironman Austria in July. They may both be some distance away but I’m already feeling pretty focused and determined and am trying to keep these in mind during each training session. I definitely feel like I’m making progress at the moment, which is great. 

You’d naturally assume that training for a sprint and an Ironman – the two ends of the triathlon spectrum – would be completely different but I’m not finding that to be the case. Of course, I know that I’ll need to focus on building the endurance more and more as IM approaches but, for the moment, I just feel like I’m getting stronger and stronger in all three events which can only help, no matter what the distance. For short course racing, that power is explosive and used for hard, fast racing; over the longer distances, it’s used for endurance and keeping steady throughout – something I definitely struggled with on the bike in Wales.

However, I think these jam-packed busy/eerily quiet days are coming to an end, which is good news as far as the creative juices go as it means lots more material for writing about. For starters, I’ve the Dubai Creek Striders Half Marathon this weekend. The following week is the final Aerofit sprint tri of 2011. Then it’s my birthday (which I’m hoping to celebrate with a team session of 100 x 100m off 1:40 in the swimming pool...a 10k swim in around 3 hours!), Christmas and a whole New Year to look forward to. I’m also hoping to upgrade my bike in the next few months. So, busy-busy, but in the good way.

That’ll do for now then. Laters. 

Dubai Discovers Endurance Sports

In some ways, I guess it’s a victim of its own success, but it seems that Dubai appears in the media so often that it’s easy to forget that it’s just not that big. The entire emirate of Dubai has a population of about two million (75% of which lives in the city of Dubai). So, that makes it about 20% of the size of London, less than half the size of Madrid, smaller than Hamburg, Budapest or Warsaw...in fact, about the same size as Milan, the West Midlands, or Greater Liverpool areas.

It’s pretty new too, as far as cities go. Things that are older than Dubai (and by this I mean Dubai the city, not Dubai the fishing settlement): the internet, the song Ice Ice Baby by Vanilla Ice, the band Blur, Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe...

So, since the early 90s, the city has expanded and expanded, swept along on a tide of oil and real estate money; until, suddenly, it stopped in October 2008. Now, when I speak to folks back in the UK, they’re almost surprised I’m still here – I think the image portrayed by the European media is of a giant futuristic landscape slowly crumbling back into the Arabian Gulf, crippled by poverty.

But that’s not it. What’s actually happening is what I like to call a spot of colouring in. During those boom years, all those huge developments and housing estates and economic cities and holiday resorts were thrown up...and they give the city an outline, a template, but not a soul. A soul takes time, but so strong is the human spirit and its love for art, culture, music, sport, society, fun and learning that it seeps into every little space it finds, if you give it time. And the time seems right in Dubai.

Multisports, triathlon in particular, and endurance racing on the whole have boomed in recent years and it seems like that boom has finally boomed its boom here in the booming (but not in the way in once boomed) UAE. Like I said, it’s finding its soul and its identity which, in a city, reflects the souls and identities of its inhabitant.

In spite of having grown up in the outdoor activity hotspot of North Wales and having lived in cycling mad Spain for almost 10 years, I actually didn’t take up triathlon – or endurance racing – until I got to Dubai. I’m not used to countries where, each weekend, there are ten local groups heading out on rides, 15 different triathlons across all different distances and, for good measure, a new sportive of half marathon is announced every week. Like I said, Dubai is actually quite a small city, and there have only been relatively few events until recently.

Then, suddenly, BOOM! Where once there was just the Golden Tulip sprint triathlons with the occasional one-off other race, now we have three or four small series of races, with a couple of big international ones thrown in for good measure. Between now and the end of the year, for example, I’ll be racing two sprint series (GT and Wadi Adventure) an Olympic distance tri, an Olympic distance aquathlon, a time trial, a half marathon and a 92km road cycling race. In the New Year, add the Yas tris to that mix, the Dubai Marathon, RAK Half, Wadi Bih adventure tri... and that’s not to mention the events I can’t do because they’re on the same days as the others!

And that, I guess, is one of the downsides; with much more variety comes choice. In the past couple of years, I entered everything going because there weren’t so many races anyway; and you’d see the same faces, which led to a nice sense of community. I guess as even more races are added, that’ll be diluted. But that’s still a good thing. Different races, different course, different faces, different place to come fourth...boom boom!