Final acknowledgements

Back on the road bike yesterday. Selected the singlespeed machine for the hour commute each way to Brighton and back. In the morning the focus was on relatively high cadence - quite easy to do on a singlespeed bike on a route without hills. The return journey was a strength session - not by design, simply a very windy evening and hard going along the coast.

This morning was my first run since the Ironman (swapped Tue/Wed sessions). I was pleased with my efforts - it was an interval session, including 6 sets up hill and off-road. The legs worked well enough - no ill effects or fatigue.

In bringing this blog to a close (well almost) I need some final acknowledgements and thanks to the characters involved.

I was encouraged to start this blog by one or two friends that were just starting to get involved in the sport and interested to find out about the crazy world of Ironman. I have been quite amazed how many people have actually being following my progress and have told me that my own story has inspired them to set some challenges for themselves. Since my first blog I have had over 5,000 views and only 4,500 of those are from my Mum. No seriously, I really do appreciate people's positive comments and it is so wonderful to think my rather basic content has had readers coming back for more. So a big thank you to all the followers of this blog.

As previously highlighted I know I wouldn't have got to this point without a great network of friends and family. Special thanks to all the guys and girls at Horsham Amphibians Triathlon (HAT), for inspiring me to improve my fitness and increase my triathlon event distances over the last few years. I suppose I should single out both Coach Mark Tickner (MT) for providing some structure to my training and my closest training buddy, good friend and neighbour, Chris Neilson.

Big thanks to also go to all the people who kindly sponsored me, raising significant funds for the Chestnut Tree House children's hospice - a very worthy cause.

And lastly but most importantly - my wife and children - I really do not recommend committing to such an event unless your loved ones are 100% behind you and at the very least understand why it is so important to you. My family have been wonderful and I simply couldn't have done it without their support.