29

Return to the Scene of the Crime

AT 6am on Sunday 19 July 2015, I looked out over the rippling expanse of Pennington Flash for the third time. Three years since my release from prison and each one punctuated with an Ironman UK event. Within myself I resolved to make this one count.

This was the course, after all, that had kicked my arse the previous year, the race that had beaten me to my knees and kept me there. This time I had confidence in my preparation. We had been meticulous. Like chess, or criminal activity, we had planned several moves ahead.

Darren stood next to me, looking edgy. With our shared time in prison long behind, we were side by side as friends, nothing less. Inspired by watching my efforts for the last two years, he had decided to race as well, to discover his own one-day limits.

‘You’re the only one here who looks happy,’ he said, concern etched deeply on his face.

‘Good luck mate!’ I laughed.

‘Have you got any last-minute tips for the swim?’ he asked.

‘It’s too late for that now, Darren. Just rely on your training. Whatever you’ve done in your sessions, use it all now.’

Seven months of working with Keith had educated and stretched me. If I performed to my potential I knew I would be up there, challenging the leaders. The numbers said so.

Main competition in my age group would come from Brian Fogarty, who held the British 100–mile cycling time–trial record, and Michael Jolley, who finished third in 2014, along with the usual smattering of Germans, Americans and Kiwis who are always strong.

As they had been in Wimbleball, conditions were appalling. There are never guarantees with the weather in northern England, even in July, and as we all stood there in our wetsuits like mutant amphibians, thunderous rain turned the surface of the lake into a maelstrom. It occurred to me how nice it would be to do an event somewhere with decent weather for once.

For the 2015 event Ironman UK introduced a staggered swim start, as had many Ironman events, to try to avoid the mass frenzy of flailing limbs that usually characterised the beginning of the race. Stewards held up placards stating that competitors likely to complete the swim in under an hour should head for the line.

The staggered start had logic behind it, but would mean that as the day panned out, it would be very difficult to know where you were placed in your category. With all your competitors starting at different times, it became more of a case of internal racing, producing your best and hoping it was good enough to go faster than others.

I weighed up my options. The truth was that I was not that fast in the water, but I thought there was a chance if I went in with a group of better swimmers they would carry me along. Maybe I could get a tow, hang on their feet and produce my best ever time? I said goodbye to Darren and joined the small bunch of professionals and swim specialists heading to the lake.

In a typical Ironman race the swim only accounts for ten per cent of the overall time, but tactically it’s very important. For those whose strengths lie in cycling or running, like me, a better-than-expected swim can set the foundation for a spectacular race.

As we padded down to the water’s edge, the PA blared into life, piercing the dawn with the screeching guitar riff of ‘Thunderstruck’ by AC/DC, an appropriate track given the weather. ‘Thunder!’ screamed the shrill vocal. ‘Thunder!’ The song finished as we waited for the start, giving way to the first bars of ‘God Save the Queen’. I got shivers.

‘You are gonna smash this,’ I said to myself.

The voice of Paul Kaye came on, the South African MC known as the ‘voice of Ironman’. He introduced the race then counted down.

‘Three…two…one!’

The gun sounded and we were away. The swimmers around me fanned out quickly and I soon realised I had misjudged. I was not fast enough to keep up and was left in no-man’s land. Battling through the choppy water alone, by the mid-point of the second lap I was caught by the group behind.

Rather than attaching myself to guys who were quicker and swimming in their slipstream, those who were a bit slower were attaching themselves to me. I found myself dragging a whole line of swimmers along with me as if they were tied to my toes by a string. Tactically, it was not a huge error and I accepted it for what it was – yet another stage of my Ironman education.

Most swim times were slower than normal that day because of the conditions and the blunder meant I completed the swim in a disappointing one hour ten minutes but I headed to T1 with undiminished vigour. In contrast to 2014, every inch of my body felt primed and taut. I just needed to remember the basics, to eat and drink, use all my training know-how and it was there for me.

For the first two hours on the bike the rain continued hammering down. A turbulent wind squalled around too, which made for pretty miserable riding conditions. Once we were out on the moorlands, the rain stopped, but the wind got worse, often buffeting from the sides, affecting balance and at other times coalescing into a pitiless headwind. The only consolation was that conditions were the same for everyone. It would not be a fast race.

I held on to the power numbers that Keith prescribed for me to stick to, but that meant with the wind and all the twisting corners of the Bolton course, my average speed fell back. I felt so good physically, my heart rate was low and instinct said I had it in me to push harder, but at the back of my mind was my embarrassment from the previous year. What if I exceeded my power numbers, pushed on with the bike then blew up on the run, ending broken and defeated like last time? I would never have been able to live with myself.

By the halfway point of the cycle, I had overtaken many of the professional women which had to mean I was up there. Ironman is a sport in which the distances between the best male and female athletes are not that great, but I knew that the top men were still a distance ahead. Ignoring the desire to give it everything, I held stoically firm to Keith’s pre-race instructions, pedalling mechanically and with restraint.

On the last 2km of the bike course, as I neared Bolton Wanderers’ football stadium, I could see the first runners coming past on the other side of the road, more of them than I expected. A little hint of panic spiked in my guts and I figured I would need a strong footrace to achieve my goal of the top ten.

I sprinted into T2 from the dismount line, wheeling my bike. The realisation hit home that there were around 50 bikes already racked. That meant 50 athletes with a considerable head start for the marathon. I changed into my running shoes frantically, feeling flustered and threw my bike anywhere, not caring about my race number or racking it in the correct place. I downed an energy gel and headed off. Physically I still felt great. My legs were strong, my heart was steady and my energy seemed boundless.

I reset my Garmin to run mode and went at it, finding that from the beginning I picked people off with ease. It was as if I was running a 5km and they were doing a 100km. Within the first 8km I must have passed at least 15 runners. I was flying.

‘You might beat me on the swim and you might beat me on the bike,’ I thought, ‘but none of you are beating me on the run.’

I checked my heart rate, which was comfortable, and settled into a rhythm. On road, my domain, I ate up the ground.

I ran away from the stadium, down Chorley Avenue and found myself at the base of the hill that led up into Bolton town centre. I knew that once I reached the top, it would be three loops of the course up there to the end.

As I neared the hill I caught up with a group of four men running together and ran past them, making it look casual, as if I wasn’t even trying. There are a lot of mental tricks in endurance sport and I had spoken about it with Keith. If possible you want to gain a psychological advantage. One of them tried to come with me. I liked that. Mano a mano, pistols at dawn, me against him.

As we started on the hill, a pretty fierce one, 500m long with a six per cent gradient, I could feel him behind me. He was close enough for his breath to tickle my shoulder.

I attacked it, showing the slope no mercy, knees pumping, elbows tight. I overtook two others on the way up, looked over my shoulder and saw my erstwhile co-runner way behind, labouring. That lifted me further and I crested the top feeling fantastic, knowing I had to be in or around the top 30 already.

Obviously I knew that the higher up the field I got, the harder it would be to overtake and the guys in the first few places may already have been too far ahead to catch, but the run was going as well as I could have hoped.

I ran through the top end of Bolton town centre, over the timing mat and through a drink station where a girl tried to give me a cup of Red Bull, which I waved away. As I continued around the first part of the loop I saw Fraser Cartmell, a professional from Scotland who had won Ironman UK in 2010. Fraser was running with a race official on a motorbike beside him, meaning he was in the top three. At that point he was about a kilometre behind me on the loop, meaning it was likely he would be lapping me shortly.

I stuck to my plan, completed the first loop, ran down the hill to take me back to the beginning and looked over my shoulder. Cartmell was nowhere to be seen. I had put distance into him, rather than him eating up the gap between us. That was when I realised just how fast I was running.

Keith stood on the corner, smiling.

‘How are you feeling?’ he called, as I ran past.

‘Great!’ I replied.

‘Keep to the plan, keep eating, keep drinking, keep fuelling,’ he shouted. ‘Fogarty was 20 minutes ahead of you after the bike, but you’re catching him.’

Terry stood a bit further along, at the ‘special needs’ aid station (I prefer to bring my own gels and provisions rather than use the ones provided) with my energy drinks. He told me I was in 12th place in my division, which fired me up. I knew I was running strongly and felt sure I could make up further ground.

I grabbed some caffeine gel from him and went hard into the start of the second loop, still feeling real zip and power in my legs. About a kilometre in I noticed Bella Bayliss, a renowned coach, by the side of the road. She pointed at me as I passed, turned to the guy next to her and audibly said, ‘Get his number.’ I knew that meant she wanted to check which of her athletes I was competing against and her concern encouraged me further. If nothing else, I was making an impression.

After running past Bella, someone on the sidelines screamed that I was in fourth, but as far as I was aware I had not passed anyone from my age group since I had seen Terry. This is a common feature of Ironman races, in which confused spectators shout out misinformation. It’s not malicious, and is meant as encouragement, but you have to learn to ignore it. With staggered starts, deciphering what is going on in a race from the roadside can be difficult. Different age groups have different coloured race numbers and you are given armbands to show which lap you are on. Mistakes are easily made. There was no way of knowing if either of them were right, so I stayed in the moment and continued running my race.

At the halfway point of the marathon I clocked one hour 26 and felt comfortable, with plenty of gas left in the tank. I completed the second loop and saw Keith at the bottom of the hill again.

‘What’s your heart rate?’ he yelled.

I had a look, ‘157!’

‘Fucking go then!’ he grinned. ‘You’re in 12th. Just drop the hammer, give it everything!’

His words were like a jolt of energy, my adrenaline spiked and – bang – I went. With the shackles of sticking to split times taken away I hit 18 minutes 50 seconds for the next 5km, a really fast pace to set after more than nine hours of competition. Again I passed a clutch of other runners. I kept that up until halfway through the final loop when my legs finally began to tire, not that there was any trace of panic or breaking down like the previous time, but simply that I reached the end of my capability to go at that speed.

I settled back into four-and-a-half-minute kilometre pace and finished the run strongly. As I entered the finishing chute, the Irish accent of Ironman commentator Joanne Murphy came over the tannoy.

‘And a great story, ladies and gentlemen, finishing in tenth place in only his third Ironman event, a remarkable achievement, John McAvoy. Just three years ago he was still in jail! What an incredible young man!’

The roaring crowd urged me over the line, where a sensation of absolute joy washed over me. I clenched my fists, raised my head and screamed at the sky like a lunatic. A time of ten hours six minutes in atrocious weather, with a tenth-place finish, was a solid showing that gave me a spot among the country’s elite. I had run the second fastest marathon in the male 30–34 age group on the day. More importantly, I had put to bed my disaster of 2014.

As is obligatory on these occasions, I sank to the ground and lay on my back. A TV camera appeared, hovering above me briefly, and a realisation dawned as I lay there – I was not spent. If necessary I could have got up and run some more.

I enjoyed the celebrations and congratulations that followed the race. Terry and Keith were overjoyed, the feeling of having let people down was banished, but inside I knew I could still do far better, especially on the bike. What if I had pushed harder at that stage, given myself a smaller gap to close? Where could I have finished then? I reckoned I lost 15 minutes while cycling that I had not needed to lose. Fifteen gained minutes would have put me in second.

These sorts of modifications are hard to understand when you are new to the sport, but racing over such long distances – and Ironman events involve 226.3km of continuous competition – every small decision, mistake, tweak or adaptation accumulates. Each can become marginal gains or marginal deficits and when stacked up over the whole day, make massive differences to your outcome.

I waited around for a few hours, cheered Darren on as he completed his run, then went back to the hotel to rest. Already that night, while I sat in a restaurant with friends, toasting my future as an athlete, my mind turned over with plans for the next one.