Pro triathletes are beating single-discipline athletes, so can I do the same?

It can’t have escaped your notice that some of Britain’s top triathletes have been making a name for themselves in single-discipline sports recently.

First there was 14x Ironman winner Lucy Gossage who won the women’s event at the 2025 Spine race in January, finishing the 268 miles of the Pennine Way (the bloody PENNINE WAY!) in 87 hours 41 minutes, despite running being only one third of the sports she normally does. 

We also saw former double Olympic Champion Alistair Brownlee taking on the Three Peaks race, a 24.2 mile trail run in the Yorkshire Dales with 1600m of climbing, and finishing in third place despite running being only one third of the sports he normally does. 

Next came reigning Olympic Champion Alex Yee who grabbed the headlines at the London Marathon when he ran 2.11.08 and finished “I’d already faced defeat in the 1500m swim by not being quick enough to enter” 14th in the elite men’s race despite it being his debut at that distance, and running being only one third of the sports he normally does. 

And outstripping them all, we saw former Olympic spectator Martyn Brunt taking on the 800m freestyle at the West Midlands regional swimming championships, AND the Coventry half marathon, and finishing in second place and third old git place respectively, despite them being only two thirds of the sports he normally does. Ahem. 

Okay, so Lucy, Alex and Johnny’s times may have been slightly more impressive than mine, and the races perhaps more challenging and hotly contested, but I like to think that I have played my part in the general ‘triathletes beat loads of single discipline athletes’ game that seems to be going on. 

Home-town pressure

In my defence there was also some extra pressure on me to perform that my fellow elite triathletes (ahem) didn’t feel because both of the races were in my home town. 

Indeed the Coventry half marathon goes right past my front door, giving ample opportunities for my wife and my neighbours to comment loudly and freely on my running style, speed, race position and general appearance as I passed, an opportunity they seized. 

Amid the general heckling my wife wins the award for the loudest and most creative barracking with such gems as: “Come on they’ll be opening the roads in a minute”, and “you used to be quicker than this”, while the one that hit home the most was from my neighbour Colin who laughed “stick to swimming”, advice which carried a sting as he ran the marathon for Great Britain at the Munich Olympics. 

Playing to the crowd

On the whole the crowd was supportive though as I slap-footed my way to a 1.32 finish, although this possibly had more to do with my choice of top than my running, having decided to curry favour with them by wearing a very old Coventry City shirt (the early ’80s Talbot T design for any fellow shirt-nerds out there). 

The regional swimming championships were also in the fair city of my birth and indeed were in the very pool I normally train in, giving me a home advantage if such a thing existed in swimming. 

I’d already faced defeat in the 1500m by not being quick enough to enter the bloody thing and missing out on getting on the start list, but I shook off the disappointment of this schoolboy error to get my name down for the 800m. 

Swimming to silver

Again the presence of many of my regular swimming club team mates gave ample opportunities for ‘dynamic feedback’ on my stroke style and pace judgement, but having watched the gold medal disappear into the murky blue soon after diving in, I knew I was in a tussle for second, and managed to put in a late spurt to bag silver and snatch defeat from the jaws of a bigger defeat. 

Anyway, the important thing is to always remember that you are a triathlete first and foremost, and whatever single-discipline sport you are doing it’s not the winning that counts — it’s reminding the competition that it is but one third of what you normally do…