Introduction

Introduction Originally my plan was to complete Elbaman (the 226km Iron-distance triathlon) before flying across Italy to Trieste and cycling to Kosice, Slovakia and completing the Kosice Peace Marahon. I had already signed up for Kosice and I had my mind set on some great cycling through Slovenia and Hungary en route. I have never been to Slovenia, Hungary or Slovakia before and was very much looking forward to making my way through them on two wheels. Then about a month before I went to book my flights and realised that the flights home from Kosice were either very expensive or at the wrong time. I had signed up for Elbaman in the first few months in 2015, and definitely wanted to complete this. So sadly The Kosice Marathon had to be dropped. I had booked the time off work, and was still very keen on the idea of some cycle touring before doing a marathon a week later. I had a look on the '100 Marathon Club' website at European Marathons on 4th October. The Turin Marathon came up - this was the perfect solution (I could get a return flight from London for a reasonable enough price at times that suited me). Also it was approximately 450km from Piombino (the port town where I would get the ferry to/from the island of Elba for Elbaman), which was a realistic distance to cover in the 6 days between completing Elbaman and running the Turin Marathon. I promptly booked my flights and Turin hostel for the first/last night and my place for the Turin Marathon. The immediate build up to the trip was far from ideal - the last couple of weeks beforehand were spent frantically searching for a house as the lease at my current house would be running out before I would be getting back from Italy. This failed and I ended up with the mammoth task of moving all of my stuff out of the house the night before going to Turin. It was a horrible experience and I was very fortunate and grateful to have my housemates Ben and Colm help shifting the endless boxes/bags of stuff into the van. Also to the guys at Reading Bicycle Kitchen who helped me offload it all at the other end. I knew my race in Elba wasn't going to be particularly quick - and I would have to rely on my previous Ironman experience and mental strength to see me through... With all the stress and upheaval of the last week I was just going to try and enjoy it.