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I’m fat. No, I really mean it – I’m 18st 7lbs (117.5 Kg) and at 5ft 8 that puts me firmly in the obese category. I’m a couch potato and have essentially been so since around 2015.

14 years ago, in 2012, I got the itch to do a Triathlon; at the time I was in a similar situation to now, though perhaps a little lighter (17 – 18st). I was living in sunny Aberystwyth in North Wales, and I was two years into doing a PhD in Robotics. I started small – there was a local triathlon club called INTRtri who ran a Sprint distance triathlon right at the end of the season. I signed up.

I had about 3 months to train and I went for it. I had no plan, no coach, no discipline, no idea what I was going, it was basically go hell for leather in all three disciplines and hope for the best. Wales is hilly! My “run” would take me immediately (literally outside of my door – no warm up, no progression) up a big steep hill (20%), through a housing estate at the top, and down an even steeper hill (25%) before going along a flat route back to my house at the time.

My bike was an out-and-back 30Km-ish route (up the same 20% hill) and cycle out of Aberystwyth for 15 Km, turn around and cycle back (up another 20% hill).

It was tough as I was overweight and unfit, but I was young(er) and determined. I started going to the pool most mornings for a swim, and gradually built up to 750m front crawl. Swimming came easy to me in comparison and remains, to this day, my strongest point.

Race day fast approached fast.

I did pretty well on the swim (which was open water). I came out in the top 10% – it didn’t last. My first ever transition was a disaster; by the time I’d managed to get into my t-shirt for the bike (I didn’t have a trisuite or any of the gear – and even less idea) almost everyone else had managed to get out the sea, changed, and had left transition: there was pretty much just me left still trying to find the whole for my left arm in a now-damp t-shirt.

Suffice to say, I did eventually make it out of transition and off I went on the bike. I remember being fairly strong on the bike by this point, and I made up a few places – I got back to T2 bottom-of-the-middle of the pack. Not stellar, but not bad.

I got an applaud as I left transition in only 30 seconds – much improved on T1. It was signficantly helped by the fact I didn’t have cleats so had no shoe changes to do. I pretty much got off my bike, took off my helmet (I forgot to take off my cycling gloves) and started running. Things were looking up; it didn’t last. During my “training” running had always been my worst discipline: not a surprise given my complete lack of cardiovascular fitness and my excessive weight. I was very slow on the run; I probably would have actually been faster if I’d walked it. By running I burnt out and had to walk slower than if I’d just had a steady-paced walk I think. But, I remained determined to finish – and I did – with a sprint finish and a big smile on my face. I got my finished t-shirt (which I still have, though it no longer fits).

From that point on, I was hooked.

I started to dedicate a lot more effort and time into triathlon during 2013 and completed several sprint Triathlons (Chirk, Ruthin, Mumbles, and several others). I started training regularly with the INTRtri club, and got some of my friends involved too. When I did the Mumbles Triathlon around June 2013, Rosie – my friend – also did the race. I spent a lot of mornings swimming in the sea, and evenings cycling and running. Most weekends involved longer rides with the local bike club or the triathlon club. I natrually started to lose weight, I was now around 16 st.

I decided it was time to move on to a Standard distance; a big step up. For my birthday (July) I got myself a fancy new bike; a £2,000 Carbon Fibre Specialized Tarmac Elite to replace the £300 Halfords Carrera TDF that I’d been using to that point. I won’t bore you with the details, my first Olympic triathlon which was in September 2013 – other than to say it went fine.

I wasn’t chasing medals or speed, I’d started chasing distance. And having finished the Bala Standard distance triathlon, that was the moment I though: I want to do an Ironman.

Pete was the chairman of INTRtri, and also happened to be a Level 3 Triathlon coach. I asked Pete if he would help me get ready to do an Ironman. By this point, my step-father (though I’d always thought of him as my father) had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. I signed up for Ironman Wales in Tenby in 2014 through Macmillan Cancer Support and agreed to raise £2000 for the charity who had been helping my father. For a very small amount of money (~£20 a month) Pete coached me: he would write me a 4-week plan and I’d do my best to follow it, filling in his weekly feedback sheets on how I’d got on. It was a long, hard slog from September 2013 – September 2014 to train for the Ironman, and it took a huge amount of time and effort. But, I made it.