With one week left until my running leg of the Hyde Park Triathlon, I visited Bupa's London branch for a fitness assessment. The aim? To find out if I've got the potential to run a sub 20-minute 5K at my current level of fitness and if not, then how

Murchie (who was carrying a knee injury) and went on to post the only sub-hour time of the day. It was here that Kerry Macphee also shook off Emma Lamont to take the lead in the women's race.Racers finished with a flat out-and-back 5K taking them back

'd realised how far off the pace I actually was it was too late (sprint or no). Lessons learnt, I'm still very disappointed and now very sceptical about hitting a sub-20 minute 5K. Although I've had some pretty quick training times, I think I've been a little

Marathon. As you can see from my Garmin stats, the distance is slightly less than 5K. So, as yet, I can't officially boast about running sub 20-minutes.I ran this time at the peak of my physical fitness. It was two weeks before the London Marathon, after

Time to work out a training schedule. The triathlon is now 8 weeks away. That's more than enough time to give me a fighting chance of running a sub 20-minute 5K. I'm booked into the Standard Chartered Great City Race, which takes place 4 weeks

I can't quite believe I'm writing this but there's only one day to go until our sprint relay challenge, the Dextro Energy Triathlon ITU World Championship Series London.We have printed off the event details, my outfit is planned and I have persuaded

The ITU Dextro Energy Hyde Park Triathlon crept up on me. No sooner had I started training than I found myself in the grand stand at Hyde Park watching Helen Jenkins romp home to victory, a few hours before the relay teams would set off.This was my

sprint-distance triathlon in the 2010 season. An intermediate might aim to complete a sub 2:45 Olympic-distance triathlon, and if you're an experienced triathlete you might be aiming to take two minutes off your Ironman PB swim time and, maybe, achieve a

potential in time for your races.For most of us, summer is a reminder of why we took up triathlons in the first place. Coach Dan Bullock (www.swimfortri.com) says, "It's just great to be outside. When the time comes to get away from the chlorine and straight

combination of hand signals and voice to indicate hazards."Going the distanceIf you're planning a long run or bike ride, David Tilbury-Davis, a Level III triathlon coach, recommends that you carry a mobile phone in a waterpoof bag - it won't be much use