S’GRAIL 100 – RACE REVIEW – Sinead Walsh
If you are looking for something a little different for next season, then the S’GRAIL100 could be for you. https://sgrail100.com/
1500M swim – a beautiful sea swim in Med. Event buses left Girona center for Cadaques at 0630 for the start about an hours drive away. We had dropped off bikes the evening before and they were racked and ready for us when we arrived in Cadaques. I rented a bike for the 2 days from https://www.bikerentgirona.com/, (there are loads of rental shops).
88km Gravel ride – a gravel or mountain bike is needed as the terrain is a mix of rough gravel, farm tracks and back roads. As the route wasn’t marked, I did go wrong a few times (my own fault) and had to backtrack, and follow another rider. We had 1200M of climbing on the route, 2 steep climbs in the first 30km, (I did have to walk up a few sections – totally worth the effort as the views were stunning), a river crossing and 2 well stocked aid stations which included donuts and coffee.
10.5km trail run – From T2 we climbed a challenging trail to 320M and the midpoint aid station, followed by a descent into Girona. The finish line buzzed, with loads of goodies, beer and burritos.
While I found it tough (I had 3 hours of gravel biking experience), the event was the most fun day I have had in a triathlon.
Girona is a lovely city, the weather was perfect and everyone was incredibly friendly. There are direct flights from Shannon April to October, and it’s only 20 minutes from the airport into town.
If you are taking on this event, make sure you know how to navigate with a Garmin (I had downloaded the map, but did not switch it on) and use the map they send you (Richard had the 2023 map, and even Jan Frodeno himself made this mistake adding a few extra km’s)
Overall 10/10