From an exclusive inside view, Natalie shares her first experience of competing in an ETU European Cup last month...

I left you last month on a bit of a cliff hanger... Well, some of you may have already seen via the British Triathlon social media that I had gained a start in my first ever European Cup race which was really exciting!  I wanted to save all the details for this blog and it was my main focus of the month for me, so I hope you enjoy my tale of an Elite International race.

The race was in a place called Melilla which is a small Spanish city on the coast of North Africa which was not the easiest place to travel to. I had to change flights in either Malaga or Madrid then get a small propeller plane for the final leg of the journey.  I travelled out on the Friday and on this second flight there were many athletes from different countries, meaning a lot of bikes to try and squish into not much space! It wasn’t the best moment seeing my bike being driven away from the plane knowing it was not going to arrive with me, but I was not the only one in this position - there were 6 of us who arrived without our bikes. 

Some were Hungarian athletes who were really nice and we eventually sorted it out together - although it turns out not many people in Melilla spoke much English! Anyway, the bikes didn't take long to arrive as they came on the next flight before we had even left the airport, so all was good.

That evening I went for a little jog to loosen my legs after all the travel and ran all the way to the Moroccan border (not that far, it was only about 2.5km as Melilla is not that big).  On the Saturday I worked out the bike route and cycled it. There wasn't an official ride and it was a bit unnerving riding on the right side of the road on my own, but I liked the course which was a flat 5km loop with some tight turns and a small bridge to go over. 

I also got to go for a swim and test out the course, which was a hard one with roughly a 70m run and dolphin dive before the water was deep enough to swim. Then it was a case of swimming two 750m loops and exiting with the same dolphin dive and run technique which is really tiring!

The Saturday evening brought registration and race briefing - it was great to see someone who I recognised and this was John Petrides who was actually the technical director of the race and took the briefing. This was brilliant as he was really clear and it was easy to understand everything that would be happening (I normally ask John loads of questions when racing back in the UK, but only had a couple this time!). The briefing made the nerves really start to kick in, up until then I had been feeling lots of excitement but now it was certainly a mixture asit was getting very close. 

One thing that did make me nervous was the thought of being lapped on the bike which was 8 of the 5km loops, I knew if I was in a pack I would be fine but still felt worried.

After an excellent nights sleep (which is surprising as many of you may know it's not always easy to sleep the night before a race) I had a long wait until race start at 3pm and spent the day in the hotel room watching the Juniors through the window, checking my kit, eating, keeping hydrated and trying to relax as much as possible.  Then from 1.30 it was check in, pick up swim hat and timing chip, tattoo and kit check (having a photo taken of your trisuit to make sure it followed all of the ITU rules), transition check in, swim warm up then race line up and start. This all seemed to pass really quickly and is a bit of a blur but I do remember feeling more excitement than I did nerves when waiting to be called up to the start line. 

As a lower ranked athlete I was number 22 going into the race, meaning I was one of the last athletes called up to the start. Therefore I didn't have much choice of where to stand and found a random free spot in the middle of the bunch. I would have really preferred to be on the outside. 

The start went really well and having seen some photos I was right up near the front of the field, but started swimming a bit earlier than the others so I lost a few places (lesson leant - it's faster to run and dolphin than to swim). After rounding the buoy for the second lap I think I went slightly wide and perhaps tired a bit, so was dropped from this main bunch arriving in transition towards the back of the field.  Transition was a long 500m run up the beach, up some steps, across a road and round behind a building, I felt exhausted and like my legs did not want to work during this run and I nearly slipped over too which didn't help. 

My race position wasn't going to change much from here as I had missed the packs on the bike, meaning a long 40km of cycling on my own.  I knew from this that the risk of being lapped on the flat but technical course was very high - as cyclists in a group travel faster than a single cyclist - and could see the front pack catching on every lap.  If you are lapped on the bike then you are out of the race and this was looking like it could well happen, but somehow I managed to pull a gutsy and determined performance out of the bag to get round the bike course and onto the final discipline, the 10km run. 

By this time my legs were pretty shot from the bike effort but I just tried to remain relaxed and worked as hard as I could even if it was a slow run. I had finished the race and not just that - finished a European cup race in 19th place. Yes it was a small field, and yes I was at the bottom of the field, but I am very happy with my performance in such a high level of racing and most importantly I have learnt about what my weaknesses are and can now build on this for future races. 

Even though I thought the swim was a strong discipline for me, at this level of competition everyone is good at swimming, so I need to work more on my swimming in open water as well as focussing on my transitions - particularly T1!

It was such a great atmosphere with great spectator support and even the French coach was cheering me which was really nice.  It was nice to chill out after the race with a nice big ice cream and watch the men's race where Brits Gordon Benson, Beau Smith and Elliot Smales were racing - a great race to watch and even better that Gordon went on to win.

This race was a huge highlight of my Triathlon journey so far and I may not be the best at this level at the moment, but I had fun and want to keep working hard and improving to be the best I possibly can be. This should be the same for everyone. Triathlon is your personal journey, we all have our own individual goals and challenges whatever they may be so dream big, work hard and achieve your goals, but most of all have fun doing it.

Natalie's next blog post will be on Wednesday 3 June. Read her previous post here.