Ely Tri Club has had a busy start to the season with members already taking part in several events.

The club, which sees its members compete in many events of differing disciplines and distances including charity runs, open water swims and adventure races, has seen its membership grow.

After another solid winter of core strength and base fitness training, the last couple of months has seen an increase in the number of events entered as the race season gets underway and already there have been two notable events in which ETC members have taken part.

In May, Graham Chapman (English Middle Distance Champion in 2014 and silver medallist in the British Sprint Champs 2016), and Mike Van Der Merwe represented Great Britain in the ‘ETU Triathlon European Championships’ in Lisbon coming in 4th and 10th respectively in their age group categories.

Graham was given the accolade of Team Captain for the GB Age Group competitors, and said: “ It was a truly awesome experience.”

Their reward for the fantastic results is both have pre-qualified for the 2017 ETU Champs in Kitzbuhel, Austria. True ambassadors for Ely!

Mike was in action again recently in the ‘Ironman 70.3’ in Staffordshire, along with Richard Kay competing in his first ‘Ironman’ branded event.

Mike produced an excellent time of 4:47:23 placing him 4th in the M45-49 age group and 64th of 2331 athletes (including 20 Professionals), with Richard coming in under the six hour mark, a superb time for only his second middle distance race.

Mick Butler completed the Challenge Galway Ironman distance event in just over 16 hours, all of the ‘normal’ distance triathlons have been entered in June.

To round off a busy month of triathlon, the Monster Sprint Tri at Feltwell on June 26, saw Thea, Anna, Rebecca, Lili, Alan, John H, Max, Justin, John B, Doug, Adam, Graham Ross, Sam and Bev take on this familiar local course, with many competing for the first time, producing some excellent results.

But it wasn’t all multi-eventing. Cycling has featured too with four ETC members (John, Ross, Ben and Kyle) joining Ely’s Octagon Cycle Club for the 300 mile challenge in May, helping raise an incredible £12,000+ for ‘Addenbrooke’s Charitable Trust’ and ‘YouCanBikeToo’, and in early June Ross and Doug took part in the second ‘Grand Fondo – Tour of Cambridgeshire’ with 8000 participants filling the closed roads around Peterborough.

With experienced athletes and relative novices coming together for regular training sessions in and around Ely, the atmosphere is relaxed with everyone able to train at their own level while being supported by the clubs fantastic coaches.

Training takes place all week round, on a pay-as-you-go basis or free depending on session.

For more information visit the club website www.elytriclub.co.uk for all the latest news on training sessions, races and links to Tri related information. It’s exciting times for one of the fastest growing sports in the UK, so why not come and see what it’s all about.