Nearing the end of the cycle stage of my first standard/Olympic distance Triathlon on Orkney.

Such a fantastic welcome, for attending the best organised event I've ever taken part in. Just to add emphasis to that, I'm recalling and uploading this with fond memories some twenty-five years after the event. We were spoilt rotten. Best T-shirt too - of far too many amassed that year, several of which are still kicking about - and they also kindly sent everyone a photo from the event.

Swimming section was 60 lengths of a 25 metre indoor pool, followed by a 40 km (25 mile) cycle, and then a 10 km run. As said at the start, the first time I'd done a triathlon of this distance, with several previous ones all being "Sprint" events, where the distances where about half for each of the stages.

The reason we, a friend Neil and myself, had chosen to go to the event, was to use it as training for the bigger Highland Cross charity event we'd both being taking part in about three weeks later. We'd originally been planning to do a ten mile road running race, but when we heard the Orkney Triathlon was on the same date, we considered it would be a better endurance build-up.

So many wee things and laughs from that day, that I may add more much later. My biggest fear was perhaps surprisingly not doing twice the distance of any previous event, in my first Triathlon of the year, but the state I'd be in after the ferry crossing of the notorious Pentland Firth. It was smooth... for the Pentland Firth.

Was told off for smiling/laughing when the photo was taken, my usual reaction to having a camera pointed at me... when there's no escape. The criticism was always along the lines of, "you couldn't have been trying hard enough if you could smile!" Quite so. I've never taken any of these things too seriously, not being of the greatly competitive types. Neil was 8th, and I was 14th, out of 33 participants. Neil had done loads of events over this distance, several being open water events, and at least one half-Ironman (much bigger) event as well.

Thank you to everyone in Orkney. It took me twenty years to finally visit, even if it was just for some of the day's daylight hours, but I will (and did) return again for a longer visit.