Race day at ExCeL London
Dr. Costilla Reyes arrived in London on August 6, 2016, the day before the race, writing that he was very excited to take part. On August 7 he completed the London Triathlon, his first triathlon, covering a 1.5 km swim, 40 km on the bike, and a 10 km run in 3:05:16. The race was based at ExCeL London, where the photographs on this page were taken after the finish, with his race number, 8016, still pinned on and his road bike beside him. The finisher’s medal marked the event’s 20th anniversary.
He described the triathlon as the hardest sport challenge he had completed so far. It came during his PhD at the University of Manchester, in the same summer that the Rio Olympics were under way; he arrived with the hashtag #OlympicSpirit, and eleven days after his own race he congratulated the Brownlee brothers on winning gold and silver for Britain in the Olympic triathlon.
The bike leg
The bike leg was the part he enjoyed most. He wrote that he had never ridden so fast, reaching 45 km/h at one point, and that the course gave him a view of London all the way from ExCeL to Westminster in central London.
From parkrun to three disciplines
The triathlon grew out of the running routine he had built in Manchester. Saturday parkruns had led to 10Ks, trail runs in the Peak District, and his first half-marathon in Oxford in 2015. The London Triathlon brought swimming, cycling, and running together on one start line, and it was a new way to test his training. Running remained his anchor afterward, through marathons in Amsterdam, Hannover, New York, and Philadelphia.