At 00:01 on 1st February 2021, the members of Bayside Tri began a unique journey.

Setting off from the spiritual home of the club, Bayside Cabin, the aim was to collaboratively rack up the virtual miles in any way possible and make up the distance of 10567.4 miles/17006km to reach another Bayside - Bayside Triathlon Club in Melbourne, Australia!

Our namesake Bayside Triathlon Club down under has been part of the Melbourne triathlon scene for almost 30 years and has a similar ethos to our own - Commitment, Community and Friendship.

With just 4 weeks to achieve our goal, success was dependent on as many people as possible taking part - no teams competing against each other for this challenge, just one big collabrative effort. Club members had to make every mile count, and count every mile. It very soon became apparent who the dog-owners were, all adding all their miles of dog walking to the cause. At work, walking laps of the playground whilst on break duty contributed a couple more km's here and there. 

Many of us assumed there would be no swimming involved with pools closed, but several hardy sea swimmers braved the arctic temperatures to add to the running total.  With all of that and the main mileage-makers of bike and run, we were soon well underway.

During the challenge we were asked to post selfies of ourselves in our Bayside kit whilst clocking up the kms, which added to the sense of cameraderie and meant we got to see all the friendly faces we were missing due to being in lockdown.

Submitting details of individuals' swim, bike, run and walk totals at the end of each week gave us a good idea of our progress. As the weeks rolled by we pressed on and by the end of Week 3 we were well on target approaching the West Coast of Australia. As the 4th week drew to a close at 23:59 on 28th February we had reached a total of 12135.28 miles/19529.79km - otherwise known as "Smashing it!" 

Job done.

With many cries of "Are we there yet?" and somewhat repetitive jokes about "firing up the barbie" along the way, the club once again created an opportunity for its members to keep in touch, pull together for a common aim and keep the spirit of Bayside alive and kicking during a time when we are missing the ability to meet up and train together in person. 

The only thing is, we're all daydreaming about making the trip for real now...!